Picnics and walks

We've had some awesome weather so far this Summer.  Perfect for lunchtime garden picnics!  Picnics have the added benefit of not having to clean the highchair and kitchen floor. Al fresco dining and no clearing up means everyone is happy!
When Rowan woke up from his nap, I gathered a selection of lunchtime nibbles (he loves having a selection of different items to chose from, although cheese cubes and raisins always disappear first!).  I have to be quick now as he can undo the child-lock on the fridge.  By the time I'd plated up our lunch he had already helped himself to a cheese and onion roll:

Serious business, this eating

We sat on the grass under our umbrella and enjoyed a platter of sandwiches, cheese, apple, tomato and pineapple.  Once the initial hunger was abated, Rowan then ran off to play in the garden, returning every now and then to take a bite of what he fancied

Buttons the Cow was invited to join us

Tangent wasn't invited

We had a fairly busy day, with walking Tangent in the morning, the picnic at lunch and meeting up with a friend and her toddler at the local park in the afternoon.  By bedtime Rowan was definitely ready for sleep, but insisted on his story.  He's really taken to books lately which is a relief as both Gareth and I get such enjoyment from reading, we really wanted to share this with Rowan. This evening I thought I should bypass his story as he seemed so tired.  Half an hour after leaving his room Rowan started crying.  When I went to his room to investigate he was sat on his bed and said 'book' pointing at his book shelf. Of course, I was happy to read him his story, and quite pleased that his bedtime story has become such an important part of his routine.  I'm sure his grandparents will recall trying to read him a soothing story whilst he darted up and down his cot, seemingly uninterested!  

Walking the dog. Sometimes he even shares the ball with Tangent

Poor old Tangent

Tangent has had it a bit rough lately.  Rowan has progressed from being an immobile lump of interesting smells, to a highly mobile, loud, grabby whirlwind in a relatively short amount of time.

Rowan was about a month old here, and the novelty of new

baby smells had Tangent obsessed!

Tangent still feeling the love with Rowan at 5 months old.

Rowan was getting more accurate with his grabbing, and 

showing an interest in dogs.

Tangent looking a little depressed not long after

Rowan learnt to walk.  There is no sanctuary.

 A resigned expression as Rowan continues to

haunt his days.  We started using the child-gate

to the kitchen more to give Tangent a break by this

point.

Escaping to the garden for a break whilst Rowan naps

 

It's not all fur-pulling and eye-poking!  Life isn't completely over when you're usurped by a toddler.

Good bye baby bed!

 Over the past month or so, Rowan has been working on climbing out of his cot.  He can get one leg on top of the bars, and can hop with his other leg.  It was only a matter of time before he figured it out, and Gareth and I didn't want him to fall over the bars and hurt himself.  So we decided to take the bars off his cot.  Rowan is not quite 18 months, so it seemed a bit early, but his aptitude for climbing indicated the time was now.

 We took the bars off Rowan's cot last night. It probably wasn't the best timing as we were in the middle of decorating that day, and I hadn't seen him at all the day before due to my work's company meeting*. However, since my Mother-in-Law was staying to help babysit we figured 3 adults around over the night would be good if things went bad.  Anyway... we got Rowan through his bath and PJs routine as usual and took him to his room and showed him his 'new bed.' We started reading him his story and he was running all over his room, on and off his bed and I thought he's so hyper now, we're screwed.

 Does this look like a child ready to sleep?

 Story over, we said good night, popped him on the bed and left. I shut the child-gate over, but left the door open because we have crap doors and a gnat's fart can open them anyway. He was in hysterics for 20 minutes, crying so hard and retching I thought he was going to be sick. I went back up, gave him a hug and reassurance. I picked up another story book and started reading it with him since he was so worked up the 'silent return' method wasn't going to work (he was acting afraid to even sit on his bed at this point). I changed tact and instead of talking about his 'new bed' I told him it was exactly the same bed - same blankets, same mattress, but that he didn't have the bars anymore. After repeating this (and reading the story about 6 times) I left the room again and he tried following me out and he was breaking his heart screaming after me (I have to say, at this point my heart wasn't doing too great either). He went quiet briefly then started crying again This time Gareth went up and lay on the floor in silence with Rowan lying on his bed. Rowan was clearly exhausted and trying to sleep but still woke up when Gareth eventually left his room. Gareth propped our trusty heavy books against the door (these have proven golden on windy days when his door would just blow open!) and left. Rowan cried for about 10-15 minutes then went to sleep. This must have taken about an hour and a half from start to finish.
Before going bed myself, I sneaked into his room to lay a doubled over quilt along the floor by his bed, in case he fell out, and he was fast asleep on his bed; not the floor where I expected he'd be! He slept right through the night, and didn't wake up till 7am.

