The Rs slept mostly in their own beds last nights. Both appeared sleepily at some point before midnight needing to be directed back and snuggled up and Ms R joined us in our bed at some point so I carried her back. She’s asked for a Baby Annabell canopy which is currently residing unbeknown to her in the boot of the car, I don’t like using bribery as such but I have discussed with her the possibility of having nice things for her bedroom (such as a Baby Annabell canopy) once she starts actually sleeping in there. This morning when she woke up she woke Master R up and they both came to tell me in very proud (and loud) voices how they slept in their own beds before going downstairs for breakfast and Cbeebies. Ms R told me she’d dreamt that we were out shopping with the whole family for Christmas when we saw red daleks, we weren’t scared because they looked like they were inflatable or something but they were moving around and were friendly. Master R got the wooden puzzles out and Ms R made me a card with ‘zero, one, two, three, four’ written on the inside copied from the puzzle board that just happened to be next to her at the time. It’s the first time she’s been interested in copying things, usually she likes me to call out the letters. Her letters are starting to be similar sized and are quite box like.
We had high winds and heavy rains but that didn’t deter us from heading East to home ed group. We’d barely left when Master R listed the friends he knows who are in possesion of a Dr Who sonic screwdriver. That in itself was fine (bearing in mind we’ve never actually seen Dr Who) but then he went on to say that Ms R doesn’t have one because (drum roll please) "…she’s a girl" 
. Erm no, she doesn’t have one because she doesn’t want one,
"But she plays with girls toys because she’s a girl and I don’t because I’m a boy"
What? Where’s he getting this stuff from? I asked him what things are ‘girls toys’ and he said
"Babies and stuff like that" but didn’t know who said they were for girls or why they were girls toys, he just knew they were 
. So we talked to them about that for a bit but I’m sure they were just thinking that I didn’t have a clue what I was talking about, I told them my brother used to play with dolls with me which had them asking why in surprised and disbelieving tones. A little later he asked me if he’d be a lady after he’s been a man, he’s asked me a few times when he’ll be a lady. I’m surprised the whole boy/girl, man/lady stuff is coming up at this age but it seems important to him at the moment.
We all did some lego and then they did some drawing. Master R did a quick scribble on the corner of a large piece of paper, asked me to fold it in half for him and then gave it to me as a card. While Master R and I started on lunch Ms R spent ages doing a chalk picture, folding it in half to make a card and writing ‘To Mummy’ on it. She declined several invitations to make pasta necklaces and one to make scones and then wished all the way home that she’d made a necklace, I wished she’d made scones. She was a bit lost without her usual friends although spent some time pushing a little boy on the ride-on, lounging on the chairs in the sports hall watching with interest the behaviour of the older boys and playing ball with another boy. Master R spent our time eating and chatting. By the time we came out the rains had gone and the sky was blue.
Once home they settled into some train track playing with Colin and then I helped them both make birthday cards for my Mum. Together Ms R and I made a 3d butterfly card with some of the printed card she got for Christmas. I told her she’d have to write smaller to fit all the words on and she did, her writing looked less all over the place smaller and it meant that the second half of words didn’t have to go underneath the first half. Every so often I feel like I should be ‘doing’ something with regards to her writing, a little bit of that ‘catch it [interest in writing] quick before it passes’ attitude but then I remember that I’ve decided not to think about formal education until she’s seven so shove that worrying thought and all it’s implications (what sort of ‘doing’ would I/should I do?) out again. Master R stuck Ms Rs left over bits of card haphazardly onto a bit of paper.
Colin again cooked us a nice dinner. Beef which turned out to be lamb. Master R didn’t think he could wait any longer for dinner (it had been at least half an hour since he’d finished that carrot) and had an angry moment where he stomped around hitting things (like the wall and the sofa) and grabbing at things with the intention of throwing them. He managed not to throw anything and quickly picked up the one item that he had dropped when I intervened with a loud ‘Oi!’ It slightly concerns me that his anger gets so big that it displays itself violently and aggressively but I’m reassured that he knows he shouldn’t be behaving like that and modifies it so that it’s not as bad as it could be, ie he’s not completely out of control, just very physically expressing himself. I like to think that if I can help him to deal with his feelings at this age as opposed to passing them off as ‘being two’ or ‘being a boy’ then it’ll help when he’s a teenager and he’ll manage not to do those daft teenager boy things like breaking windows, punching walls and graffitiing that they all do around here.
We finished ‘The Faraway Tree’ by Enid Blyton the other day so had short stories again. Ms R chose a Noddy book which was mine and has an inscription on the inside cover ‘To Sylvia from Grandma 1955′. By the way, I’m not Sylvia and it wasn’t given to me in 1955! I wonder who she was and if she realises that something that was new and treasured by her is still bringing joy to young children today. It’s not bringing a lot of joy to me though, much as I like Noddy I’m not great at reading a longer book more than once so with the incentive of not having to finish it we’ll be at the library tomorrow.