Garden cricket

Do you remember when you was younger and you used to make mud pies, play tiggy block with lamposts, play kirby, polo etc? I do. Thats why im determined not to bring Rio up in this new generation where outdoor play is suddenly next to none. Where kids interact with their friends over a computer instead of face to face. Okay as i got older i loved MSN as much as the next teenager but come on, whats the fun in that?

Last week i stumbled across the 'let kids be kids' linky and had to join in. At first i thought i wouldnt be able to again this week, its been raining, ive been working, we havent done all that much! But then i thought.. to a child we have! We've been down to the horses, to the park, to explore toys are us. We painted outside, built and knocked down towers, crawled through tunnels and learnt to play cricket!

Looking at these pictures i almost forget he's only 16 months old!

What games can you remember as a child? What does your child like most now? As Rio gets older im always on the look out for more ideas so feel free to let me know/leave me links what you've been upto!

P.S Im amazing at cricket ;) my dad and Craig sarcastically told me to have a go, little did they know it would be ages before they caught me out! *Oh yeah, doing it for the girls ;)*

Life lately

I, like an idiot, decided to follow an online tutorial to fix my laptop (its worked in the past) and in the process managed to delete the wrong file. The file i actually deleted was my laptop profile and backup. Basically that means that i lost everything..all my photos, videos etc. Luckily i havent deleted anything too important off of my camera so i have some backup but it means that all the uploaded and edited photos that i wanted to use in drafted posts are now gone and i have to do it all again. GREAT!

So for now..please bare with me and accept this as a post instead :)

Lets BUILD fine motor skills!

Do you own wodden blocks? According to BBC1 Breakfast this morning you should!

Today they were discussing the benefits of children playing with wooden blocks and though i dont normally pay much attention to tele in the day,  this made me sit down with my cuppa.

Some of the key benefits that stuck out to me were that along with helping with fine motor skills, they also helped with imagination, space, shapes and measure and if you get the coloured ones like me id go as far as including colour to that list too.

They said one of the joys of blocks were that it has no fixed end product so its something that children with a whole spectrum of interests can enjoy. Whether it be by building a princess castle, or bulldozing them down (Rio's favourite).

They also talked about capturing it on camera, so that is what i did.

                        
Thats as far as we got before Rio knocked them down, used them as a football and packed them away. But three is an improvement!

Our blocks can be found here , alternatively you can get the better deal ive just ordered for a friends 1st birthday here .

I'll be getting the blocks out more often now..will you?

Footprints & all that fun!

Whilst Rio was laughing away last night i spotted two fully through new back teeth and various other ones, including his fangs, just waiting to pop through. As a baby his only tell tale sign was the rosey cheeks so we knew he was a trooper, but wow!

Filling this in his book i realised i still hadnt done his footprints so headed to Wilco's on my lunch break today to get all the needed bits.

It actually didnt end up anything like i had in my mind. I imagined him just toddling down the rolled out paper leaving perfect little footprints but that didnt happen in the slightest. I quickly gave in and just let him paint a picture, the floor, himself...oh and he would of painted the rabbit if i hadnt of noticed what he was upto! Much more fun that making footprints.

Silent sunday

Whats the magic word?

When i was pregnant i used to love looking at the weekly updates to see how Rio was developing, likewise in the first few months of his life. At some point i must of stopped, and as the emails got less frequent i drifted away from keeping up with them.

As a parent you always wonder if your child's 'doing the right things for their age' (although we all know that children develop and do things at different rates and in their own time) so i couldnt help having a look at some of the things it said for 16 months. One of which really stuck in my mind, and that was manners!

Please & thankyou

In my opinion manners go along way, they dont cost anything and if your going to teach your child anything, teach them manners! I dont mean holding back something until they say "ta" just implementing it from a young age. For aslong as i can remember when Rio has passed something to us we have said "ta" and in his own time he started mimicking us, even making us say it if we forgot. Sometimes if he wants something he will chant "ta ta ta" with his hands out..cheeky monster that he is. So we are half way there.

I think please is the harder one to learn, though you may disagree. At this young of age i think "ta" is enough. I will be making sure i include please more in our daily routine now however. Though im sure for a while it will be repeated as "peas".

Mummy: "Thankyou daddy"
Daddy: "Your welcome mummy"

Like i said in Rio's 16 month update , toddlers are sponges at this age so just model the type of language you want them to use yourself and most of all..dont forget to praise them :)

Rio: "Ta"
Mummy & Daddy: "Good boy Rio!!"

Corn field with a camera

Do you ever wish your eyes could take photos? Do you slow down your blink and imagine them being stored into a hidden album? Sometimes the camera doesnt quite capture things how my eyes see it, or how i want it.. and i want to change that. Recently ive been taking alot more photos to try and improve my technique. Ideally i would like to take a childrens/family photography course but nothing ive seen close enough distance wise catches my eye, so for now im happy just snapping away entertaining myself.

I love these photo's by My Pretty Mummy but truth be told, im abit of a pansy when it comes to Bee's. Instead i improvised and headed to a cornfield, dragging Annalise along to be my model. (It was intented for Rio to be in them too but he convienently fell asleep as soon as we got there)

 

 
 
 

As you can see she's a natural. It wasnt til i moved her further into the field that i realised how uncomfy these places actually are..i swear ive seen pictures of couples running through corn fields hand in hand? Crazy people. I guess it was a good job Rio fell to sleep afterall. Any heavy editing is down to my personal preference as i wanted a 'sunny look' and on that day there wasnt any..infact we just beat the rain home.