Well..

.. I would post pictures of how wonderful the aquarium looks now that the water is clear and the plants are in, or of the fantastic shiner Enya gave herself on Sunday when she fell and hit her head again on the sandpit (seriously when she gives herself such a whopping shiner, does she seriously need to go the next day and flirt with the neighbour who works for the child protection services!!), but Z snuck the camera out this morning so instead you can just take it on faith that they are as great as I say they are.

Life is meandering on in the House of Z, I managed to get both girls to eat ham yesterday- usually if meat is not pureed they spit it out (too much work to chew it, you know) but this time they ate it in omelette and then took bites of my ham matzos. Another case of "if it comes from mommy's plate, it's better than what is on ours". I have however given up and will be taking the blender stick with on our holiday, we'll try feed them table food but for my own peace of mind I want the blender there if they don't eat normal food.

Also in preperation of our holiday I'm trying to get them used to sleeping when their room is not completely dark. Up to now we have had their room pitch black for naptimes and nights (roller blinds outside the window, great insulation and makes the room nightlike) however we won't have the luxury in Turkey so they need to get used to napping when it is light. Naptimes now start with a half an hour to an hour playtime but eventually they do fall asleep, the plus is naptimes are now longer which gives me more time to get chores done but also means we have less time to play together.

ON the mobility side, we now definitely have 2 toddlers, neither girl crawls much anymore. In fact Ciara never crawls anywhere and Enya will crawl if she falls down a lot but usually only for half a meter before standing up and walking/running off again. Both girls have mastered the step up from our patio, we can trust them to go up and down it alone with only the occasional mishap (hence Ciara's grazed elbow and Enya's grazed knee). They love to be outside on the grass, playing in the sandpit or on the swing and slide set (no, we haven't spoilt them, our nextdoor neighbours have all these toys for their granddaughter and have generously allowed us use of them, not that we could really stop C and E from using them as there are no fences between the backyards in our block).

Talking about the lack of fences, Ciara and Enya escaped my watch on Monday and managed to get outside without me being aware of it. I thought I'd closed the patio door when I brought them inside to change their nappies but I hadn't. After the nappy change I set them free to run inside while I finished cleaning the fridge, gradually it dawned on me that they were way too quiet (quiet=danger), I went running through to the lounge to see that the patio door was wide open and they were nowhere in sight. I ran outside and immediately saw Enya playing with the washing line but Ciara was not in sight- my heart was pounding! Thankfully the wind set the washing flapping so I then saw Ciara playing with the swing seat, before I totally flipped out. I have already joking suggested we fit lines to their harnesses and peg them in the backyard so they can't get away, like people do with dogs. Surprisingly enough no one else finds the idea very good ;0). I'm dreading the day they learn how to open the doors (particularly our front door) by themselves, as we have no fences or gates or secure areas without direct access to a road!