This blog is not about to become all cute kids, all the time, I promise. But if I don't post this now, I never will, so:


Happy third birthday, kiddos.

Moar Fotos

My mother gave me a sound telling off about not updating my 'Family Blog' often enough. (It's been - ahem - about ten months). She was about to revoke my membership of the human race if I didn't get my act together, so I pulled together some holiday photos in a hurry. Since I've been frantic overwhelmed totally overwhelmed utterly overwhelmed busy lately, I thought I would share them here too because I certainly wasn't going to get the chance to write anything else in case anybody needs to know what nearly-three-year-olds look like in the rain. 

They turn three tomorrow, actually. I had planned to write something lyrical about what they are like, on the cusp of three-dom, but see above. I will summarise it by saying: mostly they like Thomas the tank engine, Hello Kitty, Peppa Pig and yelling at each other. Okay, now that's done - here are the pictures.

They are always doing this. Okay, maybe not. Alright, I totally told them to kiss, but hey, they did it, so I figure I win at parenting. For once. 

Pink on the carousel in Honfleur. As you can tell, she loved it. Blue, on the other hand -
"I NOT go on carousel! Carousel too scawy!" This joins a long list of things that are too scawy, including watching Finding Nemo and eating meat.

After two minutes on the carousel - already feeling pretty nonchalant about it. Carousel? Whatever.

Whatcha doin, twins?

Uh.... just hanging around.  (Sorry, had to be done).

More kissing. I guess I win at facilitating grandparent / grandchild relations, too. 

The beach! It was very warm and sunny. Obviously.

 It was a gorgeous beach, actually. This was pretty much the only two minutes of sunshine we got all week, but those two minutes were lovely.

 Giving us the look that sums up one of her favourite phrases: "I BUSY!"

 so grown up.

 such a baby.

  

 So beautiful.

So unaware that he is not actually a dog.

 We went to an aquarium. There were lots of fish.

 It was freakishly, ridiculously, insanely rainy. It rained every day. Actually, it poured every day. This day, Blue and I ran down to the beach to build sandcastles in the rain - J and Pink were too chicken tired. We got thoroughly, utterly, bewilderingly wet. And for ten minutes, as we got soaked to the skin and I kept digging in the sand with my boy anyway, I truly felt like a good mother. 

Ten minutes after that, of course, I told him that we were going go back inside, and my mum got these pictures. Please note how self-satisfied I look, due to aforementioned temporary feeling of competent motherhood. However - wearing this wet wool cardigan is probably the only time I have ever stood next to him and realised that I smelled the worst of the two.   

 

 More kissing. I'm sensing a pattern. However: I don't want to criticise my two-year-old's technique, but please note that I am not the one going straight in with an open mouth. French kissing indeed. 

And that's it, I think. Freaking out a bit here. Tomorrow, they are getting their very own potties (with Peppa Pig and Thomas on them, of course). I know they are ready - this isn't just because they are turning three. So, um....anybody got any tips for potty training? AARRRRRGGGHHHHHHHH!

Back

We are back from France. The compensation for British weather is that France is only a ferry away. You know how I said that I probably wouldn't have any internet access while we were away? Well, I didn't really think that was going to happen, but it did. Two weeks with no wi-fi, so I've come back to a pile of un-checked email (including some moderately important work stuff - oh, well) and several hundred unread blog posts. You'd think I might have used all the non-internet time for getting useful stuff done, but no- mostly I was just eating butter. (Did I mention we were in France?) The area we were in (Brittany) has this amazing butter which is unsalted -creamy and almost sweet - but studded with big flaky salt crystals. Honestly. Honestly. It's like having your mouth filled with dancing angels. Why don't the rest of us demand that our own butter manufacturers get on board with this? In the first four days, we had to go back to the shop three times to buy more butter because we were eating it so darn fast. Also - the other regional speciality is this same salted butter boiled up with sugar to make salted butter caramel. Salted butter caramel everywhere! Why did nobody tell me this? I would have gone years ago. 

On a related note - she who goes to France without elasticated waistbands is an idiot. Ahem.

Anyway. I'd say that it's good to be back except it's not - it stinks to be back. I feel discombobulated and discomposed and cranky. Why isn't my fridge full of salty crunchy creamy butter? Why aren't my parents getting the children up in the mornings?  Why isn't there a beach outside my window? I don't want to go back to work, and I don't want Jay to go back either. Why can't we go to the aquarium instead? Also - why did I think that it was a good idea to book the children's first dentist appointment tomorrow? 

I love holidays. I really do. I just hate how, for the first few days back, I always feel like this: