After Anabelle

I can hardly believe that my last baby is now one! I have no idea at all where the last year went. July 2016 seems so long ago but only yesterday all at the same time. How did that tiny little baby get so big?! Oh just think of all the things he will be able to do another six months again from now on my next update. He is  observing and trying to copy lots now and time just moves way way too quickly. 

The run up to Lucas's birthday felt pretty manic, with all the end of the school year stuff going on as well. I did wonder how we would fit it all in. And then to top it off a bug hit the household in the few days before Lucas's Dedication and Party which was a massive stress too! It couldn't have been worse timing; well other than them going down with it the night before or on the day that is! Thankfully the birthday boy and biggest brother recovered enough to enjoy his day but middle brother (and Bampi looking after him) had to stay at home. 

I'm sure there is loads I've forgotten this month, all the little things he has done but he really did have the most wonderful birthday and we had a fabulous week celebrating him!

Little Lucas Elias! You are ONE! What an absolutely beautiful year we have been privileged to spend with you. We have had so many adventures and have loved every moment of watching you grow from the tiny little baby you were to the perfect little boy you are now.  To think you were just 6lb 8oz at your smallest! 

Again this month you have learnt to do so much! You've had your first haircut, you have started to cruise properly, had a little go at walking across the room with your walker, climbing more and more, (including the stairs so the gate has gone up!). You have learnt to clap, knee crawl consistently and even had a go at your first word.  And the best word it was too.... Mama! For me! Crawling after me shouting 'Mama'. I thought it was a fluke at first, but then you did it again and again. Seemingly consistently associating me with 'Mama'. Makes me burst! 


You are getting more and more vocal. Responding with your voice and trying to chat back in a slightly different way now. Shouting out to get our attention and babbling a little more. You are beginning to understand more and more. We think you understand 'No' now although whether you listen to it is another matter. You listen for Bampi apparently!  

You are exceptionally cheeky and know just how to make everyone laugh and get them on side with your super cuteness. You, my boy, are most definitely spoilt - continuing to have a lax-a-daisy bedtime when it suits you. We are totally softer on you than either of your big brothers would have got away with at a year old. A late nap is a disaster now and basically means you end up still downstairs with us until 9.00pm or later! 

But sleep on the whole, touch wood, is improving. The last two or three weeks have started to see a consistent pattern of you sleeping until the morning after your late night bottle. (Apart from the last couple of nights due to the 4 immunisations you had Tuesday, hope its not going to cause another regression!) It is incredible and you may very well be passing the crown of worst baby sleeper back to Zachy. Although I'm not counting my chickens just yet!  

At a year old you have 7 teeth, wear 9-12 month clothes, are 75cm tall and 19lb 6oz big. Which is incredible considering the week before your birthday you had lost a fair amount of weight;  with failing appetite, suspect nappies that turned into full blown diahorrea, plus sickness... it was a stressful few days where I thought we were cancelling your birthday and Dedication celebrations. But anyhoo, you recovered and clearly made up for it in the next few days with some non-stop eating and plentiful weight gain back on too!   

Your Dedication and party day was wonderful and it kicked off your birthday week perfectly. Apart from Zachy still being too poorly to come and celebrate with us, which meant Bampi volunteered to look after him so he missed it too. We celebrated you in Church, told everyone why you are so special to us and read a special story called "I'll Love You Always".  We partied on through the afternoon at your circus themed soft play with so many of our family and friends.  You looked gorgeous in your rainbow and red romper and totally enjoyed yourself all day.


Then the day before your birthday we took you to your first proper visit to a soft play,  Jump in Cardiff. We discovered you are quite the dare devil; wanting to go again and again down the slide with Daddy letting you go and then catching you at the bottom, shrieking and squealing with laughter! You were in your element, exploring all around!

On your birthday Mummy had to work, which just sucks but you had a great time! We opened a few presents in the morning (and your brothers 'helped' you with the rest the next morning!) and took some special birthday morning photos of you. You spent the day in Nursery enjoying extra birthday cake and playing with your other little friends, and then after work we had a lovely little tea party at Nana and Bampi's. You were so excited about your Dinosaur car and thought your brothers pushing you around the living room was just the best! You had tea and cake and a chocolate finger so you were happy! 




Your birthday week you discovered chocolate and boy has it been a slippery slope already! I'm amazed how quickly you have learnt to identify chocolate since that first taste. Just yesterday Xander and Zachy were having some animal biscuits while you were still eating your tea - but you spotted them with their chocolate biscuits, rejected the spoon and cried until Xander gave you one of his biscuits too! A few days ago you cried because Zachy had a chocolate finger and you didn't! I'm sure the other two were not this knowing with food at a year old!


We finished your birthday celebrations Monday with your birthday day trip. We went down to the South Devon Steam Railway and Rare Breeds Farm. You loved it! Sat on a little train table bouncing and cooing as the train took off and we were on our way. You loved looking out of the window! You enjoyed meeting an owl, tortoise and baby goats at the farm, but you weren't so sure about touching them or them touching you! 


Your favourite toys this month has been anything that Xander and Zachy are trying to play with! Haha! But also still the wooden blocks; you have learnt to build towers! You have truly discovered the kitchen cupboards and as I type you are taking great joy in emptying all the small plastic pots and building towers with them too! What a mess! Little mini menace!  

Your favourite birthday toys were your tambourines, wooden shape-sorter blocks and your dinosaur cosy coupe. You were mesmerised playing with the shapes with Daddy, watching them disappear into the hole; very funny you thought it was! 

You love bouncing and throwing yourself backwards on the bed (or sofa or ball pool, but somehow seem to know not to do it on the floor?!) You love Xander picking you up to carry you. You love a bit of rough and tumble with your brothers and Daddy. Xander and Zachy are your favourites. You like Teletubbies, Mr Tumble, Twirlywoos and In The Night Garden. You love cuddles and are full of affection. You love books and dancing and singing songs. 

Eleven months old. Merely weeks away from his first birthday.  

So naturally I'm reminiscing again about this time last year, being enormously pregnant, suffering PGP, multiple hospital visits a week; just counting down those days to my planned section. Swinging between willing them to pass quickly but wanting to savor every day as much as possible, those last few weeks of my last ever pregnancy. 

I've no idea where all that time has gone or where my tiny little baby has gone! How can he possibly be nearly one?! I'm so not ready for my baby to be a one year old. 

Darling Little Lucas.  You are eleven months old and 19lb exactly. You're mostly in 9-12 clothes now but still wearing the odd 6-9 month top. It has been a whizz by of a month with you seeming more and more like a little boy, rather than a baby. You are becoming 'one of the boys'! Starting to get stuck in with your brothers, joining in when they're wrestling on the bed with Daddy and just so obviously desperate to be in the mix with them too. You pull at them now, wanting to look at what they are looking at and reach for the things that they have got.   Zachy isn't overly keen on this new found 'show me show me' lark and has already squealed a few times that Baby Luc is trying to take something off him. You are becoming known as the pesky baby! 

You started the month with still only two teeth but you've ended it with four, with another two bulging in your gums ready to come through. I wonder if you'll have six by your birthday?   Dare I say it, I think sleep has been a little bit better since those two teeth popped through. There are still some really tough going nights but on the whole you've been sneaking into my bed later into the night than you were. I think the bottle you have with Daddy around 11.00pm routinely now is helping too.  You can tell you were a Summer baby and born on the hottest day of 2016; the little heat wave we had last week saw the best nights sleep in a very long time!  We're still a long way off sleeping 12 hours in a row though aren't we baby! 

You've mastered pulling to stand good and properly now. You are quick to get to your feet anywhere and everywhere and even taking the odd sneaky side step here and there; so is it cruising we're looking out for before you are twelve months?!  

Guess what! You have started to crawl on your knees! I can't believe it, after three months of worm crawling you decided, on the day you turned 11 months old, to finally give knee crawling a proper go! You're not doing it all the time, and still more often than not drop to your tummy and worm it, but you are a wibbly wobbly knee crawler too now! It is the cutest! 

This month you have suddenly started to eat different foods - you can cope with a rough mashed plate now and you've cracked your fine motor for picking up little things and so there has been lots of exploring with finger foods. Your absolute favourite is strawberries and you can demolish a bowl in no time at all! Haha!  It has made meal-times that little bit easier, now you are able to fend for yourself a little bit with a plate of finger food. 

Your favourite toys this month have been the big red wooden truck with the colourful bricks (that used to be your big brother Xander's) and our mobile phones. Eleven months old and already a tech obsession. Father's son much?! 

