Chimney sweep

Our chimney has been blocked this week and today the chimney sweep came around to clean it.

The tallest has the job on the roof. It was interesting to watch and got me thinking about the chimney sweeps in Mary Poppins.
Today's craft was making a sugar crystal flower. First we dissolved sugar in water (with some food colouring to make it look pretty).

Then we bent a pipe cleaner and suspended that in the liquid.

Unfortunately by the evening I could already see crystals forming on the top as well as on the bottom of the jar. So we may have to try this again at some point.

We had a good laugh this afternoon. We headed out to meet Dad as we normally do and Ruth wanted to walk through the big puddle in the drive. But got stuck in the mud. So I headed over to help her out and got my foot stuck. So Brendon (standing on dry ground) helped pull me out.
The mud was rather deep. And although we all had a really good laugh about it all, Rachel thought it was hilarious. I think we ended up laughing at her laughing. :D

Both Ruth and Hannah had great first years with almost no dirty nappies. I don't know what happens after 1 though - and things go backwards. With Ruth I thought it was related to our international move - but the same thing seemed to happen with Hannah. It also seems to link to teething and the runny tummies that go with that. Their little systems just change and they are not as predictable I suppose.

Well this afternoon Hannah surprised us because she told us "poo" while pointing to her nappy and so we assumed she was dirty (or at least busy) but as we normally do - we ran her to the toilet. She was clean though and got it all in the toilet. Clever girl. Although we don't expect this to become the norm, it was just good that she was aware and could communicate to us.

Rachel went to youth group again this evening and Brendon picked up some library books for me on the way home. Ruth is just like Rachel now and when new books arrive she sits and pages through them all.

I also took her old braids out this evening as we will be having a hair day tomorrow. The previous lot lasted 5 weeks - so for a quick style they did really well.