After that heady start to the blog, we can probably get away with a cute video of Oshin - here enjoying a fine game of Peep-O after a bath:
Another thing we did on the first was to get out the worm house the boys got as a part of their Christmas presents. It wasn't hard to find the worms - there were about a hundred of them around the pot plants outside:
The boys loved looking at them, and they wanted it in their room, so that they could look in on them last thing at night and first thing in the morning... not that they did much!
The other Christmas toys, of course, enjoyed a good life at the start of the month, including the ones you already know from last time, like the Saxoflute (the dulcet tones of which are perhaps less welcome by now!):
A present which was somewhat underwhelming for him at the time but which is now very much appreciated by us all is the boxes Cori got for Finn's Lego. There was a lot of them, but there was a lot of Lego to sort, and order is a thing which pleases everyone in this house, perhaps especially Finn where his stuff is concerned. (Clarification: Order pleases Orry and Oshin, but only because it is always someone else's order, which they can then enjoy smashing... but that can only be done if it's in a box!)
Oshin's favourite present, by far, was something Cori fond in the tip - a rather garish bouncer, which he really enjoys being in. This is the one thing that Oshin will happily be off Cori with/in. She can do something else for a while (in the same room), or dart out quickly to the loo or the like. Marvellous!
A present which Cori made for me (but which we all know is actually for her!) got its first outing a week or so into January - a Manx language umbrella, complete with different types of rain in Manx written out around the rim. The boys liked it, but Manx-speaking friends we knew were in awe!
The whole excitement of Christmas took some time to wear off with the boys, of course. One manifestation of this was that for weeks afterwards Orry was wrapping things. Cori had to go out and buy cheap wrapping paper and new sellotape to fund his habit, and nursery put on wrapping activities in his honour. It's all very lovely, except that Orry tends to make obsessions of things, so it was all-consuming for a while:
This is probably a nice segue into some of the fine crafts created recently.
Unlike his older brother, Orry is a fan of crafts. So much so that he got a heap of Making & Crafting sorts of books for Christmas. These have given rise to such fantastic things as puppet worms (as you do):
You will note that the scene-setting for the wormy drama includes a painted egg thingy, inside & out (that was a pain, but there was no dissuading Orry from it!), and some houses with sellotaped fronts. The sellotape, of course, is to allow us to look inside - genius!
You will note Finn & Orry drawings here - Orry's people are like the one by the washing machines (& the one inside it too!)
If you don't know what's going on here, here is Finn to explain it in (mostly) Manx:
Of course, December being the end of a term, Orry came home from nursery with lots of crafty things too. They go back some months, but they are fantastic, and undoubtedly show off what great ideas the nursery workers have there:
The monkey is ace! The elephant was from perhaps as early as September, and we were amazed by it when seeing it beside the ones others had done. Such definite care for putting in the separate splotches of colour. We were very impressed, especially as his patience isn't the best for other sorts of activities, but this was obviously a winner with him.
This doggedness of idea and commitment to a crafting task also shows through in things which are somewhat annoying for us who are called upon to help him. Such as when he's determined that he needs a pair of bubble-wrap trousers. He used a lot of sellotape in that!
The Laare Vane took some steps forward, helped by Cori getting the broom handle which will eventually be used when it's done. Finn liked that, but Orry was unsure of anyone else under the sheet - he found it appropriately unnerving, and you can see why:
It's not really craft-related, but Cori cleared out the nature-stuff box which all the sticks and things go into when the boys bring them back from outside. Of course, this had to be done secretively, without them knowing, but it was good to clear out such a stash of things no one ever even looks at!
This should go onto the kids' art, but perhaps we should put in something else to break it up a little...
How about Oshin looking cute:
There are also some cute noises too (... though they are more annoying than cute when done in the middle of the night if he decides that he's awake):
It is very clear that Oshin is learning noises and practising them (constantly!), before learning a new one and going onto that. It is nice to see him developing so obviously towards speaking.
Talking of Oshin being awake at night, here he is amazing us all by falling asleep with the dummy! (Don't get too excited though - it only last a short time, and he isn't being fooled by the thing now! And, as you'll see, he's still lying on Cori's lap - she's not getting away!)
And here are the two older boys, looking cute in their own way, still sleeping together, but now just down in Orry's bed (and sweating away the way they do):
And, whilst we're at it, here is a video of Oshin loving kicking (more of which will come later in the January blog posts!):
So, back to the art, these are some which Orry did (with a surprisingly little amount of help from Cori) from one of his new books:
Finn also got an art-related thing for Christmas.... it's... err... one of those things... which does geometric repeating patterns.... You know!
Anyway, Finn enjoys it, but probably more because of its mechanism rather than the art, though he does do a fine picture with it:
As you'll see from the space rocket, if Finn is drawing, it'll be a machine or the like, like these:
You'll see in this second one (of people counter-weighting a weight in the crane) that Finn's weak spot is his writing. He has trouble keeping the numbers the right way around, and in the right order. Which is surprising as he's good at maths and at reading. It is probably something which will click soon enough though and we won't need to think about it again.
On the other hand, who knows what's going on in Orry's head with his art...
Apparently the hand-people were on fire, and the person with the long legs was firing water on them to put them out...!
Helpfully, Orry's nursery put on little post-it notes on the things he does there, which explains what's going on... or, rather, they describe Orry's explanations, whether or not that actually explains anything:
Orry was very proud, as were we, of the rainbow he decided he wanted to make, and then just went about and made without any help, other than Cori being called upon to find him the right colours - Cori's praise of him for it meant that it had to be sellotaped to the door for about a week, with everyone having to stop and admire it on their way to the toilet:
Orry decided that it would be a good idea for him to write a book, which we thought would be a great idea. However, after much effort in putting it all together, he found that the actual writing of his story about Suzie was much too much effort and so gave up after the first page - even though it was going so well! (Once upon a time, Susie went to the loo to have a poo...)
But that is probably more than enough art for everyone, and enough of a post. So we'll bring it to a close, with our favourite picture of Orry's - a man running away crying because the ghosts of dead people were chasing him (which was prompted by nothing at all in the real world - just Orry's odd and surprising imagination!) - enjoy!
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