Wedding

Bipedal Motion and the Return to School

Thursday 25th September 2014Saturday 11th October 2014Baggie

Once again the update has been delayed and the gap between write-ups has widened further than I would prefer. As per the last few months the shadow of IMG casts long over Team Bagnall and so I have been unable to put fingers to keyboard and regale to you the tales of our corner of the world. I will attempt to remember the past month and so you will have to forgive any memory lapses or curtness of writing over the next thousand words or so.

As you can perhaps guess from the title it has been a momentous month, even if I have not been there to share it with the family that often.

But first let me take to back to the last Thursday in August. Friends of ours Kerry and Dave were due to be wed the following day (Friday 29th August 2014) and so we needed to find babysitters for our brood. Unfortunately both Lucinda and I were due to work Saturday and Sunday so we were looking for at least three days of babysitting in a row, a tall order for anyone. Up stepped Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz which was very nice of them and the girls were very excited, however it did mean that we had to drive to West Bromwich to drop them off. The girls are always excited to see Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz but there was an added edge to this visit but more of that later.

Unusually (ahem), I was at work on the Thursday so Lucinda packed them in the trusty S-Max and drove the 120 miles to West Bromwich. With Kerry and Dave’s wedding the next day she stayed in West Bromwich just long enough to rest and have some lunch before saying goodbye and heading back home. She was slightly concerned about leaving Ezra as we had not left him that long before and she was concerned how he would react. She need not of worried as he simply waved her off. Not only was he not bothered but to rub salt in the wounds of the separation, he decided that being 120 miles away from Mum and Dad was the perfect opportunity to take he first steps! Yes, the little blighter decided that genicular locomotion was no longer in vogue and decided to totter to his feet and begin the usual plantigrade locomotion favoured by humans. So, disappointingly, both Lucinda and I missed this huge developmental stage.

Lucinda arrived home Thursday evening and when I got home from work we both commented on how empty the house felt, even though all of the kids would have been asleep there was still a sense of emptiness.

The next day was the Wedding; the venue Random Hall. Random Hall is 16th Century cottage (somewhat extended) set in the Sussex countryside a short trip outside of Horsham. As this is within shooting distance of Staines Upon Thames (about an hour away) we decided that we would drive there and back and not look to stay. This meant that one of us needed to be the nominated driver and as Kerry is ostensibly Lucinda’s friend and many of Lucinda’s (and Kerry’s, obviously) work colleagues would be in attendance. For those of you that think that the internet is an evil place and no good can come from it, Kerry and Dave met on the same dating website as Lucinda and I, so good things do happen in cyberspace.

Random Hall was an excellent, one stop venue and a fantastic day was had by all. Kerry looked beautiful and Dave passed muster! The only slight downer was the fact that we were both semi-conscious that we would be working the next day, it would have been nice to have been able to take advantage of a sans-child weekend and really let our hair down. No such luck.

A weekend of work followed and before we knew it Monday morning arrived and we were heading back to West Bromwich to relieve Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz and collect the Baguettes! We left early because Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz had a big day the next day and was the cause of the excitement from Éowyn and Amélie. Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz were leaving early the next morning to catch a flight to New York. Yes, Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz had booked themselves a short trip to the Big Apple. Now why would Éowyn and Amélie be excited that Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz were going to America? The power of the internet unfortunately.

The girls have discovered, on Youtube, an American lady who plays with dolls and films herself doing so. She is either in the employ of the toy manufacturers or is just slightly crazy and has lots of spare cash, or some combination of all three. She always has the latest dolls and makes little stories with them, much to the delight of the girls. I have to stop them watching her and actually encourage them to put the iPad down and actually go and play with the dolls themselves. Whoever she is, it works. The girls are always interested in the new dolls that she has bought and we had always managed to put them off wanting it by telling them that they were only available in America (which in fairness, they quite often are). Therefore imagine their delight when Nanny Fran announced she was going to America! Éowyn began writing a list for her and Amélie so that Nanny Fran could load up with presents. The upside of this was that we had warned them before going to Nanny Fran’s that if they misbehaved that Nanny Fran wouldn’t buy them anything. To be honest they didn’t need that (they wouldn’t dare misbehave for Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz) but it was a good warning nevertheless.

