This Year Has Brought…

31 Tuesday Dec 2013

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2013

A slightly more confident H. The little girl who started 2013 ends as one who does stuff, but still has a few confidence issues.

Swimming? A piece of cake. She can happily swim (with a float of some kind) up and down the length of a pool without getting tired, constantly kicking and splashing up and down and not at all fazed by things. The next thing to work on is doing it without a float in a pool which is deeper than she’s used to. Apparently she’s very good at Vest Stroke. She has her Duckling 1,2 and 3 as well as Stage 1. No further badges though….

Speaking out loud? Not so confident, though resents not having a chance. I suspect she’s not speaking out loudly enough or putting her hand up high enough to let others know she’s interested; just like me. Waiting for something to happen that never does. Performing with her class at the school play? Nervous but did it.

Balance? She still falls over, trips up and so on. Forever bumping and scabbing her hands. She’s so sensitive about bumping her hands and is slowly letting us see them, as every time she scrubs them they hide in her sleeves and it’s a real battle to get those hands out to check them. All four year olds trip up and fall over, I just know the exact situations H does it – usually when she’s not listening to me and runs off. On Boxing Day she did just that and fell over hands-first into some mud. That went down well…. She’s so particular about her hands and I’ve no idea why. When she needs comfort, if a tv programme or film bothers her, she licks her hands. Apparently it’s because “it tastes nice”. Hm.

Learning? She’s reading quite confidently now which is amazing to see. The fact she’ll pick out words in menu’s or signs, or shops and will tell us what they say – she’s getting really confident and is speaking out when she sees them which I love hearing. She surprises me daily with what she spots, more often than not unprompted. At the weekend she drew a picture and wrote two sentences about it which she’s never done before – I was so proud of her. She didn’t ask us for any help, just showed us what she’d done. School has opened up lots of things in her mind, and she’s enjoying herself so much doing it all. We’ve been working on numbers and she’ll often find me sums to give her so she can work it out. We’ve been working on telling the time for the last year or so – she was bought a gorgeous clock for her birthday in 2012, and we got her a proper wristwatch (she has currently lost it) for Christmas this year, and how many minutes it is before the next hour, and working on multiples of five to work out how many minutes.

Friends? Things have shifted slightly with school – old ones left behind in different routines to new ones made daily. A new chaotic daily routine which we’ve all found works for us now we’ve had time to settle. Playdates planned for the new year when my new work hours kick in. Catching up with the past, the current and still doing what we do. Old friends now new daily friends and a happy child. I can’t ask for any more than that.

Music? Apparently her favourite band are One Direction and she loves Harry Styles. I have officially turned into my grandparents by teasing her about the band No Direction and their singer Harry Smiles… she only knows two of their songs though. I bought her some music this year, the Boyzone comeback single. I also bought things like the Lorde single so there’s something that doesn’t get played at Haven Holiday Camps… and she likes it. She also loved Lollibop.

Films? She loved The Moshi Monsters Movie. Mary Poppins is a firm favourite. Anything Disney is a favourite and we have a rather large collection. Frozen is the next one on the agenda and the Lego Movie after that. I love we can go to the cinema or theatre and have a fun time as a family – there are no theatre trips planned but we’re working on that.

TV? We haven’t watched Peppa Pig or Ben & Holly for a few months now. I suspect things will move back, she still loves the idea of them, she just prefers Baby Looney Tunes and Fireman Sam at the moment. Add to that Topsy & Tim and that’s the top three by a mile. I’m bringing ‘grown up’ programmes into her repertoire, and she’s currently enjoying repeats of The Great British Bake Off. Nice. Total Wipeout and Takeshi’s Castle have also proved popular.

Books? So many, too many. Today I finally removed the ‘That’s Not My’ section from our bookcase as I wanted her to read them first. There are already many books to replace the space.

Characters? Moshi Monsters all the way at the moment. She can name them better than I can. We’re both playing the Moshi Monsters Village game on our iPads, me watching H very closely (nobody is going to be her friend apart from me, she’s four so that’s how it stays) and trying to teach her to save to buy a house for her moshlings rather than spend everything (she doesn’t listen to me). It’s like social networking without the networking. I figure as long as she’s closely supervised she’ll be okay. The minute she does something and doesn’t tell me I’ll remove it from the iPad.

