One word? When seven would do…

Saturday morning Scarlett awoke and announced she had a cold. I love her self-diagnosing of things, she does it often and is frequently correct. She did look pretty rough and was sniffling and snuffling and doing that hot and cold thing. I was off to work and Ady and the children were off to Lakeside Costco to return a sleeping bag.

Ady had bought two new sleeping bags on Friday. We’ve not long had ours and they were posh Vango ones but they are mummy sleeping bags and neither of us can get on with that design. I sleep on my side with one leg up and the bag simply doesn’t allow that. So although I am cosy and warm I often woke last week with pins and needles in various limbs from being restricted and possibly tensing in my sleep. Also although they can be zipped together we thought that would be even worse for that claustrophobic feeling. The children have cheapo sleeping bags and piles of fleeces though so they can now have the mummy bags which won’t be so restricting for them anyway and will last them and we’ve bought new ones. These are huge, kingsize and two zipped together are indeed the size of a king size quilt. They have a removable fleece inner which will be perfect for sitting outside the tent in of an evening and then getting into the sleeping bag in and they are lovely and weighty like a proper winter duvet. Unfortunately I was a little heavy handed with the zip when trying to work out how to put them together and one broke so Ady was returning it for a swap over.

I had a nice morning at work, fairly quiet; I did some work on a display and then ripped it all down again because I wasn’t happy with it and then spent some time on the enquiry desk. I got home a full ten minutes before Ady and the children but got caught outside chatting to David the Thank you Neighbour for at least five of them so only really had time to put the kettle on in unaccustomed silence before the others arrived home again. It does feel very odd being in the house all alone.

We had lunch and I was shown Big Brain Academy which the children had a joint gift (bargain at £16 in Asda). It’s proved an instant hit with both of them able to play it alone and doing lots of playing together on it too. I’ve had a go and it is pretty good. 🙂

Ady and the children harvested some salad potatoes they’d grown from QVC featured kits and had an impressive crop from just a couple of seed potatoes each 🙂

yes she is clutching a soft toy under her arm, she has no favourite or loyalty to any of them but is usually to be found with one of some sort about herself. Rabbit today, monkey tomorrow, panda a week on Saturday!

No he is not attached to the washing line, no I do not hang him out damp in the hope he’ll stretch like a heavy wool jumper!

Scarlett had peaked for a while but was feeling rough again and had gone back to bed when Kirsty, James,Marcus and Alex arrived :). We didn’t see the children at all, they all got on really well in various combinations. They watched Doctor Who which inspired a game with all Davies’ characters and seemed to join in with the lego and cars they were already playing with. There was some Xboxing and some running around the garden. Oh and some chicken mingling too. We sat outside and chatted until it got cold then Kirsty and I sat on the stairs (there isn’t any other place quite like it) while Ady cooked and James chatted to him. The kids had pizza and we had a very late (and very large) curry while listening to songs from the 90s and marvelling at some of them being nearly 20 years ago 😯

It was lovely to see them all and when they left the children went to bed, Ady and I sat and chatted for a while and then when he’d gone to bed I watched Doctor Who on iplayer as I just knew Davies would want to chat about it in the morning.

Sunday I woke up feeling intolerant and impatient. Scarlett and I had a falling out about her sniffing and refusing to blow her nose. Davies is quite possibly also coming down with the cold and was also very tired so a bit floppy and pathetic. Ady was setting up his new toy – a dvd recorder with hard disc that does all sorts of fancy media centre type stuff including pausing live telly like sky plus does. Another Asda bargain at £60. He got his annual bonus on Friday – can you tell? 😉

Once we’d all had breakfast despite Ady being happy to play with that and the children being tired and wanting a quiet day at home I insisted we go out as the sun was shining and I hate ‘wasted’ weekends where we don’t do anything. We decided to go to Asda (another pattern!) to get the little tents we’ve been talking about so finally got out the house and drove there to buy them. We were then driving past Fishbourne Roman Palace on the way home and Ady has never been. My season ticket is about to run out so it made sense to go and only pay for him to get in. The woman on the counter was lovely and suggested I sign his season ticket so I can use it rather than him as I am more likely to go again with the children in the next year so it didn’t even cost that over the year :).

Davies and Scarlett showed Ady round, surprising how much they have absorbed over our various visits there. This time Davies was interested in the hydocaust underfloor heating so we chatted about that. We then got rounded up to go and see the little film about how the site was uncovered in 1960 and what they think it would have looked like in Roman times. Ady and Scarlett didn’t manage the whole film as she started to cough so he took her out but Davies and I watched it and Davies recounted it to Ady afterwards.

Once we’d walked all around the gardens I sat in the interactive bit with the children while Ady had a more leisurely look at all the mosaics. Davies built a roman villa with some blocks and then spent ages with various camera settings of black and white and sepia to make it look ‘like the olden days’, self timer so he could be in the shot and so on.

Scarlett did some coin rubbings and some mosaic pictures.

We went into the store room museum part too where Davies wrote in the visitor book – it’s his new thing whenever we go somewhere that has one. Today he wrote ‘cool’ in the comments 😆

We got home and I made up the tents which are going to be just perfect for what we want – might still look out for a small tent big enough to take the four of us but don’t want to pay much for it as it won’t be something we use that often.

The children had a bath (they were filthy :oops:) and Ady cooked a lovely roast dinner. We ended up all watching Doctor Who again at 8pm so it wasn’t the early night for the children we’d planned and they both faffed about even when it was bedtime so I think a quiet day is in order tomorrow.

This morning started badly really. Both Davies and Scarlett were in really grotty moods, really annoying and unthinking and squabbly with each other (allowing me to blame it on them rather than feel worried it might have been me in a bad frame of mind ;)). I made a picnic lunch and probably only sat in the lounge with them for about an hour but they both ended up sent to their rooms to get away from me after just being so silly. Scarlett attempted to launch herself onto my lap when I had my laptop balanced and was on the phone and then Davies started talking at me while I was on the phone too so I just sent them away. Grr.

