Christmas 08

click for Sophie singing

Christmas parades and Rock parties

Enjoying her pool in the hot sun

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Sophie has has a busy past couple of weeks - We took her to the local Birkenhead Christmas parade last weekend (which she hated...) - the fire engines and trucks all decided to crank their sirens and horns all at the same time and frightened the be-jeezers out of her!...and the weekend gone we all headed over to Devonport for the annual Rock Christmas party, which Sophie LOVED! (I guess anywhere with food all laid out on a table is exciting for kids!) She did make lots of new friends and even befriended one of the caterers - Sophie latched on to her and talked her ear off all afternoon. We were all laughing at how much the Rock Xmas parties have changed over the past few years...I can remember a time there was nothing but drunken debauchery and carnage - but these days there are lollie scrambles for the kids, a civilised barbecue with caterers and the whole things over by 6pm!

Ingrid has been home with Soph the last couple of days because Kids Klub wrapped up last week - the both of them have been having a ball together and Sophie is really looking forward to seeing her relies in a couple of days...I've got a sneaky feeling she knows she's gonna get spoilt rotten by everyone too!

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Sophie's new friend...one of the catering staff at The Rock party...

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Chilling out at The Rock shindig
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Mummy and Sophie at the Christmas parade..."Don't like the loud trucks Mummy!"

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Daddy's turn

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These ones are pretty cool though...they don't make any noise!

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Sophie bit her own cheek...Ingrid looks in more pain they Sophie!

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Kids Klub Xmas Party

Kids Klub held their Xmas Party yesterday afternoon down at one of the local parks. There were fish and chips for all the parents and kids - lots of sing along's and everyone got a present. It started at 6pm and we didn't get home till around 8pm so was a pretty late one for Sophie - add in all the sugar and excitement and she was buzzing for ages! - Kids Klub finishes up next Friday and return on the 5th January.

Sing a long time

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Oh!...what's in here?"
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"yay...more singing!

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Check out the video here of Sophie singing with the other kids.

Xmas Trees

We’ve been telling Sophie all week long that we’re going to buy a Christmas tree this weekend. So you could imagine how excited she was when we finally got around to getting one. We drove to place way out in Albany where you drive onto a farm and they have a zillion wicked trees to choose from. The friendly old geezer who owned the property took a wee shining to Sophie and told us we could go for a walk around his property and look at all the animals too...good to see there are still some genuine people around. When we got home we did lots of colouring in and drawing in her activity books - we're trying to teach Sophie to colour in between the lines...it's a slow process...

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Sophie in full concentration mode...

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How did I do mummy and daddy?

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Yesterday we dropped Soph off at Auntie Nicky’s place for the afternoon – Nic offered to have her for a hew hours so we could go Christmas shopping and chill out with just the two of us. Even through it was only a few hours, it was quite relaxing shopping without a 2 ½ year old latching onto us and wanting to play on every merry-go-round and play thing that malls have these days! Sophie had a blast at Nic’s place anyway- they went to the park, had a swim and did lots of Auntie/niece things all afternoon…cheers Nic! (we'll see you next weekend too huh?)

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Yay Auntie Nicky!

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"Mmm which tree do I like?..."

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"I think this one!"

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"Come on Mummy!...I know you're pregnant but I want to see the animals!"

Brad

Samoa

Next time I'm having a crap day at work, I need to remember how lucky I am...I've just spent a week away in Samoa with the entire Rock team. It was a sort of conference/thank-you for a big year. The resort we stayed at, (Aggie Grey's) was nothing short of spectacular and we all had a great time.

I did miss my two girl's back home though...I left Sophie a video of me on the computer and Ingrid said she would watch it every mornng and talk to me while trying to feed me toast throught the screen...

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A typical Samoan night...pretty awesome.

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The beach on our doorstep

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Whoops don't tell Ingrid!
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The locals came out and entertained every night
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Trying out for the olympic dive team...more like the special olympics!

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Working hard.

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Dinner at the restaurant...the only downside was the prices...HUGE!

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Is that Rog from The Rock or the dead guy from weekend at Bernie's?

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More work.

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The view from my room...O for awesome.

Three Blind Mice

Sophie’s latest obsession is stickers! She can’t get enough of them – we’ve ended up buying her a couple of big sticker books where you have to match the hundreds of stickers to the right pictures and shapes in the book – and Sophie has pretty much nailed the entire thing!