You like sand more than Daddy though. We took you for your first seaside day out at the weekend and you had lots of fun! Unlike both your brothers, who before they were one weren't very keen on the sand or sea at all. You were covered in sand, from head to toe, enjoyed eating it, crawling in it, rolling in it, patting it; and just when I was expecting you to cry because I'd sat you in the sea (it was fairly warm to be fair), you instead starting splashing and gurgling at it! Then when I got you changed into dry and clean clothes you couldn't wait to get back out onto the sand again for another go! Haha! Such lovely memories made at Barry Island! 

Oh my goodness. I cannot believe there are just three weeks until your very first birthday. We have so much planned baby boy and we're going to make it super special for you. I had better order your present hadn't I! Don't be growing too quickly these next few weeks to be a Big One will you! 

Could not be more in-love with you precious boy, my baby.

June has been undoubtedly hard, but, I think this year we had a 'good' birthday. 

This year I tried so very hard not to watch the clock, not to allow myself to feel like we were running out of time. I tried to be realistic with what we could fit in in a day. Because that has always been the trigger for a birthday meltdown; the clock. The clock and the feeling of nothing happening like it was supposed to. 

So this year I was so aware that I wanted it to be different. So I tried to 'relax' more than I have other years. To go with the flow just a little bit more. I think it worked, mostly. There was a while from around half five where I could feel the usual birthday panic rising; where we hadn't got home and there was still so much I wanted to do for her birthday but was worrying about preparation time and the boys teatime and bedtime.  But I kept myself in check all but for a wobble.

I think what really helped this year was just two hours child-free time in the morning. Time when we could go and collect her balloons and party food and everything else without lots of little boys in tow too. It was Lucas's nursery day, so after Alexander and Zachary had gone to school we had a little time to be quiet, collected and organise ourselves without worrying about anyone else's needs for a little while. 

I cannot believe it has been seven years. That Anabelle is seven, should be seven. The movement of time seems so hard to comprehend sometimes. This year she should be finishing the infant department at school and moving up to the juniors. More than ever I feel increasingly aware how big she would be in Year 2,  going into Year 3 now, when Alexander in Reception, going into Year 1 is starting to feel so big.  

Since her last birthday I've joined the PTA and been more involved in a few things at school, for example, the Christmas disco. And there seeing all the little girls that would have been her cohort, her class, her friends and realising time and again she should be in amongst them all too. That the boys school have a Year 2 pupil missing. 

Our darling girl. On Wednesday it was your seventh birthday. 

On the longest and HOTTEST day of the year so far. My girl, you were born on a scorcher, and you've always had good weather for your birthday since. But this year the heat for your birthday rivaled  the temperature on the day your baby brother was born last year.  Up and over 30 degree centigrade. Hot! 

I tried to imagine what sort of things you would have enjoyed or been into now. At a big seven years old. What would we have bought you? I reckon you would've been about the trend around now. Maybe you would've had a whole drawer full of those ridiculously enormous Jo-Jo bows. I hear there is a special expensive brand of children's stationary that is all the rage at the moment, maybe you would have wanted some special pens for school. Maybe this year you would've wanted lots of Beauty and the Beast merchandise because after all Princess Belle is your namesake and it is the year of the big film. 

But for all the maybes I don't really know. I can only imagine and pretend. 

This year for your birthday we bought you the Princess Belle Lego castle. We bought you a Guess How Much I Love You colouring book for your brothers to decorate in all the colours for you. We bought you a Nutbrown Hare garden ornament for your garden. We bought bubbles for your brothers to send to you from your garden. We bought you balloons. We bought you a Beauty and the Beast cake and your name spelt out in candles to go on top. 

So this year on your birthday, after getting your brothers to school and nursery, your Daddy and I went for a birthday breakfast. It was a real rare treat to have a few hours to ourselves and go for a cooked breakfast! It was a good and calm start to your birthday; so unlike so many of your birthdays before. 

After breakfast we collected your huge number 7 balloon for your garden and the pink balloons your brothers would send to you later on in the day. Then we got food ready for the party we planned for you later. 

Your brothers were excited it was your birthday again this year. And you have another brother now! Lucas, and my he looks so much like you. From the moment he was born he was the image of you; and still now, even though we never knew what an 11 month old you would've looked like, I can see you in him. His soft and delicate features that are ever so slightly different to your other brothers. Lucas is the closest to knowing how you might've looked. 

And then there is Zachy, who is so much more aware of you this year and was shouting 'My sister Belle is seven' and telling Xander that is was your birthday. Like Xander before him Zachy is beginning to think about the concept of death now. They both often say they miss you, they miss you and they miss FizFiz. We scattered Fiz's ashes with you on her birthday a few months ago; I like to think she found her way to you and you have your own little cat pet friend now. 

