Sue, Kev and Jonny slide by

My sister Sue came down from Leeds to see the Sprockmeister.

Aunty Sue has been waiting for two months to get hold of her little niece.

Uncle Kev and Cousin Jonny had other priorities. They wanted to get their hands on the Ping Pong table. Whilst Kev and Jonny put up a plucky display Ports remained undefeated despite their best efforts.

Daddy takes a break from whooping Kev and Jonny to have a nice picture with Ali and Sprock.

We all decamped to Pizza Express by Barnes Pond for a bit of sustenance.

Aunty Sue and Cousin Jonny push Lucy around the pond and on for a nice walk around Barnes Common.

So Sue, Kev and Jonny then nipped off to see the Queen musical "We Will Rock You" in the West End. Lucy and Daddy chuckle about their poor taste. But they are from Leeds. Scaramoush Scaramoush indeed!

Lucy's Little Chums

All the ladies from the NCT classes met up at Harriet's house and all the 6 babies got to meet up together for the first time. Here they are in the order that they were born: Evie, Lucy, Oscar, Jerome, Lucy and Raffi.

After a while the models started playing up a bit and falling all over the place. Lucy waits for her cue.

Here is a snap of the three oldest, Evie, Lucy and Oscar.

And here is the first group shot with all the Mums in as well. Charlotte and Evie, Lisa and Oscar, Ali and Lucy, Harriet and Lucy, Solene and Jerome (sitting) and Sarah and Raffi.

They grow up so quickly

Daddy went to put Lucy in her "doggies" growbag today. It is quite cute.

Sadly as you can see Lucy now fills it rather too well. She can't even straighten out her toes properly. So here we have the first of what will be many clothes that only last a few months before she grows out of them. Bye Bye "doggies"

Tom and Laura visit Lucy

Laura hadn't met Lucy before so we dressed her up in her best sailor suit that Neil bought her. Lucy that is - not Laura. They both look very smart though.

Lucy likes Lightning Tom's funny face. It made her smile.

Lightning Tom likes Lucy's funny face. It made him smile.

Sprock goes to Sainsbury's

Mummy and Daddy took Lucy to Sainsbury's today to get some food and some nappies for her parpy botswana. They now have clever trolleys that let you put the car seat directly onto them rather than having to disturb the kid and transfer them to another seat. Very neat.

Mummy and Lucy go Ooop Norff

While Daddy was gallivanting with the French in Paris for a week at a conference, Lucy and Mummy decided to visit her big sister Niki and cousin Jonathan. Here are Niki and Jonathan are enjoying the Shropshire countryside. Granted, Niki seems to be enjoying it a bit more than Jonathan.

Ali and the Sprock enjoy the countryside of Shorpshire as well.

The two cousins chill out together. Jonathan is looking slightly more alert than Lucy- and it also seems like he has cornered the market in toys!

Mummy and Lucy were staying in this room that Imogen had kindly lent them for their stay. Unfortunately the rather flash red walls somewhat over stimulated Lucy and she couldn't settle.

Instead she had to sleep in the rather more sober atmosphere of the corridor. It may seem a bit odd - but it was the only place she would sleep. And as new parents we have quickly learned to not question solutions that work. Just use them.

Jonathan has now grown out of this hippo play mat so he generously donated it to Lucy.

She very much appreciates his kind gift.

Meanwhile Jonathan is catching up with a few zeds.

FA Cup day

I have supported Manchester United since I was 9 years of age. I went on a school trip to watch the 1977 FA Cup final at Wembley between Man Utd and Liverpool and encouraged by some school friends, decided to support MUFC. As luck would have it they beat their scouse opposition to win 2-1 so my support started off with a flying start. Although the rest of the seventies and the eighties were pretty lean pickings with just a couple of FA Cups to show, the nineties and naughties (otherwise described as the Alex Ferguson era) have been pretty successful.

Obviously once you support a club it is with you for life. Through the good times and the bad times. You can't just pick and choose. Unless you're my wife Ali. She started off supporting Brentford FC because her first football match was at Griffen Park. However, as soon as Chelsea started being successful she dropped the Super Bees like stone and started supporting Abramovich's plaything. Just because her best friend Lorna is a (proper) fan of the Blues.