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Sophie is 2 ½ and learning more and more every day - she was in the bath last night singing “I can see a rainbow” with full-on hand movements and even throwing in a couple of verses that I've never heard before! – and today we were reading a nursery rhyme book and Sophie got all emotional and dropped her lip when we were reading ‘Three Blind Mice' she said she was 'weally sad' because 'the mouse’s can’t see and they might fall over and hurt their knee…'

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Sticker time with mummy

This weekend, I finally finished off the 'man-cave' outside too - it's only taken four months to get the entertainment system hooked up...and last night we set up the projector and cranked the volume to 'Ear Splitting 10' and enjoyed a movie without fear of waking Sophie up!

Today, we checked out Big Boys Toys - Sophie got a bit freaked out by the share amount of people there but still seemed to enjoy herself...

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The Man Cave

-All the necessities...a couch, fridge and entertainment centre

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"Arhh I'm not sure about this dude daddy.."

Brad

Two very different weekends (Ingrid posts)

Last weekend was a nightmare! Brad and Sophie were both sick with some kind of cold/virus and were as miserable as hell and I was just pregnant and grumpy! Made for a very interesting weekend with me growling at everyone and Sophie starting her whining and grizzling routine again – the one thing she does that can result in me going totally nuts. By Sunday night I was well ready for Sophie to go back to her daycare and was for once actually looking forward to going to work the following day. But alas upon waking on Monday it was pretty obvious that Sophie was not well enough to go back – her eyes were almost completely closed with conjunctivitis and her nose was very green! I could have cried. Luckily it wasn’t too bad a day as I tried to keep her as occupied as possible – however she got a taste of whining and decided that it sounded good to her ears (and probably because she knew it drove me nuts) and kept it up for the whole week – throwing in a couple of tantrums and a bit of hitting of mum and dad also for the sake of it! Yes hitting! We are desperately hoping it is just a phase and will pass before the new baby arrives. Needless to say she has had plenty of time out to think about her actions!!!

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We couldn't wait until Xmas

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This weekend however, after a major growling from me, her grizzling and whining stopped and she has been an absolute angel. It has been a fantastic weekend and we wish we could bottle the good times and bring them out when she is pushing the boundaries. Saturday, we had a massive day starting with doing her favourite thing (going for a fluffy), visiting Michelle and Reece and their beautiful wee boy Ronan who is just divine, we then went for a ‘ham and cheese’ sandwich (Sophie’s favourite at Subway). On the drive home she fell asleep in the car and once home after a 10 minute sleep we unsuccessfully tried to move her from the car to her bed, which had us worried for the rest of the day that we would have a very grumpy girl on our hands, but surprising us all she managed to not only stay awake until 7pm that night, but be perfectly behaved with it! As it was a beautiful day, we put up the paddling pool that we were actually going to give her as a Xmas present and let her just run around and be a kid in the water. Sunday was just as good and her behaviour was even better! As she had a massive two hour sleep this afternoon to recharge the batteries, we let her stay up later until 7.30pm. At this very moment its 7.47pm and she is up in bed singing songs to herself which she will do until she falls asleep – very cute. At times like this I can’t help but think how lucky I am to have such a lovely wee girl and how she is just so amazing – something I must keep remembering on days when she is pushing every button and driving me a little closer to insanity! Oh the joys of parenting huh?

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Check out the sprinkler too!

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A quick game of chasing shadows

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This pool rocks!
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"Timber!"
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Oh stink...tower fall over

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Butter wouldn't melt in her mouth

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Exhausted and happy after an eventful weekend

Ingrid

Labour Weekend

We both took Friday off last week and headed down to the Naki for the long weekend. We drove down Thursday night and Sophie coped with the drive sweet as - we left home at 6:30pm and after a couple of hours of singing and chatting away about 'waking up at Nana's house' she eventually went to sleep. The weather wasn't the flashest (is that a word?) but we had great time there - Sophie sure does love hanging out with her relies and hasn't stopped talking about her trip all week long!

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We drove back home Sunday night so we could chill out together on the Monday - The weather gods turned up big time on Labour day so we decided to have a day outdoors - we cleaned the barbecue, did some gardening and had dinner outside on the deck - a sweet way to end a sweet weekend.

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Mother and daughter having a see-saw together...not sure which one loved it the most!

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Sophie enjoying the passage at Nana's house...put some clothes on young lady!

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A quick pose at Rochelle and Darren's house
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Cuddle time with Aunty Rochelle...
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...and Grantz...
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...and Nana...

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Sophie had more fun standing in the bucket, rather than cleaning the BBQ!

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This gardening thing is pretty sweet...

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...are you sure these things are legal daddy?

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Dinner time on the deck - Sophie is far too grown up now to let us cut her food...

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"Now listen up Mummy and Daddy - next time we have a BBQ outside - I'm in charge of salads ok!

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Brad