If I could re-do it, I would have converted his bed during the day so we could play in his room and get him used to it (not just before he went bed!), tell him it was the same bed just no bars instead of freaking him out by telling him it was completely new, and keep his door closed as we always did when he was in his cot.
Today for his nap he cried for less than 5 minutes before climbing into bed, then slept for 3 hours! And tonight he stayed in his bed whilst I read him his story, looked upset when I started to leave his room but he stayed in bed and didn't cry.

Fingers crossed this is it!

 Hopefully we'll see more happy bedtime scenes like this one!

*Part of the day's activities was rock climbing. I was hoping I'd get allocated climbing, not because the other activities were rubbish (they kinda were though) but because I'd never been climbing before and thought it would be something I'd enjoy.  I volunteered to do the challenging climb as the easier ones had already been snapped up. Turns out I have an aptitude for climbing!  I know that makes me sound arrogant, but the instructor indicated I was good at it too (along with another woman there) and that we may be interested in doing a course in rock climbing.  I definitely would be interested, but I think climbing is prohibitively expensive, so I'm not sure how likely it is that I could take it up as a hobby.  Plus, I don't have an abundance of spare time right now.

Sewing shirts

Gareth had a wardrobe clear out recently and gave me one of his old shirts to cut up for sewing practise.  Since I liked the original shirt's design, I decided to just make a mini version for Rowan.  I thought it would give me practise with pattern matching the tribal design on the front, and generally be a good way to have a go at making shirts, which can be difficult, without ruining some expensive new material.  I used the shirt pattern from Small Dream Factory - you should really check out her site, she has some brilliant free tutorials on making baby and toddler clothes.  I particularly like that she uses lots of diagrams, so you can really follow what's going on.  Being new to sewing, I've found with some online guides I don't always understand what the text is describing, so having lots of pictures is brilliant!

The material I used was really shiny and slippery, so it made it very awkward to sew with. I also made some really basic errors (like sewing the sleeve on the outside of the shirt, so all the seams showed. Rookie mistake!) and making an utter mess of the collar.

This was the first time I'd made button holes and I they came out

ok.  They weren't quite as in line as I'd hoped, hence the slight 

puckering, but overall I was happy.

I was pleased with my pattern matching!

It took me awhile to complete this one, due to various 

time constraints, so Rowan had already started to 

outgrow it. I squeezed him into the shirt to take these photos.

Having now made one toddler shirt, I felt confident to go and buy some new material to make another.  Since it is Summer, I picked out the loudest material I could find (and busy patterns hide a multitude of sins). I showed what I bought when I got home, and I think the brightness temporarily blinded him.  

I made one size bigger, but I still think I should have added an inch or two to the length - Rowan is very long for his age.

This time, I sewed the sleeves on the right way around, and the collar looked pretty good!  I wouldn't be afraid to make another shirt at some point.

Rowan reluctantly posing.  I took the buckets he

was playing with to take the photo, and he wasn't 

happy about it.

Still thinking about buckets...

Finally, access to buckets after indulging his mum!

Self-promotion

I completely forgot to add a link here to the article I wrote for Bristol Post months ago, so here it is now:

Knitting up a storm

I had originally submitted it to a knitting magazine, but it wasn't quite what they were looking for.  I'm sure I'll get used to rejections if I find the time to write and submit more regularly (and hopefully acceptances!).  I am still waiting for an accepted feature to be published, and as soon as I have the issue details I'll post them here.

Going to the park

I often take Rowan to a local park when we walk back from our fruit and veg shop.  When he's first released from his pram, he looks a little unsure of all the park equipment, and spends some time people watching before dashing off toward the roundabout (his favourite!)  His interest in the park is increasing as he's getting older - when Gareth and I first took him there he looked like he was going to burst into tears, and wasn't happy until he was sat in an open green space playing with leaves.

It's not just our local park he's unimpressed with.  I recently took him to different one and he remained nonplussed.

I took Rowan to the park to go on all the equipment.

That's him in the distance.

Rowan is beginning to come round to the joys of parks.

He is proving to be a bit of an adrenalin junky and insists

on going down the slide face first.

Hobbies

Every time my parents visit us, Rowan immediately absconds with my mum's walking stick.  He enjoys tapping it on the floor, and waving it threateningly at Tangent.  Sometimes contact is made, but Tangent is learning to be quicker.
This is all lovely and innocent when my mum doesn't actually need the stick to be mobile.  Unfortunately, when she does need to get about, Rowan is reluctant to relent the stick.  A compromise was made on a recent visit, and Rowan generously swapped his hobby horse for his nanny's stick:

My mum relaxing with a sippy cup of milk whilst

Rowan terrorises the household*

This may become quite problematic, since Rowan can't distinguish a walking stick from a toy.  On a recent trip to the doctors, the waiting room was filled with elderly people.  It was hard work distracting him from all those walking sticks.  I am expecting him to swipe a stick right out from under someone one day soon.  I may ensure I am a good distance ahead, and tut at the growing delinquency of today's youth.

*We are currently decorating (The. Whole. House. Sigh) so all those patches on the wall in my photo's are poly filler.  For some reason the camera flash makes them really stand out.