Bolt

We took Jake to see his first film today. It was a little touch and go because there was horrendous traffic on the way to Greenwich, so we missed the earlier showing. We ducked into Starbucks where Jake had a babyccino. After this we continued our journey. We arrived at the cinema with half an hour to spare. Armed with our 3D glasses we treated ourselves to some sweets form the pick ‘n’ mix. Jake chose a blue dolphin which he devoured immediately.

In the cinema Jake donned his glasses and we started to watch the adverts. The 3D effect was very good. When the film started Jake started to get a little scared and kept either jumping at unexpected noises or started to flap his hands when something was going to happen to Penny. I kept telling Jake that everything was alright and Bolt would save the day.

Jake was brilliant all the way through and only spoke out loud a couple of times. Once when he excitedly saw a character from the film Cars he said “Daddy, I have seen those cars before!”. Also he got excited when he saw Wall-E.

Arrr me hearty!

Jake went to Antonia’s party yesterday. He looked great dressed up as a pirate. He had the ragged trousers, blouson, jacket and headscarf complete with skull and crossbones motif.

Amy and Jake returned at around 5.30pm. Amy looked completely exhausted and Jake was very hyper and excited. He showed me his goody bag which consisted of a note pad, chocolate dubloons and a sweet necklace.

Jake’s party bags and contents turned up as well. I ordered some mexican jumping beans, micro bubbles, water tube thingies and frog and duck bath gels. I’m not too sure whether to give out the beans as it says from age 6 and they do look a bit like sweets.

G1 R.I.P

So there I was tootling down the O.K.R proud of my new handlebar mount and cradle for the G1. I had successfully traversed the potholes and speed bumps of Wickham Road so I thought that the G1 was fairly safe.

However I hit a very small hole just as I passed the Tesco junction and off popped not just the G1 but the whole cradle as well. It arced gracefully to my right and over my shoulder before hitting the ground with a crack. Seconds later an articulated lorry ran over both cradle and G1.

I hit the brakes sharply and gathered up the remains of the phone leaving the shattered cradle in-situ.

The battery had come out and the back had popped off but apart from that it looked okay. Alas no, when I got to Waterloo I switched it on and saw that the screen had cracked in a spectacular fashion. Reminder to self. Always, always secure with rubber bands when mounting phone on the bicycle.

I am surprised that the cradle was the weak link as it seemed to snap very securely into place.

Sayings

Jake

“Radish” – Jake’s name for his dummy
Upon arriving home from a rainy cycle commute “Are you worn out Daddy?”
When Jake saw my Valentines Day badge “Can I have your Badger?”
When a programme has finished on Cbeebies “Can I watch another foalm?”
When doing a jigsaw “Yes, I suppose this piece goes here”
When kissing his own finger better “Daddy you missed out!”
While trying to take his t-shirt off himself “Watch this Daddy!”
He saying he wants more than one of something “I want both a ’em”
When naughty “You silly old cracker!” (We’ve tried to stop him saying that)
When naughty “Cracker!” (he says it in the same voice as the previous one, so we’ve told him not to say it too)
After putting him to bed he will say “Chats while hiding?”
“Bajabo”. What Jake calls a Baja Beetle.
“Oh no I losted a bit”. When he lost a piece of Jigsaw puzzle. He puts -ed at the end of a lot of words.
“Look Daddy, there’s a flying spider!” when he saw a daddy long legs
“I don’t very like this” when disliking something
“Oh muck!” when playing Lego Star Wars. Not sure where he got that one from
When Mia has done a posset. “Baby Mia’s done a mosset!”
Saying “Darth Maud” instead of Darth Maul
Saying “Light Saver” instead of Light Sabre
I told Jake this joke “two birds sitting on a perch, one says to the other “can you smell fish?”, Jake retold it as “Two birds sitting on a log, one ate a fish and the other getted dead”
As I turned the telly on “I don’t like this. It’s a chatterbox film!”
Saying “Tardist” instead of Tardis
Jake’s name for Mia : Mia super ribbon bakugan destroy fight

Mia

“Bapple” – apple
“No like it” – while shaking head vigourously – she doesn’t like something
“Bappy” – nappy
“Nodis” – bogies
“Mat” although now at 2 it is “molk”- milk
“ba” – bath
“beh” – bed
“larts” – light as in pretty light which we look at from the loft room before bed
“I don’t like it” – while shaking her head.
“Yummy, I like it!”.
“Binish” – when her milk has finished at which point she gives me the empty bottle.
“Gok!” – when she wants to go for a walk.
“Sowwy” – when you ask if she has been sharing with Kit at her childminders
“pocky” – coffee
“Right way!” said like this “rah way!” when there is a choice of two paths and Mia decides which is best.
“Radis” – raisins
“Cochin” – means cushion or more accurately pillow. She has taken to taking a pillow from our bed into her cot. Can also mean “I want to sleep in your bed and not in my cot”
“Kwylet” – quiet
“I kie” – Meaning that Mia has cried
“I two” – said just after Mia has been cheeky to Mummy and said as a justification for her actions 🙂
“pizz milk” – how Mia asks for milk
“hello big/little boi” – When talking to her babies
“course you can! ” – when asked a question
“no you can’t” – when Jake asked for some of Mia’s chocolate
“hello big boy!” – a general greeting which is a reference to her favourite baby “Baby Big Boy”
“go on the stinking step!” – when Mia is telling off one of her babys
“godjabilla” – One of Mia’s cryptic sayings. I don’t know what it means but it sounds cool all the same
“shamaglosh” – One of her later sayings.
“Is it a PE day today?” – The usual morning routine of Mia asking if she can wear her PE kit to school

“Dortor” – Water

“cheers” or “chz”, “upsy daisy”, “dooown”  – when she wants to get down.

Hayfever

I don’t know what’s going on but over the last week my hayfever has been really bad. Today at work my eyes were itchy and constantly streaming. Very uncomfortable indeed. I’ve bought some special Optrex spray that you spray into the closed eyelids. I hope it works. Amy’s friend Charlotte is also suffering with it. Maybe it was the long winter that has caused the flora to collectively say “we’ve had enough, we want Spring and we want it NOW!”

When I got back from Sainsburgs Jake was practicing leaping about on his, bed. Today he went to Sam’s 3rd birthday and by all accounts had a lovely time. He came back with a goodie bag containing cake and a lolly.

During story-time I read him his new story that Tante bought him when she came to visit this weekend. It is a Thomas story and has a special Harold ‘searchlight’ that you place under cellophane images to ‘light up’ the story. Jake loves it and always asks lots of questions.

Today Jake was painting and painted his first proper face with two eyes a mouth, eyebrows and a beard. I asked himif he was painting Daddy and he said “Yes!”. Apparently the painting of a face with such accuracy is quite advanced and is something expected of a four year old!

Sunday DIY

The weather was not so brilliant today for being up on the roof. There I was, hanging onto the scaffolding trying to paint the apex of the gable while getting buffeted by strong gusts of wind. I got it done though but it took me 3 hours :-(. Inside we painted the woodwork in the front and rear rooms as well as sealing the walls and ceiling in all but the dormer room. Amy has also made a start painting the walls in the dormer room.

We also tried our hand at hanging wallpaper. We managed a respectable two strips before we ran out of wallpaper. A few schoolboy errors were made:
1. Didn’t buy enough wallpaper for the job
2. Forgot to match the pattern while cutting(wasted one strip)
3. Cut the strip too short(wasted another strip)

The papering that we DID managed to get on the wall looks very nice though :-).

Jake arrived at around 5pm. He was very excited to see us and also what we had done in the loft. He immediately busied himself helping finish off the papering with the seam roller. He has a lovely new haircut which makes him look very grown-up.

DIY starts here

Jake has been despatched to Grannys so that we can crack on with decorating the loft rooms. We didn’t get off to a flying start. Woke at 9am then tootled down to the B&Q on the A20 then we had lunch in Blackheath. By the time we started it was around 1pm. All was not lost because we have done quite a lot. It is now 10pm and we are about to watch the latest episode of Lost. Chores ticked off today were:

Painted 90% of the side gable(then ran out of paint)
Primered all the woodwork except doors and the front room skirting boards
Sealed the plaster in the dormer room

The trouble with gamanges…

Yesterday evening Jake was helping me tidy up the new loft rooms by peeling off the protective tape and pads from the windows. Jake named the pads gamanges.