Everything improved when we got out fortunately and we had a really nice day. We arrived at the PYO farm about 15 minutes before Julie did so we sat and chatted in the car. Julie has her mother over visiting at the moment and she is a charmingly eccentric (read mad) German woman who dresses in an array of rainbow clothing and comes out with utterly random conversation. She is currently working her way round all the local churches near Julie, visiting one every evening to compare the refreshments on offer. I think she is bored because she normally has The Brothers with her. A pair of brothers, both with special needs who she lives with and appears to have some sort of sexual relationship with both of. The three of them normally spend all their time in close physical contact with each other, stroking and caressing. It’s an odd thing to behold but they are clearly all very happy together. She is over here alone this visit at Julie’s request.

We went to the strawberry fields first. Julie, her Mum and I just sat on the floor and ate and picked (Lorna was in the sling and barely stirred for the whole time we were there. Davies, Scarlett, Maisie and Jack did some half hearted picking and then disappeared off into the corn. They came back to tell us that Davies had found a pheasant and the ‘best strawberry ever

They then came across a mother pheasant and her chicks who was very cross with them and even went for Davies and finally happened upon a chick which Maisie picked up and they brought over to show us. It was indeed very cute but they do all know better than to pick up baby birds so we went and put it back where they had found it and hoped it’s mother would return. It would be self-sufficient enough to eat as they are not fed by their mother like blackbirds etc. but wouldn’t be safe from predators or able to keep warm enough through the night. I did briefly consider bringing it home to put in with our chickens but it headed off quite happily once we put it down so it seemed to be okay to leave.

I picked some peas, Davies and Scarlett battled with the carrots and managed to pull a few up and then it began to rain so we got on the tractor and headed back. We had lunch in our cars as we’d all brought picnics and the four children moved between the three cars and then played in the field when the rain stopped. They had a lovely time together, playing all sorts of games and eating most of the peas we’d picked while Julie and I chatted and ate more strawberries and her Mum had a nap :).

We left and went to Sainsburys for a few forgotten off the internet shop items and then on to the butchers for this months meat shop.

Once home I made some jam from the strawberries from earlier in the week. Inspired by the farm we’d visited last week in Cornwall with strawberry and chili jam I chopped up 3 chilis to put in too. It made enough for 5 jars of jam which Ady and the children have already been eating still warm off the spoon and loving – the chili just gives it a subtle kick which is lovely.

Ady was home late so Davies had to come to Rainbows with us. He and I sat on the bench outside for the first 40 minutes or so and chatted about various things including stranger danger and he practised what he would say in reponse to invitations like ‘do you want to come and see my puppies?’ he thought it was funny and gave some great retorts. Then we got cold so we went inside to see the end of the bracelet and necklace bead threading which was the activity. We moved into the smaller room for the show and tell circle where Scarlett talked about being on holiday last week and showed her toy monkey.

We got home and Ady wasn’t too far behind us. We read Dinosaurs and all that rubbish which was excellent and finished the last 3 chapters of the Famous Five book we were on.

for me today, which feels strange so long after the beginning of the week and Ady going back after the holiday. Ady was home with the children this morning but it did mean he didn’t get home tonight until nearly 10pm as he had to catch up. This is looking to be a less and less sustainable situation but I am being a bit head in the sand about dealing with it and hoping that something will come up. Something normally does…

It was slightly odd at work as the manager, Yvonne is on leave this week and the person ‘in charge’ is a lovely but very dizzy part time librarian who really struggles. Consequently I looked over the timetable she’d done for her to check it as she was wobbling about it not working, the library was opened five minutes late (cue much grumbling from the 3 old men who are outside prompt at 925am waiting to be first through the door to read the papers) and I was scheduled to spend most of the day on the enquiry desk. But first I was doing Storytime. I rummaged through the picture books and chose Quentin Blake’s All Join In which is a personal favourite, My Granny went to market selected for lovely bright illustrations, easy rhyming text and good read-upside-downability and All afloat on Noah’s boat which was just ace.I checked it through first to ensure it didn’t contain any religious references (we can’t even theme for Christmas so pulling ouvert bible stories out wouldn’t go down well). I drew outline pictures of the butterfly from the Noah book and Granny and her magic carpet from the market book which were both good for creativity and colouring, photocopied them and unleashed myself on my audience :). They are really too young to sit in a group and listen to a story and it’s very hard to pitch it right as there are babies up to 3 year olds there which makes it tricky to get the right length and complicatedness of story just right. I got several compliments at the end from the mums though so that was nice :).

In my lunch break I bought two little instrument and instruction book kits in a charity shop cheap, one is a penny whistle and the other a harmonica. They were unopened and the books are really good first introduction to the instruments ones :). I also spent some time on the phone to a local and fairly newly opened arts centre who are advertising a youth theatre group from September that I think Davies would really like. They are planning to meet weekly and hold regular productions at the arts centre and include drama, circus skills, comedy and more. They have not firmed up details for it yet but I’ve put us down on the contact list so we’ll hear when they do. Sadly there is a high risk of it clashing with Badgers, Swimming or Rainbows I guess so it might not happen, we’ll see.

In the afternoon it was very quiet and I sorted out all the display materials for the Summer Reading Game which starts in a couple of weeks. It has an Olympic theme this year and is called ‘Team Read’ with bronze, silver and gold awards, the usual stickers to go on a wallchart and a medal at the end for all six books read. I’m going to speak to the children’s librarian next time I see her as I have a few ideas for events which would be really cool to tie in with it to chat to her about. Every so often I see a little niche in working for the library service which would so suit me and it is frustrating that I am struggling to commit to 11 hours a week so certainly couldn’t do any more as I really do believe I could pitch my ideas to the right people and be listened to and carve a little career out for myself. Ah well, need to wait for that era ;).

