I’ve decided I don’t like shopping (much)

One of the biggest differences with Boy Lacer now being at school full time is that I go shopping far less often, ok let me clarify that, actually I go to Sainsburys far more often to buy packed lunch stuff, but that’s about it. Back when Boy Lacer was at home with me, we did go into town quite a bit, not getting anything major, normally just bread and milk type stuff, but it was something to do, an opportunity to get out in the fresh air and Boy Lacer liked charming his way round the shop assistants and carrying shopping baskets. Now on the few occasions I have been into town since Boy Lacer has been at school full time I’ve discovered that I actually don’t really like it, not that much anyway, I think it’s when I miss Boy Lacer the most because as much as when he was at home I’d be desperate at the weekends to get some shopping time on my own, I realise now that shopping with company is far more fun and town is full of mums and toddlers, so I feel like a sore thumb to. Also I’ve been busier, so haven’t really had the time, specially when I’ve realised that there really aren’t that many hours in the school day.

However I had to go shopping today, I desperately needed new shoes and I needed to sort out Boy Lacer’s birthday party stuff. Mr. Lacer got paid today (which is why all this shopping had had to wait) and now after coming back from shopping I feel broke again, which is another reason why I don’t like shopping. Is it me for a start or has the price of shoes gone up about £10 in the last few years? I know this because I keep on having to buy the same styles and I’d swear they didn’t used to cost £55! Yep, I may have new shoes, but they’re ‘old’ new shoes as I had the exact same pair last winter to, which feels rather boring. Shoes are getting more difficult to buy again (disregarding cost), as I have dodgy feet and I need flat, ‘sensible’, with some form of strap, comfortable, well made shoe otherwise I’m in agony after just a few days wear and for the last few years there’s been a great range of fashionable shoes that fit those criteria, but now I’ve noticed yet another season (it was like this in the summer) where more and more shoes now have heels which I just can’t wear, if it keeps going like this I’ll have to start wearing DMs again (which I wore as a teenager, I had such a lovely collection of brightly coloured ones, sigh, getting all reminiscent now).

New shoes for me, specially that transition between summer and autumn wear always means new socks as well (as I don’t normally wear socks in the summer and the tumble drier eats them), so what I was pleased to see in M&S is that this autumn-winter, hosiery seems to have gone all woolly, even leg warmers are back in (according to M&S anyway).  I bought a nice pair of stripy socks and some nice stripy tights and will be back for some lovely patterned thick grey wool tights when the weather gets colder. I also had to buy Boy Lacer a couple of shirts, as the boy has suddenly been getting party invites and he has nowt to wear. Oh and I got Girl Lacer a pair of witches black and purple striped tights, partly because I knew she’d love them but principally because I so wish they had them in my size!

I have a big, big thing for red shoes and thick striped socks

The once in every couple of years event happened to me when I was out to, the ‘item I fall head over heels in love with from Warehouse’ event. I normally avoid Warehouse because it’s a bit expensive and most of their stuff isn’t really to my taste (I’m more of a White Stuff / Fat Face girl) but every now and then I see something of their’s, in their window as I pass or on a cat walk show and I want, desperately and no matter how broke I’m feeling I normally do succumb eventually and buy it because I can’t stop thinking about and touch wood, all the clothes that have made me fall in love with them from there have stood the test of time and I wear them very regularly even to the extent of having to repair them and get compliments whilst wearing it to, so I’ve got good value out of the very occasional piece I’ve bought from there. This is what I fell in love with.

Rib Polo Maxi Dress from Warehouse

This dress gives me the instant sensation of imagining me wearing it and feeling fantastic, sashaying down to do the school run, propping up the local bar etc. etc. and it is a rare item of clothing that gets me that enthusiastic these days (oh I used to buy so many clothes pre-kids). Now I’m not actually sure if out of my head and into real life this dress would actually suit me, I would definitely need some ah hem, good under garments, but a dark all in one colour I think on me could be quite flattering. The dress weirdly reminds me of something the ultra trendy and far far skinnier than me school secretary would wear, in fact I think I may have seen her wearing this already (and she’s a grandmother) but I don’t mind the trendy school secretary look. So, anyway I was very very glad they didn’t have the dress in my size, on the rails, as I would not have been able to control myself.

