Pyjama Boy and Graduation Boy

New chapters started this week for both boys

At last we bestired ourselves and decided to change the sleeping routine we so far had. Robin is almost two years old, we can't still put him sleep on the sofa with his milk while Benji listening to stories in our bed.
Since two nights ago this will go amongst to the "why didn't we do this earlier?!" stories.
Robin loved being part of the story telling, and he went to bed without a fuss when I told them "bedtime now". And they both slept without a stir until the morning for the last two nights.
I also enjoyed their two little warm bodies either side of me while reading "Superworm", Richard also enjoyed his extra 20 minutes which he can spend alone without trying to be quite because of Robin. The only person who might looses out was Bejni, as he had to share his one-to-one time with me and also had to read baby stories which we read million times.
And it is a little bit sad, that I don't have a baby in a sleeping bag anymore, no all-in-one pyjamas, just a big boy pyjamad cheeky little man (whom already grown out of the 2-3 year old pyjamas).


My other big boy also closed a chapter last week. He had his graduation at nursery, and he is going to have his last week there next week. They even did a graduation photo of them in cap and gown, which I think is a bit of an american monkeyness, but he still looks cute on the picture.

They have prepared a little show for the parents, they reanected the Gruffalo, and sang an Astronout song where he participated. He didn't really want to do anything in the beginning, he started crying that he wants his mummy, but Caroline his key worker managed to persuade him that he should do something. I waved at him encouragingly and he looked at me saying "I love you mummy". Difficult to fight back my own tears.

At the end they all received a little graduation Teddy and a photo. We could take picture of them with Sarah the nursery manager. Shame that the photo wasn't with one of his key workers, as I don't particulary like the manager, and now we can watch her face in the photos for years on :-)

And the boy's new craze: World Cup football stickers. Every night Richard brings home 2-3 packets of stickers and they stick them into the album together. Benji reads the numbers, Robin hands them over, and Richard sticks them in. I really can not decide which of the three is more enthusiastic when they get a team together. They even have their "swapsy mates" with Oscar and his daddy, whom is probably even more fanatic than my three.

Little scardy astronout on the right is ours

School boy

The big day has arrived, we have put on the white polo shirt (not the red jumper yet), and we started the induction days at Benji's "Big school".
He was quite scared of the unknown before the day has arrived, he even started negotiating that he would give back all his birthday presents, as he doesn't want to be 4 years old, and doesn't want to start school.
On the first day, which was just an hour play session, he didn't even want to move from me, even though everything was really positive, the school is lovely, his teachers seem nice, they went to talk to each children, tried to involve them into team play, encouraging making friends.
Next day we were expected to leave them for an hour, which Benji knew is going to happen, so he didn't want to go to school at all, even though Calub - who he thinks is going to be his friend - was there too.
When his teacher kindly started to invite the children inside, only him another little boy started crying (putting the girls to shame), so I walked in with him, the teacher started showing him the dinosaurs, I waved quickly and kind of run outside, where I also started crying...I just feel for these little people, I so sympathise with this horrible "first day in school, I don't know you, but please be my friend' feeling. I really hope he will find some good friends. I am sure he will.
However the receptionist lady gave me a tissue and went in to check upon him, just to find him two minutes later stopped crying and happily playing with the dinosaurs.

I couldn't wait for the hour to finish, went to the gate 15 minutes early, waiting together with the other mums for the door to open. It was so cute when the little 4 year olds appeared and they run to their parent's arms smiling. Benji's first sentence was that he had a good time, and lets come again. Then the teacher came to me and said, he was fine, and "He is really chatty, isn't he?" Oh well...tell me something I don't know :-)

At the weekend the school organised a little summer fair, where we went as well, so Benji gets used to his new school more and more, and we were hoping his little future classmates will be there as well. There were, but we didn't really have the opportunity to talk to them, but him and Robin enjoyed themselves a lot, dancing and running around..
Little Robin is becoming more and more clever by the day, he is really trying to talk both languages now, copying what he can hear. His institutional life is much less than Benji's as unfortunately the nursery only has him on Friday half day, as they don't have more places in the summer.
One would think that because of the irregularity he would have trouble settleing in, but he actually loves it, waves to Richard, walks in, and apparently has fun all day.

And we found another good reason to go strawberry picking again, we will go down to London this weekend to visit our friends. I think that is a really good exuse :)

Really needed this sunshine

 Somehow days are passing by nowadays without me even noticing them, I have a never-ending to-do list in my head, and it makes me feel that even if I am doing something I am not 100% there, which makes me forever guilty.
At work I am trying to catch up with private mails, printings, when I play with the boys in my head I am thinking what to take to the notary to get Robin's Hungarian citizenship, on the way to the notary we pop into Benji's new school to drop off a form...etc. I think I really need those three weeks holidays now. Until then it was really good to have a little break last weekend.
We had Dosthill Open Gardens Festival, where habitants of Dosthill can decide to open their gardens to the public, we admire the beautiful gardens, some of the owners make cakes or some drinks, put out some toys for the kids, and they offer the income to the local school.
We had a great day, good weather, the boys were ok with the long walk (to have a treasure hunt during the trail, helped).
The day after we went to Packington for pick your own strawberries (yeay for strawberry season!!), and on Monday we took out the paddling pool at last as the weather was so good, altough that was one of those "half of me was there only" moment, as on Mondays I suppose to "work" from home...