Eliza bike riding

This week Eliza and Daniel wanted to do a bit of bike riding. She has grown a lot since the last time she went riding. This time I found that she can easily reach the pedals so encouraged her to try riding on her own. She started to push with her feet and mainly went backwards but she did keep trying and rode on her own for a little bit. She also found that she can put her feet the ground and walk the bike around. She still needs to work on steering too but that will come. I am looking forward to her growing in confidence and skill with riding to head out with her and Daniel.

Chatter

Alexander is becoming a bit of a chatter box at times. I do enjoy listening to him talk.

 

First Solids

Now that Alexander is 5 months old we have started him on solids. On Saturday 22nd October 2016 after Alexander had his morning feed we then popped him into his high chair and made a teaspoon of rice cereal. The seat filler that mum and Dad found in IKEA is fantastic! It really helps him sit up properly. He was pretty happy to be starting solids. 

He did well with opening his mouth when the spoon came towards him but he wasn't too happy with the first mouthful. I love the faces that he pulled with having his first mouthfuls. 

First spoonful

Not too sure

Helping bring my hands to his mouth

A bit happier to be eating

You gave me what?

Scrunch up the nose

Still helping eat

Blah

On the whole he did well. He does have a fair bit of a tongue thrust but eventually the rice cereal went down after scraping it off his face and then putting it in his mouth repeatedly. Here is a video of him eating.

While there were a lot of funny faces he did continue to open his mouth and he did eat it all.

It has now been a week and he is doing a lot better with eating. The tongue thrust has decreased a lot. He is now eating a tablespoon of rice cereal twice a day. He enjoys sitting in the high chair and eating with us breakfast.

 

Daniel's first ice-creamery

I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream!

Before we headed to Hervey Bay James and I decided that we'd take Daniel out one day for an adventure to the icecreamery. James and I often like to sneak out to this place as it has so many options and is just so yummy! Daniel has had ice cream with mum and dad before but it was just vanilla. I wanted us to be the ones to take him to

Choose any ice cream for the first time. 

One afternoon after rest time we asked Julie if she could look after Eliza. James, Daniel, Alexander and I hopped into the car and headed to the esplanade. On the way we told Daniel that we were going to get an icecream and he was so very excited! He clapped his hands and had a massive grin on his face and said 'yay I like icecream'. 

When we arrived we told him that he could choose any flavour that he wanted (although James didn't want him to get bubble gum). Daniel was so excited to look at all the different colours (and flavours). He saw a 'brown bumpy one' and said he wanted that. James then took him to look at the other options but it kept coming back to the 'brown bumpy one'. Daniel had chosen chocolate mousse. 

He kept saying 'chocolate mousse for greedy goose' like the title of one of his books. I think that gave him more incentive to have that flavour. We ordered a kids cone of chocolate mousse and then James and I ordered some icecream for us and then we walked over to the park. We were going to sit on the beach to eat it but it was a very windy day so we stayed in the park. 

Daniel loved his icecream. He started with licking the drips that kept falling down and then he enjoyed crunching through the coke and eating all of it. 

 

The result - chocolate everywhere and a very happy boy. 

It was lots of fun sneaking off for icecream with him. Looking forward to doing it again in future trips.

Alexander's first trip to Hervey Bay

Last week we headed to Hervey Bay again to have Alexander meet more of his family, and to have a little break. We flew up on Wednesday and each of the kids were awesome with the flight. Alexander fed for a bit then slept for half the flight and then happily sat on my lap. Daniel and Eliza enjoyed drawing and writing in their magazines. They did really well and James and I were impressed.

Once in Hervey Bay we met Boompa at the airport then headed back to their place for lunch and a play. After a bit of a rest time (where Daniel and Eliza just played) Jenny, Maddie and Aly came around for a play. The kids had a great time on the scooters! Daniel and Maddie played really well together today and had a lot of fun.

I was amazed by how well Daniel went on a 2 wheeled scooter when he hasn't really ridden a scooter before. Makes me keen to get him a scooter at some point.

