Octobernovember - Blogging mother is behind!

October was so full of birthdays, work, travel and (did we mention?) birthdays that this mother is very late with the October news. She is sitting here in Park City, UT in LATE November, still recovering from a 16 hour journey from London to Salt Lake City. But more on that later. Back to October...Can she remember what happened in October...

Zoë got to be Special Helper twice and Flower Helper once in October. And she had a nearly month long celebration of her 3rd birthday. In mid-October, we took the Eurostar to Paris where we had a bunch of friends and family over to celebrate Zoë's birthday, including Mami and Papi from Montpellier, cousine Michele, Tati Lisa, Olivier, Emilien, Valerie, cousins Richard and Brigitte, and great-uncle and great-aunt Gilbert and Gisou. She also got to go on another pony ride, on a carousel and on the big-kid swings.

The celebration continued in London with Zoë being serenaded by her whole class and being presented a birthday book. In the evening, she had her best friend over for more singing and cake. In December, she'll be having a joint birthday party with her friends Tessa, Maya, Ben and Marin.

Favourite phrases: "I don't like [fill in the blank]", "I love [fill in the blank]", "It's night time" (it's dark a lot in London at the moment), "I don't waaaant it", "What's that?", "On ne peut pas toucher la lune", "N'abondonnes jamais!"

Favourite songs: Pirouette Cacahouette, Whoopsy Daisy Angel

Current wardrobe preferences: Doesn't want to wear trousers or anything that's not pink. Leggings are preferred. Doesn't want to wear anything in her hair.

Favourite colour: PINK, PINK and PINK

Favourite foods: Saucisson sec, strawberry and mango ice cream, smoothies, clementines, muesli

Favourite activities: Playing with her dolls, stickers, singing, brushing her own and her parents' hair, picking her nose, blowing her nose, fluffing, seeing and feeding the horses on match days, watching football (aka soccer) and rugby with her papa

Favourite books: Zoë la capricieuse, The Odd Egg

Routines: Choosing her clothes for the next day, having her mum sing "I love my Zoe (Marin, Claire, Cyril, Djembe, Roger, Mims, Papa, Mimi, Bibi, Miss Smyth, Miss Camille, Miss Sari, Miss Monique, Miss Alessia..) my Zoë (Marin, Claire, Cyril, Djembe, Roger, Mims, Papa, Mimi, Bibi, Miss Smyth, Miss Camille, Miss Sari, Miss Monique, Miss Alessia..) loves me, I cherish my Zoë (Marin, Claire, Cyril, Djembe, Roger, Mims, Papa, Mimi, Bibi, Miss Smyth, Miss Camille, Miss Sari, Miss Monique, Miss Alessia..) 'neath the old oak tree."

Milestones: Can now jump with 2 feet, prefers showers to baths, birthmark on thigh is fading

September (Late)! Nanny to Nursery - Into the big bad world

After a relaxing August it was back to business for everyone in September. Zoë started nursery 5 days per week in mid-September at the Gower School after 2 1/2 years with Nanny Jan-Jan and Marin 3 days per week and nursery 2 days per week. Wow! Attending nursery 5 days per week can be exhausting! But Zoë is finding her stride and engaging well in the more rigorous, structured Montessori program in her new room, Les Petites Souris. Luckily, her best friend Marin has joined her at Gower and Jan-Jan did pick ups and drop offs for the first 2 weeks so the transition hasn't been too brutal. In the new room, all of the children get the chance to be Special Helper and Flower Helper once per month. Zoë particularly likes being Special Helper because she gets to wear a special necklace, bring the snacks for the day and most of all, order everyone around. This new room also offers the opportunity to take Yoga and French classes once per week and continue the crush, I mean, football class with Coach Danny. The nursery is vegetarian so on the weekend, Zoë makes up for meatless weeks with ham sandwiches for breakfasts followed by meat for lunch and meat for dinner.

