Two and a quarter

Not many photos this month - a combination of needing a new memory card for the camera and not getting out much due to both boys being off. Tajy started with a cold that he gladly shared with his brother, which resulted in a quick trip to hospital for Alex after I noticed a rash and hives appearing and disappearing at great speed all over his body (turns out it was roseola caused by a virus and nothing to be concerned of, which was great as we were starting to think he was allergic to a lot more than we already knew about) and has been topped off by Alex having severe gastro for the best part of a week (a result of the hospital visit??). We must give Alex acting lessons before we have to take him to emergency again as he raced up to the triage desk with a huge grin yelling "hi!!!!", so it was good there were only a handful of patients waiting as I'm sure we were given a low priority number as a result of one not-very-ill-looking child. Is he too young to learn how to fake a limp or hold his tummy or something? Ha ha. Alternatively, matey boy, could you just wait until the doctor or chemist is open when you next have a problem?

Both boys are just about good now, which is well timed as we spent yesterday driving around in our new car. We traded in the family car that we purchased just before the boys were born, and have ended up with the SUV that we nearly bought but didn't as we were attempting to save a few $s at the time. False economy there as we ended up with a lemon (classic example: the windscreen decided to spontaneously crack two days before we traded it), so we decided to cut our losses and buy a car that's nearly new so it won't cost us anything for repairs for a while. And we all love it. Except maybe Alex as the headrests on the front seats are solid, so he has to lean into the middle to see out the front window. Still laughing that Nik thought driving 1500 km (935 miles) to drop off our old car and back in the new car in 27 hours was an exciting outing... Can't half tell he's home full time.

Managed to get the boys weighed last month and Alex was just under 15kg, with Tajy around 13.7kg. No idea of their heights as they were both taller than the ruler available, but we must get this checked soon as Alex would only be an inch or so off a meter now. So had to laugh when I was chatting to a girl who works with my sister (we work for the same organisation) who's 4yo daughter weighs 16kg! I'm going to put this down to our two being boys, and not the fact that Alex particularly is huge. The size difference was clearly noted by my nephew last weekend who agreed with me that we could get away with saying the boys are brothers that are close in age, and not twins.

We had another member of the wildlife attempt to join our happy household again this month - a snail. I'm happy to report that it didn't become a permanent family member and it was duly evicted after Nik found the boys playing with it in the lounge room. Baby Bird is still with us and sings up a storm ALL day. Lily is still camped out permanently in its vicinity, except when she's in our bedroom hiding from the boys.

Speech is kicking along well still, with Tajy coming out with more and more - again which he doesn't feel inclined to repeat too often. It's definitely words but it's more like sounds if you don't listen closely enough, such as "ar" being star and "rar" being car. The one thing I hope he forgets is 'quack quack' as Alex is now saying that correctly, instead of his incredibly cute 'gonk gonk' when you ask him what noise a duck makes. Was very impressed with Alex the other day when he was looking at whatever and then told me the number and the item without counting, ie 'two shoes'. He loves to count and point, so actually coming out with the number was a real achievement. Books are a huge hit with both, with Alex frequently coming to see what Tajy and I are reading and hanging around until we finish. Books for me (at least the pleasure variety) are about to become a thing of the past as uni starts again next week. So, so glad I've nearly finished. But the hardest thing I've faced lately? Trying to come up with a unique name for each of our monthly blog posts as this is the only place we refer to exactly how old they are!

The concentration...

and evidence that Tajy did survive after burying
himself for the nth time in the swimming pool come ball pit.