Good News

For those of you that know my dad, will also know that he has had his business up for sale. He OFFICIALLY sold it a couple of weeks ago! That is a welcomed relief for both my dad and my mum. He will stay on for another 12 months but this time he is the employee and not the employer. Mum will retire so she should be able to put her feet up a bit more.

Dad has a pretty sweet deal with the new owner in terms of his working hours. After his heart attack last year (it is almost 1 year ago!), he needed to slow down and take care of himself.


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Oliver's Spending Money

I completely forgot that Oliver got some money for his birthday and Christmas. I had put it away in my other bag for safe keeping!! LOL

Anyway, we went out today and he finally got his 'Thomas Bridge' and there was enough money left over to buy 3 trains. I don't think that there are too many trains he hasn't got.

Here he is with his cheeky grin! Yes, he just had to be in the photo too!


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Howletts Zoo

It was an overcast day but as our friends from Germany are visiting, we wanted to do something together. We were going to go to Legoland but left buying the tickets online too late. It was waaaay too expensive to buy tickets at the gate so we went to Howletts instead. The kids love animals.

The photo doesn't really show just how BIG this elephant really is! They are beautiful animals.


Here are the Black Rhino's. There are actually 3 of them with one just to the right - out of view.

We actually went at the right time because is was 'feeding time at the zoo!' Here is one of the tigers with his/her (I cannot tell!) bag of goodies but the one on the right that is jumping up was the one to get stuck into the other bag.

I didn't get to take photos of the gorilla's. They were funny when their food was dropped from the top of their massive cage. Some had climbed to the top to be the first to get the carrots and lettuce but the other ran around on the ground picking up the food and hoarding them in their arms. They would then go and find a quiet place to sit and munch away.


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Artist In Training

Today was painting day! I bought Oliver these new tubes of paint (so much easier than using a brush!) and after priming them ready for him to use, off he went!

Do you like how he is sitting on his chair? He carries this chair all over the house - especially in the kitchen so he can see what I am doing!

This is his second painting and he clearly likes the colour red! I managed to get the purple in his hand but he is distracted by the television in the shot. He does love to paint.


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Do It Yourself Icing

Our local super market sell these un-iced ginger bread man cookies and while walking up and down the isles the other week, I cam across these little tubes of icing already to go! I thought it would be a good idea (and funny!) to get Oliver to ice his own cookie.

He loved it! He needed a little help in squeezing the tubes though!

You may notice he is in different clothing! - I took him up to have a bath!

He thoroughly enjoyed his self-iced cookie! I think these ones are just the right size for him to eat too. The other ones we get are bigger and only a few times has he not been able to finish it.


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Snow Time - 1st Post

This is what we woke up to this morning - SNOW! And lots of it too.


Here is Oliver getting ready to go for a walk in the snow and throw snow balls at daddy !! LOL

This will show you just how much snow we had in one night !! OMG. This doesn't happen very often, especially in the London area and especially in APRIL !!!

He is throwing snow at the garage door. Bless him !! He couldn't really throw properly so it was funny to watch.


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Snow Time - 2nd Post

We decided to walk down to the shops to get food for dinner.



Rob was shaking the trees as Oliver walked under them but this one got Rob more than Oliver ! LOL

Another shot of Oliver in the snow.


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Party Boy

Doesn't he look smart !!

One of the boys Oliver used tos wim with is having a party today with a bouncy castle. The past few days have been lovely weather but today is going to be cold with snow predicted over night.


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I've got a Mouse !

Rob got a new mouse for Oliver to use while playing his games. It is the perfect size for his hands.

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Computer Game

Rob bought Oliver some computer games (his first ones) as he likes to sit on Rob's lap and watch Rob play his game (Lord of the Rings).

It is called "Piglet's BIG Game" and Oliver loves it. Rob showed him how to use the mouse and that the arrow needed to be white before he could click on the item......he picked that up in no time !! Our mouse is a little too big for his hand so we are going to look for a smaller one just for Oliver to use.

Ok, so the game is really good for kids. You travel with Piglet through the Hundred Acre Wood collecting items Rabbit needs to make his Very Large Soup, visiting all the other characters along the way as they each have something to add to the soup.

Here he is concentrating !! LOL Isn't he cute !!

Rob bought 3 games in total but the other ones wouldn't load on the pc so we are trying to sort those out.

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Breakfast Time

It is scrambled eggs !! Another new thing he is eating. We had tried him on eggs before but he refused to eat them. Now that he has his spiderman stamp for his toast (it is a plastic stamp which you press down on the fresh bread and then toast it) he is always asking for toast !!