Then it was on to shopping for Boy Lacer’s party, now Boy Lacer’s party is small, very small but eek even then it feels so expensive, it’s at home, it’s as home made as possible (do it yourself dinosaur masks, home made cake (of course), home made goody bags) but even then it’s the cost of the raw materials etc. etc. The party will have a loose dinosaur theme (you may have been able to guess that), so I spent ages hunting for a suitable, cheap but nice present to go into the centre of the pass the parcel (probably the only game we’ll play), that had a dinosaur theme, a lot of the dinosaur stuff was too expensive, some of it was too old, some too boyish (in case the one girl coming to the party wins), so I eventually settled on a book and after much searching found the only appropriate thing I could find that fit the criteria, Dinosaurs Love Underpants (couldn’t find any Harry and his Bucket of Dinosaurs books). Unfortunately whilst looking I also spotted something else.

That’s right, a new Charlie and Lola book actually written by Lauren Child. Actually, according to Amazon, Slightly Invisible isn’t out till October, but I found it in Smiths and it looks great. It’s all about how Lola is being a bit of a pesky little sister and keeps on wanting to play with Charlie and Marv, even though occasionally Charlie and Marv want to play on their own, catching ‘tricky monsters’. It goes to remind you that as great as all the Charlie and Lola books are, the ones based on the TV series, which aren’t written or illustrated by Lauren Child, don’t quite have her inventive charm. I think both kids will love this, although I bought it for Girl Lacer to give to Boy Lacer for his birthday, as officially Girl Lacer is getting a little old for Charlie and Lola (although really she still loves them).

Going shopping with Boy Lacer

Chattering Charlie and Lola edited

Originally uploaded by lacerslife

Boy Lacer loves shopping, but it’s not the shops so much, as in shops are the only places were he regularly encounters lifts and he loves lifts. If I tell him we’re going shopping, he then questions me intently about where we’re going and which sort of lifts there’ll be. And if we go shopping and we don’t go in enough shops (read enough lifts), he is not happy!

So, today we went shopping with some birthday money, first up was the toy shop Early Learning Centre, but the early bird catches the little boy with lots of money to spend, Early Learning Centre didn’t open on the dot of 9.30am but the nearby department store did, so we went up to their toy department (lift number one, glass walled) and brought the Chattering Charlie and Lola, which you can see in the video I’ve embedded above (I’ve always quite fancied the WordPress video add-in but it’s way too expensive for what would probably be very little use (or even a lot of use), so thanks to Flickr, I can now embed up to two videos a month! So, for the curious you can hear what me and Boy Lacer sound like and me shockingly muddle up Charlie and Lola’s names). The Chattering Charlie and Lola is rather cool, they say loads of things and the best bit was the look on Boy Lacer’s face when he saw it! He also brought a small train from Thomas the Tank Engine. Then back down to Early Learning Centre, to buy some figurines from Timmy Time (my son influenced by CBeebies, no of course not!) and then back up to the bookshop (lift number two, another glass walled but larger lift) to buy some books. The bookshop is Waterstones and oh no Waterstones, please, what have you done? Unless I was missing something pretty significant, the picture book section is now down to one bookcase! And this is a large bookshop, in a large town, in a major shopping destination, in an area where literally (and I mean literally), there are so many young children, the council is struggling to build schools quick enough and the picture book section is down to one bookcase. I’ve noticed their selection had been shrinking a bit but now the remaining tables were the books had been, are now stocking a multitude of holiday annuals, yes I know it’s Christmas (in three months) but don’t they think people might like a better selection of picture books for their kids between now and then and personally I always buy way more picture books at Christmas than annuals. Sigh, there is another bookshop in town, although another chain and a bit out of the way, it just disappoints me when a large chain bookshop, it’s very presence almost certainly preventing the existence of a smaller independent bookstore, can’t even do it properly, oh and their craft book section has shrunk to and the craft books they do stock are rubbish! Moan about Waterstones over. Boy Lacer did manage to find three books to buy, even despite the limited selection, he brought the Cow That Laid an Egg, a story we already knew but didn’t have a copy of, a Winnie the Witch collection and Five Minutes Peace, a Large Family book, by Jill Murphy, which I absolutely adore, all poor Mrs. Large wants is five minutes peace from her kids, I feel her pain. So book buying done, it was over to John Lewis, a quick trip up to the new Christmas floor (I don’t object to Christmas in October too much) (lift number three, a window out onto the road outside), which is sadly smaller this year but had a lovely collection of ‘handmade’ style ornaments which were an inspiration for my ornament making. Then down to Waitrose before up to ground level again (lift number four, a small tubular lift).

It was a nice shopping trip and as much as I have a hard time remembering now that Boy Lacer is 4, as he really is only 4 chronologically and is still developmentally about 3, what was noticeable this year, was unlike previous years where you’d take him to a toy shop or a book shop with money and say “What do you want to buy”, he wouldn’t have a clue, this time he definitely knew, which was good.

Pippi Longstocking

Me and Girl Lacer finally finished Pippi Longstocking tonight, the Lauren Child illustrated version.

Girl Lacer (and Boy Lacer to) adore anything that comes from the pen of Lauren Child, currently it is of course Charlie and Lola but we also like That Pesky Rat and Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Book? (the latter is particularly fun) and it’s great knowing that as my children grow they’ve got loads more Lauren Child to grow into, like the Clarice Bean books for example. But until then I will happily contend with my two little Charlie and Lola clones quoting chunks of Charlie and Lola back at me, e.g. today

Me to Boy Lacer: “It’s messy in here”

Boy Lacer: “It’s not messy, it’s just spread out.”

That’s a line direct from Charlie and Lola. And on the kids’ bedroom door is a sign declaring that the bedroom beyond is Girl Lacer land, with a picture of me, Mr. Lacer and Boy Lacer (nicely labelled, Girl Lacer likes labelling things) with a big cross through it, this is also from Charlie and Lola, for days Girl Lacer would not let us into her bedroom unless we showed our passports.

But back to Pippi Longstocking, which is what this post is actually about, as this version was actually illustrated by Lauren Child, complete with her trademark recognisable prints (“Oh look Pippi’s got the same dress as Lola, etc. etc. etc.), of course the kids loved it. Boy Lacer liked looking at the pictures and Girl Lacer liked the pictures and most of the story. This was actually the first proper chapter book I’ve ever read to Girl Lacer, so it was quite a big first*. The only bits Girl Lacer got a bit bored and restless was if Pippi decided to have one of her long monologues about something completely made up, Girl Lacer much preferred Pippi doing something and I have to admit, so did I. Still it’s a wonderful book, both in story and in illustrations.

*Girl Lacer’s teacher actually beat me to it though on the first reading of a chapter book from start to finish, as one of the first things they did when her class started school was read The Wind in the Willows, which really made an impression on Girl Lacer, she still, months later, comes up with little snippets of plot about Toad (her favourite), Badger and the naughty stoats.

Lots of ATCs

I’m still doing the ATCs. A beginners one on rainbows.

One based on your favourite cartoon, so I did something from Charlie and Lola.

And finally (and this took alot of time, specially the needlepoint one, which I won’t be doing again in a hurry) a set of sewed ATCs, which I based on metal work I saw in the V&A the other day.

Happy Birthday Girl Lacer!

Sorry for my absence, things have been hectic in the birthday preparation department, I’ve also been doing something potentially very stupid.

Friday was party bag preparation, I didn’t want to go down the whole plastic toy route and I also wanted them to be cheap. So a while ago I brought some cheap beads with big holes for threading from a great bead shop near me which sells beads individually, often for about 5p a bead and some pink leathery string stuff. So I divided up the beads and leather string stuff and bundled them up in a square of pink fabric and some pink ribbon (original idea, ages ago was to make little pink bags but that was me naively believing I’d get over my irrational fear of my sewing machine) and then I labelled each bag with a little luggage tag thing explaining what it was. For the boys I’d found some very cheap twin tubs of glitter and labelled them with stickers saying ‘pirate’s treasure’ and a little stamp of a pirate’s ship. I then bagged them up in a square of skull and cross bones fabric. I then found a suitable pirate colouring in picture and a suitable princess colouring in picture (it was a pirate and princess party) and adapted them with MS Publisher to say ‘Thank you for coming to ________ party’ with suitably princessy or piratey fonts and then tied them up in ribbon like scrolls.

Original map from Barefoot Books

Yesterday was the big birthday preparation day and I woke up with a severely bad hair day, my hair, in summary was (note the was), just below shoulder length, brown, curly and very, very out of condition and full of knots that would have done a rasta proud. My hair was extremely high maintenance in both time and money, something I’m short of in both and I’ve been neglecting it. So I woke up, looked in the mirror, lifted up an obvious knot on the side of my head and . . . took a pair of scissors to it, which ultimately once removed made me look like I literally had a half mullet. So, considering I’d just done something very stupid, I thought I might as well continue and took the scissors to the rest of it and to cut a long story short (ha ha) I now have a fairly closely cropped hairdo. Mr. Lacer’s reaction was akin pretty much to my reaction when he’d cut his long hair off recently (well at least he paid someone else to do it), I wasn’t too keen when he did it and Mr. Lacer was likewise with my hair but he says it’s now growing on him (hang on, it should be growing on me!), me personally I don’t like it, my ears are cold, these lovely Nigella goodies) I saw only four women with short hair below ‘a certain age’ and that was on a very crowded ‘credit crunch, what credit crunch?’ Saturday, so I feel ‘odd’.

When I wasn’t seriously messing with my hair I was spending 4 hours on Saturday night in the kitchen. I made number 5 biscuits (family tradition a la Nigella to make the appropriate age biscuits) using Nigella’s Butter Cut-out cookie recipe, which I always use because it works. I made fairy cakes using an Annabel Karmel recipe (this recipe, minus the very cute teddy bear decorations, I iced them and used sprinkles instead). And then I made Tana Ramsay’s girl birthday cake again, this time with the prescribed pink icing, which was so thick, it was tearing up the surface of the cake as I spread it, mixing crumbs into the icing, so I had to make a second batch of pink icing, which of course was a slightly different colour to the pink icing already on the cake and I had to make the icing a bit runnier so it sort of splurged all over the place, icing is so not my strong point. Oh and I made rainbow jellies, just like my mum used to make and then (whilst making them) I remembered her ultra fancy variation of setting the jellies on an angle in the fridge and then changing the angles between the layers but I wasn’t going to do that for 16 jellies.

Today was birthday day, I woke up earlier than Girl Lacer, 5.30am, what with the clocks changing and couldn’t get back to sleep again with the worrying about the rest of the work I had to do. Girl Lacer got up at 6am and so did consequently everyone else. She got a Lilydoll plus an extra outfit, a sparrow kids make your own sparrow bag (which we’ve started making, definitely a lot better than those standard pre-punched hole thingys you get in catalogues like Yellow Moon), a Charlie and Lola book and a Charlie and Lola puzzle from us, a Yoga Pretzels box from Boy Lacer and he’s been consequently desperate to get into it all day, as he likes yoga (as does Girl Lacer) but Girl Lacer hasn’t opened it yet, lego from her Grandma, Sylvianian animals from her Aunt who is reliving her childhood and a massive proper ‘grown-up’ train set from her Grandad and various additions to the train set from other members of my side of the family. 

She had a party with her friends and family this lunch time, it was the first proper kids party (i.e. more than 3 kids) that I’d thrown. We hired a hall and set the party time for 90 minutes, as I was a bit chicken to do the full 2 hours without an entertainer but with the craft activities at the beginning (decorate your own party bags), followed by pass the parcel (which had Mr. Lacer rebelling because he thought it was too pc to put a chocolate coin in each layer, which is what happens at just about every party I’ve been to), musical bumps and musical statues and then food, we were rushing at the end to do cake and fill party bags. So with that, some space and some balloons, I think the kids had a ball! I was pleased with the food, I did just the right amount I think, with only enough left overs to have a very pleasurable and lazy tea tonight. The cakes and biscuits which were iced in blue and pink icing (may I recommend Squire’s colouring paste (as recommended by Jane Brocket), I brought a virtual rainbow from them recently having got fed up of those little bottles of dye that aren’t exactly subtle, I did my pink using their ‘Rose’ and the blue using ‘bluebell’ which was a nice sort of blue – grey – purple colour, sort of like the grey on Royal Navy ships). What is it though about pink icing? To quote Charlie and Lola “pink icing always tastes the best”.

We got home and Girl Lacer opened the many presents her friends had brought her (and some absolutely lovely presents they were to, well thought out and very generous, including a Disney dress and Girl Lacer only has one of those because they’re so expensive and she’s growing out of it, so that was a lovely surprise), then played with her Grandma and Grandad until they went their separate ways. I now have two very tired children and I am very very glad it’s half term next week. Now I have to find somewhere to put all these toys. Oh and start thinking about Christmas properly now that the birthdays are out of the way!

My little man is 3!

It’s been a busy couple of days. Boy Lacer spent his last day of being two yesterday, being hard work. He was in a bad mood (for the third day running) and being almost equally demanding (and he’s not actually that much of a demanding boy usually, I think because his vocal skills have improved, he now finds it easier to demand). So a mixture of being in a bad mood and a demanding mood meant no peace for mummy and no chance for getting any chores done. In the end we went out into the garden. Was yesterday the last good day of weather? It’s the complete opposite today, very cold and wet but yesterday was lovely. So, as long as I was within sight Boy Lacer pottered around the garden doing the grubby sort of things little boys do in garden (stacking dirty plant pots and putting stones in the watering can yesterday). Me, stuck in the garden, actually desperate to go into the kitchen to just unload the dishwasher and I couldn’t because he wouldn’t let me (it sounds terrible, like I’m being brow beaten by a toddler but put it this way, the mood he was in, if I had gone into that kitchen he would have followed me in, wailed and demanded to be picked up, have a tantrum and basically make it impossible to unload the dishwasher anyway). Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t leave him out on his own in the garden anyway but our kitchen opens onto the garden anyway, so I could have at least unloaded the dishwasher!

So, I made the best of it, I thought if Boy Lacer is demanding my absolute attention anyway today, I’d get the potty out in the garden, get him out of his trousers and nappy and have a spot of alfresco potty training. So Boy Lacer spent a good deal of time sitting on his potty sunning himself on our patio, nothing happened of course but still, sitting on it b*re bottomed (sorry for the *, just don’t like pervs coming here after searching on google for something else), well sort of b*re bottomed, as he was wearing one of his new long sleeved t-shirts for this autumn – winter and they’re in size 4 – 5 because he has trouble getting his head through smaller sized children’s clothes and honestly, they weren’t t-shirts, they were dresses! So if had done something in his potty, chances are something else would have gotten mucky, as he was sort of half sitting on his ‘dress’ but still just getting him to sit like that is progress!

I also started work on some pirate bunting (inspired by The Creative Family) so I could do a stitch here and there. It’s very, very basic bunting, it’s not hemmed, it’s not even measured particularly accurately (I was measuring my triangles using a piece of cardboard I’d snatched from an empty cereal packet) and marking out on my knees. But (fast forwarding to today) it did the job decorating the living room for Boy Lacer’s birthday tea and will also go up in the hall we’ve hired for Girl Lacer’s princess and pirates party.

Yesterday evening, once the kids were finally in bed (oh I was so glad yesterday when Girl Lacer got home from school, someone else to distract Boy Lacer, although when Girl Lacer asked me if she could help me when she came home, I said she could distract her brother, to which Boy Lacer, who had heard this, ‘ran’ screaming and sobbing out of the room with his hands in the air!). Anyway, yesterday evening when the kids were finally in bed, Mr. Lacer was charged with assembling Boy Lacer’s main birthday present; a large toy garage from Early Learning Centre, brought with money from the two great grandmas. He spent ages putting it together, lovingly applying the stickers in the right place, gave it a quick, experimentally whiz down the ramps with a toy car, proclaimed “Awww, this is cool”, put in the batteries, switched it on, no sounds, cue lots of understandable moaning from Mr. Lacer and us feeling bad for Boy Lacer that his one ‘big’ present wasn’t going to be there when he woke in the morning. So Mr. Lacer had to dissemble this thing, put it back in the box and I had to suddenly ramp up my birthday baking because suddenly instead of doing some baking the next morning when Boy Lacer was in playgroup, I was faced with heading into town with the toy garage to get it replaced and then rebuilding the new one, all before Boy Lacer got out of playgroup!

So, after some late night baking, the day finally arrived. Boy Lacer got some Charlie and Lola books, a couple of small In the Night Garden toys and a Charlie and Lola t-shirt from us, a book from his sister and a book and puzzle from his grandma. He however did get a lot of money from the relatives! Girl Lacer had made him a card and sent it into CBeebies but it didn’t get on, so the sweet thing went straight on the computer and made one using this cool page on the CBeebies site where Chris the presenter will read out your message and then some CBeebies characters will give you a wave. Boy Lacer was just as amazed to see the ‘card’ and for Chris to say his name on the computer. I’ve just checked to see if Boy Lacer can return the favour to Girl Lacer when it’s her birthday but it won’t be able to include her name as it’s not listed, still too unusual I guess, which is a shame.

So, playgroup the plan was to go straight into town and spend the birthday money (plus have one of favourite McDonalds for lunch). I managed just about that morning to run into town myself, exchange the garage (“Did you put the batteries in?”, “Yes”, “Are you sure you put the batteries in?”, “Yes”, actually we tested the original garage with two different lots of batteries, taking the second lot out of a toy that we knew did still work), rushed home and build it, with a few minutes to spare before picking up Boy Lacer. When I picked up Boy Lacer, ooh I was in for a ‘surprise’, he’d been painting but he’d refused to wash his hands and he’d been hand printing, now I’m sure he must have originally been wearing an apron but obviously he now was not and his brand new Charlie and Lola T-shirt was covered in blue paint, in fact so covered that when I took him home after some persuasion from me to wash his hands (he doesn’t like toilets because of the mechanical hand driers, so refuses to go in them, now that’s going to cause a real problem when potty training properly), anyway, his t-shirt was so covered in blue paint he left a trail of blue paint from the playgroup to our front door as he brushed past or lent on things. So bang went the idea of going straight into town, as I needed to rip that T-shirt off him and put it straight into the washing machine (and I was not hopeful, the last playgroup paint splattered T-shirt did not wash out). So of course that flying trip in doors was interrupted by Boy Lacer noticing the newly complete toy garage and he was amazed bless him, going over and over again “It goes up!” (in reference to the lift on the garage). Poor boy, I felt bad dragging him away from it, specially as it was now colder and raining more heavily and he’s decided he doesn’t like coats again (it’s the elastic on the wrists), but forgetting birthday shopping, I also needed to go to the supermarket!

