This post is for w/e Sunday 30th November (George's 5 month "birthday").

This week has just flown by...Dan was away over the weekend competing in the Taupo Cycle Classic; 160km in 4 hours, 36 minutes (an improvement of 30mins over 2007's time!) so that it meant it was just me and the boys for a couple of days.

George celebrated his 5 month "birthday" on the 30th...he enjoyed sucking his thumb and dribbling. He is still learning to sleep on his tummy and we keep having to get up during the night to "reset" him! I keep finding him in different positions in the cot.

The boys' Great Aunty Aida came over on Thursday night, just in time to give George his night time bottle.

During the weekend, Joseph and I put some bread and the rest of the beetroot cake out for the birds. Once we'd done that, Joseph told me to "go away" - I snuck up on him later on and caught him eating the cake!

On Sunday, once Dan was back, Joseph and Dan started doing some work around the house. Joseph, as always, was keen to help and here he is "painting" the deck (with water).

Finally, here's a picture of the two brothers taken tonight. George had his five month injections today and goes to Plunket tomorrow for his weigh in. Look out for an updated weight chart next week!

This post is for w/e Sunday 23rd November 2008.

George's second tooth has popped through the gum too - so, now he's busy chewing even more trying to get them through the I would imagine! There's lots of dribble too so I wouldn't be surprised if some more pop up.

We have been harvesting some lovely strawberries from our garden over the past couple of weeks. Joseph and Dan water the plants together at the end of the day. Here is Joseph with a good specimen. They also grow strawberries at Bear Park and on Friday night Dan helped out by taking some of our netting and placing it over their plants.

On Wednesday, after his morning sleep, I found George looking very cute in his cot (and in a cute outfit from Val and Steve!).

Once he'd woken up a bit more he rolled over on his tummy and was having a great time pushing against the bars with his feet.

Joseph and I experimented making a cake on Sunday afternoon (chocolate and beetroot)...it needs a bit of tweaking before I can release it for wider consumption but (quite) a bit of icing meant that Dan and Joseph tucked into it!

Finally for the week, a picture of the brothers!

This post is for w/c Sunday 16th November 2008.

We had some lovely weather this week which meant Joseph wore shorts and tshirts all week (no shoes and no long sleeves even though it was a bit chilly in the mornings!) and George busted out a few tshirts as well. He wore this funky "playsuit" from Vikki...it is really cute and I hope he gets lots of wear out of it!

George has been spending a bit of time in the exersaucer, building up his stamina. He likes to suck the edge (as per the picture). I thought he was just "exploring" but on Friday we discovered that his first tooth has come through! The centre bottom left tooth. It is hard to see as every time you try and pull his lip away he uses his tongue to check out your finger! I did have a bit of a looksee yesterday though and I could see the centre bottom right one sitting there as well.

We had a out first "family of four" holiday when we took off to visit Tracey and Brett in Havelock North. We had a great time, the boys were great in the car and travelled really well. Tracey and Brett have three boys - Tom (9), Blake (nearly 7) and Olly (3) - it was quite full on and Joseph took a bit of time to get used to things. However, they have loads of great boy toys - diggers, bikes, a trampoline, a rope swing and a huge sandpit (or sand pip as Joseph calls it!). Joseph and Olly got on really well - here they are having a ice cream cone after their bath.

Joseph tried all the different bikes - trikes, glide and ride, scooters and his favourite, the tractor.

We've also gone cold turkey on Joseph's bottle - he's not had one since Friday. He did cry for it last night and this morning (40 mins of grizzling at 4am!!) but we have been steadfast in our resolve (even though we're tired now!). I've hidden them all away in a cupboard so he can't find them. Now for toilet training!

Another first was Joseph and George sharing a bath. I'm not sure either boy was convinced this was a great idea!

This post is for w/e Sunday 9th November 2008.

A momentous week for us in that George "slept through" (ie from 7pm - 6am) on three nights!! Very exciting - it would have been even better if this had not coincided with Joseph doing particularly poor sleeping at the same time!! After that, our sleep patterns got a bit mucked up as Joseph, George and I succumbed to a head cold (runny noses and a bit of a cough).

I have been trying (with little success) to get a passport photo done for George...I can't get him to pose correctly! Here is one shot of him losing interest and finding his thumb more appealing. He has started to dribble and his hands are more often than not in his mouth. His gums have changed shape so I guess he's getting ready for teeth sometime soon.

Jo and Phil passed on Charlotte's exersaucer to us and we've popped George in it a few times. We think he likes it...it does give him a different perspective of the world!

Joseph had gymnastics on Saturday morning and for the first time we were all able to go down to the YMCA. Dan helped Joseph do lots of things and I carried George around and managed to take a few pictures. Here he is on the little pedal thingo which helps him use his legs likes he's riding a bicycle.

And here Joseph is on the rings crashing into the triangle pad...he loved this one! He's also getting much better at jumping on the trampoline too!

Finally, an updated weight chart...I took George into Plunket for a weigh in as I wanted to see how he was going since I moved his feeds out to four hourly during the day. He's stil behind Joseph but has over taken Dan and myself. He has been doing a lot of growth in the height department however and he is now on the 75th percentile (having moved up from the 50th in a month!).

This post is for w/e Sunday 1st November 2008.

I seem to have more Joseph photos this week - sorry, George!

First up, George - another great week on the rolling front; going well rolling from back to his right side and on Sunday he started to roll to his left side. He's still getting stuck/frustrated but the little nudge sets him right. He is reaching and grabbing onto toys and things are starting to make their way to his mouth. He is also doing lots of talking and giggling. He's a model pupil when it comes to sleeping - we need to get him to train Joseph!

Joseph had his 12 month grommets check with Dr Bill Baber...they're still in situ so we need to go back in another six months. Bill said we're getting good value for money!

Here's a comedy shot of Joseph (wearing an outfit from Grandma) squeezing into a small space amongst his toys. When I asked him what he was doing he replied "I'm squashing".

It was Dan's birthday on Thursday... Joseph was very helpful opening the presents and he also sang a great rendition of "happy birthday" (complete with burp mid-song). However, it transpired that it was "Joe and Daddy's birthday" so he got to help blow out the candles too. We gave Dan some Instant Kiwis and Joseph started his gambling career.

Thursday was also photo day at Bear Park. I carefully dressed (ie stage managed) the boys into matching outfits and off we went for some brotherly pics. Joseph was receptive to the photograher so I hope to get some good shots of him however George was a bit tired so I'm not confident about his pictures. I did manage to capture this one of the boys when we got home.

On Saturday, we had another gymnastics session and then Lizze came to our house for a playdate. The last couple of times they've been a bit niggly with each other but on Saturday they were very good and were telling each other when the other could have a turn on something - they watered the garden, kicked the ball around, dug the garden up, went on the see saw and had a tea party.

Finally, amongst all of this, Dan decided to trim the hedge. Joseph loves helping Dan so it wasn't long until Joseph got on the tools!