Owlfit of the Week

You might recognise these shorts from an Owlfit a few months ago.  I bought them in TK Max and Little Owl wore them loads last autumn before growing out of them.  When I shared a photo of her wearing them for an owlfit, I wondered if she could fit in them now she is out of nappies - well as you can see she can!  They aren't going to fit for much longer but I'm so pleased that I squeezed a bit more wear out of them!

The green smock was from a set of four from Marks & Spencers which have been worn and worn and worn this summer - definitely a good purchase!  The jacket is a hand-me-down from H&M, and of course, the shoes are from Livie and Luca.

Little Owl wearing the shorts last year

When your child is THAT child

Little Owl was a very easy baby.  She didn't mind where I took her or when, she didn't mind crowds and fireworks, and equally would sit quietly during a church service.  I could walk out of the room at a playgroup and she wouldn't mind, I could take her for lunch and she would sit there for hours.  Hell, I even flew to India with her on my own!

But Little Owl isn't a baby any more.  Little Owl is a two year old.  At first that was fine, but something happened when she turned two-and-a-quarter. It was almost a Kevin the teenager moment, her going to bed one night all sweetness and light, waking up the next morning this fireball of energy!

Little Owl favourite thing to do now is to play with her friends.  The trouble is, they aren't always so excited.  They don't always want kisses, or hugs.  Little Owl doesn't understand this and a hug with a toddler who is trying to get away can result in them both wrestling on the floor.  A subtle turning of the head to avoid a kiss is no challenge for Little Owl who merely grabs the child by both ears enforcing a head turn until the kiss is achieved.  Little Owl's attempt to get a child to play with her on the swings could look to an outsider (or the other child's parent) that she just pushed them over.

Is my child now that child?  Is my child the one that other children don't want to play with?  Is my child the child that other parents don't want near their children?  Am I about to discover that my new found mummy friends, aren't going to stick about?  Am I going to miss out on seeing them because of they don't want my child there?

I'm usually a quite confident person, but Little Owl's behaviour is making me feel very vulnerable.  If I feel like this, then how do less confident mums feel?  Those who's children are perhaps deliberately hurting other children?

I have tried telling Little Owl off.  It doesn't really work.  She doesn't understand.  She is just having fun.  Sometimes I wonder if I am just saying the words to appease the other parent.  The parent of the toddler who is now crying... And suddenly I'm all insecure again.  What if my friends don't approve of how I am parenting Little Owl?  What if on their secret meet ups they all sit round discussing how terrible Little Owl is and how its all my fault for being a bad parent?

I know some people might read this and say "well they can't really be your friend if they treat you like that" but would you really choose to hang around with someone if you knew their kid was going to make your child cry?

My cheeky monkey!

And how can I stop Little Owl's behaviour?  Helicopter parenting has never been my style, but maybe I should start to prevent others kids getting hurt until Little Owl is past this phase?  I think mixing with bigger kids might help, but apart from sending her to nursery or playgroup, I'm not really sure where to find bigger kids!  And while nursery and/or playgroup are on the cards, I almost feel like this needs sorting first.  She is my child.  Her behaviour is my responsibility.  I can't pass that on to someone else.  I know many do.  I teach their children when they get to secondary school and its hard.  

So while I try to cling on to my friends, old and new, and try to prevent Little Owl from hurting anyone too bad, I have come up with a simple rule that Little Owl does understand: "no touching"

Now someone get me a gin and tonic and make it a large one!

New Bike

I have a new bike and I love her!

Isn't she a beaut? She needs a name.

I haven't owned my own bike since I was a kid.  I learnt to ride on my brothers bike and around the age 7 or 8 I got my own bike, it was red.  But I didn't go on it often, I had no one really to ride with and no where really to cycle - I remember getting told off for cycling on the prom which is funny really as now there is a white line down the middle of the same prom and its called a cycle path!

Anyway, that was the last time I owned a bike until now!  We're lucky enough to live near the seafront where there is a cycle path.  Papa Owl has been taking Little Owl for rides all summer and I have been feeling a bit left out, so a few weeks ago I hired a bike from Bells Bicycles in Hastings Old Town and we cycled all the way to Bexhill.  I love the bike I hired, I'm not a very confident cyclist so I found the sit-up-and-beg position was great for me. 

Often, we only want to go out for an hour or so on the bike, or to cycle to my parents house, hiring a bike is a bit over the top for such short trips so this weekend I took the plunge and bought my very own bike!  The lovely lady at Bells was very helpful, letting me try out all of the bikes, carefully explaining everything to me whilst holding her own with Papa Owl's complicated questions (he has his mountain bike leader qualification amongst other outdoor things).  After an hour and a half I walked out with this beauty!

I took it out first thing this morning and it was wonderful cycling by the sea, saying good morning to the other cyclists, most of the ignored me but hey ho!  My target it to ride this enough times to make the price per ride less than the cost of hire so look out for more photos of my adventures!

Cross Monday Week 26

Week 26. Gulp.  That's half a year!  I had really hoped to have finished this second section by now, it would have kept me on track for finishing in a years time, but I haven't so the deadline has slipped.  I'm secretly thinking it might be more realistic to aim for December 2015!

Silent Sunday

Owlfit of the Week

As the summer is fading away, you'll start to see more cardigans and jackets appearing over Little Owl's summer outfits until I finally give in and accept that summer has gone.  This weeks Owlfit is another funky design from Me&i.  The dress is actually a tunic but I deliberately ordered it in a size too big so that Little Owl could get maximum wear out of it.  