The weekend also threw up another of Éowyn’s misheard lyrics, this time Ghost by Ella Henderson. The actual lyrics are: ‘I keep going to the river to pray‘; Éowyn instead sang: ‘I keep going to the river to play‘. Coming from a non-religious household, I can understand where she was coming from and a more enjoyable way to spend time by a river in my humble opinion.

The second part of this update is the fact that September marks the advent of the academic year. Éowyn has begun year 1 while Amélie still has a year before she starts full time education. Both girls have had a little shock going back to school. Éowyn, because there is much more focus on work this year and she no longer has free-time in which she is allowed free reign to discover her talents; Amélie because a lot of her friends have left Mini-Tots to embark on their education journey, leaving Amélie as the oldest at Mini-Tots.

Although this has been a bit of a shock for the girls, it will no doubt all be forgotten in a few weeks. Amélie is making lots of new friends and Éowyn is thriving on the work focus and it is good for her. She is racing through reading books at the moment and has already progressed through one level and the next level is in her sights. There has been an improvement in her writing and she has already earned one ‘Magic Moment’ (the reward system employed by her new teacher Mrs Harris). It is safe to say they are settling in.

Éowyn’s imagination is developing and will stand her in good stead if she pursues her latest career choice: author. She enjoys writing and will quite often write books for us. Yes, books, not stories. She will fold sheets of paper and loosely bind them into a book before crafting her story. Her stories are quite good and have a defined beginning, middle and end. She carries this imagination into her play and some of her character names are quite impressive. My particular favourite is Sharon Von Poopenwrench. Have no idea where she got that from!

Ezra, too, is a cheeky little fellow at times. I was playing with him and pretending to be a sleep replete with comic snoring noises. As Ezra crept nearer and I suddenly ‘woke up’ and surprised him. He thought it was the funniest thing that had ever happened and was positively chortling. So I did it again. Again, he thought it was a riot and encouraged me to do it again. After about the tenth time it was becoming a little tiresome, for me at least. Ezra had other ideas. When he realised I was not going to do it again he put his head down and started the fake snoring. So I put my head down and did it a few more times. The next time I refused to do it, Ezra once again put his head down but still I refused to do it. So he grabbed my head and pushed it down, he was a tenacious little monkey.

So with Amélie’s birthday a few short days away and Éowyn’s just under three weeks later I will leave you with the knowledge that I have to update you sooner otherwise two of the biggest events of the year will have been missed.

Peace and Love

Baggie

Cheeky boy

The finished house

I can walk!

What are you looking at?

What?

Is it still there?

Just out for a walk

Tight turn

Out for a stroll

Richard and Lucinda

Gis a kiss!

The Happy Couple

Anna?

Amélie’s first day

New hairstyle

Looking Northern

Ey up

Looking for a space

Pony treking

Saddle up

Living up to my name

Scooby Doo, Where Are You?

Painted ladies

Those pesky kids

Whoa!

Push me!

Whee!

Push me sister!

Push!

Asleep!

Bongo, bongo stylee

Wednesday 27th November 2013Sunday 16th March 2014Baggie

After an early hat-trick of updates at the beginning of November this site has been a little quiet. Three weeks into our new home I thought it was perhaps times to rectify this and give you a little insight to the life of the Bagnalls in the new Bagnall manor.

November was always going to be a busy month. A wave of productions were due to relocate from Chiswick to our company’s new base at Stockley Park and a number of these involved Live Operations (and hence me and my team) including the Football League Show. Therefore if there was one month I didn’t want to move home it was November. Unfortunately fate conspired against me and so a busy month at work coincided with the move. With no opportunity to take leave, the relocation of the family was done on days off and hence we are still mainly in boxes.

Although I, personally, have not had much time to settle into the new abode it does feel like home. Again that is despite the fact that we still have dozens of unpacked boxes and the heating isn’t working. Yes, the biggest problem that we have faced is the fact that the temperature has dropped close to freezing point over night and the heating has serious issues. We have had heating engineers around who both have confirmed that the system is full of gunk and thus the hot water is not filling the radiators. The good news is that the boiler works as does the pump, however that hot water is not reaching the radiators and thus downstairs, especially, is barely warmer than outside. Unfortunately due the design of the hot water system it is not the easiest of systems to service and that design is part of the issue, there are lots of turns and u-bends where gunk can gather. Fortunately phase one has begun and now the radiators take the chill out of the room (I wouldn’t say it is tropical but at least it is a step in the right direction) and hopefully the chemicals in the system carry on dissolving the gunk and allow the hot water to do its job.

Apart from the heating, we are as much in love with the house now as when we first looked round it. There are only a couple of minor annoyances that we hadn’t noticed when we looked round: a) the kitchen light switch is located behind the door, so as you walk into the room, you have to then close the door before you can switch the light on. Why do people do that? It is so annoying, surely when you are designing a room you automatically place the light switch on the opposite wall to the door hinge so that you can open the door with one hand while simultaneously turning the light on with the other and b) the hot water tap in the downstairs shower room (hark at us – downstairs shower room!) opens clockwise and closes counterclockwise which is the opposite direction to every other tap in the house including the cold water tape on the same sink. These are minor annoyances and the kitchen light switch will be changed when we manage to scrap enough spare cash together to redesign the kitchen.

The girls have settled in well too. They do not notice the cold (something that we have to watch for as they wander downstairs with no dressing gown or slippers on). They do not seem even to miss the old house, which is nice. They have settled in quite quickly and both are happy to use the extra space that the house offers to run around and play hide and seek. Their playroom is coming together and now we have just got to encourage them that their toys live in there (or in their bedroom) and are to be put away each night in the new boxes we have bought them. Let’s see how that goes.

So while I have been busy at work, the girls have been busy at school. Éowyn, especially has been excelling at school, she has begun to read and write and is brilliant at breaking words into their letter and then blending the sounds together. It is great to sit with her and see how excited she is when she reads a sentence. It is quite exciting for her parents too! She also has a line in the Christmas play, but more of that in the December write up. Needless to say there is plenty of practising She knows it off by heart and now we are working on projection. Éowyn wants to take it one stage further though and has started making up some actions to help emphasise the words, building her part up! We have a little diva. There is no truth in the rumours that her rider includes 23 orange smarties and a bunch of daffodils.

Although it has been a busy month at work, there was one ‘dark weekend’ and my friend and colleague cleverly chose that weekend to get married. John and Sara have lots of friends that have small children so their wedding was organised with children in mind and as a consequence my invite also included an invite for Éowyn, Amélie and Ezra.

John and Sara were married at St John’s the Evangelist in Blackheath and therefore the shortest (it turned out not to be the quickest route) was to drive through the centre of London. It was a great opportunity to point out the Natural History Museum, Buckingham Place, The Houses of Parliament and the Tower of London. There were colouring books and pencils to keep the children entertained during the ceremony and afterwards there was cake and bubbles. Then it was on to the reception at Devonport Hotel at Greenwich. This is where the beauty of the S-Max comes into its own. One of my colleagues, Matt, was going to have difficulty getting from one venue to the other, so with our seven-seater beast we could offer him a lift.

Now, Éowyn and Amélie have started to make up their own language and phrases. Bongo, bongo Stylee is one of them (it means something that is very good), others are more nonsensical. One day going to school they were talking to each other in one of these made up languages so I started to join in and they thought it was one of the funniest things that they had ever heard. So now they will ask me to talk in my made-up language.

So on the way to reception the girls requested that I spoke my made up language. So I strung together a line of vowels and consonants into an amusing set of words and they started laughing. Matt thought that he would join in and copied what I had done. Amélie, however turned to him and said, ‘Matt, you’re not even funny!‘ Put into your place by a three year old, how we laughed!