Photography? H Takes Photos is going strong, our blog we started back in spring – a photo each week taken by H. I need to upload some more as I’m getting close to the end of the ones which are good (there are many blurry ones which have been retaken), although of late she’s taken to borrowing MY camera to take photos – she’s only had her Kidzoom one for a year. Already like her mother… I’m looking for cheap cameras like mine which have a few more functions so she can learn a bit about macro shots and when to use them (she’s already played around a bit with mine) – she just moves around a bit too much.

Teeth? I’ve forgotten what she looked like with two front teeth. The other teeth seem fine, although I wasn’t impressed with her last dentist visit – it was over in about ten seconds, a different chap to the usual lady we see. Fortunately the infection cleared and we’re not having bother with any of the other teeth. Relief.

There’s so much more, but that’s 2013 as far as I can remember. It’s been memorable.

Sound City – Another Film Review

18 Monday Mar 2013

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music

Ahh, Dave Grohl, a nice chap. He’s a little bit over a year older than me and he’s a bazillion times cooler than me (which, to be frank, isn’t hard), and he’s made a documentary all about the Los Angeles Sound City studios, who closed back in 2011, where he recorded ‘Nevermind’ and has since bought some of the studio’s old equipment.

It’s a real musicians film (something I am not) but it isn’t boring – you get a history of bands who recorded there, from really early albums to the time Buckingham Nicks were recording their album and were spotted by Mick Fleetwood (ah, that brought back memories of my dad) and Fleetwood Mac of the classic mid-seventies lineup was born.

If you wanted to bring it out of the eighties and into the nineties then you’ve got your Nirvana onwards bands – Rage Against the Machine, Kyuss, Queens of the Stone Age, Weezer get a brief mention but didn’t feature other than at the end, and several others; in fact it’s probably better to read the Wikipedia page for a full list. Then watch the film and see the happiness on (most of) the musicians faces as they reminisce about their time there, until it’s time for Dave Grohl to invite his celebrity chums into his new Studio 606 for a spot of jamming. This is where the Grohl/Novoselic/Paul McCartney collaboration came about.

It’s an interesting piece of history and something I enjoyed – especially when you realise a lot of bands chose to record there because of the sound you’d get – and listen to a few of the songs and there is a familiar drum sound in there…

I watched it via Blinkbox via the PeerIndex peerperks, so worth doing. Having said that, the sound was low on the computer so we need to work out how to plug the MacBook Pro into the back of the television, so hopefully we’ll have cracked that one by the time we want to watch Skyfall….

A Film Review – Hit So Hard

16 Saturday Mar 2013

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music

I think I’ve only seen Hole live once – and that was at Reading whenever they played, possibly the same year Kurt Cobain and Kristin Pfaff died, when everyone expected Courtney to be a bit car crash.

I think.

I’m not sure. I might have been there.

I like Hole. I don’t have the last album though.. but now I have a rdio account I can at least give it a listen (I hope). Courney fascinates me – after all it is pretty much her band (although whenever I think of Hole I think of Courtney and Eric as he’s always been there), but this isn’t about Courney. It’s Patty Schemel, the drummer.

It built slowly, very slowly – a film documentary based on home footage and interviews over several years (as you find out at the end) as Patty becomes a heroin addict, ends up on the street and eventually rebuilds her life. Death features as you’d expect, the two main deaths being the Cobain and Pfaff ones. There’s a lot of what feels like really personal footage in there – Kurt, Courtney and baby Frances (and a funny section where they do the voice of Frances – take my word for it) – a fascinating insight into their lives. I love that so much home footage exists – and wonder how many bands do that and it’d never get seen (I know Phil from Lush has a lot of personal footage from one of their last tours).

There’s live footage, some quite uncomfortable viewing as you see Courtney the falling apart period having her dress ripped off her when she dived into the crowd (and I seem to remember reading about even more uncomfortable times when that’s happened). But they’re alive. They’re older. They’ve got hindsight, and this is about Patty. This is a life where drugs were just there, it wasn’t some rock and roll thing.

There’s interviews with Courney, Eric, Melissa Auf Der Maur, Roddy Bottum (Faith No More), Kate Schellenbach (Luscious Jackson/Beastie Boys) Nina Gordon (Veruca Salt) plus more people, friends, family and loads of female drummers. It’s a slow starter but by the end things feel positive, lives are being rebuilt.

I’m doing a trial of Blinkbox via Peer Index where we chose this as our first film – and I’m glad we did as I’ve wanted to watch for a while now. If you wanted a glimpse into that life (and there’s some footage where Patty is obviously completely smacked out and really not well at all) then it’s here – it hasn’t been edited out.