Oliver is now willing to try new things now. Before he just refused. Whoo hoo !!

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English Oliver

I just had to post this photo of Oliver. This is first thing in the morning and it is a little on the brrrrr side and I didn't want Oliver to get cold feet so I asked him to put some socks on. This is what he did. What makes it look even funnier is that he has summer pj's on with his socks pulled up - very 'English'.

Look At This

Here is the proof. Can you tell by my posts that I am excited and happy that Oliver is finally eating properly.

We told him that Brocolli will give him muscles and make him strong. Carrots are good for his eyes but he is not really wanting to eat the corn (only a mouthful, maybe two) AND can you see the chicken dippers cut up on his plate ?? Yes, he loves to eat them too now.

In action shot.

"Yay, I finished my dinner and look at what I get to eat now!! "

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Another Small Victory

I don't have any photos of Oliver eating today but this morning he ate scrambles eggs on toast and while the other night he didn't want to try the chicken nuggets, he ate two of them for dinner tonight. There has to be tomato sauce on his plate but who cares, as long as he is trying new things - we are happy. Whoo Hoo !!!!!


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Fun Fair

I wanted to show you what Oliver and his dad put together. This is what Oliver got for Christmas.

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Coffee Please

Rob (or should I say Oliver!) bought me a coffee machine for Christmas even though I drink more tea than coffee. Oliver likes to make our coffee for us. He sits on the bench and puts the milk in the machine and then pushes the lever across to fill the cup. He then takes out the milk and replaces it with the coffee and does the same thing. It is so funny to watch him do it. I should video it and let you see him in action. LOL

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Unofficially - I've done it !

Yes, I went to another of my exercise classes last night and got on the scales to see my progress and since Monday's weigh in, I've 2 1/2 pounds !! That means, I've now lost just over 2 stone in total !! YIPPPPEEEEE !!!
Unfortunately, because Easter Monday is a public holiday, there is no exercise class or weigh in so I will have to wait another week before I get my 2 stone certificate. Boo hoo.

Little Steps.......

OMG!!! Olive is eating vegetables. Yes, we have decided to take drastic actions - not really but we are taking a different approach to get Oliver to eat like a 3 year old should eat.

So far so good. Even though Rob is putting the food in his mouth, he is eating it and not saying 'no'.

We spoke to our health visitor about his eating as he is not getting enough vitamins and goodness in what he is eating. She suggested the different approach and that she would like to weigh him to see where he is on the scale of things. If he was underweight, she would refer us to a nutritionist. He is not under-weight by any means so I am not concerned there. But it would be nice to go out and order something from the menu for Oliver instead of hoping he might eat chips or garlic bread. We went our for a curry a few weeks back and Oliver loved eating poppadoms, but that is all he ate. He refused to try anything and I think we gave in too easily. We have always not given him anything else to eat if he doesn't eat his food but there was always milk for him to fill up on !! Now he is not having milk at night but he is filling up on flavoured milk during the day !! Oh, what to do !! LOL He has been to bed 3 nights without eating his dinner so he has been very hungry when he wakes up in the morning. After 3 days, the picture above is what happened. Little steps.

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Look at me Mummy !

This is Oliver's inventive way of taking his track out of his box, piece by piece. That is until he got bored of it !! LOL You can see the track he has already put together and his trains. How he loves his Thomas The Tank Engine set.

Here he is in action (sorry it is blurry). You can just make out the track between his toes - yes, it is between his toes !! LOL

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Scalextric Boys !

I tried to post this on Sunday but an error kept coming up so I thought I'd wait a couple of days and try again.

So here we are. Oliver is looking on while Rob is putting the track together. Rob bought this track (for Oliver!!) when I was pregnant and before we even knew that we were having a boy !! He used to have a set when he was young so I think he is re-living his childhood. LOL He had to test it out as soon as we bought it and then our friend's bought a set so with the two sets combined it made for a mighty track which the two boys (um, men) had a ball with.

Now that Oliver is old enough, this is the first time that the two of them have played together and Oliver got the hang of it really quickly.

Oliver wanted to pose for the camera so while Rob was finishing off putting the accessories on the track, Oliver sat in the middle - "strike a pose".
Here is Oliver in action. He loves his 'yellow' BMW Mini. There is a red Mini too but he only wants to use the yellow one.

He actually has the control upside down with the lever on top and he is using his thumb to make the car go.

He gets all excited and starts shouting 'Look at my car go'.

I think we have a winner here!! LOL