Settling In? C'est bien, non?

Lara had her second settling-in session at the new nursery yesterday, I left her there for 90 minutes in the morning, and when I came to pick her up the kids were all playing outside, and I was able to watch her for a few seconds before she saw me, and she looked really happy, and not at all nervous or shy. Her new key-worker, Lilian (no sniggering from those Shamless watchers out there!) said Lara had been absolutely fine, she'd struck up a friendship with another girl on a settling-in session, and they'd sat in on the weekly French lesson, although Lara flatly denied this later when I interrogated her in my perfect A-S Level Business French. After that I took her to her Marlow nursery, where she handed out the "leaving cakes" she'd helped to make on Tuesday night:

Tomorrow she has a 3-hour session including lunch at the new nursery, then her final afternoon at Marlow. It'll be sad to leave there, the staff have been very good with Lara, and she's really enjoyed it, I don't think we can recall one occasion when she's been upset at the idea of going to nursery. OK, sometimes recently she would have preferred to stay in bed, but once she's up and dressed and fully awake, she's always been excited about going.
The new nursery, like Marlow, would like us to bring photographs of family & pets in to help settle Lara if she does have moments of homesickness, and I'm afraid I've gone very "Competitive Dad" on this one this time, although Picasa does make this sort of thing pretty easy, but here is Lara's "Comfort Card":

They wanted photos glued to a piece of A4 card, I might have got a bit carried away, but at least I've tested out our new office printer.

The home office, nearly there

We've still not finished getting the office ready, but fortunately Olga's first day tomorrow will be at our boss' house. My part of the office is in need of a bit of filing:

And tonight, when I tried to get up to finish the tidying up, I was pinned down to the sofa by my boys:

Next stop - Tour de France

I took Lara to the park today with her bike; she's not been on it for at least 6 months, probably more, but somehow she knew how to ride it. Last time she basically sat on it and we pushed her, but today she told me "put my helmet on, put my feet on the pedals, and hold the handles", and she could ride confidently (so long as we didn't go uphill, then she needed a push). After we got home I asked Olga if she had taken Lara out on her bike and shown her how to ride, but she hadn't. We asked Lara if she had cycled at nursery, and she said no, and we've not seen any bikes there, so we can only think that she has picked it up off the TV, as plenty of the characters in the cartoons she watches ride bikes. Anyway, it was great to see and will make trips out all the more interesting now, as we won't have to "helicopter" over her while she's on her bike in the park: