16 mths+

A good 10 days
It's been quite a nice week. Boo's been in fine form mood-wise, a little grizzly and drooly one or two days but otherwise actually quite charming.

Weekend before this last one we discovered Queen's Park, which is perfect for tots. We went largely because we'd read it had a little farm section.

And the farm is just right: large trough by the entrance with soap, in case the little ones touch the animals; a few large chickens, all with spectacular hairdos, many rabbits and guinea pigs, two handsome goats, and a number of ducks and geese. I was expecting more animals but, really, you can get bored of looking at too many animals, so we spent a nice 15-20 minutes walking round, with Izzy waving bye-bye (or my-my, she pronounces is) at the various animals, then left.

Several miscreant parents allowed their children to feed the animals despite the numerous signs saying 'DO NOT FEED THE ANIMALS'. Where they were giving bread to the chickens and doves, I could turn a blind eye. Where these giggling, twittering 12-year-olds were trying to give the goats tissue paper, however, I wanted to kick them in the pants. Fortunately the goats are used to this sort of nonsense and rightly ignored the twits.

So anyway then we took a long stroll around the park, admiring the flat expanse of well-kept grass. Tufts and bumps become important when your daughter might trip over them and cover herself in mud as a result. It took us about half an hour to get to the playground on the other side, about 400m away, because Boo insisted on walking herself.

This means she'll walk in the right direction for about ten steps, get distracted by her shadow, trip, get up, walk in the opposite direction, decide to look at the grass, stop to point to the nearest dog etc etc etc. All very lovely though when it's a beautiful sunny day and the park is filled with other parents and their kids, rather than impatient, huffing Londoners who want to get somewhere in a hurry.

The play area in Queen's Park is also rather lovely. There's an enormous section for toddlers, with a table for changing nappies, and it's gated, so no large children bouncing the tots off the toys. The area is covered in clean sand, rather than the usual rubberised surface which, while very good for bumps, is quite slippery when wet. Baby had a good time on a slide, shooting entirely off the end one time, she was going so fast, and then spent a good half hour ferrying sand from inside the pit to the outside. She also enjoyed throwing things into the bins, which were shaped like large bears with open mouths.

Alex says her face going down the slide was quite a picture, as she went from glee - sitting at the top of the slide - to panic - when she realised how fast she was going - to surprise - when she landed with a bump on the sand - and then glee again. There's an area for bigger children as well. There was also a beautiful paddling pool in play area and I'm already dreaming of taking weekdays off in summer to go there with her.

Afterwards we went to the cafe there. Good menu but boy did it take forever for the food to arrive. We ordered a mushroom sauce pasta and toastie and it took 20 minutes! And we ate at about 1430 because we'd had a large breakfast.

Boo says 'Daddy'!
Finally! Last Wednesday morning, 17 January 2007, Boo, in a mellow, maleable mood, said 'Daddy'. Not mama, or yaya or yeah, but 'Daddy'. Or rather 'Dchaddy'. Which is close enough. She said it twice, we both heard it, but she has refused to say it again since. She really is a terrible tease where her father is concerned.

Boo thumps a celebrity
Baby has had her first celebrity encounter... we think. We ate at Giraffe this Saturday morning and, after she was done stuffing potato wedges into her mouth and scoffing my berry yoghurt smoothie, baby did her tour of the restaurant.

She's quite queenly at the moment; loves taking a stroll down the street and waving to people. I took her for a walk in the closest thing we have to a mall where I work on Thursday night and she had a jolly time waving to every single shop assistant she saw through the shop fronts and to all the diners in the restaurants we passed. It took about 20 minutes just to walk 100m to the one we ate dinner in. She's quite persistant too. If someone doesn't see her, she'll wave until they do and, if they're rude enough to ignore her as they walk past, she turns round and calls out 'bye!' as they go.

Anyway I digress. After a round of the tables, she walked up to a booth and the family sitting there and slapped both her hands onto the lap of the man there, like she owned it. Alex watched in amusement as he kindly smiled down at her and said 'Oh, hello.' She looked up into his beardy face, whimpered and began backing away. Alex came back to the table with her and said: 'On the way out, check out the bald guy sitting there on the right - I think it's Bill Bailey. Boo Boo just thumped him on the thigh.'

Oh no
Took babe to the doctor's this morning for conjunctivitis in her right eye, though it looked better this morning than yesterday. Unfortunately the nursery called to say she now has a temperature of 37.8 degrees! Poor thing. Never lasts, does it? Little consolation that two of my three colleagues also have sick kids at the moment! This darned freaky weather (3 degrees in London this morning).