One of her previous tunics started out as a dress with tights under, we then progressed to leggings when it was getting too short and I suspect it will be out again this winter with jeans.  The shape of the shoulders and neck have been designed to grow with the child so its not obvious that its too big at the moment.  It doesn't hang quite as nicely as the actual dresses from Me&i which I think are stunning, but with the addition of the denim jacket I think this looks great.  

I wish I had managed to get a picture of Little Owl with her sunnies and straw hat too as she looked like a proper little rock chick!  The jacket is a hand-me-down from H&M and the shoes are from Livie & Luca.

Cross Monday Week 25

Here it is - a nearly finished second section!  All that is left to do is to complete the vine going across the top.  I say all... but it is going to be tricky as the pattern for this second goes across 4 sheets of paper!  This is a brilliant kit but my only criticism of it is that there is no overlap at the edges of the paper, so wish me luck for the coming week!

 

 

  

 

 

Silent Sunday

Hotel Regina, Ypres - A Review

With just under 24 hours in Ypres, we needed somewhere central to stay!  My preferred site for booking hotels is hotels.com I used it for all of the hotels we stayed in on our train trip to Hong Kong, and its always got us great rooms at fantastic prices.  I grabbed an old copy of the Belgium Lonely Planet from my shelf so I could check out their recommendations too, and use their map to see where places were.  Inside the planet I found 105 euros! It must have been left from a trip we did years ago - we didn't even stay in Belgium, just passed through, but it was enough for our hotel on this trip, so thank you past selves for being so casual with your cash!

A hotel that appeared on both hotels.com and the planet was Hotel Regina.  Its located on the central square, right opposite the In Flanders Field Museum and just down the road from the Menin Gate.  At

€95 for the night, we still had some cash left for a beer!  Thanks again past selves!

Like everywhere else in Ypres, the shadow of the war is part of the fabric of the building.  However, it was in WWII that the hotel was used to help the repatriation of allied airmen.

A down side to its central locations is that there is no specific parking for the hotel itself.  However, it wasn't a problem to find street parking nearby which was free on a Sunday but it did mean we had to put money on the meter first thing Monday morning.  If you are staying longer, I'm sure there would be free parking a short walk away and you can get a ticket for half and hour free which would be enough to unload the car.

 

The staff couldn't have been friendlier and more helpful.  When it turned out that a bed hadn't been provided for Little Owl, the reception staff themselves came up with one.  The room was plenty large enough to take the put up bed, along side the generous double bed.  Our room looked directly onto the square.  The 'original' features made it hard believe that this hotel, along with most of Ypres had been lovingly rebuilt after being destroyed in the First World War.

Breakfast was served in the bar area, which made for a relaxed experience in comfy chairs rather than a formal dining room.  There was cereals, cold meats and cheese, bread and a selection of pastries, and a rather attentive man keeping our coffee cups topped up!

If you are heading to Ypres, I highly recommend Hotel Regina.

Ypres - A town that never forgets

Ypres, a town that never forgets - a town that can't forget?  One hundred years since the start of the First World War, Ypres is the focus of the pilgrimage that many thousands of tourists make each year.

Ypres (or Ieper as it is officially known) is located in the west of Belgium, just one and a half hours by car from Calais which makes it very accessible.  As you near the city, you begin to spot cemeteries by the side of the road or in distant fields.  The Commonwealth ones are the most recognisable, with their matching white headstones.  We had visited Tyne Cot Cemetery, the largest of all the cemeteries in Belgium, several years ago.  This time we visited the Essex Farm Cemetery where the famous poem In Flanders Field was written.  

If you are going to visit a Commonwealth Cemetery or Memorial, then I highly recommend this leaflet produced by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission for a basic introduction.

Ypres itself is a small medieval city, largely rebuilt after the war.  Its town square is dominated by the Cloth Hall building which you could be forgiven for thinking is a cathedral.  The Cloth Hall is home to the In Flanders Field Museum which Papa Owl assures me was worth the €9 entrance fee (Little Owl was desperately in need of a nap, and I wasn't sure she was quite ready for a museum!).

A short walk from here is the Menin Gate, a most impressive structure which dwarfs the nearby buildings, over fifty thousand names are engraved on the gate, all of whom died during the war and who's bodies were either not found, or not identified.

Every night at 8 o'clock, the Last Post is played during a short ceremony. We arrived not long after 7 and the crowds had started to form.  Papa Owl headed into the gate itself, while I found somewhere to sit with Little Owl outside.  Here is Papa Owls words on the ceremony:

"The ceremony is a simple act of remembrance centred around the playing of the last post. Wreaths are laid and the exhortation is read. On some occasions, including ours, a  visiting band plays some hymns. I stood at the back and started taking to some Ypres locals who attend every day without fail. They told me about one of the buglers who only missed one day in 60 years. My impression was that the people of Ypres are still immensely grateful for the sacrifices made by the soldiers of Great Britain and the Empire 100 years ago."

As always with traveling, meal times get out of any resemblance of normal, which is even more noticeable with Little Owl in tow.  Breakfast had been on the ferry, lunch was ice cream at about 4 o'clock and dinner was yet to happen.  However, at 9 o'clock there were still plenty of restaurants open around the main square, many of them family friendly with other children dining.

The next morning gave me the chance to look around the shops.  There isn't a large shopping area, with several small retails parks located outside of the centre.  Nearly all of the shops are closed on Sundays, and many of the independent shops are closed on Monday mornings too!  

Ypres is a small beautiful city which is still completely in the shadow of the war that started over 100 years ago.  I cannot help but wonder what it must be like to grow up in such a place.  To have your life dominated by such a devastating event that happened so long ago.

Ypres, a town that never forgets - a town that can't forget?



If you are visiting Ypres, then check out my review of Hotel Regina