As we fast approach Gregory's 4th birthday, it's time for a brief reflection on some of his achievements so far, showcased on the noticeboard in his room, which also features some baby scan pictures. The board includes his Footy Totz achievement booklet (possibly a replacement as I don't think we ever found the original, unfortunately), a special award from pre-school for "fantastic listening and always being helpful". and Swim Tots Level 2 / 3 certificates.
Of course, the young Jedi has learned many of his skills from the Jedi master, Daisy,
In January, we had visitors, namely Jessica (pictured here betwixt her cousins) and Louise (very much not pictured).
I don't know what nightmares that prompted Gregory, but he was no stranger to a bad hair morning as he munched on granola (from which both he and Daisy always remove the almonds before eating).
Later that day, hoping not to spoil their appetite before tea, Jessica and Gregory had a picnic.
In early February, Gregory was very happy to take Russ the bear home from pre-school.
In the morning, breakfast was your classic golden squares on a small plate washed down with water.
It also turned out that Russ was a somewhat of a jigsaw enthusiast.
With Lynne having her hair done and then later out with the school mums, we evidently decided that it would be a good idea to go for a meal at the Woodside pub in Worsley, at what has swiftly become our regular table. The kids busied themselves with drawing, as is also standard.
Gregory had a pretty big pizza which he was delighted to cut up himself...
...but of course he demolished it. He seems to be able to eat his own body weight in pizza, leaving him with a body shape combination of skinny frame and bulbous stomach.
Back at Nana Sue's afterwards, Uncle Matt and Gregory played on a tablet to chill out.
Bedtime on Valentine's Day. Not sure of the significance of this particularly but he looks a bit mischievous.
A couple of days later, Charlie Roberts came round, presumably for tea, but also for some dance routines, it seems.
At the weekend, I got them helping with the tea, setting up a production line of homemade chicken nuggets, with the classic flour, egg, breadcrumbs combination. Gregory's desire to get stuck in is usually a little hampered by a dislike for getting his hands too dirty, as can be seen on the right. Quite often he needs to wash his hands in the middle of preparing food, which is a little pointless as they quickly get covered in breadcrumbs, etc. again.
Still, it all turned out well enough: homemade chicken nuggets and potato wedges, plus sweetcorn. Gregory has a weird dislike for certain types of potatoes so he probably didn't eat his share. He loves bought chips but make them at home and he won't touch them - nor does he like mash or roast potatoes, but he does like hash browns and potato waffles. It's slightly baffling.
The next day, he was helping me out again, this time frying some chorizo and vegetables...
...before stirring it all into a tomato pasta sauce. Often when I am cooking, I hear him approaching first, with the scrape of a kitchen chair being dragged over to the cooking area.
This is what happens when you let your daughter loose with your phone (Lynne's).
I don't quite recall the reason for this, but evidently Daisy wanted to help Gregory out. Perhaps he was feeling a little sad or something.
He doesn't do jigsaws quite as much as he used to, but occasionally he does give one a go. This is somewhat of an old favourite.
This is what has been, in 2018 (looking back), Gregory's number one favourite toy: Lego. While Daisy and Lynne went to see Nick Sharratt at the Lowry, we had a bit of a Daddy and Gregory day. Having completed the jigsaw whilst in pyjamas, we moved on to constructing a vehicle (whilst eating peanuts).
Nearly done.... all done!
It's therefore time to go outside and do some trampolining - what fun we're having!
On Daisy's first day back at school after the half-term holiday, it snowed! Gregory is dressed, presumably because the pyjama shorts that he wears were not appropriate winter wear, but Daisy has gone for the classic pyjamas and coat/boots/hat combination.
Gregory seems to be realising that it's not easy to play football in the snow.
Needing to move things on ahead of school and work, I left them out there (for a short while), but saw the opportunity to take a picture of them from upstairs.
And whoosh, we swept into March and Daisy's birthday, which was held at Build-A-Bear in the Trafford Centre. We got exclusive access and Gregory got his own bear (in a rabbit costume).
Here is the exclusive Build-A-Bear club
After bear customising and naming was (finally) over, we shuffled over to Frankie & Benny's for lunch, with all of them still in our care.
Later that afternoon, Daisy got stuck in to her present opening while Gregory looked on dutifully.
In the evening, having eaten a hearty lunch, we moved to a packed sandwich, er, tea in the lounge watching TV.
Two days later, on Daisy's actual birthday, Gregory shows his party trick of scooping up ice-cream on the underside of his spoon. Don't do that at home, kids. Or indeed in a restaurant.
Some good mini egg sorting from the boy.