Ezra, too can be amusing and seems to be a ladies man. He is forever trying to catch the eye of the ladies and with his blue eyes and cheeky smile he tends to melt their hearts. Sometimes he is not content with just a smile though. In a restaurant a week or so ago, he had caught the eye of a couple of ladies and they were cooing over him. However they turned away from him and begun talking to each other, Ezra was not happy. He started calling out to them, getting more and more agitated. When they turned to see what he was doing, he immediately stopped shouting and just looked at them and gave them a big blue-eyed smile! He is going to break hearts if he continues like that! His latest smile is even cuter as he screws his eyes up as he grins. I will try and get a photo.

Unfortunately we have all been fighting a winter cold. Éowyn was the first to succumb, although we were not convinced at first. The Bagnalls are the kind of family that do not stop for a mere cold, so when Éowyn had a bit of a cough we gave her some cough syrup, wrapped her up warm and sent her to school. We were surprised when Lucinda received a call on a Tuesday afternoon to say that Éowyn had vomited and would we collect her. Lucinda asked her why she had vomited and Éowyn told a different story, namely that she had accompanied one of her friends to the toilet and (I quote Éowyn directly) ‘She did a smelly poo and it make me sick.‘ Therefore thinking that there was nothing in it, we sent her to school the next day. School must have thought that we were bad parents and immediately called Lucinda to collect her again, saying that when a pupil had vomited they needed to be off school for 24 hours.

Thursday morning came and we sent her to school. Her cough had got a little worse but nothing too much to worry about. However at lunch Éowyn had a coughing fit while eating and once again vomited. So the bad parents were called back and they requested that Éowyn stay at home the next day. Thus Éowyn will not receive a 100% attendance certificate for the next half term.

So as we settle into our new home we haven’t had many visitors (we are still in boxes and it is a little cold) but the first of my friends to visit has one of the longest journeys. Sanjiv, was over in England for a couple of weeks from his home in New Delhi (India for those of you with an F in geography) and we managed to meet up (for the first time in ages) and he came round to look at our new home and also to meet the family. Éowyn was a baby the last time he met them, now we have Amélie and Ezra – how scary is that? It was good to see him and it illustrates how we let life get in the way of living, years seem to pass so quickly and before you know it, friends’ children are going to university. Surely I am not that old? Although I have just ‘celebrated’ 18 years at IMG. I can now employ people that were not born when I started at IMG in November 1995!

With those thoughts I will leave you and see you in December!

Peace and Love

Baggie

PS Apologies for the lack of decent photos, have been a little busy, I will try harder for the next update.

Cute smile for Zebra

Smile for Mommy!

Look at my teeth!

Smiler!

Cheeky boy

First meal in the new house

Bagnall manor

John and Sara cut the cake

Matt eats the cake!

Amélie’s Third Birthday

Thursday 3rd October 2013Saturday 5th October 2013Baggie

The fourth quarter is upon us, the nights are drawing in and the girls have completed their first month at school. In the last write up Éowyn was enjoying school while Amélie was in tears and begging us not to take her to nursery. So is that still the case?

Éowyn is still enjoying school and has got use to the fact that it is five days a week. It has not, however, been completely plain sailing since the beginning of September. There were a few days when Éowyn became upset and said that she didn’t want to go to school. Sensing that something had happened at school, Lucinda asked her what the matter was and had anyone upset her. Lucinda’s fears of something from school were soon allayed, it was something much closer to home: me. To be exact the lack of me. It has been a very busy period at work and I have spent long hours away from home. Although for Éowyn’s (and Amélie’s) first week or so at school I’d managed to trim the hours a little (a dark weekend helped – a dark weekend is a weekend with no Premier League football) the hours had begun to creep back. With Éowyn spending every weekday at school, and me working into the evening and at weekends, the girls were only seeing me in the morning. Not exactly what one might call quality time as it is all about shepherding them through breakfast, getting dressed for school and eventually out the door and into the car.

