The eagle-eyed among you may have noticed that I haven’t posted anything for ten days now, missing two Living Arrows posts in the process. This has been because the last two weeks have been clouded in a fog of illness in the Toby Goes Bananas house.

Toby was first to succumb; he had an awful cough, a snotty nose, temperatures of nearly 40° and pretty much stopped eating for three days. He was also waking up a lot in the night leading to lots of broken sleep for me too. I was, perhaps inevitably, the next to fall and although I avoided the temperatures I still felt rotten. We were really hoping Gabe had managed to avoid it as he seemed to still be well after a week but no such luck, and then finally Barry also lost his fight against the germs.

On top of that we’ve had to deal with the Forth Road Bridge being shut which has added an extra two hours to Barry’s working day. With that and looking after poorly boys, while trying to look after myself there hasn’t been a lot of time for blogging, hence this double Living Arrows post.

This photo of Gabe was just taken at home last week. It’s terrible trying to take pictures inside at the moment, it’s just so dark all the time, and what with all the illness we’ve not really been out of the house much. Gabe is four months old today (update post on the way when I get a chance!) and he’s really turning into a proper little boy now, there’s nothing of the newborn left in him. He’s so interested in everything that’s going on and sits watching his brother with fascination every day. I can’t wait for the next few months for him to start sitting up and hopefully then he’ll be able to interact with Toby a bit more too.

Toby’s picture was taken in the garden at the weekend. We actually had what felt like a proper winter’s day; cold and frosty, rather than the miserable wetness we’ve had almost every other day for the last few months. Barry took the chance to do a little bit of tidying up in the garden and Toby wanted to go out an join him. I think he looks ridiculously cute in his big bobble hat!

And lastly I wanted to include this picture of me with the boys, even though it’s not that clear. We only managed to get the Christmas decorations down out of the loft this weekend, and we decided this year not to put our big tree up, mostly due to lack of space but also so we wouldn’t have to spend a month telling Toby to leave it alone! Instead we’ve just got this little fibre optic tree. Both boys love the lights and for this year it’s good enough…

We are all now on the mend but none of us are entirely well yet. I’m just hoping we’re fully recovered for Christmas and that we’ve seen the last of the germs for this year!