On the Sunday, the children had separate birthday parties at the same time. While Lynne took Daisy to Charlie's party, I took Gregory to Ollie's party, which had a Footy Totz theme to it. Gregory was shy at first, clinging to my leg, but a bit of football action between us soon got him into the spirit of things, and before long he was stretching his legs apart while standing on coloured circles. Classic warm-up routine.
Later in the party, after a number of non-football-related activities, they all had a task to crawl through a hoop, crawl along a snake and score a goal in the nets, perhaps as an elaborate metaphor for playing a Wednesday night League Two game at Grimsby. They all, eventually, succeeded.
We roll into mid-March now, and we got a decent covering of snow on the Saturday night, so on the Sunday we took to creating snowman and snowdog. It took a while, but much snow-shifting later, and we got there.
Later that day, Gregory turned his hand to some feather dusting. He has always had a desire to help out, even selecting one of his potential career choices as "servant", and this has only escalated. I am writing this over a year later (poor show, I know) and he has requested a cleaning set for his forthcoming birthday. This is not a typical boy.
The changeable weather is somewhat unforgiving to carefully-crafted snow sculptures. This is what is left of poor snowman and snowdog. May they melt in peace.
But as the snow thaws, it's time to turn our attention to sowing seeds, as Gregory pops some peas into the seed tray...
...and watering them with a handy little spray gun.
While I cycled back from Doylie's in Lostock Gralam, on a glorious Sunday morning, Lynne had taken the kids to the Garden House in Marple, where Gregory enjoyed the slide in his wellies...
...and potentially climbing a tree, although he probably wasn't quite brave enough then.
They certainly looked to be having a good time.
One evening I arrived home and it was clear that Gregory had been hanging out with Kevin, our gardener. Gregory was keen to help out, mimicking both what Kevin was doing but also, it seems, what he was drinking.
On Good Friday, they were having an Easter Bonnet Parade in Stockport town centre so we wandered along. The first step was to sit on tiny benches to make Easter bonnets in a cordoned off area in the middle of Stockport's Merseyway shopping centre.
It wasn't long before they had finished, although Gregory appears to have gone for a fairly limited decoration approach. He seems cheekily happy about it, though.
Having made the hats, we then headed off to take part in the Easter Egg hunt. We were approached to see if we would like to be filmed by Belly Flop TV, a northwest-based TV and video production company. We didn't see why not and immediately Gregory, normally quite shy, took to it like a duck to water. I hung back, photographing them (and trying to stay off the video). Here is the video that they put on the YouTube: "We need to find hats! With letters on".
They couldn't pass up the balloon modelling person, with Gregory going for a long sword and Daisy a unicorn (naturally). Unfortunately, in the sword-unicorn game, sword beats unicorn.
And then it was time for the parade, led by Jive Bunny (unfortunately the Mastermixers couldn't be here today). We dutifully followed, quite close to the back. The mayor also made an appearance.
The next day, we headed to Woodbank Park for an Easter orienteering event (all these events were laid on for free, albeit with sponsorship on occasions). Gregory's pose suggests that he's taking his time to survey the lay of the land, whilst Daisy's suggests that she wants Gregory to get somewhat of a move on.
We managed to complete the orienteering event, landing us a much-sought-after certificate and some sweets which the children were less bothered about. (I might have that the wrong way round.)
The next day, on April Fools' Day, it was Easter Sunday (the British calendar can be confusing, huh), where it is customary for the children to receive gifts and chocolate. Their reactions appeared to be somewhat varied.
For lunch, naturally, it was egg sandwiches. Gregory, as ever, was keen to get stuck in. Here he is, peeling the shell off the egg.
After lunch, we moved to the music room (i.e. the garage), where Gregory showed us his drum skills as Daisy waited for her turn. He is reaching in with his foot to stamp on the bass drum pedal
For tea, Aunty Katie and Nana Sue came round to join us for some roast gammon, accompanied by roast potatoes, cheesy leeks, Yorkshire puddings and peas (although Gregory had special dispensation to have hash browns instead of roast potatoes because he doesn't like them - it looks like he's nearly eaten them all already, before the rest of us had even started, so he must have been hungry).
On the Easter Monday, we went to the cinema to watch the film Coco, which they were very excited about.
On the Tuesday after the Easter weekend, everyone but me were heading up to Haddington so I took a quick picture before I left for work. It is very much a scene of activity, as they rush around to get packed and ready to go.
Here is a delightful piece of artwork and teamwork combined. Stragnely
Meanwhile in Haddington... Louise plays some game or other with Jessica, Gregory, Becky and Daisy (handily in age order).
Later that week, the three older cousins enjoyed some ice-cream. That's pretty much all I have for that week, sorry. Some people aren't as prolific/obsessive with their photography, I guess.
And that was that. Suddenly it was time for Greogry's 4th birthday. Would you believe it?
Back to the Secret Portal.