So life seems to continue to flash past our eyes,

Ed is already 3 months old! He has settled in well to his role, he clearly understands that Mary loves her sleep and that he should try and keep down the number of wake ups to a minimum if at all possible, he has developed a lovely smile ( but it is a bit delayed - it takes a good ten seconds between getting eye contact with him before he can process the information and then preform the smile). He is still rather large, but a little bit more sensible than the 99.6 percentile - we might even have somehow produced a tall human ( no idea how ) so he is enjoying the use of clothing of far older children than his own age group .... but I think Tiny and Emma were perhaps taking the micky out of him during a recent shopping trip when looking at 6 and 7 year old clothing!

Kate has and is adapting to the role of sister, the death grip hugs on her younger brother have reduced and she is starting to enjoy school even a little (it has taken a while!) she still refuses to be any older than two and three quarters, and also flatly refuses to stop wearing nappies - which may well be coming to a final battle, as I have stated that the current pack of nappies is absolutley the last pack I buy.... hmmm wonder who is going to flinch first. She has amazed us by her drawing when we are not around, when we help her she simply scribbles, but alone she can produce drawing that actually look like things - clearly i must intimidate her with my awesome talents.

Mary is surviving on her limited sleep, and is enjoying being mum for the second time and certainly finding things easier this time through... the biggest worry is the impeding doom of redunancy - but Mary is well versed in the ways of dealing with these things and doesn't seem at all worried, whilst i worry for the both of us. She has joined some baby groups and is making new friends and enjoying all that Ivybridge has to offer.

Millie is having to adapt to old age, she has certainly slowed up in the last year and although still gives it her all in the park it's the recovery stage that seems to talk longer and longer. Having said that she has lost weight and she still has a brain like a laser, she can still steal french butter faster than you can say sacre bleu. We had a bit of a wierd week with her when she yelped really loudly when she got up late at night, and then walked around with her tail clamped between her legs for three days. We could not find anything or work out what had happened, but she seems to be back to normal again now and ruling the sofa.

Tiki seems to be invading my dreams at the moment, i have had 3 dreams about her in the past month, the most recent of which she made a play for top dog by ripping millie apart... not a good dream to have on a sunday night! She is also trying to win the world title of "most in the way dog of all time in any universe" it's interesting how she can actually get in the way three or four times as i try and cross the kitchen - she runs in circles around me so she keeps tripping me up which ever direction I turn.

And me - well I am in a pit of dispair about not being able to run, I have had a series of injuries that have stopped my plans for half and full marathons this year and I haven't run for the whole of Eds life. School has been mad and hard work and depressing also, but things have turned a corner and i am trying to a) catch up on all the stuff I haven't done B) enjoy the rest bite a little and C) prepare for the onslaught of next year , which will be worse than this. Home life however always come to the rescue and the family are just brilliant and an instant antidote to the day at work. I have continued to have BBQ's at almost every opportunity and I certainly feel my powers of outside cooking getting better than ever before. I keep having plans to extend the house and spend money that we don't have somehow. Then I remember the impending doom and stop myself. More than anything else I want to find more time in my life, but no matter where i look I never seem to find it, Mary says staying up late looking for it doesn't work either. So with that i mind, I'm off to colour in ( and probably be told I'm doing it wrong and that I should use boy colours!)

Leon xxx

Family reunion

So a lovely weekend with both sides of the family - here is a piccie of the Barker side - great to see everyone, but such a shame it wasn't longer - could have spent hours catching up with everyone.