The first big exciting thing in May, perhaps obviously, was the Laa Boaldyn (May Day) celebration, in Peel. This was a new thing which Finn's dance group was involved in. The event, despite being new, was built on an ambitiously massive scale, and things looked ominous when the morning began; we set off from the house in sun, but were shocked, within the space of about 20 metres to go from sunlight into this on the promenade:
We had planned a morning in Peel Castle, and we were heading into the thick of the pea-soup at that of the bay, exactly where the festival was to take place:
However, at the time that the 'Oie Voaldyn' festival was starting, the fog lifted, and it soon established itself as a glorious day, as you'll see from Finn's trying out some of the Viking's of Mann's kit on the beach:
But much more of interest to Finn than vikings were the bands, as he wanted to do this:
We had been on the beach, when Finn heard one of the band's start up. He asked to go and dance, which I took only half-seriously, but he wouldn't let up until we were there, and he danced constantly through a number of different bands, for what much have been about an hour. He was just by me in the crowd, but then was delighted when someone said he was allowed in the space in front of everyone, which he leapt into. Other children joined him, but he was mostly on his own, dancing for his own benefit (though he was showing off a bit towards the end, taking the audience's applause over the band!). All-in-all, a very surprising thing to see, since he's so sluggish about joining in Manx dancing - he joy and freedom in dancing here was lovely to see.
Somewhat hot and sweaty, Finn was then in the Manx dancing, which was lovely there in the sun, in the middle of the closed-off road:
After all that wonderful dancing, there's no doubt that he deserved a treat:
Because of the horror of pink stickiness left over Finn's mouth and shirt by this, we returned home and came back changed, bag-packed and ready for the evening's part of the event.
We had planned to be a part of the crowd watching on the beach, but once people began to assemble on the hill, Finn didn't want to be left out. So it was that Finn and I wandered up to see what was going on, only to find spare torches available and so to end up in the torchlight procession!
This went from off Peel Hill to around the bonfire on the beach, where we watched viking battles between summer and winter, before I lost Finn in the crowd (amongst his other Manx dance friends, to be fair). The next thing I knew, I spotted Finn as the first child in the line of people walking ceremonially around the bonfire, holding the hand of one of the two attendants of the Ben Rein y Voaldyn (The Queen of May)! Naturally, the first 10 or so people were all from Finn's fearless dance group, who wandered around happily around the bonfire in front of the entirety of Peel and more along the beach and promenade. It was a wonderfully strange thing to see!
The fireworks closed off the evening, with a Finn wobbling from tiredness and Cori already having taken Orry home, painfully and laboriously, to get away from the noise of the fireworks (which were a horrible way to wake up from a sleep! Poor Orry was ill and feverish throughout - which meant he mostly just slept on Cori's lap on the beach as stuff went on, but then the fireworks woke him and between that and the bonfires and people in costume and the fever - he was terrified! So Cori had to carry him clinging to her all the way home) But for Cori's experience of the end, it was a lovely day!
As for every month, there were plenty of outings of Cori & Orry, but in May these became happier and out-doors-ier as the weather improved.
Places visited included Noble's Park (which we'd not been to since last year)...
... along with another of Orry's exciting outdoors potty sessions - the travel potty is a very useful thing to have in the boot!...
... the home of rest for horses (which we'd never been to)...
... to Peel beach for the first ice creams of our summer (which has a few dairy-free options much to Orry's delight!)...
... another first was a trip to the very lovely Sunset Lakes, a new enclosed park/play-area with lake & cafe above Peel. Orry & Cori enjoyed having somewhere new to go to with friends, and it was there that Cori was again amazed by Orry's newly-discovered fine drawing & writing skills, drawing on his own Cori and the baby, and even going so far as to write 'Mama' alongside (or mA!ma) - amazing stuff!
We were so impressed by Orry's general cleverness in May. From his enjoying working with numbers and letters a few months ago, to our including him in reading out a few letters at reading times, he leapt to amazing us in being able to read entirely new words on his own.
For instance, Cori couldn't believe it when, without having been speaking about it at all, Orry began to read 'mortar' (even correcting Cori for good measure on her pronunciation!) off a bag when wandering around B&Q. Amazing stuff:
Orry was really excited about reading, as the B&Q video shows; we can take almost no credit for it - it was just something he leapt into doing on his own and wanted to do all of the time. It was not our pushing him into it or anything like that!
However, once we saw how keen he was on it, we had some fun making some things for him to enjoy. One of these was a treasure hunt, where he read a one-word clue of where to look next ('pot', 'ball', 'bin', 'mama' etc.), which was a game he adored.
Another game which he loved, but which was a bit more effort, so he wasn't so enamoured by it was a series of numbered cards he turned over to read. Some of the cards were quite difficult (words like 'grass' or 'frog'), but he managed to get them all, even first time. Some he even managed to read, upside down, on the first time of seeing them, as I was writing the cards! It was really quite amazing - a reading switch had obviously clicked on inside his head and it was quite phenomenal to see.
(The money rewards were irrelevant to Orry's enjoyment - it was only a part of this run-through of the game as they'd had a monopoly game out just before):
Orry's excitement about reading even went over into reading for Finn, which Finn enjoyed playing along with once or twice:
It is really quite remarkable. I had thought it a normal state of development, until Cori pointed out that Finn was not reading words before school, but reading letters, ahead of many of his classmates! I had entirely forgotten that. And Orry still has another whole year before school (starting not in Septmeber 2018, but 2019). He'll be very much over the excitement of learning to read by then!
Hopefully, however, he'll still keep his logical / intelligent mind, which leads him to do things like happily recreating coloured block patterns from off a box:
But, please don't think that Orry is some sort of genius - he's still a frustrating fool, as this irritating interpretation of responding to Cori's request to get his shoes and socks on will demonstrate:
Weirdo!
Whilst we're on the theme of Orry's doings, his passion for paper dolls continued into the start of May, though we tended to make it a bit more interesting, doing things like paper bugs and other such things, which he enjoyed colouring and then naming (mostly involved the words 'Orry' and 'chicken nuggets' for some reason):
And, to close on for this first half of May, here are three of Orry's pictures, which are as inventive as they are disturbing!
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