September #2: Dancing, canal tunnel trip, and photoshoot

Following on from the last update about September, which was mainly about Orry, this is the exhaustive second part, which happens to be mainly about Finn, I think...


Dancing!

One of the greatest things about September was Finn and dance.

The story probably begins with our going along to an amazing family-centred day at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden with Finn's friend Lily ("with the black hair") and her parents. We watched contemporary dance, comic circus skills, family presentations of the fight scene from the ballet of Romeo & Juliet, an off-the-cuff production of a scene from Carmen and a demonstration of ballet-shoe making, as well as taking part in opera karaoke. It was an amazing event and we all enjoyed it immensely. Finn really liked "the sword dancing," but we suspect that it was mainly the swords rather than the dancing. But he also really enjoyed the creative activity we took part in.

Museum activities are not normally Finn's sort of thing, much to Cori's frustration, but perhaps being there with Lily and her parents made Finn engage with it, or perhaps he was just into it. The activity was making the bodice of a tutu. The thing was run really well by one of the people in charge of making the costumes for the place and after an preamble/introduction/explanation she gave everyone a choice of themes and laid out materials for everyone to create their bodices. Finn chose a water-nymph. He never actually asked what a nymph was, but it quickly became a dress for a "water fairy" so he must have had a clue - anyway he just went on the water thing, having stormy waves (in the edging), the boat at the top and the fish below:

All of the elements were selected by Finn and he helped us sew them on. He was very proud of it and he really got into explaining it to the leader in front of the class.

He is normally very shy of this sort of thing, but he felt very at home there and at the end wanted to go and hug the two people who were running the workshop in thanks (and also to chat to them in a toddler stream of consciousness for far too long!). This rather caught the activity leaders by surprise, though delighted them, though the random person who was just walking past and Finn mistook for one of the leaders and so also hugged was rather surprised! (We weren't sure whether to be pleased with Finn's affection, or embarrassed about people thinking that we starve him of hugs/emotion - we don't!) Finn, and Lily, were very pleased with the result:

But he felt cheated, because he didn't come away with a tutu, as we had promised, having mistakenly told him that that was what we were to be doing. Perhaps having seen some of the dancers in them, Finn kept hold of the idea of getting a tutu. This went so far as borrowing books about ballerinas from the friends he visited who had older sisters. This is a picture of him on the way home from Gabor's house, reading Flore's ballerina book silently as he walked.

(Reading whilst walking is something that I do on the commute to work, which some people find remarkable. I felt very pleased to see Finn doing it too!)

As it was evidently a very serious and genuine desire for a tutu and an interest in (Finn's idea of) dancing, so Cori ordered in the material and made him one, in his favourite colour, yellow. He was very pleased:

This then became what he wore to do dancing. So, for a week or so, his favourite activity was to get on his tutu, get out the keyboard, put on the demo tune, and have us watch him as he did his dancing. Great fun:

I have to admit that it did get a little tiring to watch, especially as he would tell us to "Watch me!" every 20 seconds or so, but it was still good fun. We don't have a video of him in the tutu dancing, but here is him doing some themed dancing - "Strong Dancing" apparently:

Having felt slightly jealous of our other parent friends taking their children to football or swimming, we had been thinking of taking Finn to classes of some sort, so we leapt on the idea of his doing dancing lessons. At the suggestion of this Finn was positive though far from exuberant about it. It was recognisable as wariness of landing up in a situation that he wasn't comfortable in.

This fear of the class really came out when Cori took him along for the first time. This wasn't helped by having fallen over just outside and so he was a bit weepy, but the gaggle of children there made him frightened immediately. He would not join in at all once they got there. He made up excuses not to go in, such as not having his Yogi Bear teddy and so they would have to go home so that Yogi wouldn't be lonely etc. But Cori managed to get him to peep into the class as it began, from behind the curtain. Eventually he built up the confidence to go and sit on the bench, but then he fell off that, and started crying again. And that was the end of that.

We were really sad about this, because we knew that he would have really enjoyed it, that he wanted to be a part of it, and that he was sorry to have missed out. He didn't admit it or speak it out loud, but he was sad about it - he didn't speak about it, or else he knew that we'd then corner him into going again, which he was too frightened to do.

