Learning to say no

Everything is no at the moment with Henrik.

"would you like a yogurt Henrik?" and the answer is "no" whilst he is climbing to his chair to be ready to eat it.

"would you like to go outside?" and again the answer is "no" whilst he is sitting on the bottom step trying to put his shoes on.

So it's all fun and games - you are wondering did he really mean no or was it a no because he just likes saying no!

He has also learnt to say Jack (the boy next door) this week and couple of other words. I keep being amazed by all these words he can say, mainly because I speak Finnish to him so I haven't even realised that he has heard the word he is saying, let alone learnt to say it.

One of Henrik's favourite books at the moment is Santtu kukkuu, he loves to have it read over and over again. Next time we are in Finland I'll have to get some more for him as he really likes the pictures in them - more than the story at the moment I think!

It's half term this week so I haven't had Rosie to look after and it's been funnily quiet - Henrik has had no one to squabble with about the doll's push chair or his trains. But next week is back to normal - busy and crazy but very enjoyable.

Birthday boy

Henrik had his 2nd birthday the day after we got back from the US. We had a little party for him with just us and Jean (his nanny) on the actual date and then the following weekend we had couple of his little friends over for a party.

The first couple of presents he wasn't too sure what to do with them but by the end of the week he'd got to full swing of opening presents. He got very upset when he wasn't allowed to open a present that we'd got for Andy and Naomi as a good-luck-at-university-thank-you-for-all-the-babysitting-present...

And Henrik definitely approved of cake. Lots of it :) On his real birthday we had a little cake for him and he blew the candles out fine but when we had more people around he was not too sure about what to do as everyone was looking at him and in the end his friend Nathan helped him to blow the candles out.

Holiday snaps

Here are some snaps from our trip to South Carolina. The weather was gorgeous and we spent most of the time on the beach. Henrik absolutely loved it and it was easy entertainment for him as he could run, scream, splash and do whatever he wanted. We discovered that visiting cute little towns with cute little shops and coffee houses is not too popular with him or it's too much effort for us to keep him interested in the above so beach was definitely the place to be with no extra entertainment required!

We did do a one short little town visit to Georgetown, SC. But it was very brief, we had a lovely lunch in a little restaurant that had a huge fishtank by our table that kept Henrik amused :) And then we had a very very brief wander around and saw some signs telling us not to feed the alligators! We didn't see any though :(

So here we are on our stroll in Georgetown

Henrik chilling on the beach

Building a sandcastle with daddy

Feeding mummy a very sandy biscuit

Amicalola falls in Georgia

Southern comforts and miracles

We are back from the sunny South Carolina. We had lovely time catching up with friends, making some new ones and just chilling on the beach. We have tasted all sorts of southern delights ranging from grits for breakfast (a bit like semolina, only grainier, made with milk and butter), fried chicken, pancakes and bacon for breakfast and fried gruper (white fish). The weather was lovely and we spent most of our time on beach just chilling.

When we got back home we were faced with cold weather, dead battery in a car and poor Jean with trapped nerve in her shoulder and possibly having to have 6 weeks off...which in turn would have meant that I would have had to have 6 weeks off. I was so tired after flying over night, not sleeping & time difference that I didn't even have to energy to pray apart from saying to God that I couldn't see a way around, please help-type prayer. And it's all got resolved amazingly - my next door neighbors childminder has resigned leaving her in a pickle so we are going to help each other out, she is going to have Henrik two days a week and I am going to have her two two days a week - how great is that! Yay God!!!

Time flies

Time does fly, it's the end of August already. Henrik will be two in two weeks from next Monday and David just had his 30th last Sunday! Can't believe Henrik is already two! I can't believe David is 30 either!!! We were 19 when we met...

We had a lovely weekend celebrating David's birthday. Ol(iver) and Becky & Amy came up for the weekend. On Saturday night we cooked a sea food paella on a bbq with lobster and everything. We also discovered that it is not good to put the lobster in too deep water...On Sunday we had everyone from church around for cakes and buns. I'd baked little bit everyday for the last couple of weeks so we had plenty of cakes which is good as we had 50+ people around. Lots of fun and lots of washing up - thank God for dishwashers :)