Three and counting

Who would have thought three years ago that we would be where we are today? We've come a long way together, Grace and me. I so want to sit and pen my thoughts and memories, hopes for you Grace, but life is crazy busy just now so I'm bunging this timeline of pictures on here instead, while I can, and just as soon as I can grab half hour to gather my head and put my thoughts down, I want to capture how I see you through my eyes as you turn from two to three years old. Until then, here's a little snippet, some favourites of mine...

3 years old

3 years old

2nd birthday

2 years

1st birthday

1 week old

5 days old

2 years and counting

Well Happy Birthday to me! Two years ago today I started this blog on a rainy Saturday when the ironing pile was beckoning and I needed something better to do with my time. What started out as "The Making of Gracie-Wiggle" became "Grace and Me" and brings me to where we are today. 260 posts under my belt and a whole lot of memories.

April is the month of occasions, blog's birthday, my birthday, our wedding anniversary. And Grace turned 20 months. She can now dress herself remnants from the laundry basket, favourites being Mummy's knickers and bra. Plenty of material to play with.

Thanks again for stopping by to read my drivel, hopefully you enjoy some of it.

Ciao for now! x

Merry Christmas!

Christmas is coming...

Fasten your seatbelts, Family L are ready for Christmas. Bedding in some new traditions, we've spent Christmas Eve dotting the i's and crossing the t's. Grace had us up early so we were out for sunrise at our favourite dog walking haunt at Newmillar Dam. Daisy ran her socks off in the forest while Grace slouched in the buggy digesting a breakfast fit for a princess. We popped into Ma Potter's on the way home to raid the fridge for all things yummy and foraged enough to see us through till tea time. Grace spent much of the visit practicing standing with both hands on her head to prove she can do it without the help of anyone, clever girl.

Back home to Faulty Towers, Grace caught up on some beauty sleep while Matt the Husband baked an arctic roll and some shortbread for Santa. That done, we're watching the obligatory Christmas movies on the box wondering how much longer G-bear will sleep for. We're not in a rush, but we do have some Christmas Eve traditions to lay down - baking the biscuits being one of them - DONE!

We are planning on helping Grace pen her letter to Santa this year, probably a crayon drawing of the big guy and his reindeer with her name written simply on the bottom so he knows who it's from. That's important, don't you think? After that Grace will take delivery from the Christmas Elf who has already popped by to drop off her pre-Christmas gift of new pyjamas and a book to read before bed for the last sleep before Santa pays a visit.

As usual, we're cooking up our Famous Festive Fajita Feast for supper, the full works with all the trimmings. It will be a first for Grace as she was still full on milk this time last year. How time has flown. From Milk to Mexican in 12 months, how blessed we have been.

I'll bid you all Merry Christmas now as I imagine I'll have other things on my mind tomorrow - just Grace, me and Matt the Husband make three. From Boxing Day onwards the family frenzy kicks off, so tomorrow is just for us, and we're going to enjoy it. Ho Ho Ho!

Halloween Happenings

Gripping on for dear life, Grace has taken to her feet and wants to walk, a lot. Crooked backs and lumbar pain has become par for the course as has a gaping cleavage if one dares to stoop with a flimsy T on. At the same time as Grace is advancing, Matt the Husband has gone through regression and is merrily reliving his childhood. Carving pumpkins, getting giddy over crispy autumn leaves and tugging at my apron strings asking if the pumpkin scones are ready to eat. Much to my amusement, he's discovered pumpkins are hollow and filled with seeds. Cue more amusement at the image of him bending half of his Mothers steriling silver spoons trying to hollow out a Turnip some 25 years ago. Turnip lantern. Has a ring to it, doesn't it?

Sticking with the americanisms of pumpkins for Halloween, we chowed down on pumpkin soup tonight under lantern light as Daisy-woof fended off a steady stream of trick or treaters.

Here are some of my favourite pics from the last few days...

First Birthday - a few pics

The cupcake mountain

The cake that Grandma made

The new playhouse unveiled

Sheli and Grace on the drums...

Laura and Canoe-matt opening pressies with Grace

Grace and Michael playing with Dolly

We took hundreds of pics on the day - some of them are on our flickr link so do take a look!

Birthday Belle: 1 year

Wow! Your birthday has come around so quickly Grace!

It's been a rollercoaster year, I won't lie to you! That said, I have cherished every moment and can't wait for the next. My raison d'être has emerged and I'm so grateful after all these years of searching for the perfect career path and I have found it completely by chance. We've had our ups and downs, our good days and bad, but we have always found patience with oneanother and for the first time in my life I can admit to having real peace - I want for nothing, I long for nothing as little G is here and she is everything I need. Matt the Husband is the same - he rushes home every night after work so we can all enjoy dinner as a family before taking Grace upstairs for bathtime, snuggles and bed.

We know we are very lucky. We are grateful.

Happy birthday little Buzz - we call her that - it's short for Buzzard... She eats anything.

In twelve months Grace has come a long long way... 12 teeth, size 4 nappies and a steadily growing 2 feet 8 inches tall! Weighing in at 21lb 6oz (pre-birthday cake), Grace is going strong. No real signs of movement on the crawling/walking front, although she's jolly good at sliding around on her bottom so she can reach the things she wants. Her favourite fruit is the blueberry, cereal is weetabix and favourite dinner is definately pasta or curry... spicy of course. All this goodness has made her stretch every item of clothing in the wardrobe and she is now reliably into size 2-3 years old, mainly as her legs are so very very long.

We had a wonderful day celebrating, more on that another day when I have more time. For now, Grace - one year old.

My favourite time of day - watching Grace wake up, refreshed, bright as a button and ready to take on the day with cheer...

Happy Father's Day!

Hi friends! I hope you enjoyed father's day as much as we did. Marking the first of many father's days to come we started off with a morning trip to the local swimming pool. This speaks volumes as only once before in the history of Matt the Husband and me have I known the hairy beast to strip down to his shorts and take a dip. It's a long story and I'm not going to go there today, just take it from me that Matt + Swimming pool = ACHIEVEMENT!

Grace hasn't been swimming for a while as we've been so very busy getting into the swing of life now I'm back at work but we're planning on making it a regular thing now Matt the Husband has his water wings out of the closet. Grace took a while to warm up but a few songs from her Daddy to get her in the mood had her giggling and waving her arms about like the crazy child she is. For me it was a nice excuse to rattle off a few lengths and it felt good!

In the afternoon we took Daisy-woof for a long walk through the woods and across the meadows on the outskirts of Leeds. The rain held for us and the sun came out which made a wonderful end to a wonderful day.

Here's the card that Grace made....

You can't quite make it out on the photo but there are some very random crayon scribbles on the grill of the car - clever bear!


A little father's day prayer inspired by our local church -
Celebrating fathers today. For the joys and privilege of fatherhood, we give thanks to God our heavenly Father.

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY!

I simply had to share this card with you that Grace made for me at nursery (with more than a small dose of help from Doromey her carer). My first mothers day was a treat as Matt the Husband took on household duties which allowed me relax in the morning... and do the household duties in the afternoon instead of the morning. He did cook a great joint of beef which we shared with Grace's Nanny and Grandpa, and we had a nice visit to her Grandma's on the way out with Daisy-woof.
Grace marked the occasion by popping out her 3rd tooth. HAPPY MOTHERS DAY!

Grace's Baptism

On Sunday Grace was christened by Canon Ian Black at St. Mary's. It was a beautifully special day spent with family and good friends sharing the occasion, yummy food and pink cake.