When the next week came around, Orry was due in for an allergy test at the hospital, and so it was up to me to collect him from nursery and take him along. We arrived early, when there was only the teacher and one other boy there. We chatted to the (very nice) teacher for a while, and then Finn warily played with the other boy. Everyone else was late in arriving, and so the class managed to start with just Finn and one other boy in the class. Finn was able to then start doing it, and getting into it (starting with them forming a line and dancing like a train), so that he didn't at all interrupt his stride when others joined. Having been shaking with fear outside, he danced throughout the 45 minute lesson with a smile on his face. In the end the problem was not Finn's being too shy to join in, but his being too excited to be able to stop dancing or speaking and to listen to the teacher's instructions. Listening in from outside, there were a few titters of laughter as Finn excitedly tried to lead the class in other types of dancing before the teacher had had a chance to issue her own instructions - if she didn't have her wits about her, she would have ended up with Finn teaching the class!

I was so pleased with him on it. I don't think that I've ever been prouder of him, really. It was really lovely to see. I couldn't hug him and praise him enough when he eventually emerged. And it was lovely to go home and report back to Cori in our usual speak-about-Finn-as-he-sits-by with praise and wonderment until he pipes up and joins in. It was very nice to be able to praise him for his bravery at overcoming fear and his being such a good dancer when he was clearly there feeling very proud of himself indeed. (Direct expressions of pride he is generally too embarrassed or distracted to acknowledge or submit to!).

He has since been a third time and enjoyed it again. We are delighted that he is doing these dancing lessons - they will be a great thing to show him what bravery can achieve, and also something that he really enjoys. And, of course, he will also emerge as an excellent dancer of frog, lion and snake dances!

We don't have a video, or pictures, from the class, but as a substitute there is this video of Finn enjoying some Taylor Swift on his newly-claimed Radio 1 radio, as Orry has a post-dinner sink-bath:

Random photos

To speed things up a bit, I'll give you some of the loose pictures without too much preamble...
Two boys quietly enjoying their own books:

Orry can roll in his sleep, Finn is a deep sleeper who begins the night in our bed (before I carry him through to his own bed), and so this can sometimes happen, which is a lovely thing to come in to find:

Finn is silly at dressing up:

Orry jumps about in his high-chair and shifts it back from flush against the table. Since he often therefore gets out of reach of the table, we have to push him back in again so that he can reach his food. But it does mean that Orry has been able to discover the delights of putting his feet on the table to relax as he eats!

Finn overcame his fear of bouncy castles (and/or the mob of children one encounters thereon), when he went on one at a friend's party. But that might have been just because his old friend, Conrad, was there (who we were surprised but delighted to see that Finn still got on with wonderfully well).

Orry looks cute when apparently impersonating playing the banjo:

And, finally in the random photos, Orry and I are good mates (though generally for the space of minutes, before he notices Cori's absence!)

You will see in my hand a little fish. Tied to a string, this is a toy that Orry likes. It is one that we especially like for on bus journeys etc., as it is quiet and easy enough to dangle and make fun for him.



Finn's pronunciation


I am called "Deedah" in our household, because Finn somehow managed to flip "Daddy" when he learnt it (and we liked the result and took it up ourselves). This strange mishandling of words is still with Finn and it emerges with some strange mangling of words. We managed to get a video of it, and you will note that he retains his mad pronunciation of both barbecue and doll's house in spite of our pronouncing it correctly to him. This is just how he does it:

We could perhaps be worried about that - it doesn't seem like a normal thing, and it could mean something for a neurologist or psychiatrist - but it only comes out in a few odd words and it is not at all problematic. To us it's just a funny quirk of our Finn.

Here is the "dolloes" house he was speaking of (beyond Finn, inside the cabinet thingy) - it was something that Cori bought on the back of his interest in such things at his Granny's and friend's house. However, with his own one, he pays it as much attention as he is evidently doing here... It will be soon back onto Ebay!

Canal & Party

The final weekend in September saw the birthday of Finn's friend Lily ("with the yellow hair"), at a soft-play out in Camden. Since it was in the afternoon, we thought that we'd make a day of it, and a great day it was too...

It started by cycling down to the Canal Museum on the other side of Angel, where Cori and the boys had been before. After a quick look around we went out for the main reason for our going there - a trip on a canal boat!

And the main reason for our going on the canal boat was because that stretch of the Regent's Canal goes underneath Angel in an 878 metre-long tunnel. There isn't a picture of this (other than the boring ones of blackness), but this is what the entrance looks like - note the tiny speck of light from the far-away other end.

It was a lot of fun, and genuinely exciting, for us all. It was not something put on for children, and Finn and Orry were the only children there, but Finn still enjoyed it. He especially liked going up on deck for a bit, especially when the driver (if that's what you call the person at a canal boat's tiller!) showed Finn the engine. Finn was speaking about the crank shaft spinning the propeller for hours after.

