Toby's First Grand Prix

Just him and Daddy.
They were very excited....

A month in photos

I won't be able to do a post on February 29th for a while...so I thought I should celebrate the day with some photos that didn't make the blog this month...

That rare thing, afternoon sleeping Toby...

First thing in the morning Toby

Den making Toby

Ridiculous Toby....

 Punk haired Toby in the bath

Tattooed Toby... 

 

His inspiration (and barber)

A rainy day

It rained pretty much all day yesterday. A months rainfall in a day. And it was hot. And steamy and sticky and generally uncomfortable. The kind of weather that puts everyone in a bad mood. So I decided the only way to get through it was for Toby and I to fill our day doing lots of stuff.
We had swimming in the morning. Toby is really confident these days in the water. He loves going under. And is great at "popcorns" (pushing backward off the side) and 'torpedos' (diving in).
After swimming, we went for a ride on his scooter to the supermarket and for a coffee. Once home, we made lunch together, and then played with Lego. Each building our own cars and racing them down a slope Toby constructed.

Later, Toby and I made cheese scones. Toby mostly made them, he pushes me out of the way and won't even let me near the bowl once he gets to the mixing together part!

And then of course we ate them still hot from the oven, with lashings of butter

It was a lovely, wet day.

Lego

He's been playing with tiny Lego (as we call it) since his 2nd birthday.
I think he may have played with it every single day since.
These days, on our days together, he plays with it for hour after hour. He likes to build his own things now, not just play with the things I put together for him.
He makes some pretty cool stuff. Cars, houses, toilets. He loves to make Lego toilets.
This morning before breakfast he asked me to help him make a break dancing shop. And his wish is my command. We had a bit of fun making this together, and then playing with it afterwards.
( I'm not sure if you can make out the trousers hanging on the rack at the back, but that was my favourite bit of this shop!)

I think I'm enjoying the Lego almost as much as he is.   

Weekending

Spent doing things that Toby loves.
A music lesson
Egg and soldier's at Twenty and Six (our favourite local cafe)
A trip to the library
A haircut from Toby's friend Wayne the (Tattooed) Barber
Drawing Tattoo's on his own arms....

Ice cream in the city
Making how-to-make-Lego video's (like the ones he loves to watch on Youtube)
Making a Lego model of Twenty and Six

Playing Gotye's video clip " Somebody That I Used to Know" over and over
Singing Michael Jackson songs
Singing Weird Al Yankovic songs
Chocolate brioche and babycino at Seven Seeds
More ice cream from Brunetti's
Playing on his scooter
And more Lego making....

A day out in Geelong and Queenscliff

 It was a beautiful day on Saturday. Hot and sunny. We decided to have a day out by the sea in Queenscliff, and we stopped off in Geelong on the way to have a look at the wooden people who are dotted all along the waterfront.

Once in Queenscliff we had a spot of lunch, and then the most enormous serves of ice cream before heading to the beach to play beach ball. Toby really enjoyed himself, killing himself laughing as he stunt rolled in the water. Totally forgetting about his bad knees that he has been weeping and fussing over constantly. Not noticing that he was running across the sand with blood dripping down his leg as he raced against the wind to catch the ball.
It was fun.

My little man starts Kindergarten

We talked about it for weeks ahead. He got to chose his own bag on the internet, and then open the big box when it arrived.
We had 2 weeks of settling in, where I went with him just for the mornings and got him used to everything.
And last Friday he had his first proper day there. I left him making Spring rolls for Chinese New Year and then picked him up after lunch. I felt guilty the whole time he was there, guilty for having time to myself, guilty for liking the idea....
I phoned part way through the morning to check that everything was going OK, and the teacher said he was absolutely fine, though he had fallen over and grazed his knees. But he had been very brave and not cried.
When I arrived he was happily playing with Lego and didn't even want to go home! He had really enjoyed himself.
As soon as we left Kinder, the crying really started over his knees. It was his first really big fall, he is so cautious usually. I felt guilty that I hadn't been there to give him a cuddle and a kiss. And my guilt got the better of me so I promised him that we would take a tram into the city and go and get a new Lego set because he had been so good.

He managed to limp his way through the city. And he chose a new Lego mechanics set, that comes with an extra bag of bricks to make up your own cars. He loved it, and has pretty much being playing with it non-stop ever since, making up his own crazy cars.

The Games We Play

Oh, the complicated games we have to play.....
All invented by Toby, of course.
There's the game where he is a barista (coffee maker) in a cafe, and I have to come in as a robber and steal all the coffee and cakes and Toby arrests me and throws me in jail.
And the game where he is a famous motorbike rider who keeps on crashing, and I am the TV commentator.
And the game where he is a contestant on "It's a knockout" and he keeps falling over and losing all his clothes.
And one of his favourites, when he is a stone statue busker, and Gaw-Gaw and I have to drop money in his hat.
He's still fanatical about Michael Jackson, and we spend many an evening re-creating the video for 'Beat It', complete with fight scene. I've noticed that Toby even pretends to smoke a cigarette and then throw it on the floor. That surely isn't a good thing for a three year old to be doing....

Last week we went to a playground we haven't been to before. It's in Albert Park and is all wooden and resembles a huge castle. I took with us his knight's cloak so we could play together. Each time we play knights I give him a different knight's name, Sir StinkySocks or Sir Sleep-a-Not or something silly like that. I started saying to him, "OK Toby, so today you can be Sir..." and I couldn't think of a name, my mind was tired and fuzzy and not a single name could come to me. Then Toby turned to me and said, "Mummy, just call me Lami, I want to be Sir Lami" and then he killed himself laughing at his own joke. 
 

He's just so funny, this delicious, crazy boy of mine.

little Mr. Wordsmith

He has always loved words. He used really long ones even when he could still barely talk. He asks about words and phrases all the time, what they mean and why.
He finds it funny when one word has two meanings. He made a joke just the other day when I asked him if he was going to eat the rest of his pancakes. 'No Mummy. I'm going to have a rest on my pancakes instead. I'm going to go to sleep on them!' It makes me laugh, and it amazes me the way he has worked this stuff out for himself.
For a while now he has been curious about sarcasm, and I knew it was only a matter of time before he tried it himself. I use it on him when I'm tired and cross, and he'll always pick up on it. He'll do something annoying and I'll mutter, "Thanks Toby, that's really nice of you" and then he'll ask, " Why did you say thanks? Why did you say that?" "I'm being sarcastic" is my only reply.
And now he's used it on me while we were decorating the gingerbread house just before Christmas. He was stirring the icing, I had to sieve the sugar. I was getting bored as it was taking sooo long, and ended up sieving the icing sugar all over Toby's hand. And he said, "Mummy, I really love it when you snow on my hand" in a serious, slightly annoyed tone. "Do you?" I said. "Not really, I was being sarcastic" he laughed. And I killed myself laughing too, amazed at him and how much he absorbs from all around him.

Christmas Day

All the signs that father Christmas had been....

Christmas morning

 

Opening his stocking

His favourite toys - Fireman hat (complete with visor) and his Lego, of course...