A Matter of Choice

Dear Louka, Happy birthday little dude! So now you are 7 years old, and we should probably stop calling you the 'little one' but as Dad says, he's in his 40s now and is still the little'un according to Auntie Bek so you're going to be stuck with it too. You've had a great year,  started big school and you have enjoyed it so much more than your little school.  You like going to school with Leo for the first time, and now even walking together without me.   I hope you enjoy 2nd class just as much and do even better this coming school year. What else can I say about you,  you are a contradiction - very loud and crazy and very quiet, such extreme opposites! We are proud how you talk to many more people these days, even if you don't really want to it makes such a difference when you answer questions and acknowledge the fact that you are being spoken to. Your swimming is amazing, you have definitely nailed that now, jumped straight in at the st...

Just before we celebrate Loukas 7th birthday I thought I'd better share some photos from last years.  The themes have never come as easily as they do for Leo's birthdays, I think because Louka generally is not one for being really into something.  Leo's a bit like me in the way that if we like it we LOVE it and everything to do with it,  we will read the book, watch the film and know all there is to know about it.  So when it comes to parties we love the little details.  As Louka approached his 6th birthday however it became clear that a Minecraft party would go down very well.   Louka only had one special request for the party which was a pinata,  whatever else happened was not a concern of his!. As usual I jumped onto Pinterest for inspiration, and roped in Aaron for some crafty bits and Leo who is also our resident Minecraft expert. The Food I love food labels! As well as egg sandwiches - a staple of all our birthday ...

It's been a while but here I am again, as we approach the next birthday and my thoughts return to the traditional birthday blog posts.  I'm not sure why I  always feel the need to explain my lack of blogging, or who I think might care but here come the explanations (excuses!) I started work this season, part time,  it's officially 2 days a week but summer is busy and that tends to spill over to 3 or 4 quite often (in addition of course to our   website and photo booth).  I work with a great team of ladies during the summer season here, covering the east coast of Cyprus cleaning and steaming wedding dresses .  I'm enjoying it and it's been a great year so far but it does make a big difference to the amount of time I have and while it's been relatively easy to adjust, it's still a change that we've all had to get used to. I'd say the main reason for my lack of posts is the age of the boys now,  and the fact that I feel like I should or I ...

Ten years of birthday letters, blog posts about parties, and birthday interviews! Our Leo is now in double digits! No birthday blog letter this year, I've still written one but I've printed it off along with all the previous years and will be giving them all to him when he gets home from school today. Not too old for the themed party though - it was Pokemon this year (at the time of writing it is still in planning )   Going on last years birthday blog fail, I may or may not write about it!   I realised I'd missed the post party blog only last week and wrote a very belated birthday post. It's fine, May is crazy month and with work, kids and businesses it's amazing I've even written this! Happy birthday to my (not so) little Leo! 

Next week is Leo's 10th birthday and as I started to write my usual birthday letter I have just realised that I broke the habit of a (blog) lifetime last year and didn't write about his party! After so many epic themes (Harry Potter, Doctor Who, Spiderman, Lego, and Thomas the Tank Engine)  it was always going to be tricky to beat,  it was entirely Leo's choice (unlike a couple of the others where I may have gently planted the idea!)  So we had a Marvel party, complete with fancy dress - adults included!  With a 'Hulk Smash' Cake, Thor's Hammer marshmallows among other yummy treats.  As well as the traditional pass the parcel we had a couple of super hero training games 'minute to win it' style.  It was full fancy dress too, well until much of it was abandoned due to the heat! It was a great afternoon /evening for us adults as well as the kids!

A flashback post today, back to early 2015 Leo was 5 and Louka was 2.  It was quite early in the morning and we were having breakfast outside.   That was quite a rare event, and one of the only times in all the years we've been here that we did that, I assume it just seemed like an unnecessary additional effort especially in the high chair days.  There had already been a pre-breakfast playdough session,  I really don't miss days starting that early with things like that! It may be more than 4 years ago but I remember the morning well,  the breakfast went well.  Leo buttered his own bread (sort of)  and no-one cried or moaned or had any drama - this is why I remember it, it was a rare event! I sat and watched the boys play thinking how lovely it all was, the sun was shining the boys were happy and had been playing nicely together so far all day (remember it was breakfast time but you had to celebrate the little th...

I've had a big 'to visit' list for many years ans slowly but surely we are getting round to ticking things off.  It's taking time due to a variety of reasons, usually money, often time,  sometimes weather and some which were just not as appealing with young kids. Earlier this month we crossed off two places from my family day out wish list with a trip to Nicosia, a planned trip to Melios zoo and an impromptu visit to Extreme Park . I wasn't sure what to expect from Melios as I'd read several bad reviews online over the years but looking at the website it seemed to me to be worth a visit. Entry prices are low (€3 for adults €2 for children) but I knew everyone wouldn't be impressed if I dragged them all to Nicosia and it was rubbish! You can buy big bags of carrots for €1 and feed the animals if you wish. It was actually a great place to visit, the boys really enjoyed it and we were surprised.  I do sadly have fairly low expectations when it come...

Louka's favourite thing at the moment is football, he spends ages on the balcony kicking a ball around (and often over the edge!) or down with his friend on the field outside.  He loves anything and everything with even a hint of football about it, so you can imagine his joy when we gave him a football themed water bottle! Since then he's taken it to school of course - as that was the intention He's carried it around the house, used it at the dinner table, in front of the TV and taken it to bed! I explained to him that we received the bottle to review and he took it very seriously, telling me that it is a good colour and he likes the footballers on there especially the one with the blond hair.   The best bit apparently is the lid because it looks like a football and he's never seen that on a bottle before. The bottle is by Sigg Cyprus and is part of their Aluminum Kids range.    It's great to have a bottle that the boys like to stop them wanting...

This weekend saw our first beach trip of the year! It felt very strange to put on shorts and a bikini top for the first time,  after not being out of jeans, cardigans and boots so far this year but it seemed a bit silly to go to the beach dressed like that, especially as it felt warm in the sun.  (about 21 degrees in case you area wondering) I learnt from previous experiences and made sure the boys were wearing swim shorts as I couldn't even tell you the amount of times they've ended up soaking wet despite them saying they are not going in the sea.  I even put sun cream on us all! As you can see it wasn't very busy,  it's not one of the busy tourist beaches though,  Fig Tree bay and the like would have certainly been busier but this was nice and peaceful.  We counted less than 10 people, including us! I even managed about 20 minutes laying in peace while the boys played - something that has never happened before. It was actually relaxing t...

It's my favourite time of year! After cold winter spring seems to appear suddenly, almost overnight. You can feel a real warmth in the sun and you start to remember the kind of heat that will be on the way in the next couple of months. Unless you also live in Cyprus I expect you are thinking 'Cold winter? She doesn't know the meaning of cold' etc etc, but living here in winter is a whole different kind of cold.   While it might nice enough outside, indoors can be uncomfortably cold. The houses are really hard to heat and we end up wearing so many layers and snuggling under blankets all the time!    This year has also seen an amazing amount of rainfall, the most I think in over 100 years I'm sure I read somewhere.   The country is just not good at dealing with this and there are been roads collapsing and property damage all over the place. But Spring has sprung and I just love it! Carnival week always seems to be the start of it, everything s...

Following on from my recent 80's toy flashback post I wanted to elaborate,  while I had been writing the first post I had been browsing on pinterest and of course now it keeps showing me more of the same type of pins assuming that is what I am now interested in.  Well of course it is right, I love memories! Last time I mentioned my favourites - Care Bears and My Little Pony, plus a couple of less popular toys but now it's all about the dolls. Surely every girl growing up in any decade has to have a doll at one point, whether it's a baby, Barbie or Bratz, or whatever the latest is (I don't know, I have boys!) I had a Tiny Tears (or similar) doll, you know the one - feed it and change it, ahh the aspirations we all had!   I wasn't a fan though,  I remember it annoying me that it didn't really look like a young baby and so it seemed silly. This changed when I received Gemma (not sure why I wanted to call it something so close to my own name)   S...