After the canal we went into the Museum for a long period as Finn had a great time on everything and put up a fight about going, until we promised him food. We went across to the new development on the canal above King's Cross, which we had heard was very nice, and it was:

You will note the canal, the people relaxing (on tiered soft fake grass), the (very good) busker person playing in the background. It was very lovely indeed. We spent a long time there eating and relaxing. Activities included being cute:

Playing on the tiers:

And being silly together:

You should be able to make out that the game here, led by Orry, is standing up by the tier/step, laughing a lot, and then falling backwards into your bum. Finn really enjoyed doing it too, which was lovely.

After that we were late to the party, where Finn and I had a run around the soft play before going to dinner and a run-around. It was good to see old friends again and catch up with people, especially with Orry growing so.

It was also good for Finn to get a good run around.

We even got time to snap a nice picture or two:

But here is the birthday girl, Lily, with her yellow hair, looking very much four years old:

Finn's early morning photoshoot

The only other thing to relate are the pictures of a photoshoot that Finn insisted on doing early on one weekend morning (hence our hair and generally bedraggled state):

You will note the matching tops for the two boys though. Finn was delighted by this early birthday present!
These ones feel like strange modern Dutch still lives:

This one is quit nice though:

It seems that Finn did quite a good job! He will probably do some amazing things when he's older... like when he's four...

September #1: Orry's new words, mobility, bike seat, size and dexterity (and some outings)

September was an exciting month: Orry started crawling, bike trips, and much more. When I started writing this, I thought that it wouldn't take too long, but now that I soon ran into a post much too long for one reading, so I've split it into two: this time it happens to be mostly Orry, and the next one will be more of Finn (it wasn't planned that way - it was just written thus unthinkingly).

But first, the monthly pics:

10 months old

11 months old

47 months old

48 months old (4 years old!!)

Orry's new words

Orry has added some new words to his vocabulary: "Deedah!" and "Hiya!"

The former generally comes as a part of a game where Cori will ask where I've gone to, Orry will look up as if perplexed, perhaps throw out his arms in a I-don't-know gesture, and then point at me with a big smile and say something very close to "Deedah!" This is, of course, the the name that Finn gave to me, somehow failing to say "Daddy" and reversing the sounds completely. I rather like it, so we're sticking to it with Orry.

Cori is rather annoyed about his happily saying "Deedah" - he responds to her suggestions of "Mama!" with a blank stare. But perhaps that is because he's never away from her and so has no need to call for her with anything but a crying wail when she leaves!

"Hiya!" is hardly the most elegant ways of greeting someone, but it is just something that he says in the "Hello!" situation. It's not something that we've taught him, and he's not been around anyone else to pick it up, so it is just him starting to say it instead of "Hello." We now encourage it, as we quite enjoy it from him.

Yet again it seems that we don't have any video of Orry saying these words - sorry, Orry! But we do have a video of him doing one of his favourite soundings: "Shhh!" This is a great game for Orry: watching us say "Shhh" and they repeating it back to us, vaguely putting his finger on, or near, or in his mouth as he does so. This is also often preceeded by his putting his finger to our mouth, hoping that we'll shhh to it as well.

Just in case it needs to be pointed out, it should be explained that, although this "Shhh!" game is lovely during the day, it can be rather annoying at night when we want to quiet him or lull him back to sleep. "Shhh" we'll say in our best parental calm, there is then a short silence, and then a "shhh" from Orry in response. This is then normally followed by a hearty sigh from us...


Bikes

We live at the top of our block of flats. The top of the winding stairwell leaves a great empty space perfect for locking up our bikes against the railings of the stairs - perfectly out of everyone's way and just outside the flat (and safe etc.). Islington Homes, the managers of the flats, however, disagree and have been hounding everyone to get everything out of the stairwell spaces for months. Luckily this coincided with some of the sheds on the estate becoming available and we leapt in to get one as a store for the bikes. It is not an insignificant cost, but it pays for itself in the saved bus fares when I get to use the bike.

In shifting all the bikes and scooters etc. into the shed, Finn surprised us all in asking to use the balance bike that he'd refused to ride outside for months until we'd given up trying to make him (as it meant taking it out and then having to carry it on our shoulder on the journey after the first five yards out the front door!). We were delighted about that and he successfully managed to step it down the road to the library. (Admittedly, other children glide their balance bikes, but Finn only just got onto it, so it's kind of understandable!). Here he is looking fantastic:

Note the attractive elbow and knee pads. These were selected by Finn at Halfords, where Cori had taken him to get his new helmet, since he had grown out of his last one. He is in a curiously female/girly mood these days in his tastes; hence the pink cup-cake themed pads. They are as good as useless, but they were cheap and they were only really an encouragement for him to go on the balance bike, which they certainly are.

