May #2: Cori birthday, pictures, departure for America

Cori's birthday was a lovely one.
It was one that had a lot of people and groups of people coming out and doing nice things for her. Like presents, or days out with friends, cake and more.
The day of Cori's actual birthday was a school day, so it was a relaxed one, where I met them down at the beach, where they were hanging out with a friend (who knew Cori sufficiently well to just assume she'd be there on a lovely day as it was, and happily found her so!). I brought Prosecco, it was very lovely:

This picture of Oshin in the waves is his first time in the water. He was enthralled by it all, and seemed to enjoy it, though we were rather sorry to feel how ice-cold his legs were by the end of it!

It was on the trip back from the beach that we had the reminder of part of what makes the beach so annoying in the summer - having to help the children down the pole in the street down from us!

The presents we got for Cori were nothing too special, but we all had good fun playing Twister, which was definitely a winner (Finn won):

I took a day off work to hang out, and we had a lovely time. Firstly, Cori banished us from the house so that she could gorge herself in sewing - which was her decedent birthday treat, which worked out well for me also, treating myself to another go at my new favourite walk, down to Glen Maye:

Once out there, the idea came that it would be a lovely thing to go for lunch along there, where Cori had never been before, so I called her and she came to join us with salad from Green's Cafe, and we had a lovely quiet half hour sat out on the cliff edge taking in the view. Very relaxing, and a lovely thing to stumble upon at a birthday.

In the good weather around Cori's birthday, the school shorts came out for Finn - the first time this year, and Orry decided that he was a footballer:

I was on Manx Radio out at Dalby village hall (talking about Gef the talking mongoose, as you do), and I happily came come with Soda Cake. I loved it, and I was delighted that Finn loved it too. With Cori at the helm of most food-things, the kids don't get much exposure to raisin-heavy Manx food, so I'm always delighted when Finn takes to it like a good Peel boy. Phew!

A nice outing was up Glen Auldyn - a beautiful place to be with friends, even if Orry is the slowest of the bunch as everyone else dashes off ahead, leaving Orry whining behind! But by the time we got up to the dub he was in the thick of things again, merrily 'falling' down to sit in the mud in the water. Sigh.

After this we were at the Worm Charming in Maughold, which was a nice reason to get to Maughold, especially as we had lunch up at Reayrt ny Chalse / the Quaker Burial Ground - very lovely in the bluebells:

We actually took a heap of photos there, since it was so pretty, but we'll save those to the end.

Here are the obligatory happy pictures of the boys enjoying books. The first is a Saturday afternoon lunch, fresh from the library; the latter is Orry found in a state of quite absorption, curiously sat on the horse:

The Aesop's Fables book Orry has was a perfect level for him in terms of his reading. But it was one he devoured there at the table, merrily reading out the morals to us. But then he was done with it, and that was that. - It's a problem that he is good at reading and so finished books at his level too quickly, and the longer books are above him. - It'll work itself out eventually.

Cori had the brainwave of trying out a magic trick on Orry, which was perfect for his age. He was truly baffled by it (and Finn didn't work it out either):

Then it was just about time for everyone (but me) to be off on their American trip.
We can't afford such trips often, so every seat on the planes count. So we've settled into the situation where one year we all go, then Americans come here, then Cori and the kids go, then Americans come here, and then we start over. This was the last time Oshin would be free (as an under-two) in the cycle, so this was the time to go. It is also the only time Cori will have to do it with a 0-year-old and a 4-year-old (and a well-behaved Finn), so she was brave enough to commit to doing it, even all her Manx friends thought she was insane.
The prospects of an easy flight were diminished as Cori and Oshin fell in, Oshin especially. But at least it was easier than it could have been, since his illness meant that he lost his voice, and so this is his full-scale crying for his mum to come back...!

The bags were only packed at last by my going out on another very-long walk with him, this time into the evening, just to give Cori time to hunker down to it. A lovely thing to be out alone with the sunset sea:

Then they were off on their American adventure:

Cori will update on the American side of things next time.
So this time we'll leave you with those lovely pictures from up at Rhullick ny Quakeryn:

May #1: Orry Fighting, North, ice cream, Kentraugh

The first topic is Orry rebellion, but we'll prelude that with pictures of Cori looking silly after decoration from Orry, and Oshin brooding cute:

Orry is very self-determined. Which is a nice way of describing what others might describe differently.
He is very much in his tantrum stage, when he can get in moods and we can see that he's not going to give in, for anything. We have grown to recognise the start of them, and we know that we need to tread very lightly around it, for fear or forcing him in further, into a hole he's not going to get out of.
Sometimes this shows in the morning and we never quite know if he's going to get to nursery or not, as it is often very close to being too much.
Here is an example of what we're talking about (which, as I say, is a good reminder of what a terror such a wonderful & fun child could also be at times):

