Making the most of Boy Lacer

This is the last week of having Boy Lacer at home with me all the time (two mornings a week last year hardly counted), so I’ve been making the most of it. I like the quiet simplicity the two of us have when it’s just us, of course he’ll still be home in the mornings but it won’t be quite so leisurely. We’re approaching the end of a slow ending of an era, the start of which was Girl Lacer starting nursery two years ago and will come to a final close when Boy Lacer starts school in a year’s time. Even now the time when Girl Lacer was just attending playgroup and Boy Lacer a chubby baby seems a different lifetime, punctuated by lots of sunny picnics in the park which is what I predominately remember about that time (was that our last good summer weatherwise?). But I’m also fully aware that they change and move on, by the end of that summer (before nursery) Girl Lacer was climbing the wall and I with her and nursery was a complete blessing! It’s sad in a way though, in that Boy Lacer, being developmentally about a year behind is now growing into the boy he ‘should’ have been last year, he’s wonderfully curious about everything now, he appears to be developing an interesting mathematical brain, with a particular interest in shape, colour and direction. He’ll be out of the flat for half the day, just as he’s getting even more fun but oh the fun he’ll have in nursery! I count myself as lucky that I’ve been able to be a SAHM for these past nearly six years, ok I have absolutely hated not bringing in much money of my own and it is worrying how this time off has affected future earning prospects (along with continuing childcare issues) but Girl and Boy Lacer, they’re priceless and so worth it.

So, me and Boy Lacer went out for lunch today, well, it was a McDonalds, we of course chose the day when the heavens opened and got absolutely soaked! Boy Lacer was insisting on walking (which is good), he was wearing his oversized poncho (it’s size 6 – 8), so in the sort of rain, where thanks to my glasses, I could hardly see a thing, it was like being accompanied shopping by a little wet cloaked hobbit, with a little hand sneaked out from under the poncho to hold mine. When we eventually got home we both had to strip off, hopefully from next week, with less expeditions, we’ll all be a little drier!

Nursery home visit

Boy Lacer had his nursery home visit today and once again I feel so incredibly lucky that my kids go to that school. The nursery is attached to the school, taking children for five mornings or five afternoons a week, the year before they start reception, Girl Lacer went there a couple of years ago and had a great time, she learnt lots through play and gained a foundation, particularly in maths, that is still with her today (her class group, which she is still with, showed an uncanny interest in maths pretty early on, so taking their lead, they did lots of maths based play in nursery and in reception continued on that by introducing numbers into pretty much everything, just because the class liked it). So the nursery, like the school, suits an academic child (the school has excellent SATs results) and yet on the otherhand, they have the excellent record with special needs children that makes any therapist we encounter, just on the mention of the school’s name, wax lyrical for at least five minutes about how wonderful the place is for them. They have a specialist asd unit within the school but the quality of the care throughout the school, just makes the whole place very special. And you know I think that’s one of the reasons why the school does so well academically, they care for every single pupil, providing a safe and nurturing environment, where everyone is going to thrive and learn, as opposed to other styles of academic schools where it’s far more nose to the grindstone and the weaker ones drop by the wayside. It all makes living in our tiny, too expensive flat, worth it.

So, the teachers have left after their home visit, with lots of ideas about what Boy Lacer likes, that would be lifts, arrows, drawing, cars and computers and lots of advanced warning about what he doesn’t like, that would be washing hands, going to the toilet (even in his nappy) and climbing things he’s not confident about.Boy Lacer is still not toilet trained (we’ve given up on the potty aspect of it, he no longer fitted) and they are absolutely fine with that, in fact there is a community nurse, who partially works out of the health centre attached to the nursery, who specialises in toilet training and worked with children with the same problem last year, apparently really successfully. So once Boy Lacer has settled in, we’re going to see her, which is a relief, as Boy Lacer has such issues it was becoming clear that I couldn’t toilet train him without help. They’re also going to do a visual timetable for him to.