It sounds like life for Zoë is all work and no play, but au contraire mon frere - life is still lots of fun. We are trying to take advantage of Zoë's free entry to the zoo until she turns 3 so we recently visited with her friend Tessa. She wasn't all that impressed with the penguins but loved playing in the fountain and seeing the tigers being fed. She also continues to love having her face painted - this time as a monkey. She also re-started Circus School on Saturday mornings where she's perfecting her somersaults as well as (low) high wire, trapeze and rope climbing. She and her father have started a new tradition of heading to Hampstead Heath on Sunday mornings for a walk with Djembe to see the kites on Parliament Hill.

Favourites at the moment -

Foods: Prawns, ham, proscuitto, ice cream (mango, strawberry, vanilla)

Sayings: Alors...

Activities: Smelling tea, singing in French, asking for Roger when she sees Mims, asking for Mimi when she sees Bibi

Favourite Book - La Reign Bisou Bisou

Holy Moggy, Que ca? I don't waaant it and other favourite phrases

Finally, 2 whole weeks of vacation! August has been a great month. Zoë is a dancing, singing, talking pixie. There was no shortage of fun - with Jan Jan, Marin, Lenka and Leo, she went on boat rides on the Thames and went to museums and parks. She will be starting nursery full time at the Gower School and moving into the first full Montessori room in September so Jan Jan was making the most of their last month together. We also met up with friends Tessa, Ben, Lizanne and Emily for the 2nd annual Lollibop in Regents Park where we saw giant Kangaroos, danced to reggae music and ate ice cream.

On 15 August, we left for France where we spent the first week on the Ile d'Oleron - an island off the coast of France, near La Rochelle. It was a great way to start the holiday. We hung out on the beach, went to the market, rode bikes and Zoë had 2 pony rides. At the end of the week, we headed towards St. Jean de Luz and had an unexpected but lovely stop over in Pyla sur Mer with Flory, the grandmother of Serra, Cecilia and Barbara and mother of Ghetta. Kirsten hadn't seen her in 20 years and it was a great opportunity for her to meet Zoë and Jean-Jacques. On our way out of town, we climbed the dune, quickly took in the view and then ran all the way down. We arrived in St. Jean de Luz where we spent the week with Zoë's best friend Marin and his parents Claire and Cyril. It was a great week which included in depth market research of all of the artisanal ice creams we could find, swimming every day in the sea, walks, great meals and long naps.

Zoë's language skills are progressing - the 2 weeks in France really bumped up her French and she's able to switch between French and English pretty well. Some of Zoë's favourite things to say are: Que ca? (for What's that?) instead of Qu'est ce que c'est? I don't waaaant it is also another phrase used frequently. She also will correct you when you say Holy Moly and tell you it's Holy Moggy.

Her favourite foods this month have been strawberry ice cream, mango sorbet, avocado, peach skin, saucisson, and prawns.

Favourite activities are bouncing on trampolines, swimming with her tube, being chased and chasing others, going down big slides, being held upside down, singing, dancing, serving meals to her baby dolls, playing in the sand and riding on ponies.

Every night, Zoë says when she goes to bed and we leave her room, "no door no light" as in, don't close the door and don't turn off the light. Tonight, when JJ left the room, she said "Pas de porte, pas de lumiere" - Made us smile big time!

Onto September...

4th of July in England

Hard to believe that another month has flown by in the life and times of Zoë. We stayed close to home this month and started by doing something positively anti-England by celebrating the 4th of July in Portman Square at a celebration held by the Democrats Abroad club. Zoë happily had her face patriotically painted and then chowed down on some ribs and 'slaw.

On Sundays. Zoë has been attending circus school. She has mastered somersaults, standing with no-hands on maman's and papa's shoulders and hanging upside down. In fact, she constantly wants to be upside down and to be tickled. She has also discovered that she loves slides - the bigger the better. Her mother is hoping that she has inherited her love for roller coasters.

- Biggest milestone - Fully potty trained!!

- Favourite book - Guess how much I love you

- Favourite foods - Prawns, cherries, watermelon, strawberry ice cream

- Favourite activities - Going to the swimming pool, big slides, putting away groceries, gardening with Papa, riding on her scooter and tricycle

That's all for July - Stay tuned for an action packed August.

