- FIRST DAY OF NURSERY
Maia had her first three days (well half-days) of nursery this week.
Day 1: Dropped her off with no problem. She simply ran off to join the group, leaving me holding back the tears. Didn’t even get a kiss goodbye.
Tears at lunch time when she wanted to try another child’s crisps, and upon pick-up when she saw me but had to wait her turn before running into my arms (a little unfair that she could see me across the room yet was held back as there were other mummies in front of me in the line..) She greeted me with the words “Mummy I’m so happy to see you!!” (the feeling was mutual, although the four hours flew by, I was beyond relieved to have her back in my arms..all in one piece).
Day 2: Slight hesitation when I dropped her off but no tears.
Teachers said she didn’t actually eat anything at lunch ( which explained why she devoured her cheese sandwich and bread sticks on the way home).
Day 3: Just a “Mummy I don’t want you to go..can you stay and dance with me?” (They were doing singing and dancing..) When her teacher tried to lead her to the group, she said “NO! I want to go there BY MYSELF!”.
A few tears at lunch but the teacher said only a couple of minutes and completely fine after that.
All in all I am extremely proud of my little darling. I thought the first few days were going to be horrible. I had visions of teachers having to tear her away from me, then having to walk home -sobbing- with hysterical crying in the background. But nope, she was a trooper.
She’s taken this new experience all in her stride and aside from some lunch-box envy and the inevitable “I want my mummy to bring me my usual nice hot food, not this cold-box-crap”.. she seems to be loving it.
What’s more, seeing her little face light up with I arrive to collect her sends what I can only describe as the-purest-form-of-joy through my veins. That smile is everything.
“Yeh, looks alright.”
2. THE BREAKFAST CLUB
I ‘ve come to really enjoy mealtimes with Maia. There’s still a lot of coming and going ( on my part), a lot of fetching (milk, water, straws, cheese..). Meals are still one request after another. But for the most part, she is a lot of fun to dine with. (Plus I can munch on crumpets and peanut butter on toast and call it being economical because we wouldn’t want to waste all that salty-no-doubt-highly-nourishing-goodness would we…).
Here she is on Friday morning. Her first experience with cornflakes and the crumpet I later ate. And yes that dog spent most of Friday morning at her side. She always has a soft toy to accompany her at breakfast.
3. DANCE PARTY IN MUMMY’S BEDROOM
She loves to dance. As does her mother. At the moment we’re into 80’s Classics. I managed to keep her still for a total of 20 seconds to take these photos. No I didn’t plan the matchy-matchy white shirts.
4. RAINY DAY BAKING
The glorious sunshine had to end eventually. So we baked. Sugar-free banana bread-in-a-cake-tin and not-so-sugar-free chocolate chip cookies. There was a lot of “MUMMY CAN I MIX?” Of course I let her mix..and then I kindly took over, because we don’t want lumpy bumpys in our perfectly-imperfect cookies now do we (..and because I was beginning to lose my cool with all the flour going everywhere and her demands to add more water to an already watery mixture.) I find baking with a toddler highly stressful. “YES YOU CAN CRACK THE EGG, NO, NOT DIRECTLY INTO THE MIXTURE UNLESS YOU WANT CHOC-CHIP-EGG-SHELL-COOKIES”…)
5. PAINTING IN THE GREAT OUTDOORS
We had some painters over to re-paint our house. Maia wanted to join them so I said instead of climbing on the roof with them – as safe and child friendly as this would be – I compromised and said we could do some painting outside. (*She is post-bath here, hence the slick locks).
The Colourful Kind 