So after school and collecting the boys, we went to your garden, with all our flowers, and bubbles and garden ornaments. We cleaned your headstone up and trimmed some grass and made it all pretty just for you. Your brothers helped of course and sent you their balloons. Did you catch them? But most of all they were absolutely desperate to get the bubbles out for a play. So play we did! Bubble blowing everywhere. 

But the highlight of your birthday this year? 

A pool party and BBQ in the back garden at home! Because what seven year old wouldn't have loved a pool party with her brothers and the treat of staying up really late?!  So we pool partied, and BBQ'd and sang Happy Birthday to you with your cake. 

And then, after the bigger boys were in bed (at nearly 9.00pm, and lets not mention what time they finally went to sleep after that!), Daddy and I built your Princess Belle castle together and drank Processco. Raising a glass to you our beautiful girl. 

Our beautiful girl who we wish with every fibre of our being that you could be here celebrating your birthday properly with us. You are so missed Anabelle. So ever absent, and we all feel it, all of us, including those brothers that never even met you. Another precious birthday for you. 

Always missed, always loved, always everything.  Fly high baby girl xXx 

Here we are again. 

June. 

Those days. 

Yesterday it hit me like a ton of bricks. The entire day I felt like I was wading through treacle and then come 7.00pm I couldn't keep my eyes open to put the baby to bed. I was asleep before Lucas was.  

I wasn't just tired, I was utterly exhausted. 

Today has been better. After a wobbly start my nerves eventually calmed and an afternoon in the sun with friends helped. Energy levels have been better. I'm still awake which is an improvement on yesterday after all! 

But it has been the theme of June so far.  For more reasons than even a 'normal' June. Exhaustion. Not 'the baby has had a bad night' exhaustion, but 'grief is here' exhaustion. My body feels so heavy. 

June.

Going through the motions but not really feeling quite all there. 

Even though I spent the yesterday 'carrying on', in work and directing lessons; my body physically was letting me know what the date was, even if I was trying to ignore it.  It is like an involuntary response. 

The day she died.  Knowing hour by hour what was happening seven years ago, life spiralling out of control and obliterating. The pivotal moment when my life changed irreparably forever. 

And I re-live it, and remember. I remember what it felt like to still be pregnant but my baby had died. Even now, seven years later, that blows my mind! She was dead inside me and I just had to wait and wait for an intense induction to work. Five whole days.  

These five whole limbo days. 

Is it any wonder I remain feeling so traumatised this time of year? 

Its as if delayed reality sinks in again and again. 

And it makes me an impatient mother, a crappy wife and crappy daughter.   I feel like I've done nothing but snap and get on at the boys for the last few weeks, my tolerance level for anything but toeing the line is low. And it isn't fair on them and I know I need to be better. I hear myself snapping and barking over such small things and I hate it. Hate it, but can't seem to stop myself doing it. Reacting before I'm thinking. 

Wondering if they're starting to hate me a little bit when Alexander has cried that he just wants Nana at the moment... oh and has called me 'Mean Mummy' on more than one occasion in the last few days too. That isn't to say his behaviour isn't pushing boundaries all the time too at the moment, he is absolutely trying to be a law unto himself frequently every day, but he is going to remember. He is old enough to remember when I was horrible now.  

Urgh. Well done Mummy,  hey. 

Old enough to remember but probably cannot yet understand why. And certainly cannot distinguish between justified tellings off for his poor behaviour or the times when I was less tolerant than I should be.  Cannot correlate time of year with Mummy's behaviour. Maybe I need to try and explain its nearly Belle's birthday and it makes Mummy tired and grumpy and sad. 

Not that is should ever be an excuse for me behaving poorly towards them either.

Somehow I need to start getting better at June. Someone please tell me how. 

I keep telling myself tomorrow is another day. I'll try again tomorrow. 

But Father's Day is tomorrow and not a thing has been bought, for my husband or my Dad. And even knowing Jon largely still wishes to ignore Father's Day, knows that he gets 'extra' stuff is just all too much this time of year, still I feel rubbish that I haven't even attempted to pull it out of the bag tomorrow. 

Everyone and everything is irritating me.  Everything feels a massive effort. Patience is short. Anxiety is sky-high. 

Needing to just be. 

