A Basketload of Fun

I'm now almost 17 weeks pregnant and the nausea that has been my constant companion for the past three months has finally gone. I started to feel an awful lot better this week and I am finally finding the energy to try to restore order to the chaos that my home became during my first trimester. I managed to get to the bottom of one of the enormous ironing piles today, so the Podlings were greeted with the relative novelty of an empty laundry basket when they got home from school. Emma immediately claimed it for a boat and dragged it into the lounge. Later in the evening, when I finished clearing up the tea things, I went into the lounge to find that Emma had set the basket up in front of the TV and turned it into a cozy little bed. I'm not sure why we bother spending money on toys when an empty laundry basket can provide so much entertainment!

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Class Assemblies

Lily was a Mugglewump and had to wear brown clothes. We made the ears and a long tail (which you can't see here) to go with the costume. They made the masks in school.

Last Friday morning I had the pleasure of watching Lily perform in her class assembly. Her class were doing two little plays based on scenes from Roald Dahl's 'The Twits' (which I coincidentally read to Tom and Lily earlier this year). Lily was a Mugglewump (they are monkeys, for those of you unfamiliar with the story). Lily had a couple of lines and she spoke them loudly and clearly. She did brilliantly in the dance and was basically a little superstar. I did get some lovely video of her dance, but unfortunately the school name is clearly visible in the background and I am a bit paranoid about putting too much identifying information on the Internet (Mum, remind me to show you the video when you next visit).

It is a huge thing for Lily to get through an entire school performance. She still suffers a bit from separation anxiety and usually gets terribly upset when I am in the audience. She only ever used to last up to five minutes on stage before she had to be led off in tears, but today she got through the entire performance without any tears at all and actually appeared to be enjoying herself. She did get upset after the performance when the children were allowed to come and talk to us parents. I left her in floods of tears because she wanted to come home with me, but she did so well right up until then. Funnily enough, if she is in an afternoon performance and knows she will be coming home with me afterwards, she is all sunshine and smiles! Thankfully her Christmas performance will be in the afternoon, so we shouldn't have any tears for that.

I had the pleasure of attending Tom's school assembly the Friday before Lily's. Tom's class performed Oscar Wilde's delightful story 'The Selfish Giant' and I have to confess to getting tears in my eyes they did such a lovely job. I have become terribly sentimental since becoming a mother! Tom was a narrator and did very well. Tom has come on in leaps and bounds when it comes to school performances. Loud music (and loud noises in general) can be very upsetting for him (he used to have to be taken out of music classes when he was in the infants as he found the noise so distressing), so to see him not only on stage but happy during school performances just shows how far he has come. Unfortunately, from where I was sat in the audience, combined with where he was on stage, I wasn't able to get a single decent photograph. He did so well though and I was very proud of him.

Well done Tom and Lily on your fabulous performances. Mummy is very proud of you both!

Lily is in the middle

Lily is in the middle of the 'cage' on the right

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Daddy's Girls

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Hello Little one!

Ultrasound scan picture of Podling #4 at 13 weeks.

We were excited to be able to see our newest little Podling today as I had my first trimester dating scan. Emma's dating scan was over very quickly, but the lady who did this one was lovely and spent a lot more time with us, so I felt that we got to have a really good look at the baby this time. To begin with the baby was facing us, but s/he almost immediately rolled right over and turned its back on us. Luckily it settled down and we were able to get a really good look. The baby is 6.9 cm crown to rump, has the required number of arms and legs, a strong heartbeat and there is evidence that the baby has started swallowing and that the kidneys have started functioning. That is about all they can tell you at the dating scan, but it is enough to make me more than happy. I always feel so much happier about the pregnancy once I have had the first scan. I have felt the baby move a few times (the first time at only 11 weeks believe it or not), so I did know it was in there, but it is always nice to see it up on the screen. It all feels a lot more real somehow. The more in-depth foetal anomaly scan will be on New Year's Eve, so I should hopefully be seeing in the New Year with a shiny new picture of my baby.

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Half Term and Hallowe'en

Last week was half term with Halloween falling in the middle of it, so I was able to enjoy having all my Podlings home together again. I made chocolate play dough for them on Monday, which provided hours of entertainment all week. We made pumpkin faces out of paper plates and did lots of colouring. Poor Lily took ill mid-week and turned out to have a nasty bout of tonsillitis, which meant we had a very low key Halloween. I decorated the lounge and dining room (no photos surprisingly), they all got their usual basket of goodies in the morning and Emma and I did the pumpkins in the evening, but we decided to leave all our usual Halloween fun until Lily was feeling better. Thanks to the wonders of penicillin, Lily was feeling much better the following day, so we made chocolate covered apples, played the doughnut game (see video below) and had a good game of Ghost Hunt as soon as it was dark enough. (Ghost Hunt was a gift from my sister for Tom's birthday last year and the Podlings all love it). It was such a shame that Lily was ill during half term, but we managed to have a lovely week regardless. Now I'm counting down to the Christmas holidays so I can have them all home again!

Fun with chocolate play dough

Play dough has universal kid appeal. At nine years old, Tom still enjoys playing with it.

They were making cakes and fairy cakes with the chocolate play dough, so it wasn't long before the wooden cakes and tin tea sets came out and we had a full blown party on our hands. I even had to light the candles I had put out for them to use in their play!

The Podlings made pumpkins out of paper plates, orange glitter paint, black card and chalk. We used these to decorate the dining room for Halloween.

Emma spent much of the week dressing up in various costumes. It's not really worth dressing her in proper clothes when we are home all day!

Emma helped to gut the pumpkin. Her verdict when touching the inside of the pumpkin for the first time: "This is really gross!"

Adorable!

Lily was really feeling poorly on Halloween, but she desperately wanted me to draw something spooky on her face with eye liner. She was thrilled with her web and spider, even if she did only have it on for half an hour before we had to clean it off so she could go to bed.

Emma making chocolate covered apples

Playing 'The Doughnut Game', whereby I hang ring doughnuts up in the conservatory and the Podlings have to try and eat them without using their hands. Apologies for the state of the conservatory. We don't really use it once it gets colder, so it becomes a bit of a dumping ground!

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