Baby Sam update

Baby Sam is my second grandson. He was born on May 27th 2013 to the delight of all his family and especially me. Here he is having one of his first baths. Isn’t he cute.

On Friday he visited the cottage with his parents for the first time – quite an occasion and one of many to come. So far he has been asleep most of the times I have seen him. He does seem to be a very contented baby. I’m thinking he might have auburn, curly hair like his Dad.

Needless to say his mum and dad are very proud of him. Here is Dad having a cat-nap with his new son:

Isn’t that adorable? My heart swells with pride when I see my lovely family growing and thriving.

Now please read the Stop Press notice on the right-hand side. The news I receive tomorrow is going to change my life…

Dylan update = cooking with Oma.

This is my grandson Dylan last Friday. We did cooking. Here he is waiting for me to fill his bowl with flour. He added the egg himself and did most of the mixing. He made some lovely fairy cakes.  Unfortunately I can’t show them to you because they got eaten too quickly.

Dylan is a very sociable little boy.  He likes to be doing something all the time, sometimes two things at once! and he talks non-stop all day long.

Please notice my nice new floor. This is its first viewing after being replaced.  Do you remember I told you that it became 80% saturated after a series of leaks under the sink? Thank the Lord we were insured so the work was done for us and they even managed to find the same cushion-flooring that we had down before.  I was glad about that because it took me ages to choose it and I didn’t feel like going through all that again.

News! I have news about my American cat Millie.  Millie will be coming to live with me here in England on April 10th! Her flight is booked and she will be travelling alone so I will go down to Heathrow to meet her there. I’m sure she will appreciate a friendly voice after her long flight. I haven’t told my English cat Patch yet!

Even better news is that my dh L will be coming over himself in the Autumn to see if he can become accustomed to living here with our grey skies and rain showers. He is currently in the process of sorting out all his stuff.  Of course it is a massive undertaking and all will depend on when and if he gets a settlement visa but I’m looking on the positive side and keeping my fingers crossed.

So this will be a very busy year for me.

I’m on daffodil watch at the moment. So far there are no daffodils blooming in my garden. It’s just been too cold but this week the weather is set to change so I am hopeful. Today was a lovely, warm(ish) Spring day and everybody felt much better for it.

How is the weather in your neck of the woods?

Oma

Getting through the day – remembering.

This is a picture of my grandson Dylan and me in the park recently. It looks simple, doesn’t it, but really it’s anything but!

As I get older, I find I have to think more about those simple tasks that get me through the day. I don’t just do them anymore, I think them through so that I don’t have to make too many journeys up and down the stairs or in and out of the fridge etc. For example:

When I get up in the morning, at 6.30 a.m (I’m an early riser, even though I don’t have to be!), it starts off a chain of events, which I need to do in the right order. I get out of bed, visit the bathroom and empty my hot water bottle. Since I sleep alone here, I need that every night during the winter and my cat Patch appreciates it too! Return to the bedroom, put on slippers and dressing gown and get tablets out of the cupboard ready to take with my first cup of tea. Then I go downstairs, taking care not to trip over the cat on the way down. The cottage is still cold at this point. Outside it is dark outside. First thing I do is turn up the heating.

Now begins the kitchen ritual. I get two cups off the dresser, add teabag and milk, fill kettle, switch on, then trot around all the rooms opening curtains. By the time I’ve done that, the kettle has boiled.

I fill mugs and leave to stand and brew. Next I cut a large slice of toast bread and put under the grill. While that is cooking, I fetch butter and marmalade out of the cupboard and put on the side ready. By now the cat is weaving in and out of my legs miaowing. I get her bowl and the tin of cat meat out of the fridge. Fill bowl, watch toast, put bowl down, pick up water (I do this to save too many stoopings down). Change water and put yesterday’s food dish in sink to soak. It’s just like an assembly line.

When the toast is done, remove from grill, turn off grill, put toast on plate and butter. Take teabags out of mugs and discard. Put mugs on tray. Return to toast and add marmalade. Get biscuit out of tin for J.

So now I’m winning! The tea is made, toast and biscuit done, heating on, cat fed. Hooray!

I return upstairs with tray complete with goodies being very careful to negotiate the children’s stair-gate, cat and dressing gown dangling down by my ankles.

If I get to the top unscathed, I give J his tea and biscuit, open his curtains and say ‘good morning’. Then I return to my own cosy nest to drink my tea, eat my toast, take my tablets and read my book for half an hour. I’m not being lazy – I am waiting for the house to warm up. It takes half an hour, then I can go and get washed and dressed.

And all of that before 7.30 a.m.

Getting back to my grandson, I looked at that photo and realised what we had to do to get to that point of enjoyment. It was a similar sequence of events. It took time and thought and planning. I have to take an emergency bag in case of accidents (you can’t see that in the picture). I have to remember his gloves, hat, boots and hanky.