Four days to Anabelle's birthday. Two weeks until July. 

In a month where there always seems to be so much to say and process, I want to start with this beautiful little boy. 

My Small. My middle son. Sometimes the one I worry about the most. Oh so sensitive in so many ways but my little wild one too! I can't believe he is three and a half already, that he has already been in Nursery class at school for a term and a half. These months are flying by. 

He's seeming so big now, but still so Small all at the same time. Still my baby.   Not that he would allow me to say that of course, because you know, he is NOT a baby, he is a BIG BOY. 

So much has changed in six months, but in others ways very little has changed at all. 

My beautiful Zachy Small. You are now three and a half! You were so super excited on your half birthday, absolutely thrilled that you got a present and that just by chance I came home with half a birthday cake on your half birthday too. You went around telling everyone that weekend that it was your birthday and that you were three and a half. Oh how lovely to be an age where the half is so important! 

At three and a half you are still a little one. You've grown only one centimeter since your birthday and only put on one pound. Making you a grand total of approximately 90cm tall now and 29lb heavy! You still have a few trousers you wear of 18-24m, but on the whole you are now in your (mostly sizable) on you 2-3 wardrobe. All of your 2-3 trousers fall down, so Nana has taken nearly every single pair you own in at the waist for you! 

You still have a tendency to be a little Jekyll and Hyde, but less so than you were six months ago. But you are easily unsettled; a noise, the smallest of fallings out with another child/your brother, being rushed, me being the slightest bit annoyed or impatient with you, things like this can have you in real tears so quickly. You are my little sensitive one, the one I feel the need to shelter sometimes and make everything better for you. 

The biggest thing for you after your birthday was starting at school. You LOVE it! You run in each morning without a backwards glance, often saying 'See you later Mummy'. You've made little friends and are so excited to see them in the morning at the school gates! You won't tell me anything about school really though, I get little snippets occasionally, like what you've made with the playdough, or if you've done some dancing, or if you played in the garden, but mostly you come out of school and tell me you have done nothing! Little rascal! 

But I know you are learning. You absolutely blew me away a few weeks ago when I realised you could write your name! You are always so desperate to have homework like Xander, so I said we could practice writing your name. I went to find a highlighter so you could practice some over-writing - but when I came back to the table you had already written it. Your 'a' was spiraled and the 'c' was backwards, but it so clearly looked like your name! 

Its funny. We've been practising 'Z' for a while, but you haven't always been consistent, and you're still not very consistent - but you are already so clearly giving it a good go with your letter formation. When in the right mood you draw so beautifully - already thinking about the details in your pictures and wanting to practice your pencil control, keen to write and mark-make.  

You can recognise all your numbers to ten consistently now and count to ten consistently too. You know some of your colours in welsh and recognising letters and sounds too. You love it when you see a Z for Zac! 

You are fun and cheeky and wild. So often looking for mischief, making ridiculous noises and laughing to yourself about something. You think you are hilarious; hiding in our bed and getting ridiculously overexcited at bedtime, throwing yourself around, jumping on the bed, off the bed, roly polys the lot. You know how to be the perfect monkey!

You're taking more and more to being the big brother too. You've always loved Lucas but recently you are making so much more time for interacting with him; telling him he's cute, trying to make him laugh with funny noises, wanting to push him on the swing at the park, climbing into his cot with him to read him a book and stop him crying, giving him toys, or his dummy and telling me that he 'wants it Mummy'.  It is adorable! 

You are NOT a baby though and your don't let anyone forget it. You frequently remind me you are a big boy and not a baby, and at the mere mention that you are cute you very firmly say that "I am NOT cute, I gorgeous' *giggle* You seem to think cute is only for babies.

At three and a half you still love stories, fairies, pink and princesses and Happyland but you love magic, My Little Pony and unicorns too now. Your favourite is Twilight Sparkle and you told me a few weeks ago that when you're a grown up you want to be a Pink Fairy. Your favourite story is Room On The Broom, so-much-so you can recite it to me, and for book day you wanted to dress as the witch. I adore that you have no idea you're going against the grain of gender stereotypes at the moment, you are just being you! 

And you being you is wonderful. 

You are so full of love, affection, discovery and joy.  What a beautiful boy you are. I love being your Mama Zachy, you make my world brighter and I'm loving this year of you being three!  Keep loving life my Baby Small! xXx 

Oh where do I even start? As I sit here in disbelief again that ANOTHER month has already passed us by! This is it, the double figure month, where the big birthday starts to feel so imminent!

