Thursday, July 31, 2008

July

It was sooooo good to meet up with Emma and Dan when they were back in the UK at the beginning of July - surreal to be walking around London with them when we hadn't seen them for 18 months but feeling as though it had only been a few weeks. They both did an excellent job of carrying Matthew around the dinosaur exhibit in the Natural History museum and bonus points go to Dan for participating so willingly in the lunchtime football practice!

The predictable mixed weather of the British summer has meant we've got out whenever we can. Mags and I met up with the children at Dyrham Park where Matthew and Skye demonstrated they can still get into mischief together - they really love it when they see each other again!

Neil celebrated his 31st birthday the day after breaking up from school for the summer. The weather was great so we headed to Chew Valley lake and Matthew was delighted that he could make a cake for Daddy's birthday and he could sing for him!
Matthew has grown up so much in the last three months; every few days his speech and language seems to have made huge steps forward and he's increasingly independent. He loves his Daddy very much and likes to copy him in many ways - including taking shots in football with his hands in his pockets (Neil obviously has a very casual style when playing with a two year old!) and shaving!

The other stage in his development has been potty training. I decided to attempt it this summer before Baby Shepherd #2 makes it's appearance in November. I was prepared for him not to be ready but he seemed to take to it well for the first few days. Bob the builder underpants sent by Nanna were definitely a big incentive in the early stages! It was after that that we had many, many accidents (definitely D2 for those into Lifeshapes) which was not the way Gina Ford had said it would go in 'Potty Training in a week'! We decided to stick with it, it seemed pointless to go backwards, and it's getting better but definitely not done and dusted in seven days!

Tuesday, July 01, 2008

Winners!

Neil's football team won their league - they are the Bristol and South Gloucestershire Year 7 champions! Not only that but the staff at Fairfield can't remember the last time there was a winning football team from their school!