By night the kids were so tired that they went down pretty well. We put Eliza to bed first and she fell asleep pretty quickly with James lying next to her. Daniel then went to sleep pretty quickly too. I followed suit soon after.

In the morning Alexander woke at 4:30am and that was the start of his day. Good old Queensland without daylight savings. Ha. It was ok though. It was nice sitting with Alexander and then we headed into Daniel and Eliza when they woke around 6am.

I thought I'd try Alexander sitting on the bed. I haven't really tried him sitting before so expected him to just flop down straight away. Surprisingly he sat for a short time before flopping. He doesn't balance at all but he can sit if you prop him up well with his legs in the right position.

 Daniel and Eliza helped Nana J take Charlie to the dog cleaners 

and to the park while James and I took Alexander to meet Grannie Jean. It was a lovely time just chatting with her, Alexander having happy cuddles with her. She was pretty tired but doing well and I'm glad that she got to just spend some time with Alexander without Eliza and Daniel around.

Alexander enjoyed playing on the back deck like Daniel and Eliza have done in the past. He had really grown in holding his toys and he especially enjoys playing with his rings.

He is also being very chatty - finding his voice during this trip.

 
It was lovely to have the cousins playing together and for Jenny to spend some more time with Alexander. Although each time she cuddled him she then had others who wanted to join in the fun :-)

We were able to head around to see Auntie Wendy and Uncle Geoff which was a lovely time. Auntie Wendy enjoyed having cuddles with Alexander and Uncle Geoff entertained Daniel and Eliza and they enjoyed playing with the toys. It is so lovely to see all the family when we head to Hervey Bay.

James and I decided before we headed to Hervey Bay that this trip we would take Daniel for his first experience of an Ice creamery. I will write a separate post about it but it was a lovely time. He was so excited and so happy to have some ice cream (as was I. Haha)

We also took the kids to the beach for a play on the sand (which ended up being a bit in the water too). I was Alexander's first time at the beach and first time feeling sand. He didn't mind it too much (until he became too tired). I love little feet in the sand.

Not happy to be trapped in the ergo at the beach

Happy boy to be out of the ergo at the beach

I put his feet out of his onesie so he could feel the sand

He quite enjoyed the feel

Daniel and Eliza had a blast making sandcastles and getting water for their buckets. Eliza kept running up to me saying 'Water went on my feet!' She also loved getting her hands so sandy. Daniel liked going into the water to fill his bucket (even though he was dressed and the water was quite cold). He got so wet! Luckily I had a change of clothes for him and Eliza in the nappy bag.

We headed to the shops to buy a couple of things while we were in Hervey Bay and I have found that James is a shocker when it comes to kids clothes. So many things we passed James wanted to get for the kids saying 'But they need it.' He did win me over with his outfit for Eliza.

On Saturday everyone was coming around for lunch and it was a lovely time. The kids enjoyed having the kids table to sit at.

 

Cousins all together

Alexander met Pat and Norma and they kept commenting on his eyes being so blue like the other kids eyes.

Alexander also got to meet Uncle Ryan. Aly wanted to stay with her daddy but Uncle James tried to distract her for a little bit.

We also got to have the 4 generations photo with Grannie Jean.

Sunday morning we headed to Enzo's for breakfast with Nana J and Boompa. It was really nice sitting next to the beach in the sun and the food was so tasty!

The flight home was good. We had a moment of worry when it took a long time to get through the security check but fortunately there were a lot of people in the same situation. We also worried when we saw that the seats weren't what we booked. There were 3 seats on one side and 1 seat on the other side instead of 2 and 2. James sat between the kids and they had their lunch for take off. After eating his lunch Daniel fell asleep (which is a sign of how tired he was after this holiday) which made it easier as James only needed to look after Eliza then.

Alexander was a champ and slept for the whole flight home. 

We are looking forward to heading back after Christmas. They are long days with the kids not having naps but they settle quickly at night which is good.