We were half-thinking of getting him a real bike for his birthday, but we realised that he would probably choose the pinkest one in the shop, complete with doll baby basket and tassels. This would have tested even our openness to gender freedom!

The impetus for our replacing Finn's too-small-helmet was so that it could be passed onto Orry and we could get him on the bike. Once everything was in place, we tried him in it and he seemed quite happy about it (except when I cycled, but only because it meant that he was too far from his mum!):

Orry enjoyed it, but he was certainly a lot less in awe of the experience as Finn was when he first started. Unlike, Finn, who would sit silently staring at everything wide-eyed, Orry will watch things in his usual way and then try to find a way to bat at Cori's legs or grab at and otherwise get in the way of her arms or fiddle with any bike bits he could reach. By the end of the journey home after our first outing, it was clear that Orry was very relaxed on the bike (and Cori had a very long test of her skills as a one-handed cyclist, getting all the way from Mare Street, through Dalston, home with a sleeping Orry to support!):

Of course, Orry being in Finn's old seat meant that we had to get a new seat for Finn. As he is at the limit for the front-seat, we had to get one to go behind, as is normal for children's seats. It is horrible, unbalancing and, for us anyway, rather frightening and dangerous. Cori refuses to use it (though Orry gives her no choice), and I have to pretend not to be frightened for our safety as I wobble off into the road. Horrible. I have no idea how other people do it - I am no new-comer to this cycling thing, having been cycling in London since I was a student, but having a seat on the back is awful and I find it very hard to enjoy taking Finn out in it. But, at least people can see our lack of stability and do take account of it, noticeable giving us more space and time, which is very much appreciated!

London Fields

Our first trip on the bike was out to London Fields, east of us in Hackney. It is a wonderful park for children, and we don't go there enough as it is a bit of a hassle to get to - except for on a bike, when it is quite easy. So it was a pleasant (though fearfully wobbly) trip out there on a pleasant weekend day for a picnic:

We also got to play on the brilliant playground, including the massive slides. However, I was surprised to set Finn up at the top of the massive slide (initially just at his willingness to go on it!) and to rush down to the bottom to collect him, only to have him go down letting himself down an inch at a time by adeptly gripping the side. All the grown-ups there had a good laugh as Finn confidently let himself down singing to himself and taking in the views, while I laughed and called for him to get a move on, with a mob of kids eager to get going at the top there. All brilliant Finn. Hot work though:

Orry enjoyed himself too - being around kids, and Finn - what more could be wished for?!

Well, what he would have wished for is to not have to leave his mum, at all - not even for the time it takes for a photo to be taken...

Orry's attachment

Orry's need to be with Cori constantly reached new heights as the month drew on. This meant that even my hour or so with him and Finn in the morning as Cori caught up on sleep began to fall away as Orry began to cry too much to be able to carry it off. Cori's sleep suffered!

This is the same throughout the day: I cannot keep him from wailing in agony when she leaves the room - even if just for the space of time it takes to put something in the oven or even just to go to the toilet. It is very draining on her, and rather disheartening for me. (For my own part, it is a bit miserable that Orry would seemingly cry at the same pitch if I was there holding him and trying to distract him as if I wasn't there at all and he was left alone in the room - it's not very nice to realise that).

This is partly, we imagine, just a phase, but it would not be unconnected to the new nursery settling that was taking place towards the end of the month (more of that in a separate post). It is going to make things very tricky, especially since Orry is even more attached to her than Finn was. It is hard to imagine how we're going to cope over the coming month, but, I guess, we'll have to work something out.

Orry does love his mum though, very much.

Ok, that picture was actually of our humour at their being in stripes at the same time, which he didn't enjoy, but it is still funny. The better example of them enjoying each other's company is this little video:

Orry's mobility

Orry is now crawling quite well. He can get from one side of the room to the other, and he can get himself to whatever he needs, but he certainly isn't one to just go crawling off. No, Orry is one to stay very close to his grown-up (i.e. Cori!) - why would be ever dream of moving more than a crawl's length away from them?! Indeed, I would even argue that when he first started crawling, at the start of the month, he crawled more than he did at the end, by which time he had got over the novelty of it all and wasn't that fussed about it.

Regardless, here is a video of Orry fresh into that crawling game, and doing a great zombie-like lurch of a crawl across the living room:

There is little doubt that walking is a long way off. But Orry is getting better at standing. There was a couple of weeks in September where he would really enjoy practising walking around with our holding him up, but he isn't so interested in it now - he either wants to be transported quicker, or else he doesn't want to shift at all!

Here is a video of him doing some great practice walking:

Orry "the lumper"

Perhaps a part of Orry's slowness is connected to the fact that he's massive. Here is the plot on the development chart that Orry received towards the start of the month, which showed him to be back well into the 99th percentile, having dropped away from that only a month or so ago.

Don't believe it? Take a closer look!

Here he is in his full chubby glory (helped by a good mood and the good post-rain sunset light!):

This rate of growth means that he's going through clothes sizes and other sizes much quicker than Finn did, and quicker than we had expected. It becomes increasingly hard to tell their clothes apart (or perhaps that's just me!). But at least it makes us very conscious of things that we know he will be too big to do before long, such as enjoying baths in the sink.

The little things

Another explanation (i.e. excuse) that we've been give for Orry's later development of the "gross motor skills" of walking and talking, is his relative proficiency at "fine motor skills." I.e. he's pretty good at his hands.

It is not really something that we reflect on or remark on - since it's just how he is - but we sometimes remember to look, and see, that some of what Orry is up to with his hands and feet is actually quite impressive. It might not sound like a lot, but it is apparently remarkable that at this age he's quite adept at turning the pages of books:

He enjoys books, though perhaps not as avidly as Finn did at this stage. It is a shame that we are not able to read to him more than we do, but this would always be the case with two children, I fear. Orry tends to like roughly the same sorts of books as Finn did (because they are better books!), with interesting variances. For us, it is hard to understand that he might like different books to what Finn did, because obviously those would be the ones that all babies should like. But we are unlearning things from Finn to relearn for Orry daily.

Some of his favourite toys are those from Finn's wooden train set. Orry loves to turn over the small signs in his hands, or bat the wheels of the trains, or, especially, buzz round the propellers of Harold the Helicopter (one of Orry's favourite toys). Admittedly, Finn and I only contrived to put him in the box (and briefly try to drive him around until we realised that he was too heavy to make light work of it!) and fill him in with toys only for the sake of this picture, but what a picture!

Another game that he picked up towards the end of the month is throwing things. Not in an aggressive way or even in a disruptive way (mostly); just in the way of an excellent thrower. If you sit in the right place a few yards away from him, you will be able to have a game of throwing the ball back and forth indefinitely. He will consistently throw the ball to you, laughing with happiness as he does so. The only thing that tends to end the game is Orry getting too excited and crawling towards you to retrieve the ball, and ending up directly in front of you and not nearly far enough away to throw!
We need to get a video of the great throwing game, but in the meantime here is a picture of Orry with balls in hand, ready for action:

This is also the picture (annoyingly slightly out of focus) that has Orry in Cori's favourite pose he often takes us - with his legs crossed. It is very cute.

Talking of Orry's legs, if you think all that stuff with his hands was impressive, you should hear him with his feet!

Outings

Cori is to start work mid-October, and so the count-down has begun to the end of freedom. So too were Finn and Orry to start nursery at the end of the month (more of that in another post). So Cori was keen to make the most of her time off, and so was going through her list of things to do and see. By mid-September, she had pretty much done it all, which was both great and also rather surprising to be able to get through it. Two of the final things were going to the aquarium and going on a canal trip. The latter will come later, but the former is easily told...

Cori went when I was in work, so it was just her and Finn and Orry. It was a very successful trip in that Finn and Orry were really into all the fish and they all had a great time. The only drawback for Cori was having to hold Orry up for so long to look at everything, but at least there was some very good below-the-floor tanks and also some good ones for them to sit and admire the stuff in. Excuse the pictures, taken in entirely dark settings!

They went to the aquarium on the Southbank, opposite the Houses of Parliament. It was raining, so they ate their lunch before going in...

On the way out Finn had this picture taken of him for my benefit, because he wanted me to be scared in thinking that the fish was eating him. He also had another picture taken of him smiling and stood up, just to show that he was "only teasing."

Although not really on Cori's Great To Do List, since it was where she used to work, we took a trip to the Museum of London Docklands. This is a well-known and well-liked place for Finn, and Orry, though it is hard for any of us to put our hearts into seeing it all and making the most of it when you know the place as well as we all do. But at least we always have fun there, and it is nice for Finn, and Orry, to feel at home in a place like the Museum. We went there for their Christina Broom photography exhibition, which explains this silly collage picture of us all taking our turn in the picture board thingy.

Whilst we're at it, here's Finn and Orry getting on well in a barrel... it's the sort of thing you get to do as kids in the Museum of London!

Two boys in a barrel? What could be a better place to stop? Nothing! - Second part coming soon...