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...