Birthday Season!

Birthday season is finally here! Bailey's best friend Ava turned 2 last Thursday and had a great party with a clown, magic tricks and balloons for everyone!
Now it's Bailey's turn, he will be 2 on Thursday and we're having a Thomas and Friends birthday party on Friday with his friends and a family party on Sunday afte
rnoon.
Our house has gone Thomas mad and there's soo much Thomas things coming for his birthday and party but he loves it so much!!
Lately he has started being very grumpy and difficult whenever he wakes up from a sleep - first thing and also after his afternoon nap, not knowing what he wants but wanting to keep going into the fridge and whining which is very annoying!
Talking lots more now too and more complex sentences. He is also very good at setting up his train tracks and connecting all the carriages, the creche ladies call him the 'Little Engineer'.
Also starting to look at Preschools for him, one of them he could start Term 4 next year once he is 3.
Here is the picture Tim did for his birthday party invitation.

PJ Party and August update

Tonight Bailey and I went to the Early Years Centre for a PJ party, dinner and storytime. We had a lot of fun, the parents made their own pizzas and the kids played and danced and listened to 'Hairy McLairy from Donaldson's Dairy' which is a favourite at our house too. Bailey got to play with his friends Ava and Jacob, only had 1 tearful incident when an older child took a car from him.
Think he's getting a cold though, he's starting to get a runny nose. And his cheeks have gone all red and the skin a bit dry ever since Sunday.
We went strawberry picking on Sunday afternoon which he LOVED, he ate soo many!! We will have to go again soon.
His day sleeps are getting shorter and some days he skips his nap altogether! Time to start thinking about getting him into a bed soon I think too. I have been looking for a Thomas the Tank Engine bed, he would absolutely love that! I think a Thomas birthday party next month is on the agenda too. Thomas and Chuggington are his absolute favourite things, with Roary a close third. Bailey now goes to Grandma's house for the day once a week, which allows Tim and I to get some work done and Bailey and Grandma love it too!!

'Gifted'?

On Tuesday we were at the Early Years Centre and Bailey walked into the health clinic and started pointing out all the shapes and animals he could see in the waiting room. The clinic sister wanted to know how old he was to already know shapes. She asked what other words he can say etc and she said he is quite advanced for his age and possibly gifted in some areas (letters, numbers etc) She gave me the checklists for 2 year olds and he has already achieved those milestones for language and we worked out he knows well over 200 words. We knew he was smart but doesn't every parent think that? Apparantly they only expect children his age to build towers 4 blocks high and to do 1-4 piece puzzles but he can do heaps more than that.
He's also started displaying more 'Terrible Two'-ish behaviour :-p being difficult and deliberately disobeying us!
He is enjoying colouring in using his new Mess-free Crayola textas after making a huge mess using normal textas yesterday!
And oh yeah the reign of broccolli as his favourite food has ended. He loves stirfry, cheese sticks and pineapple at the moment.
He carries a car or train everywhere!!!

Car Wash

On Sunday Tim and Bailey washed the car. Bailey just loved helping and he got to wear his Nemo swimwear and hat! His favourite part was playing in the warm, soapy water in the bucket! But he did do a pretty good job using the sponge on the car!
Later on in the afternoon he tripped on the concrete and scraped both his knees. There was a lot of blood but he didn't cry - until he saw the band-aids on him which he wanted off!
He can now count to 10 on his own, can say how many fingers a person is holding up to 10 and I'm so proud of all the words he can say now. He can finally say 'Thomas' where previously it was just 'Mas'.
Really enjoying the holiday break and spending lots of time with Bailey, Tim, Mum and Heather.
Have also been spending a lot of time with our friends Anna and Ava lately, it's good to have friends. :-)

Changes

Well there's been a few changes here lately. I am back at work, working as a teacher for a Christian Distance Education School for North Brisbane families. It is work from home but there's a lot of home visits and home calls etc to do. Tim lost his day job but is now focusing on growing his own multimedia business and doing freelance work, as well as being a stay-at-home Dad for Bailey.

Mum and Heather moved here from Perth last week too and have moved into their own rental house near us. It has been great having them here and seeing them settle into their new house.

It's been hard for me to be away from Bailey over the past week as my training has meant I've been away from home a lot lately and I have missed him. He's been a bit naughty/cheeky for Tim some days as well, breaking a part off his lamp and drawing on the coffee table with permanant marker!!

He is getting so clever now can say and point 'A,B,C', still mad about his cars and trucks and loves climbing onto our bed and hiding behind the curtains and loving his books!

My boy is very clever!

Bailey has always been very into books and in the last few weeks he is starting to show that lots of it is sinking in! He has randomly started pointing at numbers and letters in books and naming them. This comes after months of pointing at every number or letter he sees ANYWHERE (letterboxes, number plates, signs, TV) and asking us what it is. He can now recognise and say numbers 2 and 3 and letters C,D,T and Z and correctly identify 14 letters of the alphabet when asked to locate it. I think he's pretty clever but really I guess it is no different from him being able to identify a dog or bird or flower in a picture. He definitely has a very good memory and thinks he's so clever when he gets it right! He is still asking for dozens of books a day, so he's definitely going to be a reader and is even starting to sit down and look at books on his own too. Alphabet books and Thomas as well as The Very Hungry Caterpiller are current favourites. :-)

Long Weekend

This has been another long weekend and we've been busy and having lots of fun! On Saturday night we went to visit Tim's Nan and Aunty in their new home and had dinner there, then on Sunday we went and tried a new church with our brother and sister-in-law then went for lunch at Tim's Mums for his Nan's birthday, and today the three of us went to Centenary Lake for a play at the playground and a walk around the lake and Bailey climbed his first tree! :-) See photo!
Then we had a lovely time when putting him down for his nap and we played this game where he would kiss us and then we'd fly across the room and he laughed and laughed and kept wanting to kiss us, even saying 'kiss, kiss' and putting his face towards us to do it! :-) He's been saying lots more words as well, can sort of say numbers 2,3,4,6 and can say Jesus, go, watch, tree, T (when pointing to a letter T), shoe, and 'ter' when he wants a drink of water.
A favourite food this week has been, strangely, brocolli, and also Nutri-Grain as breakfast or on their own as a snack.
He has loved playing trains and left his Roary the Racing Car toy at the creche at church, hopefully we can get it back next week. He also loved climbing on our bed and 'relaxing' on the pillows and jumping on us when we lay down!
Good times with our little boy, and there's another long weekend just around the corner in June. :-)