Mia turns two!

Eats: Literally everything. Mia is never not asking for a snack or trying to eat something off someone else’s plate. Loves crisps, sweets, sausages, pasta and fruit. She's been obsessed with easy peelers since the festive season begun.

Loves: Snacks (did I already mention that?) Anything that her big brother has and she loves that she has free run of his toys whilst he's at school - currently his Hot Wheels and his Buzz Lightyear. She loves stealing Ellis' toys and putting them down the back of the sofa - often the crucial piece of the Lego set he's building. Walking everywhere and pushing her push chair round - sometimes with lazy big brother in it! Loves playing with her dolly's and pushing them round in their pushchair, putting their dummy in and feeding them milk from their bottle. Her friend Finn, 'Babel' in nursery,

Says: 'Bye bye', 'night night'. 'babies', 'Ellis', 'daddy', 'mummy', 'snack', 'netflicks', 'chips', 'juice', 'sweets', 'let me see', 'here it is', 'hiya'. She makes herself known through other ways!

Personality: Really cheerful, cheeky and mischievous. A real people person who loves to make eye contact and give big smiles to everyone she meets. She is determined, sassy and loves charging round everywhere. She is a great mix of tomboy and girly girl - always wearing mummy's shoes and carrying bags around like diva but also loves jumping in muddy puddles and wrestling with daddy and Ellis. Although she's not saying as much as some two year old she 'chats' all the time and seems to understand everything we say. She's often trying to encourage big brother into his school uniform and shoes for the school run. 

Playing: She loves colouring or at least getting all of the felt tips out and throwing them on the floor! She likes transporting toys from one container to another and loves 'helping' to unpack the groceries or washing machine! Enjoys joining in tig and hide and seek with the older kids and charging round the corridors after church. Also a wonderer, like big brother, with a habit of running off in public places.

Funny memories: We were in Boots recently and I was trying foundations on the back of my hand and when I looked over she was copying me exactly and had all these patches of orange all over the back of her hand! When she poses and say 'cheese' whenever I have my phone out - in fact she's often blabbering away on the remote control thinking she's chatting on her mobile. 

Favourite places: We're all big fans of Oxygen trampoline park and Rosie's Diner for brunch. She loves a good run around at soft play and we often go to the Play Barn, Wacky or Tumble Town. She's very daring and terrifies me constantly! She loves feeding the ducks 'quack, quack' at the park and going on the swing and the zip line - again no fear! 

Ellis turns Four - look out world!

I started the year thinking that you were no-where near school ready. I couldn't imagine you sat listening and joining in discussions when you could barely sit still for five minutes - unless you were watching a cartoon! However, in the last six months your speech, your attention span and your interest in learning has developed so rapidly that there is no denying you are school ready. You had a few taster sessions and met your teacher - who you said is kind and very beautiful! She reported that you were answering all the questions and it was so cute to see you sat cross legged on the carpet like a real school boy.

This has been a great age and you are such good company now that I will really miss you in September. You've mastered potty training, dressing yourself (you're still slow and reluctant though), learning to write and recognise your name, counting to twenty and recognising numbers and putting on your own coat and shoes. You love reading and looking at all your books and we play a game at night where you lay loads of books out and we chose one using the rhyme 'ibble obble chocolate bubble'- funnily enough it always seems to land on your favourite book. You love all the Julia Donaldson books and anything to do with pirates or monsters.

Some of your favourite things to do:-

• role play with your legos and Minions toys.
• scoot to the retail park near our house and pull the basket along in Poundland and throw all the essentials in - shampoo, bubble bath, sweets, crisps, toys...
• go to the cinema with daddy - your favourites so far have been Boss Baby, Cars 3, Despicable Me Three and the Batman Lego movie - you both love scoffing popcorn.
• meet your friends at the park for a playdate. You love slides - the higher and faster the better - St.Ives and Ilkley park are particular favs.
• build huge Hot Wheels tracks with daddy and race your cars.
• at Clare's you like role playing super heroes and you are always Spider Man.
• at pre-school your best friend is Zachary and you like putting crates on your heads and pretending to be robots.
• in Belgium you like going to the huge water park and going down the big slides and rapids. You're quite the dare devil. You also like exploring in Oma's garden - you tell us she lives in the forest.
• when we visit granny and Rara you like being chased by granny, 'helping' Rara in the garden and going to the ice-cream farm.
• go exploring in the woods. You love the outdoors and finding secret passages and hiding and giving mummy a scare.

At home you love receiving your 'making box' in the post which has crafty and baking activities in little coloured bags. You like eating hulk pasta (pasta pesto), carrot sticks, cucumber sticks, apple slices and egg mayo sandwiches. You have a sweet tooth and love ice-cream, haribos, fruit pastilles and milkshakes. Once too often we have caught you climbing the kitchen cupboards to get to the treat cupboard - you definitely love snacking!

Overall you're very sociable, confident, adaptable and happy most of the time. You can be a grump and are quite stubborn and very determined at times - time out has been your friend this year! You don't like being the centre of attention - like dadddy - and were hiding when it was time to blow the candles out on your birthday cake. You were so excited to have a 'minosaur' party this year and it was lovely to see all your friends from pre-school, church and Clare's together to celebrate with you.

Quiz your toddlers: Ellis at 4

What's your name? Ellis

How old are you? Four

When is your birthday? Three

How old is your mummy? Umm…three

How old is your daddy? Three

What's your favourite colour? Blue

What's your favourite food? Hotdonalds - fish fingers, chips, orange juice and a toy (we really aren't regulars!)

Who's your bestfriend? Annabel

What's your favourite tv programme? Most cartoons on Netflix - although he said Paw Patrol which he doesn't really watch anymore

What's your favourite film? Minions and Boss Baby

What's your favourite song? Wise Man and the Foolish Man

What's your favourite animal? Cows

What are you scared of? Losing! (Mummy's choice!)

What makes you happy? People making me laugh like Annabel

We have no doubt in our minds that four will be a great year for you full of such exciting adventures and we are preparing ourselves for the fact that many of them you will be facing alone.