Happy Halloween

We had such a wonderful Halloween last night! There were more kids at the door than we’ve ever had before, and I was going to take Ben and Daniel Trick or Treating, but we just couldn’t get our timing right. We were going with the neighbours but they were running late, then Ben needed dinner and by the time everyone got together for the fireworks Ben was asleep… But he had good fun handing out sweets at the door and saying bye bye to everyone. He wasn’t quite sure WHY he was giving away the sweets though… Surely they were his? I think he was saying bye bye to the suckers and sweeties instead of the people …


Ben in his Policeman Costume


Riding the Horse

Daniel has been a little under the weather lately too, and is on antibiotics and an inhaler for a chest infection, but thankfully he’s on the mend now. You wouldn’t say there was anything wrong to be honest as he still smiled and laughed all the way through it.

Ben had a party at creche yesterday to celebrate too, and one of the girls there had a super costume on where it looked like she was riding a horse, and she was giving all the kids a ride… And here is Ben, loving it! He wasn’t too social though, after he finished his sweets and had his ride it was “Home, Mommy, HOME” while tugging me to the door…

Well, now that we’re into November already - we’ll have to start thinking of Christmas… It’s only weeks away. I love the holidays, and so as usual I can’t wait. It’s more special now because of the boys… We are in Dubai this year visiting mom and dad and I can’t wait for my dad to meet Daniel… One of the saddest things about living away from family is that they don’t get to see our beautiful boys growing up… I know and understand why I’m so biased, but Daniel really is a cutie… just look…

Wide Smiles

Oh!

I don't do Flashes

I Ga Goo

Translated is "I Love You", sung by our favourite purple dinosaur Barney - I thought I would show you all too (this is my first video posting), when Ben disappears it's to give me a hug and a kiss... And I couldn't post this without putting Daniel up too - and since he's only four months his repertoire is a little limited - watch how he doesn't roll onto his back :)

Ben is Two

Ben is Two!

We have had such a lovely day… Ben’s party went really smoothly, and everyone seemed to have a really good time! It didn’t rain and so the kids were out in the garden, ben I’m sure ate his weight in sweets, which is always a good yardstick for a party and is now sleeping off the sugar… A good time was had by all… Here are the photo’s…


The Cake


The Table


Look no Rain


Before the Party

Watching "In the Night Garden"

My Cake


Happy to You


Enjoying my cupcakes at creche

Counting down to two

Well, Ben is two on Saturday, and I just don’t know where the time has gone to! How could two years have past… I can’t help thinking this week, of how it was going into my second week of being overdue and remembering just how much I wished he was with us… But also, who would have thought two years ago that I’d be here today with TWO boys! It’s a little hectic here at the moment with preparations for the party, but I’m sure that everything will go smoothly… I will post the photo’s on Saturday afternoon for those of you who would like to see Ben on his birthday! Here are some of the photo’s we took this afternoon as we had a little impromptu photo session…

Isn't he lovely?

I have a new computer - yay!! With windows vista and so I’ve been spending some time finding my way around the new layouts. The great thing though is that I have new picture and editing packages which are fabulous to play with. I can make movies, burn dvd’s and generally have great fun recording my family Speaking of family I can’t help myself with the shots of the boys, I know there are a lot of them, they are just to wonderful… See for yourself…

Crazy Hair


Yogurt, the sixth food group


Baby's got blue eyes



Gratuitous cuteness


what our weekends have been reduced to!

Ben’s “Happy to You” is getting closer (his birthday party) and I am starting to panic slightly. We have most of the decorations we’re doing a baby Einstein theme, but I have to get the cake organised and the eats for everyone. I’ve decided it’ll be easier to structure the party and not keep it going to long so we’re having it at 10:30 in the morning with games and stories and a run in the garden… I’m looking forward to posting those photo’s…

What Good Weather

As my previous posts have stated, thank goodness! We finally are getting a few good days... And today must have been the best of them. We had such a lovely day with the boys - both were just angelic and neither cried... Bliss... We spent the morning at Ardgillian Castle and the playground there, time flew and Ben just loved the slides, but was even more taken with the sailing boats on the sea - he's taking more and more after his grandfather! He shouts "Boat!", "Boat!" at me all the time. Then we got home to get ready for John and Nicola coming over for a Braai. The weather held up and we got to eat outside. A real treat! :)

Unfortunately, Robin hasn't been with us this weekend, he is off competing in a Cisco Fitness/Team building Challenge with his company, which has meant night runs in the rain, canoeing in the dark, I believe he had to swim 400mtrs today - he's going to come back shattered.

Here are my beautiful boys :)...

Indian Summers

Finally! We seem to be having a reprieve from the wet weather and the last two weeks have been dry and bright... In that time the boys have been dragged from pillar to post outside... Every playground in a 50 mile radius has been visited (I can say that honestly cause we were up North in Newry and took him to a playground there) and every beach north of the liffy has seen some time too. Robin took Thursday and Friday off last week and we had a wonderful long weekend together... This week however, he is off on some corporate teambuilding challenge and will be away from Thursday to Sunday - I'm going to have my own teambuilding challenge on my hands at home with the two boys :)

Here are the latest photo's:



Come here fists


Riding Sheep in the Botanical Gardens


Dan practicing neck control - serious business


Riding bikes


Me and Dad squirrel spotting


Storytime with Nicola and the twins

Say Cheese

I have some lovely shots from the weekend and so this is more about photo's than text today... But I must tell you, we've been trying to teach Ben to smile, and to do that we've told him to say "cheese" and so that is the reason for some of the manic looking smiles you're about to see :)... Here are the boys... As I'm the official family photographer, shots are always with daddy!

Daniel...

Okay, so those of you that are sensitive to over indulgent mothers who think that there children are beautiful and like to show them off at any given opportunity - invited or not - stop reading now! I want to dedicate just one entry entirely to Daniel, who is changing daily and who has already at seven weeks shrugged off his "newborness" and has become a lovely, chubby baby. He is still sleeping well and I'm delighted to say lights up when his brother is around (as long as he's not hungry, sleepy, windy or generally cranky)... So who lights up some of the time his brother is around :)... He is also BIG on eye contact... As long as someone is talking to him face to face he's a happy little chap. I am so enjoying him and like all my previous posts, am loving being a mother of two - somehow I feel my family is more complete now...

Mom left today, back to Dubai. I was very sorry to see her go, but knowing that we'll be there for Christmas is something to look forward to. It was wonderful having her over and having her here to get to know Daniel a little... The next time she sees him he'll be six months old!

Here are a few more photo's of the boy...

The August Bank Holiday

It's mom's last weekend here as she is flying back to Dubai on Thursday and finally we got to go out for a meal, albeit Saturday lunch... The weather was halfway decent, and there were people swimming in the sea - but there was no sun to be seen at all. We got a bit of an early start on Saturday and left home at 10:30 for the garden centre to buy the plants to finish off the garden (see pic below)... The women there was wonderful and spent about half an hour with us advising on the type of plants for our garden... When it came to choosing I felt like a winner of one of those shopping gameshows were you are allowed to run around throwing things into the trolley willy nilly... 3 of those, 5 of these and chuck those in too for good measure :). Finally though the garden is pulling together and we have a really nice space outside for the boys to play and for us to entertain - if summer ever comes this year!

The boys are doing well and both are now over the chicken pox, Ben has been sleeping in a "big boy bed" for four nights now and is doing very well with the transition. Daniel is wonderful, and is so smiley in the mornings which is his best time. We are really enjoying him... and he is so different to Ben, I feel he completes our family. I have yet to experience anything more special than when Ben interacts with him and Daniel beams his gummy wide smile at his brother...

Here are a few more pics of the boys....




Say "Cheese"


Enjoying the Sunshine