So what team will Lucy support? Well if Ali had stuck with the Bee's I might have allowed her to become a Brentford fan. But since her appalling defection I cannot allow Ali to influence Lucy's football choice in way - so I have had to take matters into my own hands. Especially because Lorna is coming over to our house to watch today's FA Cup Final between ManU and Chelski.

Obviously Muji rabbit will support United as well. Here is the full kit - still with a bit of growing room (it is meant for a nine month old!)

She still needs to get a bit bigger before she will be running around the park with a ball at her feet.

Dad and Lucy have a nap

Daddy and the Sprockmeister rack up a few zeds.

Ali and Solene go to Kew Gardens

Being a nice sunny day, Ali and Solene went to Kew Gardens with babies Lucy and Jerome. Having said that - this picture seems to show a whole lot of pram and very little baby. Where they even there?

Of course they were. They were just taking the relaxed route round the gardens.

Grandma writes Lucy a song

Lucy is very proud that her Grandma is a famous author and composer. You may know her from such works are Simply Nativity and The Garden!. These excellent collections of songs are aimed at little children - which happens to be exactly the catchment area that Lucy falls into.

Lucy had an awesome surprise this morning when she found a parcel waiting for her from Grandma and Grandad containing a brand new song that Grandma has written specially for her called "Lucy and Muji rabbit looked".

As you can see the pack came complete with sheet music, a CD with the music and a letter. Lucy suspects that Grandad may have had something to do with the CD and presentation since Grandma's talent for composition isn't quite matched by her IT skills.

Sample lyric: "Lucy and Muji rabbit looked. Who did they see today? They saw Mummy. They were very glad. That's who they saw today." Clever Grandma. Lucy and Muji rabbit like their song.

Car Seats

Lucy (on the right) and two of her little chums from our NCT Class catch some rest while their Mums get a chance to drink tea, share experiences and get some good gossip in.

Tickle on the Tum

Tickle tickle tickle.

Funny Faces

The munchkin pulls all sorts of strange expressions while she is being winded. The drunk on milk look.

Who you looking at?

Whats going on over there?

Burp!

Pink cardigan

Aunty Elizabeth is very clever. She has knitted Lucy this brilliant cardigan. It seemed appropriate to wear it when we went round to Aunty Pinks for Eurovision Song Contest night.

Watching all the Balkan nations voting for each other failed to maintain Lucy's attention.

In fact even Mickey the Pig telling her the Serbia had edged out the Ukraine in a nail biting finish couldn't rouse any interest.

Lucy hits the Bottle

Even though Lucy is being breast fed, it is important that she gets used to using a bottle at an early age. Otherwise it can be quite hard to persude them later on we are told. Ali has a gizmo that allows her to "express" into a bottle. So today Daddy had his first go at feeding Lucy.

We ensured that she was quite hungry to encorage her to try this new fangled technique but we needen't have worried. She wolfed it down.

Bald!

As with most babies, Lucy's initial fine thatch of hair has pretty much all dropped out giving a rather startling impression of male pattern baldness. We haven't shaved her, it's perfectlly normal. In fact she still has a bit at the back so we could even give her a Donald Trump style comb over.

As you can see - Lucy doesn't seem bothered that she has now got a more aerodynamic bonce.

An important aspect in babies development is to give them "Tummy Time". As the name suggests, this means putting them on their tummy so they can try pushing themselves up and begin the first crawling. Obviously at this stage this just means wiggling about a bit.

Sling

Ah. Lucy is looking very sweet but she needs to move. Mummy is going to try and use the baby sling for the first time. We figured it would be best to try it when Sprock was a bit floppy and sleepy rather than in octopus mode.

So here goes.

Yikes! The baby is falling out of the side!

You sit in the middle and behave young lady.

Ah ha! I guess that is what this strap is for.

Ta Da! It's up and running. So now we can go yomping about the place without needing the pram all the time. Result.