Happy New Year!

Today marks two special occasions. Firstly, after months of pursuing builders for quotes we have finally submitted our grant application to the council. This means we should be able to start work on Sunnyside at the beginning of February. I feel we have at last reached the first milestone on a long journey.

Secondly, today is New Year's Eve, and we celebrated with our lovely new neighbours, Ron and Barbara, who cooked us a delicious chicken casserole.

We had a lovely afternoon and look forward to returning the favour when we have a working kitchen.

Merry Christmas

For James the last few weeks have been a marathon of present opening. It has all been a little overwhelming for him, but he has throughly enjoyed it. The best present of all was actually the one we bought for Pops. This super-sized saucepan proved to be a great place to stand in and even better for carrying around all the other toys.




James was ready for his roast goose a little before it was cooked!

It's party time!

Yesterday James went to his nursery's Christmas party. There was pass the parcel, musical bumps, disco dancing, sausage rolls, chocolate fingers, balloons and Father Christmas. James had a fabulous time and, predictably, when it came to bedtime he took all of three seconds to fall asleep.

Birthday boy

Today James is 2 years old. He had a lovely day with lots of presents. Here he is on mummy and daddy's bed, very pleased with his new toy tractors.












We then went to a toddlers carol service at church, and had lots of fun throwing crayons around with his friend Agnes.




Then a visit to Grandma and Grandpa to discover a shiny new thomas-the- tank-engine train set. Choo choo!



...followed by a visit to Nanna and Pops for more presents. He was very pleased with this train that Pops had made. He was particularly fascinated by the way that you feed wooden sausages into the funnel and they miraculously appear in the fuel box. Not sure if this is how real steam engines work but it's fun!

But before we go home, James had to try on his new Thomas vest. Interesting look James - I think this is what Trinny and Suzannah call "layering".

Thomas

Since we borrowed Grandma & Grandpa's video, James has been obsessed with Thomas the Tank Engine. Here he is sporting cousin Jacob's new jumper. Thanks to Nanna, another one is already in production.