Collingwood Children's Farm

Yesterday was a glorious day - the kind of Winter day when you become thoroughly convinced that Spring is just around the corner (until you check the weather forecast and see a week full of rain and frost ahead).

Our mothers' group ventured out to the Collingwood Children's Farm, one of my favourite places in Melbourne.  As with last time, and the time before, I forgot my camera (actually, my memory card this time).  There seems to be some kind of farm/camera curse upon me.  Never mind, one of the other mothers in our group kindly emailed me a few snaps of Tabitha enjoying the farm.

Here is Tabitha peering over the fence at the lovely, kind, gentle goats.  Their ears are so silky:

One of my favourite parts of the Children's Farm is the guinea pig room - Tabby adores them too!  They are calm and nice to hold and stroke.  At long last, Tabby is learning to be gentle with animals, and can actually pat one, with supervision.  This guinea pig is called Possum, just like one of our cats!  Possum the guinea pig is a Grey Agouti, with gorgeous, thick, tufty fur:

In honour of our trip to see the animals, Tabitha wore a sweet top with a navy blue bunny on the front, with a pink ribbon and real bell around its neck. She also wore her bangle with the little baby fawn.

I wore my Marc Jacobs 'mousie' shoes, and a leopard print scarf.  Many people would think that wearing black and white spotty shoes, with a leopard print scarf, and a blue-and-white pinstripe jacket is a grave crime against fashion.  Not me!  I do love my prints, and never shy away from wearing them all at once.  Plus, as a mother, I have realised that prints really come into their own around babies and children - Vegemite smears do not show up nearly as much on leopard print as they do on plain colours, and bits of egg seem to camouflage well against a cheerful floral background!

Tabitha was in quite a funny mood today - she didn't want to be in her pram, didn't want to be carried (unless she was pushing the pram - without mummy's help thank you!).  She wanted to walk along, holding the pram, which is very slow.  Plus, every few steps, she wanted to stop and eat dried grass and dirt.  Hmm.  So, as you can see below, we got into a couple of battles of will - here, she wants to push the pram, and I cannot seem to prise her away from it!  It looks like she is hanging from the pram.  I think this is all just part of becoming a toddler - suddenly she knows exactly what she wants, but lacks the communication skills to tell me.  So if things don't go her way, she gets quite cross and upset.  I completely understand!

It is so fascinating, watching as Tabitha learns more about the world, and starts to express her own preferences and desires.  Although this can be frustrating for her (and me) if I don't understand exactly what she wants, it is so exciting to see her start to communicate much more.  She points to shoes and says 'zzzoezzz' or 'ooozz'.  If anyone says 'no', she shakes her head wildly from side to side - such as 'no biting', 'no touching' but even if I say no in another context (such as telling my husband, on the phone, that we have no milk), she will start to shake her head!  Cute.