That was a wake up call and although it is difficult I have to strike the correct work/life balance and make the time I do spend with the girls special. With that in mind I asked Éowyn if there was something that she wanted to do with Daddy when she got out of school. Her first choice was to go the cinema – result! Unfortunately there were no suitable films showing at our local picturehouse (Vue Cinema, Staines). So it was the back up plan: baking some cakes. Therefore, armed with ingredients and a large mixing bowl we entered the kitchen and did not leave until we had made some fairy cakes. A simple gesture but it seems to have worked wonders; she is much happier. I can not rest on my laurels however and it was serious kick in the butt. With an imminent house move in the mix it is going to be a very stressful time for all the family and we can’t take our eye off the effects it is having on the children.

Amélie on the other hand, has gone from hating school and crying whenever we dropped her off to running into school. We are not entirely convinced that she is loving it but she knows that she has to go and is quite happy to go. There are still the questions about whether we are taking her to school but at least there are no tears when we tell her that she is going. Definitely a big step forward and just in time for her birthday.

Yes, the big news of the inter-write-up period is the news that Amélie has turned 3! Saturday saw our middle child’s third birthday. Unfortunately weekends are my busy days and so although I could push back the time I started I still had to go into work so I was unable to spend the whole day with her, which was upsetting. I was there when she opened her presents however, and was tasked with the job of extracting the toys from the packaging – not the easiest of tasks especially when you are trying not to damage the toys or indeed your own fingers! So although I wasn’t there for the bulk of the day I don’t think that she missed me too much as she had the distraction of a small family party around Nanny and Granddad’s with her cousins Lauren and Maddie. She was still awake when I got home from work (a little late – but it was her birthday!) and was full of excitement with the presents that I hadn’t seen and the fact that she had been playing with her cousins.

It was her second birthday party. The week before she had had a pirate themed birthday party around Nanny Fran’s with Nanny Fran’s other adopted grandchildren. Lucinda and I were not at the party however for we were taking advantage of Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz leaving our brood with them while we were approximately 60 miles away. One of my university friends Neil was marrying (I think the official term is entering a civil partnership – but I prefer marrying) his partner Paul and therefore when we received the invite to their big day, Nanny Fran’s services were booked. We had a great time, catching up with my university pals which was good as I rarely get to catch up with them, even the ones that live quite close. Unfortunately again the pull of work was strong and we had to leave early the next morning – before we had managed to say goodbye to them – the joys of working in television! I drove back to Nanny Fran’s, dropped Lucinda off and headed straight to work. Lucinda then drove back later with the girls.

Although it was Amélie’s birthday last Saturday, Sunday saw a third birthday party in just over a week, but not a third one for Amélie, but an early one for Éowyn. As regular readers of this website may recall Éowyn was the last of our NCT class to be born and the group of us that still keep in touch try to organise a joint birthday party for them some midway point between the beginning of September and Éowyn’s birthday on the 17th October. As fate will have it, this is usually around Amélie’s birthday, so I am sure that in her mind it is also for her. This year the venue chosen was Alice Holt. Run by the Forestry commission, Alice Holt is a few miles south of Farnham and excellent venue for the kids with plenty to do. The girls thoroughly enjoyed themselves and were full of stories of the giant woodpeckers and owls in the habitat trail. Again the call of work meant that I wasn’t able to go, but not only were the girls full of praise for the woodland so was Lucinda, so when work calms down and we have a fine day I think a trip to Alice Holt is in order.

With all work and not a lot of play when my friend Andy saw an offer for a half-day’s Owl and Eagle experience at the Birds of Prey Centre in Old Warden I jumped at the chance to do something for me! This was our second time, we took advantage of a similar offer last year, and again thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. It is great to be so close to such beautiful creatures and the only disappointment was that it wasn’t a full day’s experience. There are plenty of photos on our Flickr site including the moment that a moody female Bald Eagle decided to give Andy a little nibble. Well, he probably deserved it!

So before I leave you, just a quick note to say that the house move plods on but it now looks like all of our finances are in place and we could be exchanging before the next write up. That probably means there will not be a write up until November! (I am joking!)

Enjoy the photos and keep your fingers crossed for a smooth house move.

Peace and Love

Baggie