Oh what a testing day.

I had decided to take Amelie to a local pottery painting place, to choose and paint something for my Gran's 80th which is this week (although we won't post the pottery!) Amelie however, decided she would rather have meltdown after meltdown. I told her she couldn't do something (I can't even remember what) and she decided, in her fury, that she didn't want her trousers on. I decided we needed to get out and so eventually we made it out the door and to the studio. On the whole, she had a great time painting. She chose a butterfly plate to paint and we worked on it together - I think its going to be gorgeous! She also sneakily chose a button to paint and a hanging decoration - which I agreed to so that I could finish the butterfly without her becoming bored. She was not happy when it was time to go and refused to put her jumper or jacket on - and the nice lady in the shop persuaded her to put her wellies back on otherwise she was having none of that either. She refused to hold my hand on the way home, and nearly caused us both to fall over by being silly about it. However when we got home she relaxed a bit, had lunch and seemed okay so we headed out to post some cards and pick up some nice snacks for us. Back home and it was time to paint the leaves I had drawn round yesterday - started off well and I joined in for a few but then she started freaking out about colours mixing, dirty paintbrushes, paint on her hands that she had put there, paint on the mat, paint on the leaf that she didn't want there etc etc so I decided painting was over (I really wasn't sure how it could have continued!) but she wasn't happy with that either. Then it was just one thing after another. Lots of screaming and tears.

Oh well, we all have our off days especially when we are 2. I really should have abandoned all plans after the first couple of meltdowns and just let her laze about in here as she is clearly tired. A lesson learned!

Positives from today

- Chris brought me a cup of tea in bed this morning even though he had hardly any time before he left for work
- A beautiful plate to give to my Gran was created
- Amelie held onto my hand with both her hands all the way to the post office, because she thought I was scared of the monster
- I started messing about with a stamp and ink and some card and ended up deciding on our christmas card design and making 12 of those (all the card I had!)
- We painted a few nice leaves before the great paint meltdown of October 23rd
- My new contact lenses are finally ready to collect