And so it goes on all through the day and as I get older, it gets harder, harder to remember, harder to do. I don’t really know why, it just does!

I suppose it will get even harder as I get older. I might reach for the tablets and find I’ve run out or find the stairs are hurting my knees. Those are the sorts of things I worry about now. I am not really a worrier but every now and then I stop and think.

Does all this sound familiar to you?

Dylan in the snow!

As you might know it snowed over here bigtime yesterday! The Welsh people got it worst, followed by the poor people in the South West and then us in the South East.

However, not everybody disliked it! You can tell from the look on my grandson Dylan’s face, that he had a great time. He is eating a gingerbread man whilst learning how to throw snowballs. This picture was taken on the field near his home, by his daddy and has captured the moment perfectly, don’t you think!

His joy was unbounded however because his mum bought him a sledge too. Here he is on it:

…still holding the gingerbread man!

All this after an exciteable day at my house. He was so excited by the snow he could hardly contain himself, asking me ‘when was the snowman coming’ because he’s been watching Raymond Briggs ‘Snowman’ over the Christmas Holiday.

If you haven’t seen it, here’s a short clip:

So today we still have lots of snow and more to come tomorrow. Dylan will be having more fun I think!

Don’t you just wish you were two year’s old again? I know I do…..

Have a great Sunday whatever you do people.

Woolly scarves and grandchildren…

Well he got it! the scarf I mean.  I wrote about it here… It arrived on Wednesday, which happened to be a special day for his mum! It was her birthday.  The parcel fitted through the letterbox so Dylan was able to open it himself.  Unfortunately, I don’t have a picture of him opening the parcel but here he is at the end of a long, tiring day in London when he went to visit the dinosaurs!

Looks like they had a great time, doesn’t it!

Dylan came to my house today and we had lots of fun playing with his circus train. It was great to be with him again. In the few weeks I’ve been away he has grown a little and increased his vocabulary. He now understands ‘too high’ ‘too hot’ ‘too big’ etc. and he can count to ten, although it is parrot fashion. He doesn’t understand the concept of counting beyond two yet.

We had fish fingers and baked beans for lunch and he had chocolate pudding for dessert. That’s a sort of yoghurty pudding over here and he loves it.

In the afternoon I made him a tunnel for his train to go through. I upturned the clothes airer and put a dark green tablecloth over the top of it. It looked like a big hill or mountain and served the purpose really well.

Tomorrow night he’s coming for a sleepover.

My grandson Dylan

It’s time for me to introduce you to the little boy who is such a delight to me these days.  His name is Dylan and he is my first grandson. To say I am besotted with him is no exaggeration. I was told how much love a new grandson could bring into one’s life and it is true.

Dylan made his arrival into this world in October 2010 so that makes him currently 18 months old and he is a typical child of that age, except of course that is exceptionally bright and liable to grow up to be rich and famous and clever and accomplished!!! I’m not biased of course.

The first picture was taken at Easter and shows him enjoying his Easter Egg.

The next picture shows a more wistful side of his nature.

This next picture shows him in a thoughtful mood.  Perhaps he is wondering what is for lunch or when mummy or daddy is coming home from work.  Who knows?

I look after Dylan one day a week plus additional times as required.  This wears me out but gives me much pleasure.

Yesterday was Friday so Dylan came to visit.  He likes his routine here in my English cottage. He is growing runner beans so every time he comes he wants to see how high they have grown and he LOVES watering them with his watering can.  One day I suppose I’ll have to tell him that there is a giant at the top of his beanstalk, but not yet, not today! Plenty of time to find out about giants later…

Dylan loves shopping. I take him to Sainsbury’s just up the road. There is a special place to park the car with extra space for getting the child out and into the shopping cart so I use that with gratitude.  Of course, other people like those prime spots too so I have to be quick.  Dylan gets strapped into the cart and into the shop we go. He likes to examine everything before it goes in the cart. He calls oranges ‘balls’ and wants to play with them! Why not indeed? Bananas are a favourite and he loves the biscuit (cookie) aisle and chooses his own ‘bibbits’ as he calls them, chattering away all the while.

If we bump into anyone I know, he always smiles and says ‘goodbye’ very sweetly when we part.  He’s a real charmer!

When we get to the check-out, he likes to put the purchases on the conveyor belt. He enjoys being helpful.

When we get home, he likes to help unpack the bags.  I usually have six bags of shopping so it takes a long while to unpack. I have to watch him a bit otherwise some of the shopping ends up on the floor like the eggs a couple of weeks ago.  He picked up an egg box and didn’t have it in his grasp properly.  Naturally he didn’t realise that eggs break! and looked so surprised when they did and there was a gooey mess all over the floor to clean up.

I find it impossible to be cross with him.

I like to knit and sew for him and read him stories and I hope that you will enjoy following his development as he makes his way along the path of life.

I’m looking forward to telling you more about him in the weeks to come.

Star