Rachel, Owen and Kathryn

Blazing June is here! Owen sped off to Kendal with a colleague this morning for a micro-performance of Don Giovanni, leaving me and Katy with a gloriously sunny Saturday and the car keys. The world is our oyster: where shall we go, what shall we do? Playground, nearby city farm, even Chester Zoo? No, Katy wants the paddling pool in the back garden - all day. So we have a whale of a time, splashing around naked (Katy), sunbathing and drinking a can of beer (me), admiring the washing drying on the line, and periodically dragging the paddling pool round our handkerchief lawn chasing the sun round the shadow of the house. After all the excitement she voluntarily went to bed early. By the time I'd finished the last bedtime story the clouds had closed in and rain had soaked my previously bone-dry washing. But after all the fun we had today I say: it's alright.

A vast amount of carrots were consumed by our little one last night (to say nothing of the potato, sausages and ice cream), which prompted us to measure her. She has broken through the 1 metre barrier and now stands tall at 101 cm. "Am I tall enough to go to school now?" she asks hopefully. She also displays a fine grasp of rhythm and metre in song. This morning she was clambering through her tunnel whilst I sang "The Katy went through the tunnel ..." to the tune of The bear went over the mountain. She finished off the verse for me by interrupting with "and popped out the other side"! The following utterance gives a good snapshot of various aspects of her development at 2 years 7 months: "I would like some carrot stix and some apple juice, also I need the toilet and don't you or Daddy come."

Pretending to be a MOUSE Katy can just squeeze into our (admittedly large) cat box.

In the digital, £9K-fees age, higher education institutions are thinking hard about giving technically savvy students value for money. My library has been experimenting with electronic course packs pre-loaded onto e-book readers. Manchester Business School is thinking of giving new MBA students an iPad. Katy has made an early start, as she has quickly learned how to view photos and videos on my touch-screen Android phone. Start 'em young, I say. It may not be too long before she starts contributing to this blog herself.

Katy has now officially left any trace of babyhood behind. She was reliably toilet trained by Christmas, and has recently decided that she really doesn't need to wear a nappy at night now. The only drawback to this wonderful progress is that we now get woken up in the small hours by a small voice wailing "Mummy, I need the toilet". Katy and I enjoyed the children's meeting at Quakers last week, which involved re-enacting the story of Moses being put into a basket in the river [a consideration of mothering roles in anticipation of Mothering Sunday]. I was momentarily puzzled when she started talking about wrapping up baby Noses! Maybe it's an extension of her gleeful joke singing "We wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new ear".

Sitting in the interminable traffic jam generated by the interminable road-digging, pipe-laying activities on Oxford Road affords plenty of opportunity for scrutinising roadside signage. Whilst I was gazing at the queue of cars in front of me, listening to the Debussy string quartet, Katy was gazing at the car park entrance we were creeping past. Then I heard a little voice say "Curly C, A, R - CAR". This child is already reading words - even in upper case, which she's not supposed to know - at 2 1/2 years old!

Every child can make the noise of a fire-engine or ambulance, even though they don't actually make that sound these days (well, only occasionally). Last Sunday we made our own dash to the Children's Emergency Department of Manchester's brand new women's and children's hospital. While admiring the naturalistic representation of her favourite lion picture in the City Art Gallery, Katy fell and hit her head on a seat frame: wails and blood everywhere - she had a nasty gash on her eyebrow. After nearly three hours in three different queues we emerged slightly frazzled but in one piece, thanks to some surgical superglue and very skilled nurses. We all managed to stay very calm and collected, and even wolfed down enormous quantities of fish and chips that evening, but after I'd put her to bed and sat down with a glass of wine, I was the one suddenly in tears.