I got home and we opened the instruments and played with them for a while. We looked at a riddle book that I’d brought home which we all liked and want to try and find more of the same. Then I made some tea for them while they listened to the Horton Hears a Who soundtrack I’d brought home. Very loud. 🙂

I read some Famous Five and then our months food shopping arrived. I dealt with that while they played Cooking Mama together on one DS at which point I said they could take their DSs to bed and play there til Ady came home aslong as they stayed in bed and let me get the shopping away, the hoovering done, the dinner sorted and have a bath. Ady was later than expected – I’d thought he’d be home for 9pm so it was a late night for the children. I watched PS I love you which was based on a book I’d loved when I read it and I’d heard mixed reviews about the film. Ady watched bits of it with me and found it bearable which is surprising for him. I thought it was a very good adaptation and the cast were good too.

It doesn’t seem so very long ago that I stopped identifying with the Saturday staff at Bhs and despite being a good 7 or 8 years older than them (and wobbling about the fact they were born in the 1980s) still felt like I was ‘one of them’ sharing wild stories about what we’d been up to at the weekend. I don’t feel that any more and infact have had to give way to my ‘friendly older sister’ type way with the Saturday assistants at the library and adopt a ‘very young but actually old enough to be your mother’ type way now, being very aware that I don’t actually want to hear about what they get up to on a Saturday night because the times when my own children are having Saturday night adventures are nearer in the future than the times when I did were in the past!

Today while doing storytime at work I realised I have left behind my feelings of unity with the mothers of very small children too. The nappy changes, the fretting about first words, first teeth, first steps, first day at school stuff all feels so very long ago (or in the case of school not at all of course). It’s odd that I’ve left it all behind so fast as Scarlett is only 2 or 3 years older than some of the children attending storytime but they just seem so very small and far behind her. No longer do I need to worry about being able to see my children at all times incase they have run out of the library towards the road, no longer do I need to bring sippy cups of juice with me or worry about parking a pushchair or carrying spare clothes incase of toilet related accidents. I have no horror stories to share about broken nights or early mornings any more. These are the things I hear the mums at Storytime chatter about. When I held baby Lorna the other day it felt like almost a whole lifetime ago that I cuddled my own tiny babies.

Last night Ady was trying to tell Davies and Scarlett that their childhood is the best years of their lives. I corrected him as I certainly don’t believe mine was (and I by no means had a bad or unhappy childhood, but I much prefer being an adult and making my own choices and decisions) and I hate that perpetuated myth that the best times for anyone are the ones you’ve already kissed goodbye to. I don’t want to live on memories alone; there is far too much opportunity for dreaming and hoping for the future and indeed revelling and enjoying the here and now.

I remember an old woman coming up to me in the supermarket when Davies was teeny tiny and newborn and telling me what a shame it is that we can’t remember that first sliver of our lives when we are most loved and cherished because it never happens again. And I feel a bit sad. And then I picture being a great grandmother, surrounded by generations of my family with Davies and Scarlett old and grey themselves, their children and their grandchildren all around and think ‘no that old woman had it wrong’, the best is yet to come. It was interesting to quite literally feel the end of an era this morning but I’m viewing it like a marker along the way on a marathon, good to have reached and passed and still with plenty more to smash through along the way stretched out infront of me.

Of the sweet seven year old variety rather than a 1984 stylee every move you make sort.

One of the things I forgot to blog about the holiday was the storytelling. Since I’ve started doing the odd storytime at the library and all but memorised the books I’ve read there the children often ask me to tell a story when we’re stuck somewhere with time to kill – waiting for food or on a train etc. In the style of all storytellers the tales get further embellished the more they are told and audience participation is most welcome :). At Heligan in the gift shop were some fancy gift boxes of biscuits with various story characters on the front – the hare and the tortoise, the owl and the pussycat and the mouse and the lion. The children know the story of the hare and the tortoise and we’d happened to read a beautifully illustrated version of the Owl and the Pussycat just a few weeks ago but they said they didn’t know the story of the lion and the mouse. I’d told it briefly to Davies as we walked round Heligan and that evening while we were in Asda and they were eating their tea he asked me to tell it again so Scarlett could listen. I then retold the Hare and the Tortoise and a couple of others that we’re read lately.

Anyway back to today (and there is a reason for the above, honest!). We were off to Drusillas which we have 2 weeks of membership of left so we were up and sorted fairly early and ready and waiting in the car when Lucy and The Rs arrived at 930am (amazing feat for us, that ;)). We drove over to Drusillas and while Lucy and I chatted Davies told stories to the other three children all the way over there. They were made up, he offered two of three titles for them to choose from and included theme tunes and sound effects. I’ve no idea how good or bad they were in terms of plotline but it kept the other 3 quiet and enthralled all the way over there. At one point in a gap in conversation I heard something about whales, a mummy and daddy who ‘made love and had a baby they called Sarah who liked to stay close to her mummy and daddy’. Not at all sure where he’s heard the term ‘made love’ but it was just part of the story and said with no great emphasis just his usual liking for accuracy before moving on with his tale. Possibly x rated animal tales aside it was lovely to hear him telling stories, lovely to know it is something I do that he enjoys enough to have adopted and a very clear outlet for his creative skills too which it was great for him to have an audience for :).

We arrived to discover loads of school children – I think these last few weeks of the summer term are often filled with school trips out. We raced through the first bit to get to the paddling pool. Scarlett and Rebecca (and I think Richard too) took spotter booklets to stamp as they went round and did that, being very strict with themselves about needing to actually see the animal and not just it’s enclosure before stamping that page :). Davies read a few of the boards around the place about what different groups of animals are called (my favourite is always flamingos – a group is called a flamboyance :)). At the paddling pool they did some getting wet, lots of running around and then came and got dressed and ate something before going off to play a lengthy game of hide and seek together. Eventually they tired of that and we went through to the play area.

They varied between playing in different combinations and in different areas. Scarlett showed her daring on the zipwire:). Davies spent ages pushing a load of little children on the roundabout and seemed to be really enjoying that. I then spotted him walking along holding the hand of a very small toddler and talking to him. I watched from a distance as he took him back to the smaller children play area and reunited him with his mother. He came back to report what had happened – the little boy had come through the gate and been knocked over by it. Disorientated he’d wandered the wrong way crying and gotten lost. Davies had spotted him playing in the little area earlier so assumed he had come from there and took him back and walked round with him til he found his mother, who apparently was very grateful :).

