Babble turning into words

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At around 5 this evening, C's mum passed by with one of Téo and Lukan's cousins, N, whose family moved to the village today. N (who had been with her grandparents all day) wanted to see her new house. Would we like to come to?

So off we all trooped, on a 5 minute kid-paced stroll to the new house, stopping along the way for Téo and N to splash in a fountain. C's mum, Téo and I had a snoop around the house, and N proudly showed off her new room. Then we left C's brother and his wife to finish unloading stuff from the car, and went to C's parents' house I as needed to steal some of their collected rainwater for the fly-eating plants. Téo swung with N and her brother M on a swing hung on a big walnut tree, picked raspberries with N, and kicked a ball around with M. Lukan pointed at cows and somehow wasn't hit by the ball.

And then it was getting towards dinner time so we said goodbye and meandered home.

This is exactly the life I wanted for my kids.

(If only all of you were here too!)

It's really hot here

Good thing there's a beach just 20 min away!

One year

From this:

To this:
Happy first birthday my beautiful boy!

(I'll load more photos from his party to flickr when I get the chance...)

(Oh, and photos from Scotland are now there - some stolen from Bronnie and Marcus)

The fly killers

When we were in Scotland, Téo watched my friend Bronwyn gently shoo a fly outside. In our house we squash them he said solemnly.

And squash them we certainly do. Multiple times a day. Every day since we moved to the fly-infested countryside.

C's prefered method is to whack them with a tea towel, but I've gone for the the barehanded method. I stalk them from behind, bringing my hand slowly closer and closer, then whack, I trap them, pick them up, and squash them in the bin to make absolutely sure they're dead.

At first Téo would bounce around excitedly, scaring the fly away. But now he knows to stay still. He freezes and stage whispers There's a fly mummy! Kill it!

His excitement increased after I bought these on Saturday:

Fly-eating plants!!!

We all probably enjoyed a bit too much trapping a fly, then releasing it in the Venus Fly Trap and watching the "jaws" snap shut.

It would be nice to think these plants will solve our fly problem - squashing flies is certainly effective, but it gets a bit depressing to kill five of them first thing in the morning before I've even had a cup of tea.

But I'm not that naive. I know the plants are ornamental and that we need a better solution. I actually bought some fly paper last week, but I don't know where to put it. I don't really want to watch stuck flies struggling while I'm cooking or eating. And I refuse to go the chemical route.

So for the moment we'll stick to squashing and feeding our plants... and take heart in knowing that summer is ending and so the flies will soon be gone. For a few months at least.

I can't wait to hear why he hasn't done his homework

Yesterday Téo went with J, the au pair, to pick blackberries for dessert.

- This one is too small to take home.

Pop, into his mouth it went.

- This one isn't ripe enough.

- This one is too big for Lukan.

- This one is broken.

And so on.

No blackberries made it home for dessert.

Just like their mum

When I was at preschool, I didn't like singing. So I would put my hand over my mouth to hide the fact that I wasn't singing. I never understood how the teachers could tell.

When Téo wants to do something he knows he shouldn't, he says don't look at me mummy. So I don't look, but I tell him not to do what ever it is I know he's about to do. And every time he says, kind of surprised, but you can't see me.

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My mum tells me that when I was about one, I suddenly refused to eat anything. She eventually realised I wanted to feed myself, so she handed over the spoon.

Last week Lukan suddenly refused to eat. I wondered if maybe he wanted to feed himself. He did.