Christmas Day

Sometimes I can't get over how big Stella is getting. For example, I think she looks particularly grown up in these pictures of her swinging in the Park on Christmas Day. It was a lovely crisp day and we went out before our big lunch after a nice morning of present opening and scrambled eggs and smoked salmon. Stella was most excited about her spotty flamenco dress, pictured here as well. It's great for dancing and swishing around in generally.

I can ride my bike

Actually Stella learnt how to ride her bike in the summer, but I seem to have missed the opportunity to post about it until now. Here Stella is on Christmas Day in Hackney Downs on her bike. Affy also got a new bike for Christmas, and I don't think it'll be too long before she gets the stabilisers off as well.

I've lost my first tooth

It was a very exciting event in the Harford Monks Household. The tooth was wobbly for about a week and then finally, one day in the playground after school, Stella bit into a raw carrot stick and the tooth was left dangling by a thread. She did the rest of the job herself. The tooth fairy heard the news and visited that evening! Now the new tooth is already popping through.

In the dental arena we also had another first...on Christmas eve Stella had her first filling! She was very brave and coped well with having her teeth "put to sleep"! For at least a day she didn't want to eat any chocolate or anything sweet in between meals (oh except for the candy floss and lollypop when Liz took her and Affy to Winterwonderland!) but Christmas seems to have wiped out those intentions. However, she has become a very good tooth brusher.