After a spot of whinging, he did cheer up, I think he was enjoying getting wet and we visited two toy shops; the first before McDonald’s we ended up getting a soft cuddly number 3 from Number Jacks (which as I type he’s curled up on asleep and he’s not one for cuddly toys too close in bed).

After McDonalds is was trip no.2 for me to Early Learning Centre that day. Boy Lacer ended up buying a new toy cooker come barbecue (we have one already which is a couple of year’s old but the bulb has blown on it and it can’t be replaced, so we’ve upgraded for a ‘bigger model’) and a rather cool pirate ship. Now, the new cooker is as plastic as they come (which never rates high a toy for me in the ‘niceness’ stakes) but the pirate ship is beautiful (it was a devil to put together though, I feel like an overworked engineer today, building a city garage followed by a pirate’s ship). Wooden, fully workable sails (i.e. you can lower and raise them with a rather neat system that took me a while to work out), this will be a toy (like the garage) that will last, as it’ll hopefully be just as cool to play with it when he’s 7 than compared to 3. Of course you have to buy the (plastic) pirates separately (which I did, can’t have a pirate ship without no pirates) but it’s part of a whole range which has suddenly opened up great ideas for Christmas! So more figurines (we have the ‘nice’ looking pirates, not the warty disgusting looking set, although I think he’ll like those) and a play mat.

Talking of Christmas I also (making use of the 20% birthday voucher we had) brought Girl Lacer’s main Christmas present, the jungle playset which she was drooling seriously over the other day (and it was the last one in the shop, although of course there will probably be some more) and of course had to buy the figurines separately for that to. Although I can see some cross toy playing this Christmas, pirates sail across pirate playmat to jungle island, get eaten by jungle orangutan or something and then go visit jungle castle (Boy Lacer is getting a castle for Christmas, unfortunately not a real one). We’ve already had (courtesy of Girl Lacer) the pirate ship not having any wind, so they’ve had to row to the garage to get some petrol!

After school and some serious playing (an ‘advantage’ for both my two being quite close in age is that they have ‘twice’ as many toys as they share (most of the time) each others, even though they’re boy and girl, I wasn’t sure originally if that would happen considering they’re different sexes but Girl Lacer is more than happy to play with boys toys and vice a versa), we finished icing the baking and waited for Mr. Lacer to come join us for birthday tea. Boy Lacer was desperate, seeing all this lovely food me and Girl Lacer were making, he wanted it now! We had the tea buffet style, never a brilliant idea with Boy Lacer, he thinks each bowl is his own and then will go and nick food from your plate, but he ate his body weight in cocktail sausages and crisps, put his nose up at my traditional number biscuits (Nigella Lawson’s butter cut-out biscuits, cut into the birthday boy’s / girl’s age) and stuffed a large slice of Monster birthday cake down his mouth (I’m sure his jaw has some sort of special ultra-extendable mode just dedicated for cake stuffing). The Monster cake was inspired by an episode of (you guessed it) Charlie and Lola, the one where Charlie has a birthday party that Lola ruins, it’s green butter icing with liquorice allsort decorations. Underneath all the butter icing was Nigella Lawson’s buttermilk birthday cake, which *yawn* I make every year but works. I had tried to be a little different this year by attempted to make it a marble cake, as I was feeling sentimental and remembering how the one and only (non-packet mix) cake my mum would make was this psychedelic marble cake (well it was the 70s) and I thought I’d have a go but I could only find chocolate marble cake, so I just divided the buttermilk cake batter into two bowls and added my new Squires colouring paste but it only resulted in very vague colouring.

