Plaits and Socks.

On Friday EV's teachers arranged a hair salon for the kids. One little girl was writing a list of people who wanted their hair done as I was dropping EV off in the morning. When I picked her up EV had a beautiful set of french plaits (and I thought I had done a good job getting her to have a couple of pigtails that morning). When we got home EV was delighted to find her hair clips and put a whole bunch in her hair.

This is kind of typical of EV. She loves anything to do with clothes and accessories. She even likes to tell me and her dad what to wear. Needless to say she is the one who picks out her clothes in the morning. 

This morning we went to the library, and despite it being a pleasant and warm 22 degrees, EV wanted to wear over the knee socks and sneakers. She was dismayed that she doesn't have over the knee socks, and decided to wear the short ones anyway. Lucky for her I took her sandals with us as her hot tootsies were too much and the shoes and socks had to be taken off before we left the library.

Come back weekend!

The rain is back today. Its damp and warm. Makes me wish for our weekend over again. We went to the beach on Saturday and Sunday. It was so amazing that we spent the whole time either in the sea or sitting in the shallows playing with the spade and bucket.

EV lay down for a bit to enjoy the sunshine when we arrived, but we were all soon down in the water. Making sand angels was a highlight for EV. Her friend from school was there and we had loads of fun playing together.

EV was having so much fun she didn't even care when a wave came and splashed her. In fact her confidence at the beach has been growing really fast. I am really looking forward to the day she can swim all by herself.

On Monday we went to visit EV's beloved Great Grandad and Grandma. EV was really excited to show them her new jandals and hat.

Life Lesson #52 : Always hold on to the kite's string.

I took EV out to fly her kite this afternoon, it was a gusty windy sort of day but I figured we might just handle it. And it was a bit overcast so it wouldn't be so bad watching it fly against the clouds...

It started out OK, with EV holding on with 2 hands and giving it a tug when it started diving.

I even took this photo of the frisky wee kite up so high, when EV said "watch what happens when I let it go". And she let it go. 

Boy did it go! Right across the reserve dragging it's string and it nearly got caught in the small trees beside the carpark, but then it flew out of sight. Oh Dear!

I tried to get EV to hurry up and help me go after it in case we could find it, when actually I had visions of it hanging off power lines. Eventually EV decided to hustle, particularly when I started off up the path with her bike in tow. And as we got to the carpark I suddenly saw the kite string lying across the carpark strung across a pohutukawa tree. I think we were the afternoon entertainment for all the taxi drivers who park there for their smoko.

The kite string had snagged in just enough time that the kite got this close to Mt Eden Road.

The arrow points to where the handle of the kite string was dangling on the other side of the tree.The whole length of string had unravelled.

  
I managed to get to the handle hanging on the other side of the tree and untie the string from it so I could pull the string free. We got the kite back, but I have a lovely mess of kite string to untangle.
As I was sitting at the park attempting to untangle it EV came over and said she was sorry for letting the kite go. I'm not sure what the finger pointing is all about, possibly to emphasize that she won't let the kite go again.

Fish and Chip Night.

Last night EV's pre-school had a 'Fish and Chip night' for the kids and parents to meet. EV was so excited. We went to our local chippie and bought some fish and chips to take to school. The lady at the fish shop loves EV and when we left she gave EV a packet of tomato sauce, lucky girl.

Yes, that is an e.

It was controlled chaos and EV spent most of the time running around the playground, in between having bites of her dinner. 
During the day there was a torrential downpour ( and some waterspouts in the harbour), which luckily enough had gone by the time we went for dinner. But the huge puddles on the paths were great fun and the night ended with EV and a whole lot of kiddies running through the puddles and getting properly wet through.

Aaarrrrgh! It's Pirate Girl!

We were taken by pirate fever today! EV was invited to a 3rd birthday party for Elli today. At first she wanted to wear her tutu, but after I found a sword for her she was into being a pirate. Which is cool because she is really good at saying "aaaarrrrghhh I'm a pirate!". Those swords are hard to put back into the sash belt thing!

A lovely time was had by everyone in the stinky 25 degree heat of Waterview. Fueled by cupcakes (Dada Andy's recipe!), fruit sticks and cheerios.

The lovely birthday pirate Elli!

Smiling here for the camera. Thanks for a lovely party guys! Aaaaarrrrggh!

Odds and ends.

We had a burst of creativity last Saturday morning after breakfast. Mostly involving glue and googly eyes, with the odd pom pom.

I tried out the name portrait idea that I mentioned in the previous blog. Here is our family portrait (unfinished).

I was lurking on our balcony and I captured a shot of EV and dada walking home from school. While I was there I shot some of our potted garden, which is growing some super sweet tomatoes and cucumbers right now. The cucumbers are hanging off the bay tree in the Sicilian fashion.

And lets not forget the amazing Serrano chillies! I love summer.

Vitamin D chapter 2.

EV has been drawing up a storm. Lately she is fond of saying "I want to use my imagination and draw". We have seen lots of portraits like this one above of mama, which was followed by a double portrait she drew at pre-school of 'me and dada'. (even dada noted that he looked happy in this one.)

And of course Santa had a portrait done. I love the pointyness of his head/hat and the lines over the mouth for a beard.

This one takes a bit of explaining. It's her 'sister'. We were making a family portrait using this name method of creating the body shape and EV insisted that I cut her out a 'sister' and she drew in the eyes, etc.

If this is a whale EV would name it "sosuke" (some time I will post all the Totoro drawings I saved, there are quite a few with the Totoro and Ponyo theme).

And finally a stick collage from pre-school. It's lost a few sticks but I love it. There are more that I love but they are so light its too hard to scan them. I really like how she tends to dash off her drawings really quickly and how she likes to take them to the edges of the paper. The scissors haven't featured much lately, except for when she cut some of my fabric with my sewing scissors when I wasn't looking. Luckily that was all she cut!