We collected all of these and then it was time for bed. Jake protested but as it was late I stuck to my guns. When we got downstairs Jake was in a real state. He kept saying “Gamanges Daddy!!”. I told him that we had taken all of them off the windows. He wasn’t having any of it and he proceeded to go into meltdown.

In the end I let him go back upstairs. I went up after him and when I saw him scuttling into the dormer room it all became clear. He wanted his pile of gamanges that he had left in the middle of the floor. After collecting these he was much happier. I told Amy about this later and she sagely said that she would have known that he wanted the pile of gamanges. I will know too…next time :-).

Loft conversion…done

The builders have finally left. Hoorah!! The guys were great and did a good job of finishing off and clearing up.

All that’s left to do is to book the tiler in to sort out the bathroom and then the plumber can install the shower enclosure. This weekend we have the task of cleaning and decorating the new rooms as well as making good the damaged woodwork on the landing. There is also the little matter of repainting the hallway and then painting the gable etc etc…

Jake has had a bit of a radish dilemma today. First of all we had to throw them all away because they had big holes in them. This has obviously got Jake thinking as now he is saying that he does not need a radish for his sleep and he will suck his thumb instead.

I am wondering if I should buy one and have it to hand as an emergency measure. Tonight Amy is training so it will be just be me ‘on shift’. I’m not sure a radishless Jake is something to relish 🙁 and may make for a very long evening.

Mega commute

Today I did it. My ultimate commute…

I set off from home with the intention of cycling to Putney. It was a spur of the moment kind of thing. I had left early enough, earlier than I usually leave so I decided to give it a go. However after reaching Putney I decided to go the whole hog and try to get to Bedfont. The problem was, that I hadn’t rehearsed the route enough and even with my trusty G1 and google ‘My Tracks’ I still managed to add a whopping 5 miles to my journey. Halfway there my legs started to spasm when I tried to stretch them which was a worrying sign.

Nick at work told me that this was probably down to dehydration or a salt imbalance. I can attest to the former because I gulped down most of my juice as I entered the environs of Richmond.

The wind didn’t help my poor legs either and it made the going rather slow at times(okay most of the time). I battled against it though, and arrived around 2.5 hours after I had left :-(.

When I arrived at work I took a shower. As soon as I arrived in the office Charbel asked me if I had cycled in. My red face gave it away!

Now it is 4.30pm and it is fast approaching the time to leave. My legs feel tired but not too bad. My head has started to ache though. I wonder if I am still alittle dehydrated?

The aftermath…

Okay, so I probably will not do that commute for a while, at least not unless I leave at the crack of dawn and know the route by heart. I left work at 5pm just as it was starting to spit(thanks weather gods). Thankfully this didn’t last long. I zipped down to Feltham in about 5 minutes but was then thwarted by the level crossing. Damn trains are the bane of my life even when I’m not travelling on one.

I made a few wrong turns. The first time at Apex Corner and once again on the Lower Richmond Road. This time I stuck to the A205 and A3 which was a more direct route but involved a couple of scary junctions.

As I was cycling along Acre Lane my legs really began to get tired and what with the slight incline and the wind I slowed down to a paltry 10mph. I gritted my teeth, put my head down and counted the miles.

As I reached Camberwell it was great to see a ‘friendly road’ i.e. one that I recognised. Heroically I limped onto the A202.

I arrived home around 7.30pm which was rather disappointing as I had calculated that it would take 1 hour and 40 minutes based on my average speed to date. I didn’t take into account the fact that my legs would get so tired after cycling such a distance…

Statistics

To work
Total Distance: 45.60 km (28.3 mi)
Total Time: 3:20:55
Moving Time: 2:48:57
Average Speed: 13.74 km/h (8.5 mi/h)
Average Moving Speed: 16.19 km/h (10.1 mi/h)
Recorded: Tue Feb 17 07:05:47 GMT+01:00 2009

From work
Total Distance: 44.16 km (27.4 mi)
Total Time: 3:07:09
Moving Time: 2:32:54
Average Speed: 14.34 km/h (8.9 mi/h)
Average Moving Speed: 17.33 km/h (10.8 mi/h)
Recorded: Tue Feb 17 16:57:25 GMT+01:00 2009