June 2011 - #1s and #2s

Ok, I know, it's 2-July and I am doing my June posting. Such is life these days - late late late for everything. Anyway, it's been a very productive 32nd month in the life and times of Zoë...We stuck a bit closer to home in June - no international travel. The weekend of the 11-June, we headed (Kirsten dragged JJ and Zoë) to Windsor for Kirsten's first triathlon in, er, 4 years, the last one being with Gevry in 2007 in London. Kirsten's triathlon kicked off at 6:15 am (JJ and Zoë were still in bed) just down the road from Queen Liz's house (aka Windsor Castle) and K finished in 2h 03mins. JJ and Zoë were waiting at the finish line with big smiles and cheers (actually, JJ was cheering and smiling, Zoë was just looking very puzzled as to why her mother was sweatily running past her).

We made the most of being southwest of London and headed for the 2nd most famous landmark in Windsor, Legoland where we met Zoë's best friend Marin and his mom Claire. The kids had a great time going from ride to ride - the 3 parents present had a little less fun as it was pouring down rain the whole time. The only upside was that there were no queues (aka lines). Monday, 13-June marked the start of Project Potty - when Zoë and Marin (not of their own volition) started potty training. There were a few accidents here and there but we are proud to report that we are 100% nappy (diaper) free during the day and are working towards the nighttime too. Zoë took to the whole program very well (I'm sure it had nothing to do with the reward stickers that were doled out after every #1 and #2).

Zoë has been working on her cooking skills and cooked up some mean scrambled eggs for father's day breakfast. Circus school is going well too - she loves the trampoline, chasing games, rope swing and tight wire. Last week she learned how to stand on my shoulders. This week was "the Big Toddle" - a walk around a park for charity with Zoë's nursery. JJ accompanied her and she got her face painted for the first time, and loved it.

That's all for June (that I can remember) for now.

May 2011 - Part time terrorist AND Pickpocket

Zoë is expanding her repertoire - she's moved into pickpocketing...mostly her father in preparation for teenage years.

May has come and gone in a flash with visits from Mims, celebration(s) of maman's birthday and a trip to Tuscany to visit Bibi and Mimi. Life as Zoë is never boring!

May started with a visit to Tati Valerie's new home and a walk along the canal for a sneak peek at the Olympic stadium. Zoë decided she wanted to have her toe nails painted so Tati Valerie got her some orange nail polish. For maman's birthday, Marin and Zoë whipped up a chocolate cake with raspberries on top. They of course had to pre-wash the bowls before they went to the dishwasher. Mims came to London for a 10 day visit - What a treat! Zoë got to see her every day and they went to the Whipsnade Zoo where she saw lots of giant animals.

We ended the month with a trip to Tuscany to meet up with Bibi and Mimi. It was beautiful and Zoë ate pasta and pizza and more pasta and more pizza. It's no myth that Italians love kids - she had her cheeks pinched and was cooed over numerous times. She had a great time chasing pigeons, riding the carrousel and going to the playground with Bibi. She made her father very proud by eating lots of roasted rabbit. The slight downside of the trip was the air travel (yes, all 3 hours of it) - More experienced parents out there - when does traveling in a metal tube with a child become tolerable again??

Some other random highlights...

- She is now speaking to K in English and JJ in French which is pretty cool. She was also caught initiating a conversation with Marin in French.

- Favourite sing-along song: Pirouette Cacahuete - Zoë sings along with JJ by singing Cacahuete after JJ sings Pirouette - She'll even do it if she's in the middle of a tantrum or sucking her thumb. Second favourite song: New York (Alicia Keys version).

- When JJ suggests that she sings a particular song, she will often say "Pas celle la" (Not that one) until he has come up with an acceptable choice.

- Instead of saying "Qu'est-ce que c'est" (What is that)? She says "Que-ca?"

- She has been working on her counting - In English, she tends to forget the number 9 and in French she forgets number 5. For number 3, in French, she says 'ha' instead of 'trois'

- Favourite book - Dr. Suess's The Foot Book.

