Again, I have no new pictures of Luca, so here's the alternative. Elmo is Luca's favourite toy, so we can NEVER allow him to see this....

Carole's taking little goggle eyes to the doctors this morning. Although he's acting in much the same way as normal, he's certainly not well. The rash on his chest is still very noticeable (although it does fade when you press it Lucy), and he threw up last night too. This is what has concerned us most, as he's never been one for throwing up - Luca the puker he most certainly is not.

Carole's taken the day off herself. Partially this is due to having to keep Luca off nursery, although it is also due to her picking up an (unrelated) illness of her own. Our house has been liberally decorated for snot over the past two days. Due to this, I decided to take control of cooking duties last night, and cooked us a traditional Congolese dish of sardine stew. Carole always eyes me suspiciously when I announce I'm going to cook one of my "experimental" meals, but I felt this one came out rather well. Admittedly Carole didn't finish it as she hates sardines, but I was unaware of this....

Mum (my mum, Luca's gran...) has been a great help during this unhealthy period, taking care of Luca and allowing Carole to get things done. Mainly it gave her the opportunity to purchase some "toddler stuff" for Luca from Mothercare, such as a toilet seat, elevated kitchen seat and steps to allow him to brush his teeth at the sink. It's actually very cute watching him do this, and also shows how much he's progressing. He's really becoming a sturdy, mobile boy.

And finally, Mum took back the two cardigans she knitted yesterday in order to deal with frayed edges. We're just hoping she doesn't take too long as he's already demanding them. He loves them, and cries "cardie, cardie" when we tell him they're not here. And the look on his face when we try to put the old blue cardigan on him is akin to Gordon Browns the first time he realised what an a**e he's made of the UK's economy........

**Useless fact of the day - The worlds fastest knitter can knit 118 stitches per minute**