Just when we thought the summer was over, here comes the sun again to give us another chance at all those things we didn’t get round to doing! We have a lovely weekend planned - we’re heading to Legoland today to make use of our newly purchased Merlin passes, and then planning a family BBQ for tomorrow.

We’ve had a week of ups and downs - on Thursday I took Max to Boots for his Meningitis B jab, which we decided to pay for privately when it was announced that he would miss the age cutoff to get it done on the NHS. It went much more smoothly than I’d expected - he was so brave! But to compensate for that, I’ve been determined to fill this week up with lots of nice things.

 

01. When online friends become real friends! I took the plunge and met up with two lovely Instagram friends on Tuesday. We headed to Emmetts Garden, near Sevenoaks, and had such a lovely day mooching around the gardens, watching the kids scoot around on little ride on tractors, and getting to know each other a bit better. More and more I’m noticing that Max is becoming such a friendly and sociable child, and he has such a great sense of humour - it doesn’t take much to make him laugh these days! The kids all played so nicely together and there were lots of laughs. And the grown ups played nicely too - it’s so lovely to meet up with new people and discover how easy it is to just chat. Max has been ‘chatting’ about his new friends ever since and every time he sees them in a photo he points to them excitedly!

 

02. We had Max’s 27 month review on Monday. I have to admit that I was dreading it - I don’t have the best prior experience with Health Visitors, and the questionnaire that you have to fill out did not fill me with confidence. After reading it I was quite worried about a few areas in which Max seemed to be behind his peers. But after chatting through everything with the Health Visitor I felt really reassured, especially about his speech and communication, which although are a little behind, didn’t give her any cause for concern. He did refuse to be measured or weighed though - little monkey!

 

03. I managed to snap up two new summer dresses in the Boden sale for bargain prices! I always love a dress as it makes choosing an outfit so much easier - you just throw on the dress and some shoes and you’re done! They’re perfect for these last few days of summer and I already had the perfect colour accessories to dress them up a bit.

 

 

04. I’ve been really enjoying using my new camera out and about - I’m getting to grips with all the different settings slowly. But I find lugging a camera bag around with me really cumbersome, especially when you have a toddler who demands to be picked up more than he’ll walk. Not to mention the fact that camera bags can be pretty ugly! So I’m beyond excited about my new Jo Totes ‘Alison’ camera bag which arrived yesterday. It looks more like a normal handbag, but the divider sections mean that I can throw in my camera and lenses without worrying about damaging them. And there’s room for other ‘mum’ essentials too!

 

 

05. It was my husband’s fortnightly work from home day this week, so we took our lunch break together and went out for a little daytime date! I don’t normally tend to take a lunch break while I’m working, but it’s lovely to snatch some child free time together where we can both eat a meal before it gets cold!

 

I’m looking forward to next week though - I hear it’s paddling pool and ice cream weather again!