15 November , 201615 November , 2016 - Sarah 6 Comments

Living Arrows 46/52 (2016)

This last week has been fairly uneventful, we’re still trying to get the painting finished in the kitchen so we haven’t been getting out at the weekends really. We did manage a walk into town on Sunday with Gabe in the buggy and Toby on his SmartTrike – he loves it but kept wanting me to go ‘really speedy fast’ and it nearly killed me!

Barry is away in Germany with work for the whole of this week so it’s just me and the boys and I’m in survival mode. I’ve made the most of them being at nursery today by having my hair cut and… having a nap! I haven’t actually done that since we moved here and they’ve been going to nursery but we didn’t have a brilliant night last night and I figured I could use all the sleep I could get.

This weeks photos were taken in the house this week, although autumn afternoon light indoors is awful for taking pictures! The boys are getting much better at, not exactly playing together, but at least co-existing in the same space without killing each other! Gabe has discovered the rocking horse this week – we got it for Toby’s second Christmas and it’s had plenty of use over the last two years. Gabe has been loving it – he really got the hang of rocking and was going for it so hard he was actually moving across the room!

Gabe riding on the rocking horse

Toby is almost impossible to take a posed photo of these days – the best photos I get of him are when he doesn’t know I’m taking them. This one came out alright though I think…

Toby not pulling a silly face for once

Hopefully we’ll actually get out this weekend and I’ll have some more interesting pictures for next week’s post.

9 November , 2016 - Sarah 6 Comments

Living Arrows 45/52 (2016)

I’m late again with my Living Arrows post this week. It’s been busy round these parts again – the kitchen is heading towards finished with a bit more painting to do, a new floor to go down and a new table and chairs to get. I’m really pleased with it and but I didn’t really enjoy spending a whole day unpacking all the boxes again and finding a place for everything!

Barry spent the weekend painting so on Saturday I took the boys for a walk into town to get them out of the way. It was really cold but we wrapped up warm and Toby had a lovely time collecting leaves and then running through all the dried leaves along the path.

Toby enjoying collecting autumn leaves

Gabe’s personality has really been coming out even more these last few weeks. His reflux mostly seems to be under control, we saw the paediatrician last week and she’s happy for him to continue on his meds and review things again in six months. The teeth that have been coming over the last few weeks have all finally cut now too – so that’s four molars and four canines in about three weeks! We’ve had quite a few grumpy days and nights but at least he should be over the worst of it now, and there are only four more molars to come before he has all his teeth! He’s coped remarkably well really, it must have been so painful for him – you can see the rash round his mouth on this week’s photo too, teething drool isn’t pleasant!

Gabe has been suffering with teething and has a rash round his mouth

His sleep has been slowly getting better too – a couple of nights recently he has made it until 3 am before his first wake up, which is a massive improvement on the 10 pm of a few weeks ago. There’s not much of a leap to make now before he’ll be sleeping all night….I hope! He has to sleep all night one of these days.

Gabe’s big news this week though is that he has started walking!! It was only two weekends ago that he started letting go when he was standing up, and managing to stand up without holding on to anything. He started trying to take a couple of steps last week but he’s really started to get the hang of it this week. So I’ll leave you with this….

1 November , 2016 - Sarah 3 Comments

Living Arrows 44/52 (2016)

I don’t know where the time is going at the moment; October seems to have disappeared in the blink of an eye!

It’s been a pretty quiet week here; we still don’t have a working kitchen so we’ve not been spending a huge amount of time at home. It’s getting closed to finished now, or at least usable, so things should be a bit easier in the next few days.

Yesterday we needed to get away from the kitchen noise and dirt so after a quick trip to Aldi we headed to the park. Gabe still isn’t walking on his own but he loves walking around holding our hands so I actually got him out of the buggy and let him explore, and he had a little go on the swing too. You wouldn’t know looking at his face here that he’s now on the 7th and 8th new teeth in the last three weeks! He now has all four first molars, and three of his canines through the gum, with one more canine to go. And then I really hope he gets a long break from it before the last molars come – he’s not even 15 months yet!

Gabe having fun on the swing at the park

Toby is equal parts brilliantly funny, adorable and infuriating at the moment. He has suddenly hit that age of needing to know everything and the questions just don’t stop all day! He very much knows his own mind now too and will only do what he wants too (without a lot of argument!). On the whole though I’m loving this age with Toby, and most of the time I actually enjoy spending time with him. He’s such a cool dude too – just look at him in his sunglasses at the park…

Cool dude Toby on the slide in his sunglasses

24 October , 201623 October , 2016 - Sarah 8 Comments

Living Arrows 43/52 (2016)

Hurray! For the second week in a row we have a positive Living Arrows post. It hasn’t been the easiest of weeks in a practical sense – on Monday work started on our new kitchen and by the evening we were left with a completely empty room. By Wednesday the new false ceiling and wiring for the lights had been put in and now we are just waiting for the whole room to be plastered which is happening today. Once the plaster is on the kitchen can be fitted, and hopefully by the end of next week we might have a usable kitchen, even though it will probably still be a way off finished. In the meantime we have been spending quite a bit of time at my mum and dad’s house, there have been a couple of takeaways, and we have even managed to cook a few things in the spare bedroom using our bargain Aldi mini oven and hot plate!

However, apart from coping without a kitchen, and Barry having a night away for work on Wednesday, it hasn’t been a bad week at all. Toby is still doing great with his potty training. On Friday we went to Warrington to meet my friend Claire and her twins and he managed a whole day out, including an hour each way in the car, with no accidents.

Both boys’ Living Arrows pictures were taken on our day out. We went to Walton Hall and Gardens just south of Warrington. It was a big park with a great play area, a cafe and even a small children’s zoo (if you can call goats, rabbits and peacocks a zoo). There was plenty to do for the boys but sometimes all you need is your wellies on, a good stick and a muddy puddle to splash in.

Toby splashing in a muddy puddle with his new stick

Gabe has continued to show us his happier side this last week too. For the first time in ages he isn’t ill, and although his top two molars are only half through I think his teeth are giving him a bit of a break for now too. His sleep is still all over the place but we haven’t had any really awful nights for a while, and on Saturday night he made it until 4 am before his first wake up again.

Even though he spent most of the day in the car or the buggy on Friday Gabe seemed to enjoy his day out too. I can’t wait for him to start walking though so he can get out and start running around with the other boys. In the last couple of days though he has started standing unaided, and he can walk just holding one hand so I don’t think proper walking will be too far away. And until then, just look at his little face!

Gabe and his lovely smile

17 October , 201617 October , 2016 - Sarah 5 Comments

Living Arrows 42/52 (2016)

It feels like we have finally turned a corner here in the Toby Goes Bananas house this week. In the last few days it’s like Gabe has turned into a different child. He has suddenly got a massive appetite and is eating everything I put in front of him, which after 8 months of struggling with weaning is absolutely amazing! He’s still got teeth making their way through but he doesn’t seem to have been in as much pain with them for the last few days. We’ve had a few nights of better sleep from him too – he’s still waking up but the other night he made it until after 4am before his first wake up, when it’s usually more like 10pm. Hopefully this is the first step on the road to sleeping through. I really hope so – three and a half years is a long time to go without a proper night’s sleep!

This week’s picture of Gabe is far from technically perfect – partly because Toby took it, but mostly because the light was rubbish. But just look at his big grin! When he’s wailing in your ear at three o’clock in the morning it’s hard to remember that sometimes he is actually happy but then you capture a smile like this and it doesn’t seem so hard any more.

Gabe giving a big grin

And as for Toby – I mentioned in last week’s Living Arrows post that we were making some progress with potty training… well on Wednesday he went to nursery in a nappy but after he used the loo at lunchtime they made him wear big boy pants – I’m not too sure if I’m entirely happy about that part but we’ll just gloss over it for now. He has only worn a nappy once since and that was only because I was scared about him having an accident in the middle of Sainsbury’s (and I was right to trust my instincts as he informed me in the yogurt aisle that he was doing a poo!).

Apart from that one poo in the nappy though he has only had one accident and I think that was because he was too busy playing. Every other wee and poo has gone in the potty or the toilet. He has been out in the car, to baby & toddler group, to the garden centre, to the supermarket…he’s used public toilets (with the help of a training seat) and generally just been brilliant about the whole thing.

And not only has he not been wearing nappies during the day, for the last four nights his night nappy has been dry too. I actually think he’s been pretty much dry at night for quite a while but he always used to wake up and immediately do a big wee in his nappy. That wee is now being saved for the potty. So it looks like, after our initial struggles, he might end up being dry day and night at the same time!

I’m so proud of my biggest boy. He can still wind me up in an instant but then he is three after all, and he flashes me one of his lovely smiles and I can’t stay cross at him for long…

Toby and his lovely smile

Work starts on our new kitchen tomorrow and we’ll probably move out to my mum and dad’s house for a few days so it’s all going to be a bit hectic for a couple of weeks. Hopefully I’ll still manage to get some pictures of my boys and I’ll see you next week for another Living Arrows.

3 October , 2016 - Sarah 9 Comments

Living Arrows 40/52 (2016)

We are sometimes a bit rubbish about getting out and actually doing things at the weekend – there are always jobs to be done, I worry about disrupting Gabe’s nap routine, and sometimes we are just a bit rubbish and it’s the middle of the afternoon before we know it and we haven’t done anything.

Yesterday though, the sun was shining so we made an effort to get out. We went to Beacon Fell, which is a smallish hill about half an hour from where we live. You can park quite near the top so it’s not too much of a walk for little three year old legs.

Barry took loads of photos so I might do a full post about it another time but for now I just want to share these two for this week’s Living Arrows post.