We are not ones to use force. At least, we very rarely do so, but at times with Orry there is nothing else to do - to hold him tightly as he screams and shouts, to halt him from running off to throw or disrupt something. This is generally how these things ends - with his blowing his top with shouting and some act of would-be violence or disruption, after which there's nowhere else he has to get angrier with, and he soon calms down.
It is only rarely that he doesn't get to nursery, as I am able to carry him and force him into his car seat if need be - options not normally open to Cori, with Oshin. And, of course, within 5 minutes of setting off, with Orry screaming 'No!' at the top of his voice in the back, he will be quietly reading a book or the like.
Orry is much worse than Finn, as he is inclined to push boundaries and be 'naughty' outside of the tantrums, which means that we have to give him a lot more slack than we ever gave Finn. And Finn doesn't like this - to see his brother getting away with behaviour without comment which he would be sent to the naughty step for. We're sorry about this, but it's what we need to do to manage Orry's behaviour, and we're not going to lower our expectations of the lovely and well-behaved Finn to match it!
But, to close of the subject, here is a silly picture of an Orry stand off, when he refused to move from Cori's chair and so suffered the meal squashed behind her in a silent strop:

In lighter mood, here is Finn having a hilarious time with Oshin's blah-blah-blah noise which we joked was him impersonating Finn:

At the start of the month we had a party up north, in the northern home of Manx language learning, Thie ny Gaelgey, which was a rather strange but wonderful place to have a party for children from the Manx school:

Since we'd gone all that way, we took a trip to the Point of Ayre, which we'd not been to in ages. It was as windy as ever, but good fun for a run-around:

Next up was the Oie Voaldyn event in Peel, which, as per last year, had Finn dancing in the day, both with his group, and also to the bands on the stage:

He doesn't usually hang out much with the girl he's dancing with (a class-mate), so it was nice to see them being so comfortable together and dancing away happily (or, more accurately, dancing away seriously!).
When with the dance group, Finn was going round with the bucket and so was too late back to get a partner for the Mheillea dance. So it was that he was left in the middle holding the 'Babban'. Some kids enjoy the role, but Finn was terribly upset by it. He reported afterwards that he spent the whole time trying not to cry for the shame of it with everyone looking at him, but to everyone but me looking on, it just looked like he was very austerely taking his Babban-holding role very seriously:

We thought we were going to start a trend with Finn's crosh cuirn tied around his neck, but it wasn't so. He still looked Oie-Voaldyn-Ace though:

After a mix-up and delay in our timings in going home to change and to get the chip dinner, Cori and Orry returned home, where they stayed, leaving it just to me, Finn and granny to stay out for the evening half of it all, and very lovely it was too:

It was another Finn, me & granny occasion the next outing, when we went and walked the Maughold parish boundary from near the shore up to the mountain (where we peeled off to another commitment). It was a very long way for a Finn, but he didn't complain at all. He was just happy to have lots of people to chat to, and people to be in front of in a would-be speed race, and then he was delighted to have his snack half way etc. - all the sorts of things that a Finn enjoys!

After too long inside and feeling cooped up, we escaped late one afternoon on the weekend, just to get out. When all three of the kids fell asleep in the back, we realised that the planned walk wasn't actually what we wanted, but just to be quiet for a while. So we drove around the South a bit and I was dropped off to get ice-cream, which we enjoyed in the car. At the Sound where we finally stopped, the boys woke up and had theirs. Oshin, being the ravenous young eater which he is, was not going to be left out, and so he got his first taste of ice cream. He loved it!

We failed to mention that the rather nice pair of rainbow dungarees which Oshin was pictured in in last month's posts, were made by Cori. She has had her mind set on making her own pair of dungarees, and so has been building up to them. At the start of the month she made some for Orry, getting closer to the final aim.
Orry immediately loved them, declaring that he was a camouflaged ninja, and spent the rest of the day hi-ya'ing everywhere:

Also at the start of the month was the annual opening of the Kentraugh Mill down near Colby.
The first time we tried to go - just Finn, Orry, Oshin and I - it didn't go so well, as this happened:

Orry gets car sick, but I'd never seen it before myself, so it was a complete surprise to me. He gave no warning at all, but then exploded with vomit as we were in a tricky bit of the road (in the single-lane bit of Colby), so I had to keep driving, during which he was sick again, before we stopped. After we'd cleaned him up as best we could, there was no way we were getting to the mill that time!
However, we all went together on the next weekend.
Mine and Finn's excitement for it was less raw than last year, but it was still good to see the beautiful old working mill and talk it all through with him. But his mind was distracted by Orry, Cori and Oshin having remained out by the tea & cake area, playing football and hanging out.
And some fine hanging out they did too:

It was clear before Finn and I set off to the mill, as soon as Orry started playing there, that this was his thing. Not football, but running about and having fun outside. It was lovely to see in him, and not something I don't think we'd really recognised before.
We decreed that I would have to start going down the park with a football with him (once they were to get back from their America-trip starting at the end of the month).

This gets us up to Cori's birthday, so we'll close off this first half of the month with a final picture, of Oshin looking cute at the table: