Snowing in February

So here we are in February and it's snowing. Christmas was good and fun, then we've done birthdays so we find ourselves here.

Life is merrily going about its way. Lani is now 2, sleeping well in her bed, and off of formula. Inching closer every day towards potty training....eek! Kayne is... well..... himself, reading well, still adores maths and computers. He is obessed with Gogo's and has possibly close to 100, i'm cringing on the fact that there is a 3rd series coming out soon and he hasn't got all of the first 2 sets yet - which is his plan.

DIYness.

Somehow my housy/craft side made it's way to the forefront so i've done this x2:

Nice clean and tidy, no more pencil marks, no more juice/jelly stains.

On Saturday we went to Ikea for the first time ever. We took my parents and Marks dad, and left teh kids with marks mum. We bought a bunk bed + one matteress, and we bought several Trofast items so we could have some sort of order/uniformness with the kids (abundance of) toys. we also switched rooms with them so they have the somewhat bigger room. We still have ample space in our room so it's all good.

They now have enough space to get toys out, lay train tracks, play legos etc in the room and not all over the living room. We got a white board easel for them too. we've stuck all thier stars up over the ceiling which Kayne really likes.

I'm still not 100% happy about Kayne being in a bunk bed but so far he's been really good about it. He's used one before when we were on holiday. He has been going on about his 'high bed' for ages and he was shaking with excitement when he came home and saw it. He is being careful and counting the steps down (one, two, three, floor!) and going slowly.

Lani is in the bottom bunk, Saturday she slept very little in general because she is poorly, but most of it was in the bed. Tonight she has just gone straight down in it with no problems!! She has also slept alot today,so she is definiatly feeling quite unwell.

Hayling Island

We went to the beach today, we picked a great day today. Picniced in the car, then went for a long walk. Lani wanted to go in the sea but it was too chilly. Kayne and I rode a roller coaster, i'm not sure he liked it much.
Picture montage;

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Farewell little friend

I have to put sad news; we had to have Smoke put to sleep on Friday. Such a sweet boy. He was always tiny and breathed fast, but in a small space of time he went really downhill. The vet said he had pneumonia, that we could have antibiotics but it would just prolong the inevitable. We haven't told Kayne yet...we don't know how to. Comet and Milk seem a bit depressed... poor guys.

Farewell little friend...

What colour walls should we have?

After having kids I have learnt one thing that is very important (well many, but this one is relevent) ; Do not leave writing implements laying around.
Upon coming home yesterday Kayne informs me that M had got a 'team point' at school. Cue me spending a good 30 mins making team point sheets. Kayne gave people team points - me for washing, daddy for shopping, Lani for 'good talking'. They are now stuck to the living room wall. We put away the pens and things, they start playing with dinosaurs.
After sticking them up I went to sort out some washing. 10 minutes later i hear arguing, as i go into the living they are both stood on the sofa and i see they are fighting over a pencil. Kayne says 'Mummy! I was trying to help Lani put eyes on her faces but she won't let me!!' *sigh* Now she has forced our hand at decorating the living room. There is a meter of pencil wall art above our sofa! We also have the wonderful challenge of trying to pick a colour, i'm not going to attemp wallpaper becausei don't trust any of the walls to be straight or reasonable to hang paper on.
So i go and put some dinner on and then i open the kiddie gate and a few moments later Lani comes wandering to find me. She holds her hand out to me and says 'Oh no, look, blue!' sure enough she hand is completely blue, so are her arms and face, then she says 'oh memma (mummy) look, bear-bear blue'. So obviously one pen didn't go back and i have a teddy to wash again.

Intelligent lyrics.

On of my favourite genres of music is Hiphop/rap, but not the rubbish that some people are coming out with. I like the intelligent lyrics, the artists who have crafted their music and lyrics. I like when it tells a story and describes a scene to me. I love Will Smiths song 'Willow is a player' for this reason; it's great if you understand who Willow is. Another artist that Leo introduced to me is Dan le Sac and Scoobious Pip, his lyrics are just phenomenal so well written, preformed and intelligent. I am struggling to pick which song to link to... so instead i'll link to a review.
Another person who gives us interesting honest lyrics is Tupac Shakur. The subjects he chose to talk about were strong and he did them well. I hate the use of swear words in music as i think it is completely unnescessary but with this genre you can't really escape it it seems.
And Eminem but we could be here for weeks over that guy.

Reading lyrics...

So, again i find myself questioning one of my decisions. Such is the nature of parenting i believe. I know that Kayne is gaining skills and finding joy in being at school but i am not. Truth is i miss him, I feel a bit like we've just lost something important; though i'm not sure what it is. When i fell pregnant with him i vowed i wouldn't put him in childcare so i could work, i felt it was a bit pointless having a child to be away from them 9 hours a day (though i understand people have to do this to survive). Now it feels odd that i have broken my vow because it's normal for kids to go to school. I thought hard about homeschooling but i worry about being good enough.
I guess in a week or so i will feel better. I know that it is good for him, he has friends, is happy, and is alot more confident than a few months ago. Also homeschooling is our back up plan - just in case.

I have been fiddling on Kayne and Lani's webpage, adding info etc. listening to media player. I rediscovered some of the songs i love in Dutch. After searching for songteksten i realised i can read it kinda ok. I mean obviously my vocab is like a toddlers but I can get the jist of a line if i understand a few words. Maybe it's because song lyrics are quite patterned and the words aren't that different through out a song. I find it interesting that i can (somewhat) read in another language yet i can't really speak it, nor can i understand a few simple sentences spoken by a native and i'd also have trouble writing anything because i struggle with learning the grammar.
But even still i love the band; Bløf, and the hiphop artist; Brainpower and a few others. I found this song today Engel voor één dag / An angel for a day. It's a beautiful song. My friend sent me this a while ago Omarm me / Embrace me, it literally made me breathless. The guy has the most amazing voice.
I just thought that maybe i find the reading easiest because i have strong reading skills - i read ALOT. I know why my speaking/writing is poor - i won't do it unless i know it's right. I realised also that i can sing the songs perfectly in my head... not that anyone would like to hear me sing out loud!
A while ago we found a great site for learning Japanese. I thought it was good because they explained why certain expressions are used in certain situations, also they went on to explain the Japanese 'pitch accent', e.g. the pitch variations within each word...which meant i felt i was getting it right more often.
Can you tell i am thinking about too much? I think i'm going to feed music through the T.V tomorrow and fill Lani's head with random songs in foreign languages. I think she needs more signs, she learnt 3 today; happy, sad and coat. She impressed me by using sad appropriately on person in a book who looked sad. I can't remember Kayne ever doing that.