Monkey says at age 3

Monkey is at such a cute age at the moment… I think I say that about every age but he really is and is coming out with the cutest phrases! Here are some of our favourite little comments I would like to record for posterity.

Monkey age 3

Walking around our local area he likes to comment on just about everything we see, which thankfully brings smiles from passers by in general. Some examples:

Oh look he’s running
That was a very friendly doggy
I don’t think that doggy will eat me
That was a very friendly man

He also likes to say hello to everyone too which is very sweet, and then tells me “I said hello.”

“I said” is one of my biggest bugbears at the moment actually. I ask him a question or tell him not to do something and am met with “ok, I said OK!” in response, which make sme very cross. I heard you the first time and please do not shout at me! I am not sure where he picks that up from but he is such a sponge at the moment and have to be so careful.

My parents accidentally shouted “oh Bugger” when they went the wrong way in the car recently and of course he repeated it – but I very impressed as they have managed to convince him that they said “bother” and he recently announced “Pops says bother!” so phew to that!

He has also picked up a few things from films that I am not such a fan of. He points and tells us what to do and when we have challenged him on it he says “Woody points” as in Toy Story… hmmm. He also pretends to spit and makes a “ting” noise!! Which we are not exactly keen on and I think that came from Toy Story too….. funny how he manages to pick up bad habits from a seemingly innocent film!

It’s not all bad though, he is a big fan of the Disney Cars film and loves Lightning McQueen & Mater, and comes out with the funniest things, including “I am Focus” which is what Lightning McQueen says. In London a few weeks ago we were trying to get him to go quickly down the stairs to the tube and he shouted “I am focus” making us chuckle a lot bless him!

Our cheeky Monkey would be great at the Yes, No game at the moment as he rarely says yes. We ask him questions and he answers with I did, I have, I don’t, I were, I haven’t etc. Its so funny bless him!

He is getting more and more correct in his pronunciations lately and sounding less and les toddler… But there are still a few which we hope hang around.
“Nockynurs” (Binoculars) and “Serbatry” (Conservatory) for example!

We also adore his version of The Grand Old Duke of York. He is always singing something or other and love hearing his own versions of things!

Oh the grand old dukey north
He had some thousand men
He march them up the top of the hill
And march them down again
And when they up eh up
And when they down they down
And when they up they up they up
And when they down they down

He’s a very loving little boy and always tells us how much he loves us. He has also started saying “I love you soo much” when he is a bit sad or when he wants something. Learning emotional blackmail young! And if he gets told off he does the same. Yes I love you too darling but you must be more careful not to kick your sister in the head!!

I’m probably forgetting a few lovely phrases but that’s enough for now and in the words of Monkey “Goodbye Darlings”

Little Hearts, Big LoveEthans Escapades

Making Music together – 8mths and 3yrs old

I love it when my two siblings play together. Most of the time they don’t, the play alongside each other or Monkey plays while LM watches adoringly or let’s face it, gets in the way! Pulling up train tracks to chew, pulling her big brother’s hair, crashing into him in the walker. Babies and toddlers are rarely on the same page when it comes to playing. But, just occasionally, they are. Usually because Monkey decides he wants in on whatever it is that LM is up to!

That is what happened recently. LM was in a bit of a grump and to give us a moments peace (?? probably not the best word as you will see) I set her up with a good old fashioned activity. Making “music” with cake tins, wooden spoons and some jangly spoons. She loved it, and as soon as Monkey saw/her what she was up to he just had to join in!

makng musicSuch a simple easy activity, that took very little involvement from me, but kept them both happy for ages! Evn if it was seriously noisy!!

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My Bored Toddler

Making Egg Box Caterpillars and Butterfly Painting

When I knew that we were soon headed to London to see the Sensational Butterflies exhibition I knew I wanted to do some related crafting with Monkey in preparation. So I googled a few things and got some lovely inspiration from Twitter (thanks guys!) and then gave Monkey the option of making butterflies or caterpillars. He chose caterpillars so I showed him a few pictures online of different ones we could make – finger painting, pom poms etc, but he chose the ones made from egg boxes and tissue paper.

So I duly cut up an egg box (we have the big long 12 egg boxes and I’m not sure they are the best ones for the job as they were slightly one-sided caterpillars but it sufficed anyway) and some tissue paper, dug out some googly eyes from the bottom of the craft draw and we set off doing Monkey’s favourite thing – gluing and sticking!!

caterpillars 1

As mentioned I don’t think our egg boxes are the best ones so we tried making them two different ways – first with a long caterpillar but with holes down one side, and second with a short one as I folded the row in half and then taped it together. I’m not sure which is best or if it makes much difference actually, Monkey loved making both!

caterpillars 2

The first I chose the colours (note The Very Hungry Caterpillar theme) but the second one was Monkey’s choice and it had to be all red (his favourite colour).

egg box caterpillars

Googly eyes were stuck on, and apparently they needed to have a smily face too, and I wasn’t sure what to use so I just grabbed a couple of pipe cleaners, snipped short lengths to be bent into shape and we glued them on, which I don’t think looks too bad really!

We did then go on to do a bit of butterfly craft too, in Nanny’s birthday card. It was the first time we had done the traditional, paint one side and fold together, butterfly painting, but actually he did really well with it! He painted in the lines I told him too and splodged some lovely patterns on the right hand side and it looked lovely after folding toegther. then of course we had to do some more gluing and sticking with sequins and give it a smily face using some glitter glue 🙂

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Textured Painting, 35 mths

Monkey loves painting and given a choice it is often a go to activity for him. Most of the time I am happy to let his imagination take the lead but a few weeks ago I thought I would spice some things up and introduce him to the idea of painting with some new textures.

We had fun with bubble wrap..

Bubble wrap painting

cotton wool balls..

cotton wool painting

scrunched up tin foil..

tin foil painting

pipe cleaners..

pipe cleaner painting

and feathers.

feather painting

It was great fun and such a simple activity. Monkey loved seeing the different results for each of the textures and we talked about what they felt like.

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Mini CreationsMy Bored Toddler

My little Fireman

Not a very exciting or deep post this one but I can’t share resisting these cute snaps of my little fireman. He actually started the morning as a pirate, but when we suggested going to the playpark he said he wanted to go as a fireman. He got the costume for his birthday and hadn’t worn it yet, so I thought, why not?

We had great fun at the playpark. We pretended to take water from the round spinney thing up the climbing frame to put out the fire and rescue someone by coming down the slide.

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His trusty squirrel helped him get to the fire quickly of course!

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He is such a sweety in his little costume and I adore his imagination as he grows, he really is a darling.

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Though I am not sure why but whether he is dressed as a pirate of a fireman, he always says “I need to do some digging!” Do firemen dig???

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