Springtime

Yesterday was the last day of Toby's half term so we went into town. I was thinking a casual day at the National Gallery and the National Portrait Gallery. They have events for children during half term and good cafes for lunch. Our plans changed when, on the train, Toby said that he would actually prefer to see the dinosaurs. So we got off the train at Charing Cross and hopped in a taxi to South Kensington and the Natural History Museum. We got there fifteen minutes after they opened and there was already a line at the door. It's a very popular place when school is out.

We were lucky though and managed to get tickets to the most popular exhibit, Dino Jaws, which ended today. We also got one of the adventure packs that include binoculars, games, activities and a hat for little explorers. The exhibition was all about what dinosaurs ate and had lots of animatronic dinosaurs and loads of info about dinosaur poo. One of Toby's favourite displays was a big pile of dinosaur poo that even smelled bad. He thought it was so funny. They had some coprolites that children could touch too and that made Toby laugh as well. Ah, four year old boys and their sense of humour.

Today was a gorgeous sunny day and we were all dressed in summer clothes and sandals for a change. I dug out some summer clothes for Rosie that I bought last year in the sales. I try to buy ahead for the kids when I can get a bargain. The problem is trying to guess what size they'll be the following year. I obviously got it wrong this time. Rosie is 17 months old but she is firmly in a size 2 already. The outfit I bought her is 18 mons - 2 years and you can see how small it is on her in the photo. She's going to be a tall girl.

Rosie's communication is really coming along. She's just started two word phrases and can communicate in whole sentences using a combination of words and signing. Tonight is a good example. She is very good at procrastinating going to sleep. She'll ask for more milk, another story, another song, a drink of water, etc, etc. Tonight she asked me to change her nappy by signing. I checked her nappy and told her that it was clean and she didn't need a change. She then signed 'medicine' which is the sign we use for medicine, nappy cream and teething gel. I asked if she needed some medicine and she shook her head no. I asked if she needed some nappy cream and she nodded and then pointed at her nappy and said "bits" which is what we call her vagina (it's an English thing). Of course, I had to check and sure enough she had some nappy rash so I put some cream on the rash and took her back to bed and she finally went to sleep. So nice that she can tell us what's wrong. I'm sure it saves a lot of tantrums and frustration.