We were running out of time so we got ice creams and visited the lemur enclosure. They tested themselves to see how quickly they ran and Scarlett finally broke her personal record and was as quick as a lizard :). We walked round the last bit and finally reached the car pretty much dead on time when I’d said we needed to leave by. The journey home was punctuated by them all reading out the letters on the love heart sweets we’d bought them to ask what they said. Lucy and The Rs came back to play in the garden for half an hour while Davies and Scarlett’s tea was cooking and then they headed off while D and S ate tea and got ready for Badgers.

Ady got home just in time to come with us which was bad because it meant I didn’t go for a run but good because it meant we had a whole hour to ourselves to walk along holding hands and chatting without interuptions which is still a big novelty :). We walked to the supermarket for bits for dinner and then back to the car to watch the last five minutes of the Badgers playing on the lawn. Home for stories and bed. Ady has made Davies a blank book to fill in with his Ben 10 stories so he made a start on that while listening to the story, Scarlett sat and brushed my hair while she listened.

Yesterday on our trip to Sainsburys Davies and I nearly bought some strawberries but they were pricey and although British it still seemed crazy to be spending money on them and their packaging when we could go and get our own. So this morning once we were all up, dressed and breakfasted we headed off to the pick your own farm for some fruit and veg picking.

We popped to the local shoe shop first as I needed some trainers. I don’t have any and haven’t for a long time and my knees are protesting at me doing my occassional runs or even brisk walks in unsuitable footwear such as DMs or crocalikes. I chose the cheapest and we looked at all the different prices, logos and bells and whistles on the more expensive ones to see if we could actually see any difference. The children decided Puma was the mark of the ‘golden cat’ as they were the priciest 😆 They liked looking at the football boots too, they fascinated them and I remember having football boot envy about Frazers when he was a boy. No inkling to play football myself but I did like the idea of special shoes with studs for doing it in. Mind you I like the idea of special shoes for all sorts of activities and had Ady sold on the idea I would need Maternity Shoes when I was pregnant with Davies (wider fitting to accomodate feet swelling and with ankle support for increased load bearing) until he told someone at work who once they had stopped screaming with laughter at him put him straight and he put a stop to that 😆

Anyway, we got to the PYO and waited aged for a tractor which does a circuit of the fields with drop off and collections along the way as it’s a long old walk from crop to crop. While we waited we discussed how many acres it might be as Davies has a bit of a thing about acres having listened to us talking about smallholdings. The campsite we stayed at had 56 acres and he wanted to know if I thought the PYO was as much as 100 so we were trying to decide if it was nearly twice the size or not. In the end we got fed up of waiting for the tractor and walked anyway.

We started at the strawberry field where picking was perfect and very quickly filled our punnet, we moved on to peas and broad beans, then rhubard and finished with raspberries.

It was a lovely hour or so in the sunshine, it was quite busy and everyone was very chatty and friendly which was nice. We walked back to the weigh and pay area just as the tractor pulled up so decided to hop on and do a circuit of the place as we’d missed out earlier. All our pickings came to just over a tenner which was pretty good value (and I suspect we’d eaten a good couple of quids worth as we went round too :oops:)

We came home and had lunch and debated going back out to the park but the children were wrapped up in a game (using a magnetic backgammon set from a party bag but playing something else entirely) and I was shelling peas so we decided to stay put.

Ady arrived home just before swimming lesson time so he was able to come too which is great as he misses out on seeing their progress otherwise (and it’s nice to only have to deal with one wet child afterwards :)). The lesson was fine for them both, Davies seems to have cracked being on his back and floating which I’m pretty sure is as a result of some work I did with him on that last week at the campsite. Scarlett did swim a few strokes here and there too but mainly flails about but loves every minute of it. I picked up a leaflet about the various summer holiday sessions at the sports centres around Worthing and pondered on that as a childcare solution over the summer although it would cost almost as much for the two of them as I earn and I don’t know this far in advance which days I am likely to have problems with. I went to holiday clubs at the school from when Frazer and I were their age and recall enjoying them but then that was probably because I knew everyone there from school. I’ve also been looking at various other over the summer holiday things with specifically Davies in mind as I remember looking at an animation workshop last year which he was too young for but I thought he’d enjoy so it’s something to ponder further on.

Home for the childrens’ tea which they ate watching Ben 10 while I sat in the garden with my book and a beer capturing that early evening camping feel outside in my own garden :). I came back in for story time and then Ady and I had a lovely dinner including some of todays picked veg and fruit for pudding.

Back to work for Ady today and as usual when you take holiday all sorts of things had happened in his absence. Big shake ups afoot there which will likely mean changes for him once again but he is at least in the priviledge position of knowing employment of some sort of pretty much guaranteed. He’s had a product he put forward to QVC accepted too so is waiting for the dates for his next load of shows which is likely to tip our lives upside down again too but I guess it keeps things from getting stale ;).

Davies and Scarlett were keen to reaquaint themselves with the xbox, cartoon network, pens and paper, geomags and other missed things while we’d been away. In fairness I don’t think they’d been remotely missed whilst we’d been away actually but just like me and my laptop once we were home again an overdose was in order 😆

Davies spent some time xboxing and watching Ben 10 while Scarlett brought me a big pile of books to read her. We talked about reading and she tells me she doesn’t want to be taught how to read and she’s not ready yet anyway. She is however very keen on writing things and is asking how to spell words and then copying them again elsewhere. I spent much of today with ‘car’ and ‘cat’ written on my arm. She is unconventional about where she likes to write them :rolls: I notice that out of pretty much nowhere she seems to know most of her letters and the sounds of quite a few. Her printed writing is very neat and her drawing has taken a real leap in improvement lately too although a lot of her art is still fairly abstract. Today she decided to write her name in all the books she could find that had ‘this book belongs to…’ pages at the front :). She’s also learnt to write ‘Davies’ and asked me to spell out ‘this is our book’ to write in one that didn’t have the relevant box but she wanted to brand as theirs :).

