Little things

Sometimes its just the little things that I want to remember.

Arriving home from a weekend away, and Toby saying, 'Thank you for coming home mummy. It's so lovely to have you home.'

Kissing him goodnight, just before I go to bed. Watching him as he sleeps, all sweaty, his body thrown across the bed in his own crazy fashion. It's the only time these days when he still looks so little.

His made up word, FUNCH. He substitutes it for other words in unexpected ways that make us laugh. And that makes him laugh. I love that he loves to be such a joker.

Learning to say 'yellow' instead of lellow. He practised, hard. And the look of pure shock and joy on his face the first time he said it naturally, with out having to think. I would like to remember that face forever.

The way he whispers about things that he knows I don't like. And likes to mention these things as often as possible too. He tells me he would like to tell me something. I bend down for him to whisper in my ear, 'I would like a tattoo one day'. Sometimes its a gun, or a cigarette. I am horrified by his fascination with these things, but I'm trying to pretend otherwise. It's the shock value that he likes.

And tonight. We arrived home from work eagerly. Without saying a word to one another we both started putting our pyjamas on immediately. We went upstairs and I put on "Pumped up Kicks" LOUD. We just looked at each other, sparkles in our eyes and without a word to one another ran over to the sofa, laughing, and started dancing like crazy things.  And Toby's moves are just so cool. He was doing hand stands against the cushions, and back spins on the floor, big star jumps in the air. We got so frantic we had to tun the air conditioning on, even on an autumnal evening.

It's these little things that are the best bits of all.

Easter

A chocolate egg hunt around the house this morning.
And a family lunch.

Plenty of meat. Toby scored Daddy's beef 10 out of 10.
Followed by homemade chocolate eclairs and a homemade lemon tart.

 Toby ate a lot of chocolate, and was slightly crazy before bed, must hide the rest of his chocolate stash before I go to bed tonight, or we will be in trouble tomorrow....

We've had a good long weekend so far, and still one more day to go.
Yesterday we went for breakfast at The European. Even as we were leaving the house, at the mention of where we planned to go, Toby had decided want he wanted to order. He was quite specific. 'Mummy, I want the breakfast you have, with the sauce and the orange stuff on top. I want my own one.'  Goodness me. My fussy little man who won't even eat a thing kinder, so suspicious is he of food, want Eggs Benedict with smoked salmon for breakfast! Good job we are regulars, as they made him a special half serve, just for him.

After breakfast, we went into the city and watched the Five Foot Fingers perform, as part of the comedy festival. It was super fun, and silly, and Toby has played at pretending to be a Five Foot Finger ever since. Clinging on to lamp posts as I tried to get him in to the car and pretending to slide down them acrobatic style. Amusing and infuriating all at once.

 And here he is in a multi storey car park pretending to be Michael Jackson, and singing Bad. He just can't help himself, whenever he is in such a building something seems to over take him and he is compelled to dance and sing.
All in all a lovely weekend so far.

Action Packed

We had a bit of a busy day on Sunday.

An early (for us) breakfast out with friends, followed by a 4th birthday party for one of Toby's friends at a traffic school. He had a great time there, speeding around the roads, stopping at the red lights and the train crossings. At one point he was playing with some slightly older boys and they were all pretending to be formula 1 drivers having a race. Toby wanted to be Schumacher.

After the party finished we went to Flemington market for the last hour before it closed. For some reason Toby decided he wanted to have his face painted. He's never wanted to have it done before, but yesterday he was quite determined and set about looking for somewhere where he could get it done. We eventually stumbled upon a place with a fairy painting faces, and Toby decided he wanted to be a tiger. He was her last customer of the day so she took her time with him, and he totally surrendered himself to it. Keeping unbelievably still and enjoying every moment.

Afterwards we went to our favourite local cafe for hot chocolate. I think Toby wanted to show off his face to people that he knows...he lost all of his usual shyness and actually said goodbye to the owners for the first time when we left! I think his tiger face made him brave. (This is the same cafe where he walks in backwards every morning when I go to get my takeaway coffee, so he doesn't have to say hello... Ned, one of the owners, has told him that he will have to start banning backwards walking people from the cafe, as he's worried Toby will start growing eyes on the back of his head. But it hasn't stopped him yet. Even the promise of marshmellows if he can walk in front-facing hasn't enticed him enough to change his ways.)

Later in the afternoon a fire engine stopped outside our front door. (Our neighbours fire alarm had being going off for about half an hour). Toby went to say hello, and showed them his pretend fireman helmet. He got to sit inside the fire engine and hang out with them for a while.

All in all, an action packed day.

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.