I keep thinking back to this time last year; massively pregnant, with the onset of some pretty severe pelvic girdle pain, finishing work because of the pain and the third trimester risk of rupture. This time last year the weeks to Lucas's birth felt long and fearful, now here we are appraching his first birthday quicker than ever and I know by comparison the weeks are going to fly!

We have a truly beautiful ten month old boy!

Ah baby Lucas! Look at you grow! You are ten months old now and getting cheekier and more adventurous by the day. You want to be where everyone else is, so you follow us around now, taking yourself all around downstairs. We are going to have to put the stair-gate back up before long before you get even more adventurous! 

You are absolutely desperate to figure out how to get into the the playroom with your big brothers so you can play with them. You love nothing more than when Xander and Zachy make funny noises, dancing for you or playing with your toys with you. You save your best shrieks of excited laughter for your brothers - you are going to have so much fun when you can move along with them properly! 

This month you started Nursery and Mummy started back to work. Although you have been absolutely happy being left, no tears saying goodbye and had lovely days in Nursery as well as with Nana and Bampi, separation hasn't come easily. Your bedtimes and sleep have suffered. Oh the evenings have been hard going recently; reacting to me leaving you for half the week by suddenly being unable to settle in the evening, no longer willing to be left in your bedroom or go to sleep for hours after you should be. It was exhausting battling with you, so to be honest we stopped, and just accepted you were downstairs with us like your newborn days again! You were too busy making sure I was staying home to sleep. The last week things have started to improve again and a normal bedtime has been reinstated for the most part. Now if we could only crack sleeping through the night....! 

At ten months old you still only have two teeth - although the next two have been threatening their presence for a few weeks now. I can't believe they haven't cut yet, I'm sure it won't be long - maybe that will help your sleep?! We can hope.  

You weigh 18lb 7oz; putting back on the few ounces you lost last month. You are still in a big chunk of your 6-9 months clothes, although for length you have started to wear your 9-12 month wardrobe too - it is incredibly roomy on you however, and if you were a walker it would all be falling down! You are a little Little. The smallest of the three boys by a number of pounds at this age now! 

Your favourite things this month are singing Row Row Your Boat (you row yourself back and fore independently now!), books and your eggs; as well as an obsession with the remote control and everyones shoes! You are becoming a determined little thing when you have your sights set on something you want, hiding something no longer works and you continue to search for whatever it is even when its been put away. That's object permanence as a skill we can tick off then! 

Talking of skills, we've started baby swimming lessons again now I'm back in work which has been just lovely. More on the skill front; this month you have learnt to sit yourself up from lying down, and last week, on the day you turned ten months exactly, you started to pull yourself up to standing too! You still crawl like a worm although incredibly speedily as a commando crawl now and I'm beginning to wonder if you will progress to crawl 'properly' at all?! 

And now we're looking full steam ahead into another month.  Time is going far. too. quickly! With less than two months to go now, we've started planning your Dedication and your first birthday. Its all booked, your church service, the hall for the party, deposits paid on the bouncy castle, soft play and cake, potential Dedication day outfits purchased. Oh it will be a spectacular special day for you baby boy. The perfect celebration for our perfect baby boy! 

We're so lucky to have you Lucas, you bring so much happiness to everyone in this family and we love you so very much. 

Have a fabulous month being ten months old! 

All the hearts beautiful baby <3 xXx 

Can you believe this little boy is now the grand old age of five and a half?! Five and a half and full of attitude! Becoming ever more self-assured and confident, questioning everything, having an answer for everything. 

It has been a full on six months of growing and learning, exploring and discovery, celebrations and fun.  First school discos, frightening us with another febrile convulsion, a new top bunk bed, first time ice-skating, another Christmas, lots of dressing up for school, a holiday, a swimming badge, trips and baking, parties and playing. 

Having a five year old is pretty exhausting! Another year flying by far too quickly.

Dearest Xander.  I have been meaning to write this update for weeks already, but at the moment your baby brother has forgotten that he should be in bed by 7.00pm latest and so I've had little time with arms free in the evening to type.

You are growing up quicker than ever. At five and a half you are 107.5cm tall and weigh 41lbs. Mummy can still just about lift you up if you do a little jump to help me!  I'm desperate for you not to outgrow my arms anytime soon and it seems you are in no rush to out grow just yet either - so frequently you ask to be carried to the car, or in from the car, or upstairs to bed, or from our bed into your own bed. So Big but part of you still wants to be reassured you are still our baby too. 

Six months ago you had barely started Reception, but now the end of the school year is in sight. You're well into the routine of school and loving every minute! You're having a fabulous year with a fabulous enthusiastic teacher; coming on leaps and bounds in all areas , being taught to believe in yourself and that you can do anything and well on the way to achieving the Outcome 4 predicted for you by school year end. You are so bright and at the moment schooling is coming very easily for you.  

I've loved joining in your learning with you - doing homework with you, reading your home school reading book with you and visiting the school to join in with your family Thursdays.  The absolute worst bit about being back in work now is all the school time I'm now missing out on for you and Zachy, but I suppose Daddy is getting a turn to join in!  Last week you and Daddy had a Teddy's Bears Picnic at school, you were so excited to take in your special rainbow bear and enjoyed Daddy coming in to spend time with you at school. 

Talking about learning, you've made such massive improvement in your swimming lessons these last few months. It feels like something has just clicked recently and you're beginning to find it all that slightly bit easier. You're definitely not a natural swimmer but you try so so hard. Trying hard has paid off as well because you passed Wave 1 just before Easter and moved to the Wave 2 class. You couldn't be more chuffed and we couldn't be prouder of you for trying your best and persevering. 


What you are a natural at though, is being a big brother! You are just marvellous helping to look after Lucas; noticing when he needs something to play with, or someone to play with, answering his noises with the same noises and talking to him in baby speak. You are always trying to make him laugh and are so super helpful at keeping an eye on him for a moment for me - making sure he doesn't roll off the bed, or getting nappies for me. In return Luc absolutely adores you! You and Zachary continue to be thick as thieves or falling out. I love watching you play together, making up little games. Zachy looks up to you so much and is so desperate to be as big as you are! 


You are still obsessed with ages and frequently mention your next party and birthday - although not at frequently as you did on your 4th birthday when you were waiting for your 5th! Haha! You often ask how old everyone else is too now and asking questions like when I am such and such age how old will Zachy or Luc be.  

You're always asking about when you are the same age as Daddy; will you be allowed a motorbike, will you work in Daddy's office, will you be able to go in a rocket - it goes on and on. At five and a half Daddy is your hero, just the way it should be. You want to do all the things Daddy does when you are grown up! 

Your favourite things are little Lego, the iPad and superheroes. Your detail when your creating something with your Lego is just fantastic; little cars with boosters, planes with whooshers, seats that spin. You have a vision with Lego that escapes even Daddy! The iPad may be one of your favourite things but it doesn't always bring out the best in you! We've restricted the iPad to weekend afternoons only because of how stroppy and and unreasonable you can become if you spend too much time on it! It always amazes us your love of superheroes, considering the only superhero related film or cartoon you've seen are the Lego Batman movie! Your favourite superhero though is Spiderman, of course, just like Daddy.  So for your half birthday you got a Spiderman smasher, and very pleased about it you were too. 


At the moment your hearing is being investigated. Back in November you failed your first school starters hearing screen. To be honest this wasn't a surprise to us as we'd had concerns on and off for a long time. This time last year we even started the process of having your hearing tested; but before the GP would make the referral we had to clear your ears of wax and by the time we had done that your baby brother was due to arrive imminently and unfortunately the referral wasn't chased up. I'm sorry we didn't start this process sooner and "forgot" about you in the late pregnancy new baby chaos! 

After failing your first screen it was followed up by a second hearing screen, which you failed too. Since then we waited 12 weeks for a full hearing test at the clinic - which identified that you have Glue Ear, with a mild hearing loss on your left side and a more of a hearing loss on your right. Now we have to wait for your second hearing test at the end of this month, then if you fail that test as well (because there needs to be two full hearing tests before a treatment plan, which we and the audiologist think you will based on the length of time we've had our concerns) then a hearing aid(s) will be prescribed as a temporary measure until you grow out of your Glue Ear, which should be by around the age of eight.  If we end up going down that route it will be such a big thing to get used to for you, and for us. Watch this space. 



Ah beautiful boy. You are still our inquisitive questioner. Everything is what or why or where? How do things work? What does things mean? You are so full of imagination and still soaking everything up that you possibly can. You are going to go far, we're absolutely sure of it! 

Time absolutely needs to slow down now because we're looking at six, and that just sounds far too Big for my liking!