Davies got the brio out and they played with that for a while which I then distracted them from to ask whether they wanted to walk round to the shop with me to get flour to make cheese scones for lunch. Davies asked if they could buy some sweets round there so I gave them 50pence each and they both chose kindereggs and spent ages playing with the water pistol squid toys that came inside them. I made cheese scones and chocolate chip peanut butter cookies too. We had lunch and then they went out to play with the chickens while I made various phonecalls, hung out the last of the holiday washing and sat thinking about (and blogging) a September camp. I’ve also booked the hall for both their birthday parties, booked the smear test I must have conjured up the reminder letter for that arrived while we were away by thinking only the other day that it must have been 3 years since the last one and got Davies’ name on the waiting list for Sea Scouts Cubs which he is keen to try instead of Cubs round the corner having dropped Beavers. He couldn’t start until January anyway as they start the term after their 8th birthday despite his 8th birthday being the same week as they go back for Autumn term but was hopeful to fit him in then or Easter term at the latest, so although that is potentially almost a year away at least it’s now sorted and organised :).

My Mum appeared during the afternoon as she had a dentist appointment (they use the same dentist as us, along the road from us) and then she came back again afterwards. She told me about her half marathon midnight walk on Saturday done to raise money for the hospice she works for and we told her all about our holiday and showed her the photos.

I did the children some tea and then Ady arrived home. Davies showed us a storybook he’d made with five drawings (very detailed) telling a Ben 10 story. I suggested he write the words out to tell the story and Ady went one better and promised to bring home some blank books made with the comb binder at work for Davies to create. He liked that idea lots and set to work sketching out his next story which involves an alien attacking London and Ben 10 saving the day :). Ady, Davies and Scarlett spent some time playing that game where one person draws a head and then folds the paper down and passes it to the next person to draw the body who then folds it down and the third person draws the feet. Hilarious results naturally :).

We needed a few bits of food shopping and some cleaning stuff so I went to Sainsburys and Davies decided to join me leaving Ady and Scarlett to tidy up and Scarlett to have a shower and hairwash (she is back to straight, shiny, loose hair for a couple of days after plaits and waves). Her patches do seem to be finally healing up although I wonder if sunshine and sea air has played more of a role in that than the ABs but tomorrow is swimming lessons so hopefully the chemicals in the pool won’t make it flare up again. The original patch on her leg has stopped being itchy and reached a point where I can treat it with bio oil as there is no longer any broken skin, the ones on her bum and top of her leg are still itching and she is trying hard but not always managing not to scratch.

Davies and I had a lovely half an hour wandering round the supermarket together chatting. He went off to look at the magazines while I queued up and paid and had selected one for him and one that Scarlett would like and as tomorrow is payday and I had enough change over from the food I let him buy them. Scarlett was delighted and they have both gone to bed clutching them. Ady and I had said how fab they both were last week at not expecting or demanding all sorts of things while we were away and actually a comic each is a usual holiday treat which we’d not done.

On the way out I was looking at a new dvd and Davies said he’d seen the trailer for it and it looked quite good. He was telling me it was about a girl who was ugly and loved someone so kept her face hidden so he wouldn’t see it but at the end something magical happened and she was beautiful and they all lived happily ever after. I asked him if he thought he would like someone more if they were beautiful and whether he’d not like someone because they were ugly and without hesitation he claimed it didn’t matter what people look like it is what sort of person they are that counts. I then asked him what he thought would be the most important thing when he was an adult and he said ‘being happy’ so we talked about other things such as how rich you are, what your house is like, what car you drive, what your job is, if you are married. He said jobs are important but only because making sure you are doing a job you love is really important and that he thought being married would make you happier as you’d have someone to laugh and talk with. We then talked about whether having children made you happier or not. He thought it would as it would be another person as well as your husband or wife to spend time with and he thinks loving people makes you happy. He also thought that when your child is grown up if you can look at them and see they are happy and doing well that would make you feel very proud that you had created that person and they were someone to be impressed with. Those are pretty much his exact words and of course that little speech made me well up. I’m guessing it is all stuff he has heard said but he really meant it all and it was so deep and heartfelt it really touched me :).

We then talked about whether you’d know what you were missing if you didn’t have children as I said I thought people who chose not to be parents (rather than those who desperately wanted to be but never were) would indeed not have those moments of happiness that parenthood brings but they wouldn’t know to miss them. And that not having children would probably make for an easier life with less complications. That somehow led onto HE and we talked about friends we know who are struggling with HE at the moment and what they are finding tough, how things have improved for us since the last to do we had a while back and why Davies thinks school is a very poor and illogical option against Home Education. Of course he only has autonomy to compare it with although we’ve talked about structured HE and the school at home model this makes no sense at all to him 😆 He is very articulate in his argument and that pleases me as although his views are so very clearly shaped by my own he truly believes them and can speak quite eloquently now on his own behalf about why it is working for him :). As he bustled into the house desperate to present Scarlett with the magazine he’d chosen for her he was still shaking his head at the idea of a downside of HE being too much time spent with siblings too as for him this is not only the norm but again something that makes perfect sense – why on earth wouldn’t he want to spend as much time as possible with his sister who he loves, gets on well with and plays better with than most everyone else he knows.

Of course we are now destined to have a series of awful days with me threatening school by the end of the week but it was one of those makes it all worthwhile times when everything from motherhood in the first place to staying at home to do HE all falls into place when reflected back in the words and gestures of my seven year old. He was right, having children does indeed bring moments when you are proud and happy and you don’t have to wait til they’re adults to feel it :).

Bath, dinner and watching Into the wild for Ady and I although he didn’t stick out the whole of the film. Tomorrow I have various planned options including PYO farm for strawberries, Ady might be taking Scarlett up to QVC to deliver something with him if it arrives in time for them to get back here for swimming lessons in which case I’ve promised Davies I’ll take him and his bike to the park, I want to buy some trainers and it’s swimming lessons too.

