Have been enjoying the lovely weather. Yesterday watching my father-in-law resetting fence posts in the garden, and today up the road at a neighbours with a similar aged lad.

The DIY / get the tradesmen in / help from the inlaws on the kitchen continues with Philip now thinking it's normal to take wallpaper off the wall - what fun he had pretending to be like Daddy and scrapping the wall with a spatula - and that pieces of concreting need a playpen so they don't escape. A gas fitter and plasterer are now nearly lined up. Ed also took some more units and tiles down to find the condition of the wall a bit worse than we'd hoped.

Philip's been teething again although I think we're getting off very lightly with him and teeth. Main indications that somethings wrong are that he stops going down smoothly for his daytime nap and gets really stressed at minor irritations. He had a major paddy on Saturday morning after getting up which at not much past 6am with both of us drawn in wasn't quite how we planned starting our weekend but heh. However, with the help of a bit of calpol, he does largely continue sleeping through the night so long as we're at home, and when busy and on task he's his normal happy self. He seems to get 2 periods of 3 days with each tooth - the first before the tooth breaks through, then a short gap and then more upset as the tooth grows. Must be a painful business though. I've now stopped counting but I think these are teeth 15 and 16 so we're nearly there anyway. Just 2 sets of the bigger back ones to go.

Have been reading a book a friend lent about the stresses of 2 kids. It's not entirely positive. Sounds like a year of near exhaustion before things start to settle with no. 2 - although of course experiences vary. Asked my friend whose eldest is a similar age to Philip and whose no. 2 is a few weeks old whether she thought it was about accurate and she reckoned so but is hopeful things'll get easier after 4 months. Hmmm. Well we'll see.

Easter hols over and the Jerrams happily married off during a lovely day at East Riddlesden Hall, it's now time to turn our attention back to the kitchen. A bit over 2 weeks left to kitchen fitting week, it's time to work out the minor details like plastering, painting, tiling and how to maintain a usable cooker.

The lovely shiny new range style cooker is currently doing an excellent job as a shelf part way into the kitchen, but in all its swanky dual fuel ness will need a gas and electricity connection before it's much use for what we paid all that money for. And we're not sure how far we'll be able to move it once connected up, and hence whether the painting and tiling behind should really be done beforehand. Potential gas fitter scheduled for a chat on Thursday so hopefully all will be revealed.

Meanwhile I think I've found a hole that needs some concrete putting into it to give us a flat surface to lay the floor so I'm happy!

We've also completed our first ebay transaction thanks to Grandfather who undertook the collection and are now the proud owners if not yet the keepers of a double buggy. Philip's been acquiring another couple of teeth - mainly without much fuss - and more vocabulary as well as more determination about the way things should be done around here. Good job someone's organised. He's still a little star at nursery keeping everyone amused with his giggling.

Its the Easter holidays and what lovely weather we've been having. We spent a lovely few days in the Lake District (wednesday to Easter Sunday) and then a morning with the Pinneys on their canal boat. Despite all the outdoor exposure Philip is still addicted to opening and closing doors but he is now asking to go in the papoose which is much better than the screaming struggles we used to have. We've been working really hard on getting him to say sheep but it's still called a dog (along with all other four legged animals) although he knows to find his sheep cuddly toy when it's named. All birds are ducks and he says duck just in case when he sees water.

Philip really enjoyed the Grisedale adventure playground which is recommended for kids of all ages and splashing in wellies and shorts at the edge of Coniston (though he was a bit frustrated at not being allowed to wander further into the lake). I particularly enjoyed hot chocolate by the lake in Grassmere and a very nice meal in the evening, an ice cream while sitting looking across Windemere with Philip asleep and Ed happily reading the paper while queuing for the car ferry and browsing in Lakeland Plastics in Ambleside. The Lakeland Plastics building is purpose built and they've gone to a lot of trouble to design in features to allow women to shop unharrased. There was a great play area for Philip, sofas and e-mail for Ed and lovely loos with a TV to watch incase you had to queue!

We weren't sure at the beginning of Ed's Easter holidays whether we'd be able to go away, as Philip developed chicken pox. In a way it was good timing as he seems young enough not to have been too iritated and scratched but it did rather throw Ed's holiday plans up in the air. And we weren't sure whether Philip would be better and non infectious in time. I was glad we hadn't booked a foreign holiday.

Also Ed's Grandpa, Peter, sadly died on the Saturday at the beginning of the holidays. All three of us went down to Reading and back in the day yesterday for the funeral and though exhausted by the time we returned we were glad to have been able to celebrate such an interesting and compassionate mans life. He was private secretary to Clement Attlee and Winston Churchill which produced some amusing stories.