I’m just glad they’re all alive to tell the story – if you’re a fan of Hole then I’d recommend. As for Patty, I always thought she was quite hard and tough – and I guess she is in some ways, but hearing her talk she’s funny, caring, and now teaches music to kids, as well as working with dogs. You’d probably want to have a proper old natter with her too.

The Official Hit So Hard Site

Review – How To Play Jumbo 4 Connect With A Three Year Old

10 Wednesday Oct 2012

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Connect 4, Garden Games, Review

I thought the game Connect 4 would be a complicated one, but I hadn’t considered the emotional impact when playing for the first time.

We were sent a brilliant small person sized Jumbo 4 Connect game from Garden Games, and being a good mother I dutifully assembled it and got the game ready – a five-minute job, and most of that was removing the packaging from the ‘coins’.

So, first of all you try to explain the rules to your three-year old. All she wants to do is put her coins into the game – but she needs to learn to take turns. All good; we’re set.

I’m yellow and H is red. The game commences…. and H gets three in a line. In order to explain the rules of the game I then place my yellow to block hers – cue floods of tears, heartbroken, distraught, I’ve never seen that many tears come out of her in such a short time – I’ve made her extremely unhappy by this. Oh dear. I now know I have to lose and she has to win within the next two minutes or she’ll hate the game – BUT – she needs to understand how to play it – more that the fun is blocking the other player than actually winning. That and she needs some reassuring cuddles so she realises mummy isn’t a big meanie who spoils all the fun.

So I place a yellow and do a really obvious cough while pointing at the place I could win. H spots the danger and immediately blocks me with a red, looking a bit worried in the process. I look at her with a sad face and then add an “oh maaa-yaaaannn!” a bit like Swiper from Dora the Explorer does, and H cracks up.

PHEW.

We continue the game for a little bit longer, and I help point out somewhere she can win, and that’s it! She’s won! Hurrah! But she looks really sad and those tears start to look like they might come back. I ask why.

(n.b. H doesn’t look sad on this picture as she was bored of me taking her photo)

“Mummy, we haven’t put all the coins in the game yet so I can’t win” she tells me.
We then spend the next however long taking it in turns, getting connect 4s, 5s, whatever we damn well please until the game is complete and we’ve run out of turns.

H looks at me happily “I WON!!!!” with a sense of jubilation and achievement, and a “let’s play again!!!”

Daddy came home from work, started a game with me and H kicked up quite the stink and slid the wooden bottom part to let the tiles out, to have another go – her competitive nature doesn’t seem to be letting up on this one!

It’s safe to say the game is already a big hit in our house. Jumbo 4 Connect is suitable for outdoor play, though not to leave outdoors at this time of year – mainly due to the rain. It’s also fine for indoors and not too big or heavy (H 73.4cm W 84cm D 20cm and Weight 8.75kg) and packs down quite flat – there’s also a little bag to keep the coins in when it’s not in use. You can buy it for £94.99 over at Garden Games.

We received one for the purpose of review – and all opinions are our own.

Review – Bags Of Love

04 Tuesday Sep 2012

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Bags of Love, Review

Bags of Love approached me to review an item from their website. At first I wondered, as you’d assume with a name like that it would be about bags (which isn’t a bad thing, but I wouldn’t be able to do just one picture), but looking at the variety of things on offer I was pretty impressed – there are bags, but there are lots of other things you can try – like wallpaper, cushions, bean bags, bedding, even.

I particularly liked that there was a turnaround time for everything – which is always handy when you have to plan your days around being at home at a certain time.

I took the safe option in the end though – and opted for a photo canvas.

Our bedroom is a mess. A kind of organised mess, but a mess. We have a closet which really needs sorting out, and we have two sets of shelves in our room with my neglected vinyl collection sitting in it. On the walls live two discs I was given through work. On the other wall is an Ikea frame with various photos I got printed in them, but there’s no theme or organisation to our room, it’s a mish-mash of everything. It needs to look nicer and have nicer things in it.

We recently did lavender picking, and the first photo I took worked really well – so I chose that. I placed my order with Bags of Love, and by 10am the following morning my canvas had arrived – I was extremely impressed with how quickly it was sent.

I know my photo was a high-resolution one as it was taken on the posh camera, but seeing it, it’s even lovelier than I thought it would be – the purples of the lavender come out so beautifully.

The picture has been on our wall for a few weeks now and I love it!

You can find Bags Of Love on Facebook too.

The canvas was sent to me free of charge for the purpose of review. All opinions are my own.

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