I’ve spoken to a few people who are up for the idea of a camping trip in September. I’m trying to sort out Davies’ birthday party and need to try and organise the two so they don’t create problems for each other and I think my best plan is a birthday party for D on Saturday 6th September and then camping from Monday 8th for a week. I am aware that anyone going camping on the Monday might not be up for travelling down to a birthday party on the Saturday though although we’ll have an open house to come and stay for the weekend and travel off from here on Monday if that makes it easier for anyone aiming to do both.

So, birthday party aside who is up for camping that second week in September and where shall we go? I’ve got in mind perhaps Shell Island, perhaps Cornwall or if it makes it easier I’m up for somewhere close to us here in which case we could start from the Saturday 6th and tack it onto D’s party weekend. Any thoughts?

ETA – okay I have a bit of a plan. How about the Sustainability Centre where we camped for the green fair last month? We can have campfires, it has loads of surrounding fairly safe woodland, okay facilities at the centre or hostel for showers / toilets and they hold loads of cool courses there such as campcraft and survival so I could arrange something like that for one of the days. There is loads of wildlife on site and we can do a day trip to the Butser ancient farm too. It’s well within an hours drive from us (Hampshire) so fine for people to go on to from here after the party.

Having not made it to bed until about 230am I wasn’t up until 1030am and then had to dash around doing various things before we went out at 1ish. Davies and I dashed into town for birthday presents for Boo and Buzz, I sewed up an undone seam on my dress, unplaited Scarlett’s hair which we’d washed still in it’s camping plaits and left to dry so it was suitably wavy and medieval.

On the drive over we were behind a convoy of several vehicles all with banners on protesting about fuel tax prices and proclaming Labour to be the killer of small businesses. Davies tried to read them and asked if they were an advert? We had an interesting conversation about freedom of speech and protests, what taxes are, whether it is right or wrong to make something like fuel expensive from a moral pov to reduce people’s usage, how travelling 30 miles to a birthday party is something that wouldn’t have happened years ago (possibly because you’d only actually know people from your own village anyway), the welfare state (briefly) and what our taxes are spent on. I do worry that the more I explain things like government, politics and law and order to the children the more I tend towards wanting to promote anarchy 😆

We arrived at Ros’ slightly early and changed quick into costume. Having panicked about not having any material to make any costumes and running out of time before going on holiday I’d bought a dress for me, a dress for Scarlett (although it was suitably princessy it will do her for other such occassions as she’d outgrown all the other princess and fairy dresses we had) and a ladies elf outfit for Ady which he wore with a jesters hat. We didn’t spend a fortune but seeing the outfits others were wearing I wished I’d had the time and inspiration to make ours rather than buy them.

The party was ace, Ros had put in loads of time and effort and come up with a fabulous theme, loads of activities and authentic food, drink and crockery :). Ady was in his element cooking on the barbecue, I was in my element drinking wine from a metal goblet and the kids were in their element in all sorts of games and activities – I hardly saw them!

It was lovely to catch up with friends and we finally left around 7pm.

We decided in the end to go straight to Cornwall after initially planning two nights in Dorset and then three in Cornwall. I’d googled for campsites near the Eden Project which was our only firm plan for Cornwall and noted postcodes for three promising sounding ones, packed the 2007 Camping and Caravan Guide for the UK and decided that was more than enough preparation. Cornwall is such a touristy place and it is still off peak enough for me to be happy to leave without a proper destination and just sort it out when we got there.

Monday The weather forecast was pretty awful but we drove pretty much all the way down to Cornwall in lovely sunshine. We stopped at Bridport Morrisons for something for lunch. That little Morrisons has seen us do so many holida ‘t too far for everyone actually.

The sun continued to shine while we selected a pitch, paid and booked in and then set the tent up. It went up really easily and within the hour we were totally set up and went off to find the nearest supermarket for food. We collected a load of brochures of local attractions and sat in McDonalds while the children had Happy Meals, we had tea and coffee and planned our week a bit. Then next door to Asda for food for me and Ady before heading back to the campsite.

We sat and watched a buzzard circling and various other birds including a couple of herons all come in to roost in surrounding trees, spent some time running round the campfield pretending to be buzzards

before the children went off to bed and we had dinner. Unfortunately that night set the tone for the week as far as bedtimes were concerned and no matter how active a day we’d had we failed to wear Davies and Scarlett out enough to get them to go to sleep much before we did any night. Being together in a pod doesn’t help as they have their own rooms at home and are always crap at going to sleep if they have anyone else in the room with them. Also I suspect (although I may be being generous here) that it being light til well after 10pm every night didn’t help but it was the one low point of the holiday really that we had zero child-free time as they were awake the same times as us so we didn’t have the usual switching off time in the evenings. Twice (first night and last night) Scarlett got herself into an overtired, upset and emotional state, crying over missing the cat and the chickens at home and all sorts of other dredged up things to sob about. It was clearly overtiredness and I did deal sympathetically and patiently with it but it was rather wearing. 🙁 Possibly as a consequence of sitting with her for about 20 minutes after I’d got undressed I was cold and slept really badly the first night. I often sleep badly the first night camping though for no real explainable reason other than perhaps getting used to it. We did move the camping mat round the following night though and I slept ok for the remainder of the holiday thankfully.

Tuesday

We had an explore round the campsite, met the various animals, checked out the swimming pool, had a go on the mad zipwire

and generally acquainted ourselves with the place before heading out for a while.
We didn’t have enough tent pegs with us (where do tent pegs go?) and had seen an advert for a store claiming to be ‘the biggest camping shop in Cornwall’ so decided to head there and get some pegs and also a new wick for the lantern. Clearly Cornish camping shops are all built for pixies as this one didn’t qualify as large by my standards 🙄 we did get the wick though (refused to pay 30p each for tent pegs) and then on a whim followed the brown signs to the ‘Cornish Cyder Farm’. The habit of putting the word ‘Cornish’ infront of every single thing really entertained us for the week as it only seems to happen in Devon and Cornwall. I don’t recall seeing ‘Sussex’ or ‘Hampshire’ or ‘Berkshire’ stuck in front of things in other counties although I guess Cornwall is a big tourist destination. The ‘Cyder’ farm was pretty good; they did run tours but we didn’t bother with that and just had a good look round and read all the signs, spent some time in the shop sampling various ciders, wines and apple juice, then some time in the ‘jam kitchen’ sampling jams, chutneys and relishes (delish strawberry and chili jam made me think of Sarah) before buying a jug of cider and a cute little glass tankard.