- Favourite foods - Pasta

- Favourite activities - Chasing pigeons, gardening, cleaning, and carrying shopping bags (hmm, no predictions on future professions please)

- Nursery Milestone - Zoë moved into the bigger kids room at nursery - Les Petits Poussins. She has had a really smooth transition and loves her new key worker, Marinela who she knew in the baby room. She has 2 friends from her old room, Marni and Bella which has made the move easier. She's still loving Football (aka Soccer) with coach Danny on Fridays and porridge on Fridays for breakfast.

See you in June again...

Pox and Ponies

Ok, this is supposed to be the April entry and it's 2nd May - But let's see if we can remember the last month...We have had amazing weather here in London (and in France) and we are thankful to Will and Kate for getting married and giving us an extra bank holiday this year. Between Good Friday, Easter Monday, THE WEDDING and the regular early-May Bank Holiday, we got 11 days off for the price of 3...so this is what Zoë did to take advantage of the short work-month...

It started out great with a visit from Bibi and Mimi (aka Bill and Joan). They flew into Heathrow where we picked them up and made a 2 hour journey to the midlands (aka Derbyshire) where we met up with our friends Michelle and Guy and visited some beautiful historical estates and took some nice hikes (translation: visited the petting farm and the cafe at the estate and walked across a field to look at some cows). The highlights of the trip were blowing out the candles on Bibi's and Guy's birthday cake and feeding carrots to some horses. Wild stuff!

The middle of the month was a bit rough - Zoë contracted chicken pox exactly 2 weeks after her pal Marin had them (who got them exactly 2 weeks after their friend Leo had them). Yes Americans, you read correctly, Chicken Pox. We still have it here in the UK (and Europe for that matter). We learned quite a bit about this wonderful childhood disease...The NHS (that's the UK's free health service) does not fund the vaccination as it believes that a) it's not cost effective to vaccinate UK children against this non-life threatening childhood disease and b) it's better immunisation to have chicken pox than to have the vaccination and then potentially forget the booster every 5 years and risk having it as an adolescent or adult when it's not such an innocuous, non-life threatening disease. All I can say is in retrospect, it may be non-life threatening but several sleepless nights later, 2 days of missed nursery, lots and lots of very uncomfortable itchiness and now a mild obsession with that lovely tasting "'cation" (aka Benadryl), the vaccination is looking pretty good to us. Anyway, Zoë (and we) lived to tell the story. When she was finally deemed non-contagious and able to leave quarantine (our house) we ventured to Ikea. Unfortunately, the non-contagious, healing stage involves lots of plague-like scabby bumps so generally generates a variety of looks including horror, recrimination and sympathy (from experienced parents). In Ikea, it meant that the aisles were cleared as we wheeled Zoë and her scabby face through the store. Thankfully, she was fixated on the ice cream cone promised to her at the end of the maze, I mean store, and was oblivious to her surroundings. (BTW, we do not (officially) condone bribery as a parenting method).

A slight side note here - We are (fill in the blank) to announce that Zoë has completely mastered the art of the tantrum. She can stomp her feet, kick, scream, turn beet red, cry massive crocodile tears and even froth at the mouth. A recent tantrum required 2 full grown adults to get her into the car seat. Another one involved screaming at full volume from the time we left the nanny all the way home on the back of K's bike, up the stairs, through the door and into the house (for a total of 47 minutes). [Parental note - there is an upside to these - Child expends enormous amounts of energy during these sessions, rendering them much easier to put to bed later on]

The month ended well with our 11-for-3 holiday. We decided to skip the wedding (invitation graciously declined of course) and take the car train to France. We first visited our ex-landlords, now friends, the Harmers who have a lovely house in Picardie in northern France. They have 4 kids under the age of 11 + a new trampoline and there was a local village Easter egg hunt. What more could a 2 1/2 year old want? Then we headed to Montpellier (9 hour drive over 2 days) to see Jean-Jacques' parents. Zoë stayed with Mami and Papi overnight (and parents got to sleep in until 8:30 am 2 days in a row, hooray!). She enjoyed Mami's food, including sardines, mussels and brie cheese. We got to go to the beach, the zoo and Zoë had her first pony ride. She had a grin from ear to ear the entire time. And now we're back at home, ready to tackle May, looking forward to a new room with bigger kids at the nursery, a visit from Mims (aka Carol) and a trip to Tuscany with Bibi and Mimi at the end of the month. Life is good in Z-land.

Zoë, the part time terrorist

Zoë's parents are finally getting on the ball and starting a blog, mostly a) so she won't hate us when she is 16 and we can't remember what her favourite things were because our old brains are sieves and b) because we have been shamed by the Fontaines who have religiously kept a blog of the life and times of Jackson for the last 21 months. On y va...let's see how long we can keep this going...

Zoë is playing her role as a 2 1/2 year old perfectly - She should get a Cesar/Oscar/BAFTA. She vacillates between being an adorable, cuddly, curious, silly toddler and a pint sized terrorist. Unfortunately, for her, we don't negotiate with terrorists (most of the time). Somewhat recently, Zoë and Kirsten could be spotted stepping off of a train at a random tube station in order to decrease the volume of howls (from Zoë) so that we could continue our journey. Fortunately, these episodes are sporadic and don't last too long.

Some highlights -

- Language: Zoë's French will soon surpass Kirsten's. She has been responding to questions from Jean-Jacques in French and Kirsten in English (that's English English, not American English). Favourite things to point out are diggers, trains, taxis and cats (we've moved on from airplanes).

- Songs: Favourite song at the moment is Frere Jacques. She tends to leave off the second 'Sonnez les matines' and go straight to 'Ding, Dang, Dong'

- Family: She knows the names of everyone in the family and regularly asks for her cousins Jackson, Julien, Pandora and Pierre-Louis (aka Pierre-Oui-Oui). Thank goodness for Skype.

- Friends: She is really starting to remember people - One of Kirsten's best friends, Tammy (Adle) Stone came to visit with her husband Steve and kids Lucy and Zack from Atlanta. Zoë was just emerging from her shy phase so didn't completely warm up during the visit, but she's been talking about Tammy and Lucy ever since and how they went home on an airplane. Two other friends, Brad and Florence (separately) had offspring recently so we got to meet babies Oliver and Finn, respectively. She's been asking to see them ever since.

- Routines: Zoë needs to know that everyone else is going to bed when she goes to bed at 7:30pm. We used to have a ritual of Bs - Bath, Book and Bed. Recently, 1 book has become 3. And she seems to be attempting to slip a few new things into the routine including sitting on the potty (we like this one), requesting a tissue, putting moisturizer on her face, deciding whether or not she wants to sleep with a pillow and duvet, and listening to several rounds of "I love you Zoë, oh yes I do..." Major delay tactics at work.

- Scatological information: The potty seems to be gaining popularity - we have had several successful #1s...still waiting for #2...To be continued...

- Favourite Foods: asparagus, olives, beets, madeleines, prawns, mushrooms and ice cream

- Physical Development: Starting to get the hang of the scooter and jumping. Had her checked out by a physio recently due to frequent falling down - diagnosed with flat feet and hyper-joint mobility. Nothing serious but something to keep an eye on. Kirsten and Zoë are starting a circus skills class in May to help with strength, coordination and confidence. In the meantime, Zoë loves Friday Football (aka Soccer) at her nursery with "Coach Danny".

- Other health stuff: 11 of the 17 kids in Zoë's nursery class have had chickenpox since the start of the year. They don't vaccinate kids here. Zoë's escaped it thus far, but the true test has come this week with her best friend (and nanny-share) Marin coming down with a mean case of them...Incubation period: 2 weeks...on verra...

- Hair: Out of control and we have no idea where it comes from. Thankfully she allows us to put her hair in ponytails (aka "bunches") and she loves hoodies

- Animals: Loves monkeys, giraffes, cats and gorillas

- Favourite book: Pete the Cat - Wish we could remember who gave this to us. We all love this book which finishes with "The moral of Pete's story is, no matter what you step in, keep walking along, singing your song, because it's all good". Something for all of us to live by. Until next month...