Who's the Boss?

Some days it's hard to tell who is really in charge here - who's your money on?

Dougal reads the paper over Arthur's shoulder.

Arf perfects the innocent look (but that fist looks suspicious...)

Arthur teaches Dad and Frank to read...

And shows Dad how to eat (poor Dougal is desperate for some baby rice...)

If almost-two-year-old Frank isn't a cheeky monkey, I don't know who is!

Yes, that's right, Frankie turns two in less than a fortnight (2 March). Hard to believe in terms of where-has-the-time-gone but he's such a clever cookie that sometimes he seems older than he is.

Today he set off for day care on the back of Dad's bike and called out to Mum, "Have a good day!'
It all went well until it came time to get off the bike... "Fine. Frank's fine. Nooooooo!" But he seems to be enjoying day care and appears to have a few groupies who follow him everywhere. Oh, friends!

Dougal is working hard and not getting in nearly enough training for The Karapoti as he would like. Once again it's the day before Frank's birthday so he will have to conserve some energy for both surviving the bike race and celebrating with two year olds.

Libby starts work next week, tutoring Academic Writing at Victoria Uni. She's really excited about it but not as excited as Pappy and Arthur who are already planning adventures together on Wednesdays!

And Arthur is growing and growing and growing. He was super excited to start on solids but he's more interested in spitting them back out and trying to grab the spoon. He attracts lots of fans at the supermarket, especially old men who admire his hairstyle...

Next time we post, Arthur will be 5 months and Frankie will be TWO!!!!!!!!!! He is sooooo into cakes and singing the happy birthday song so it'll be fun for sure!

The GREAT outdoors

Frank and Emma.
Arthur wanted to go to The Sevens with Dad.
Check out his tail...
Finn is in charge of putting up the tent.

Arthur!

Simon and Dougal teach Finn and Frank how to make a splash.

Frank's flying!

It's been a busy summer with visitors, a wedding, swimming, bike rides and bbqs. The weather was so amazing on Friday that we made a spur of the moment decision to go camping for the weekend with the Hereaka-Bowden family. We've been to the Greytown camp ground before and it was even better than we remembered, particularly as it was hot enough to use the swimming pool this time.

The boys were all very well-behaved (waking up at 6:03am and giggling away at each other) and we had such a great time that we felt as if we'd been aw ay for longer than one night - at least when we unpacked the car and saw how much gear we had! We'll definitely be doing that again.

The swim in the river was a highlight, obviously!