So, my little man is 3 and I think he is now starting to enter his terrible 2s! He can still butter me up with his beautiful blue eyes though! I’m sure though I’m not the only mum of a child with developmental delay to find these days bittersweet. Most of the time, even though having an older child, I’ve lost count of what a ‘normal’ 36 month old should do but on days like birthdays it’s easier to remember what older siblings were doing (like ripping off wrapping paper for a start). Here’s to another mixed up year, to Boy Lacer’s beaming smiles, his arms tight cuddles and his many passions (currently drawing, now that is one thing that is advanced!).

Taking an elephant shopping

Or – Elliott the Elephant packed his trunk and went to stay with the Lacers

Girl Lacer’s class have an elephant as a ‘pet’, they also have a goldfish but that’s a bit more difficult to take home. He comes with a little green suitcase complete with soap, toothpaste and a travel diary and he is meant to accompany you on your weekend outings. This weekend he came to stay with us. So Elliott came to watch Girl Lacer’s ballet, then hopped onto the bus with us and into town to help Girl Lacer buy Boy Lacer a birthday present.

Girl Lacer ended up buying Boy Lacer a book, ok, a cool book (it has a hand puppet in the middle of the book) but oh that boy is so difficult to buy for I feel sorry for him! His birthday presents this year (bar a large toy garage from the Great Grandmas) are not inspiring, we’re obviously on a budget (who isn’t?) but I refuse to buy plastic tat just because it’s cheap, if I purchase anything these days and I don’t think it’ll last and we won’t get a lot of use out of it, I won’t buy it because it’s false economy but if it’s too expensive I won’t buy it either. Consequently from us Boy Lacer has a couple of Charlie and Lola books, a Charlie and Lola t-shirt and a couple of small In the Night Garden toys (my kids influenced by TV based merchandising?, no of course not ). I’d actually forgotten about the In the Night Garden toys and rang Mr. Lacer in a panic going “I did buy him a third birthday present didn’t I?” (we have a birthday / Christmas rule of a ‘main’ present about £20 and two smaller presents of about £10 each). Boy Lacer is also difficult to buy for because we have a lot of the ‘standard toys’ already from Girl Lacer and it can also be difficult to judge what toys are developmentally suitable, i.e. will push him but not too much and one’s that he’ll actually play with. His favourite ‘toy’ at the moment is an endless supply of our printer paper and something to draw with, he’s been like that for a few weeks now (although he’s always liked drawing, he’s now a lot lot more in to it) and his drawings are getting (for his chronological age) pretty darn good, they’re a bit ‘abstract’ but definitely not scribbles! Boy Lacer’s birthday is also incredibly overshadowed by Girl Lacer’s birthday in a month time, which seems to be generating a lot more excitement (Boy Lacer doesn’t even seem to know he’s having a birthday soon).

As well as birthday shopping for Boy Lacer, we did a spot of craft shopping. I’m planning crafty party bags for Girl Lacer’s party (see, birthdays again), it’s a princess and pirate themed party and the boys are getting ‘pirates treasure’ i.e. a couple of tubs of glitter (ooh their parents are going to hate me) and the girls are getting beads and string to make a bracelet and I’m planning to make simple little bags to keep the glitter / beads together. So me and Girl Lacer went into a fabulous local bead shop (Bead Time in Kingston) where you can pick and mix your beads, at extremely reasonable prices. I thought, in the whole spirit of getting Girl Lacer involved that I’d let her help me choose the beads as it’s her party after all but I also wanted to make sure the beads had big enough holes to thread the string through without a needle or anything and getting over to her what a big enough hole was, was easier said than done. But we got a good mix of beads and I by chance found some flower beads perfect for an upcoming project. We then went onto John Lewis where they had some perfect skull and cross bones fabric, perfect for the ‘pirates’ party bags. I wanted to find some suitable princess fabric but Girl Lacer insisted she could ‘draw it’, so we got plain bright pink fabric (her choice, shudder), so we’ll see.