Ana with Berry Dolly

 Lara has a sling in which she carries Rose (and sometimes Ana). The other morning, Ana wanted to wear it, so here she is carrying Rose's Berry Dolly (Molly's little sister, according to Ana).

Happy Birthday Gran!

 A contented 'gather-round-the-cake' scene preceeded the lengthy candle-extinguishing session by Ana and Gran. 

Rose appears to be developing a keen interest in chocolate cake. And again, tonight, as I was eating a leftover piece - she made a lunge for my portion, covering her fingers in the undietish icing...

Thankfully, I managed to stop her hand before it reached her mouth. I could just imagine the conversation at the coffee mornings...

Mother 1: "Little Susy had her first taste of baby rice the other day, at first she wasn't too sure, but soon got the hang of it - has Rose started eating yet?"

Lara: "Well, yes...."

Smiley Rose

 Rose is developing such a lovely smile - and here is one of them for you.

Making lots of cakes (well, 2 cakes and a lot of mess)

 So, this weekend was a happy conjunction of two birthdays (or close enough). Ben came to visit us on Friday - so he got a cake - and Mom and Dad (Farewell) came today - and as it was Mom's birthday on Friday, she got a cake. The upshot of this, is of course, we got cake twice in a weekend, and the unfortunate upshot of that is that all my efforts of chocolate avoidance over the last week have just been nullified...

Windswept

 We love this hilltop and so does Ana, Rose has yet to pass judgement as she was still fast asleep.

"What's this?"

 These are the exact words issued from our eldest's mouth upon seeing this small hillock, and, apart from stating the obvious (that it was a mound with grass on), we have no idea!  And to a geologist and a geographer, not having the answer to this small natural phenomena is rather irritating.  So if you could put us out of our misery with a little story of how this (and the flock of others there too) were formed, we would be very grateful.

Out with the girls

 Yesterday was a beautiful warm-up-to-Spring day, so we decided to do a proper walk with the girls - Rose in the sling and Ana (occassionally!) in the back-pack.  Ana was so pooped by the end of the walk that she fell asleep just as we were getting to her favourite bit: seeing the ponies.  Rose also spent most of the walk asleep but had less excuse than Ana!

Daddy it's SO unfair...

 ...you have SO much more hair than me!

But not for long, Tim's not quite bald now, just distinctly shorn  ; )

Rose is rolling and talking

 A couple of weeks ago, Rose rolled over from her back to her front a couple times, and now consistently can get onto her side. What is so cute now, though, is how much Rose 'talks'. For say, ten minutes at a time you can have a squalking and cooing conversation with her - punctuated with big slobbery grins and wobble-dancing. 

When they are both awake, Ana just does not leave Rose alone - she is always trying to give her big hugs -so when the eldest has gone down for the night (which thankfully now is completely painless! Yay- thank you God!) Rose has some time to herself to play on her mat. Here another difference comes out - Ana was not be content to play by herself for long periods of time - yet Rose is. I'm astonished at how different they are.

Our car

Nigel is great at finding us vehicles which work. We neglect them and yet they keep going... Today though, I was in a rush to get home in time for supper - so I ran to the car, blipped the locks and got in. Something was not right with the car - you know when you get that odd feeling... Well, the seat had been moved forwards.

And it didn't quite smell right - as if someone had been smoking in our car... and there was an empty bottle of drink in the passenger seat footwell. It just was not as I had left it. I looked around. The car seats had gone too!

And then it dawned on me... I was in the wrong car.

With amazing speed, I leapt from the stationary vehicle, spotted my car, a few cars over, got in that and drove away.

I wonder now, how confused the owner of the other silver Avensis will be when they get in their car, and find the seat pushed back all the way...

Rose can roll

 Rose surprised us a week ago on Sunday (at just over three months) by rolling from her back to her front.

  Then, today we were even more surprised to see her stand up and walk unaided across the room... (only joking...) :) 

Seriously though, both girls are growing up so fast. There is this almost tangible tension between wanting them to develop and grow, and just wishing that they would stay tiny for a little bit longer.

Gran, Rose and Ana

 When Mom (Gran) came to help out while Lara was ill last week, we went for a walk down to the floodplain. Snow angels were made, snowballs were dropped off Goosey Bridge and a certain toddler fell over a number of times in the recieving snow. 

Snow angels!

 Here are our 2 little angels in the snow - Ana having great fun making a proper snow angel and Rose joining her for the photo.  Both wrapped up in beautifully pink suits and layers upon layers.  We had the most snow Tim has ever seen (in England that is!), 4-5 inches we think.

Snow encrusted branches

 Looking up, these stark branches were too stunning to miss against the wintry sky.

The hush of snow

 The magical muffled sounds of snow, the crunch underfoot, the whistling of the wind past swan's wings as they fly over... beautiful days.

Making our snowman

 Here's Ana proudly carrying our snowman's head before gently placing it on the awaiting torso.  Unfortunately her placement was not quite central, and the effects of gravity meant that the snowman needed a new head (which subsequently got knocked down by the kittens, hey ho!).

Daddy winning the snowball fight!

 Ok, so there wasn't much competition... Ana thought it was hilarious to be covered in snow, and Tim was more than happy to throw it. Snow can be such fun!

Ana's chair

 We've had this child's chair since soon after we got married, we purloined it from my Grampa's loft and it has been sitting in ours until we got it out yesterday for Ana.  She was, needless to say, delighted with having her own little blue chair, and Rose even fits on it too!

The showdown

 Ana was once again chasing the new cats around the garden this morning. Observant blog readers may notice the new outfit - an all in one (supposedly waterproof) playsuit! Just what our adventurous and puddle loving daughter needs! 

The other cutest baby in the world, ever...

 Giggly, smiley, happy Rose-bud. Just waking up, still swaddled up nice and warm and beaming with joy. 

"I'm just so happy to be awake!"

Sisterly affection

Here is Ana with her adored little sister.  She does love her very much but still hasn't quite yet learned the concept of 'gentle'!

Shopping with Daddy!

 Tim took Ana shopping the other day and she loved it!  She took her own little ruck-sack (Ana calls it a "nap-pack"), Daddy had his big one, and they both carried food home in them to make our chicken pie, mmmmm...

The first attempt to crawl

 Here is our little Rose Amia Joy attempting her first crawl.  Admittedly it was just a wriggle, a grin and a gradual laying down of her head as it got a bit too heavy to hold up, but it was an attempt none-the-less!

Standing on her head

 Ana is getting more acrobatic these days - such a little girl now, and such fun. 

"Ana stand on-a head!"

Walk on the floodplain by the church

 A lovely sunny walk down by the church and old water mill. Nippy, but such glorious weather!