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It was a lovely sunny day but not that warm in the shade and I knew from experience it could be windy on the top. I’m glad Toby’s rainbow snuggle fleece still fits him though – it looks like it might see us through another winter!

For the second week in a row I am also in Gabe’s picture. I’ve only carried him on my back a few times in our Lillebaby but he seemed very happy yesterday. It’s really comfortable to carry him this way too. We did need a bit of a rest when we got to the top though…

40_52-16-g

27 September , 2016 - Sarah 4 Comments

Living Arrows 39/52 (2016)

I’m sure I only wrote last week’s Living Arrows post two minutes ago, time seems to be speeding by at the moment! We’ve still not being up to much, just settling into our new routine.

Gabe was still recovering from his immunisations last week and had a bit of a temperature on Wednesday. He’s got all four of his first molars coming at the moment too – two of them have cut and the other two are on the way. He’s coping pretty well, just not sleeping very well (not that he ever does!).

My parents are both involved in Scouts and at the weekend my dad was camping with his group just round the corner from our house. I took the boys along for the afternoon on Saturday – Toby had a brilliant time just running around the field and joining in some of the activities. I had Gabe in the carrier and even though he was a bit grumpy and tired he still managed to charm everyone with a few cheeky smiles.

Gabe giving a cheeky smile at scout camp

It’s been quite a big week for Toby really – he went to his first ever birthday party, and wasn’t really a fan. To be fair, the entertainer was really, really loud and I probably would have been scared if I was three too! On the plus side though, I got chatting to one of the nursery mums and we’ve arranged to meet up in a couple of weeks so that’s good. We’ve also been making some progress on the potty training front with Toby too. We’re not there yet but yesterday he had three wees in the potty which he has never done before so we’re calling that a win!

I was messing about with my camera and a peek-through book the other day and took this picture of Toby…I quite like it. He’s getting much harder to photograph these days though – he has to be in the right mood to cooperate!

Toby through the peek-through hole of a book about space

21 September , 2016 - Sarah 5 Comments

Living Arrows 38/52 (2016)

A bit late this week… Gabe had his one year immunisations on Friday, and he’s getting two molars – he’s coping pretty well though apart from a lot of disturbed nights (for both of us). We met my friend Claire at soft play on Monday though and he seemed to be having plenty of fun. I love these sheep dungarees too – I’ll be sad when they don’t fit anymore.

And Toby this week? Well Toby had a massive chocolate ice cream!

12 September , 201611 September , 2016 - Sarah 8 Comments

Living Arrows 37/52 (2016)

You can tell it hasn’t been a great week when I haven’t posted anything since last week’s Living Arrows. Gabe’s sleep has been rubbish (even more rubbish than usual) thanks to his hand, foot and mouth, and I think possibly teeth as well. He’s gone right off his milk as well, and hasn’t been eating very well either so then he’s been even more grumpy because he’s hungry. Add to that we haven’t really been able to go anywhere because of him being contagious…

Toby has been pretty good this week though, despite being stuck in the house for a few days. We think he might have a very mild case of hand, foot and mouth too – he had one spot on his tongue for a day, and a very slight temperature but otherwise seems OK. Fingers crossed that’s it for him.

This week’s photos are more living room shots – we’ve not really been anywhere to take any others. I usually only do one picture of each boy for Living Arrows but this week I just couldn’t choose so they’ve got two each.

This first one is Gabe looking very serious. He’s not always grumpy but he’s definitely not as smiley a baby as Toby was.

And this is his other new face… I’m not sure if it’s a smile or a growl but it’s cute either way!

I usually share very smiley pictures of Toby so I’m going for something slightly different this week. Our new house has a balcony but it needs replacing and at the moment isn’t really safe to go out on. We’ve moved the play pen in front of the door now though so at least we can have the door open and let a bit of air in without anyone escaping! Toby was enjoying looking out over the fields with his big bunny this week.

And this last one is another close up but I just liked his expression…

7 September , 2016 - Sarah 3 Comments

Living Arrows 36/52 (2016)

If you read last week’s post you’ll know that Gabe had been ill with a cough which ended up causing a reflux flare. We then had a couple of days where he seemed OK followed by a few rubbish nights which I put down to teething. Then I was just about to leave him at nursery yesterday when the girls noticed he had some spots on his hands…yep, he’s only gone and got hand, foot and mouth disease! Seriously, this boy cannot catch a break. He’s actually coping with it surprisingly well so I’m just hoping he gets over it quickly and that the rest of us don’t catch it too.

This photo was taken last week before the latest illness struck. We found a new park to go to with plenty of things for Toby to do, and some swings for Gabe too. Just look at his little face…

Things are much the same with Toby. He’s doing well to sleep through all Gabe’s wakings, he’s still whinging and whining a lot of the time, but he’s also a big lovely cheeky chops.

Toby Goes Bananas

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