The strawberry grab

We're now only a month behind!!! Here is Tim on his birthday, he and Ana have just blown out the candles on his cake, and Rose has just reached out and grabbed a strawberry off it!

Tim loves the floodplain

and took this gorgeous shot a few weeks ago as dusk was falling over it.

Boxes are best

All kids love boxes. I am sure that is a fact! Ours are no exception and take great delight in squeezing in and out of them. Here Ana contorted herself to fit into a very small box, I don't think she suffers from claustrophobia!

Tired legs

When legs are tired there is no better place than the lovely vantage point provided by Daddy's shoulders.

Being Engines...

We discovered this disused railway line, and filled the small cutting with the sound of "chuffa-chuffa choo choos!" once more.

This photo may look like Lara and Ana, but is acutally of Percy and Thomas.

RUNNNNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

After her strawberry ice-cream Rose was, to say the least, a bit messy. Ana took it upon herself to clean her baby sister and here she is trying to do that! Rose was not in favour of the process and ran as fast as her little legs could carry her. Ana can run faster though and a good wiping ensued...

The first ice-creams of the season!

We took the girls to a country park and enjoyed having weather that was warm enough to enjoy ice-creams in, hurrah! The girls of course adored them and got delightfully sticky, thank goodness for baby wipes.

A momentous day

16th March 2010, Tim had his Viva. A couple of weeks later the final document was handed in and published - a wonderful day after six long years of work. Well done Dr Timothy!

The weighty tome is already unceremoniously gathering dust on the top of our dresser, but it is comforting to know it's there.

Bouncing in the cot!

Ana and Rose love to bounce, and here they are having a wonderful time destroying Rose's mattress. All of the pictures I took if this had Ana blurred in as she was jumping SO high!

No ladybirds were harmed in the making of this blog

But Ana was delighted to get one to crawl up her arm!

Ladybird watching

A month or so ago we had loads of ladybirds in our garden, much to Ana's delight! Here she is showing one to Rose.

Crumbs and all!

snack time on the bench...

...with cuddles

Ride-on toys

Both the girls love ride-on toys. So, although it was rather unorthodox, this dumper-truck was given a go. As there was no means of propulsion it was soon disregarded in favour of the trike : )

Running by!

Hiding

Ana is discovering the joys of hide-and-seek, but as yet has not grasped the finer points. Here she is hiding behind a tree from Grampa (she picked the only one smaller than her!).

Rose's first Easter egg hunt!

Ok, we've been a bit too busy to blog for a while, so here we are back at Easter!

The Friday before Easter we had our own mini Easter egg hunt, hiding the girl's eggs in and around their toys. Rose was the first to find one inside her oven, but instead of ripping off the foil and devouring the contents, she proceeded to drop-kick it around the room! She obviously thought it was some shiny and oddly-shaped football. Ana found hers in the dollshouse so we enlightened Rose what it really was and much happy muching ensued...

Rose coming coming down the slide

Rose loves playing in the garden, and particularly enjoys the slide. The day before yesterday, Rose launched herself down the slide headfirst, numerous times. Quite amusing really!

Ana is attacking me at the moment, trying to 'help' write this blog post. She says she likes kicking the ball in the garden. Now I shall take Ana out scooting in the sunshine.

Cousins!

Rose and Leia will be in the same year at school. When Leia was born, they were at rather different stages of babyhood. Now, though, the age-gap is narrowing.

I think Rose likes having someone younger than her around - she had just been 'helping' Leia to a drink from her beaker.

In a cushion house

The girls (like all kids, I'm sure) like having little houses made of cushions in which to play.

This one is made of sofa cushions and the Parisian blanket we stole from Lara's folks (don't tell them). We often get invited in to the girls' houses too, but we sometimes struggle to fit.

Say "Ahhh", Leia!

Ana and Rose are not the world's best eaters. However, they both LOVED feeding Leia. They were taking turns very nicely - one spoon from Ana, one from Rose, one from Ana, one from Rose...

Rose climbing the ladder

On a recent visit to Cambridge, we were pruning the trees. Rose is never one to miss an opportunity for mischief. So, when our backs were turned, she began her long climb up the ladder.

Thankfully Uncle Daniel was quickly nearby to provide some support (or was that encouragement to go higher?).

Fashionistas

Thanks to a swanky new phone (thanks Caroline!) I can now take pics when out and about, enabling me to capture the joy of the girls in their new sunglasses! They absolutely adored them, as you can probably see from the toothy grins. The grins are getting more and more toothy as poor Rose is teething at the moment, though it seems to be abating now after about 2 weeks of 'fun'!

Little Thomas

Ana has a new hero, with a short stumpy dome and a short stumpy funnel. He has a blue coat with red stripes and his coaches are Annie and Clarabel. She is currently insisting on being called Thomas, Daddy has been renamed Gordon, Rose is James or Rosie (a new engine) and Mummy is Rosie or Percy according to Ana's thinking at the time.

The upshot of this is that Daddy and Ana chuff constantly around the lounge diner (now the Island of Sodor), acting out the scene where Gordon pulls the express and gets so tired that he falls asleep in a siding, only to have cheeky Thomas run up and shout "peep peep, wake up lazy bones!!!". Ana takes such delight and gets so excited by this that it can't be played after dinner time, otherwise she'd never go to bed!

Communication

Rose is a very good non-verbal communicator, but today she took a step forward - saying both 'apple' and 'mine'! These may have sounded to the less interpretive of you as 'appa' and 'my', but a mother knows... What a clever baby!