Big trip to Oamaru and iceskating

Lots has happened in the kids lives lately. They had their first trip to visit Grandma and Grandad overnight. We took the kids to Palmerston and turned them over to Grandma and Grandad. They happily waved goodbye (so did we- see we are all smiling in the bottom photo :-) ) and they had a wonderful time. Riley is still talking about it and how he wants to go to Grandma and Grandads "another day"

Both children have become more chatty in the last fortnight. Dad was away working for a week and even he noticed how much more chatty both were. We can understand half of Jemma but Riley is certainly very articulate and able to answer questions relevantly and talk away, so it is great to see them both doing this.

Though Riley is now very excited about his birthday in 2 weeks and he asked for a party which amazed us as he has never been to one, and very rarely has there been children of his age at our house. However, we will have a small one so Mum has been running around organising hats, plates, loot bags etc and of course a rocket cake of Little Einsteins is to be made (Mum cleverly deflected from the train cake- 2nd and 3rd birthdays were trains.. she wanted a change!). Riley slept with the instructions to making the cake that Mum found and he wants to know what 4 presents he is getting from us for his 4th birthday. Of course his chatter that is so great... is exhausting!

Today we went iceskating. Jemma sat in the toboggan and Riley insisted on skating so he held onto the back of the toboggan with our help and worked on his balance. He tried really hard and never fell over. He was so pleased with himself. We got some on dvd and apparently we can take photos from that but we forgot to take the camera, hence no photos here. Riley loved it and wants to go iceskating "another day".

We are testing Riley for heavy metals and future chelation goals so we needed some urine. Surprisingly enough he was happy to pee in a cup and help send it to France. However, now he wants to pee in the cup all the time and put in bottles to send to France "another day".....

Jemmas gumboot fetish has been joined by her jacket fetish to match her already present hat fetish and she also likes bangles and necklaces.... we just look at her and even Dad has to ask where she got her girly girl nature from????