Slightly further down the road also following brown signs we came across an Ice cream farm – Callestick Farm which had various farm animals, a play area, a viewing platform over the factory with loads of information about how they make ice cream and the process of packaging and despatch which was really interesting. We then of course had to sample the ice cream in the ice cream parlour. Scarlett made friends with the farm dog, Jess.

We drove back a very scenic route and went through Truro where my Granny was evacuated to from London in the war. I’ve spoken to her today (her 80th birthday) and it was the anniversary of her going down there this week while we were there. I think she said it was 68years ago and judging by the newness of it today I’m guessing there is very little of what she remembered. She is still in touch with several people there and despite the unimaginable to us today experience of being seperated from family and evacuated she always speaks fondly of that time.

We bought stuff for dinner, had a minor kerfuffle about goggles for Davies (I’d gone away without a swimsuit so we’d had to buy one for me in Asda and Davies hadn’t got goggles which he was adamant he *needed* to go swimming but none of the supermarkets seemed to sell) which was finally remedied in the on site little shop at the campsite and then all went swimming. We had the pool to ourselves and when the weather finally did turn and it started raining it was actually very nice to be in the lovely warm heated pool in the rain. 🙂

It cleared up again soon after we got out and Ady went off to find something to have a campfire in while I got Davies and Scarlett fed and in bed. He returned with a small barbecue (purchased for under a fiver, totally perfect for little campfire and easily dismantled to take home and away with us again -hurrah!) and we took it in turns to go off scouting for firewood. It was our 15th anniversary and we spent some time reflecting on the last 15 years, where we were then, where we are now and other rather soppy stuff like that :).

Wednesday We’d nominated that as the day we’d visit the Eden Project. We’ve been before, back in 2005 but I was conscious at the time that the children were too young to get much out of it so when Tesco clubcard points had Eden project tickets it seemed the right thing to do. I’m really glad we’ve done it a second time as the children really did enjoy it, I found loads of stuff I’d not taken in before and we don’t need to do it again now! 😆 The zipwires were closed for the day although we’d already decided we wouldn’t do that again as the children would have to be with one or other of us and it costs a tenner each it was nice to not even have the choice as I think I at least would have weakened and wanted to do it again :lol:.

We did the biomes, the hot one was even hotted than I remembered but the mediteranean one was cooler, we spent more time walking round the gardens outside and found the plants grown for medicine area really interesting. We spent ages in the centre indoors bit which I don’t really recall from before. There was loads on display including a wall of hand prints, a wall of wax tablet and wooden tools to write and overwrite on it, an entire wall of fridge doors and magnetic letters (which amusingly was the biggest draw for all the adults who were clustered round frantically spelling things on it :)), various mechanical displays and more. Davies and Scarlett both signed the visitor book. Oh and because we only had enough clubcard points to get tickets for two adults and one child we had to pay for Scarlett to get in so she got a years pass and had to write her ‘signature’ on the back of her pass card which she did very quickly, calmly and neatly at the front of a long queue :). We had a picnic lunch in the sunshine which quickly turned to pouring rain just after we’d bought ice creams 😆 We took shelter to eat them and then had hot drinks to warm up again before going into the theatre there to watch the Mechanical Theatre which Scarlett was slightly freaked out by but Davies, Ady and I really enjoyed and led to an interesting conversation about patenting, inventing and motivation for such things.

We walked up the hill looking at various things including the lavendar beds, the hemp knots, the musical instruments, Scarlett found a puddle to jump in (and sensibly pulled her trousers up first!) and then we went to the little area where they had black cabs driven by Elvis taking you on a journey to make a pizza and talking about food miles which was good. We had a play on the arcade games all themed with environmental ideas and talked about food chains.

We had a browse in the shop and bought some postcards and I was utterly enthralled by the Dyson hand driers in the loos at the exit to the point of making Davies and Scarlett come back in there with me to wash their hands to try them and dragging Ady right to the entrance of the ladies so he could see them as they were not in the gents 😆 We started to queue up for the park and ride bus to take us back to the carpark but Davies and I decided to walk it rather than wait and be on a crowded bus taking up spaces as able bodied folk so we raced back to the car. We won – just – but I almost needed my inhaler to recover from what is a fairly steep walk back up the hill :oops:.

The rain had really set in for the night so we got fish and chips from the on site restuarant and takeaway at the campsite and ate in the car steaming up the windows :). It was an early night that night and had Ady and I regretting not bringing some sort of games to play. As it was he had his radio and I had a pile of books so we weren’t bored.

Thursday It rained all night and was very windy too but the tent withstood it’s first real test and aside from a small leak along a seam which let in the odd drip it held out really well. All the bedrooms stayed dry and it remained sturdy and unaffected by the wind. Very pleased with it :).

The morning dawned clear and sunny after a bad night so we decided to go to St Michael’s Mount. I was fairly convinced from the ambiguous nature of the leaflets which shouted rather about it being a joint NT and family run place that it would not come under free NT membership entrance fee so we were prepared to wander round any free bits and then spend money on one way boat trip which I already knew would be a fiver for the four of us. As is was the tide was out when we arrived so it was a walk across the boardwalk to the island. The gardens were free for us so we walked round those and the children did a spotter sheet activity which was really well thought out with loads of information and clues to follow which led to various things dotted around, spaces to draw pictures of things and lots of little tidbits of educational stuff too :). Even better they got a prize each (a bouncy ball with the StMM logo on it) when they returned it and the woman at the counter chatted to them for ages about everything they’d seen. The gardens were beautiful; loads of tropical plants and flowers all on a very steep hill with steps, gates, hedges and loads of little secret feeling areas and of course stunning sea views.

We came down and ate cakes in the harbour and then went to check the castle prices out. Amazingly it was indeed free for NT members so our membership has now paid for itself at least twice over with the few places we’ve already been this year :). After we’d been up to the castle Davies and I sat and watched a short film all about St MM so we knew afterwards what various things were about which was slightly mad and would have been better to have done before but at least we could look back at pictures and know what it was all about 🙂

Archangel Michael appeared to Cornish (naturally ;)) fishermen hence the name Saint Michael’s mount and it was a monastery with an abbey which many people made a pilgrimage to visit so you begin walking up to the castle (which was once an abbey) up the pilgrims steps

We came upon the ‘giants well’ about halfway up which Davies and I learnt in the film is to do with the myth of a giant who used to reside there and terrorise the villagers and steal their sheep. A brave young lad called Jack (because unless your name is Jack you really shouldn’t bother trying to tackle giants) tricked the giant into falling into the well. At the top are cannons and the most magnificent views;

We had a good look round the castle and spent a long while chatting to one of the guides who was excellent at addressing Davies and Scarlett rather than Ady and I, putting everything into simple but not patronising language and giving them a couple of things each to look out for as we carried on round the castle. It’s not the first time we’ve come across excellent NT guides actually, they are generally very good at engaging and bringing their passion and knowledge for the property to a level accessible for everyone :).

Back down again and Davies and I went to watch the film by which time the tide had started to come in. It was probably no more than ankle deep but the boats were already running. We sat and watched the last few waders go across to knee and almost thigh deep before we got in a boat;

We then spent a very happy hour on the beach as the tide came in looking at rockpools, searching for crabs and generally just paddling about.

We hoped to get back to the campsite in time for a swim but didn’t quite make it before the pool was closed for the night. Instead we had cream tea (Cornish scones, Cornish jam and Cornish clotted cream)

Ady and the children played with the kite while I put my feet up 🙂

and then we walked all round the fishing lakes gathering firewood 🙂

toasted marshmallows on the campfire

and finally had bedtime stories infront of the campfire

I think that was easily our nicest day of the holiday – unexpectedly cheap, loads of fun, interesting and with lots of authentic Cornishness and Camping touches :).

Friday We had done really well with our fairly strict budget for the week and had enough money to pay for one of the attractions we’d gathered leaflets for. So many people (and not just twitterers, one of Ady’s workmates and someone my Mum knows too) had all highly recommended The Lost Gardens Of Heligan so we decided to go with that. It was raining and although the catchphrase of the day was ‘I think it’s going to break soon’ it never actually did :(. In lieu of our missed swim from the night before we had a swim before showering and going out which was lovely and then made our way to Heligan. I think a combination of it being bloody miserable weather, the only thing we’d spent proper admittance fee on and therefore had higher expectations of and maybe us being uncultured and certainly in my case utterly disinterested in plants and flowers it was something of a disappointment really :(. We did walk all round and we were there for about 4 hours, it was lovely as gardens go, we did enjoy the wildlife and the hide, the jungle area was impressive and we liked the giant and the mud maid and the grey lady but really we would have been better going for the trashy showiness of the attractions at Lands End or even the Future museum, China Clay Museum or Mining Museum all of which were similar prices.

We did like the free mini compasses they gave out to everyone at the entrance though and the children are both now pretty good at telling us which direction we’re going in 😆

We drove around for a bit into St Austell town centre, a neighbouring town centre and just getting dry in the car and hoping that the weather really was going to break but it didn’t and by about 530pm we realised we were not going to be cooking outside again that night. We went to Asda and fed the children in the cafe there while having much needed tea and coffee (my first of the whole day as the early swim had meant I’d missed my first cup) then bought rotisserie chicken and salad and bread for us to have a Famous Five style dinner in the tent.

It was early nights all round which still meant the children were messing about until nearly midnight and Scarlett ended up getting upset again through overtiredness :rolls:

Saturday morning the rain that hadn’t stopped all night was continuing. Davies and Scarlett got dressed and then had their breakfast in the car watching a film while I packed all the inside of the tent up and Ady packed it into the car which he’d backed up to the tent door. We then very fortunately had a half an hour break in the weather which was perfect timing for us getting it all down and packed away :). We’d done it in pjs to keep dry clothes ready to get changed into but it is the first ever time I have both pitched and unpitched a tent without getting wet knees :). We were all packed up and ready to go by 11am

We had a fairly leisurely journey home, stopping at Bridport Morrisons again for food and finally got home just before 5pm. We drove through crappy weather most of the way making us glad we were not staying an extra night as originally planned.

Once home we found the sad news that one of the little chicks (hatched by a hen) had died. No idea why or how, my Dad had found it, still warm on Thursday without a scratch on it but dead and abandoned by it’s mother who has shifted all her focus onto the remaining chick. One of the other bigger chicks was not too great either and kept falling over but we think she was dehydrated as their water had run out (Dad has been here twice a day but it has been very windy and maybe the water got blown over?) and she seems to have perked up today. The definite cockerel that the children have named ‘Big Boss’ has developed a rather fiesty attitude and been pecking at my Dad and had a go at the rest of us today which as he is still small isn’t an issue but we’re going to handle him lots to try and keep him in his place.

So, a lovely time away, lovely campsite, lovely part of the country. The weather wasn’t always on our side and we made a slight error in choice of place to visit but we definitely came back feeling rested and relaxed. The tent stood up really well to the weather, our camping mats and sleeping bags were great, the barbecue for a campfire worked really well. 🙂

This morning we gathered up everything ready to get the car packed up, this feels like the most protracted holiday preparation ever :rolls:. Ady had homemade cards and some aftershave (not thankfully home made although I’m sure Scarlett could have risen to such a challenge admirably, less sure Ady would have worn it :lol:) for Fathers Day. The car got packed up, I plaited Scarlett’s hair ready for a week of neglect while she played her DS and then my parents arrived.

We’d planned a barbecue and despite a bit of a shower at one point we were determinedly British about the whole business and stayed outside anyway :lol:. Frazer arrived and stayed for a couple of hours too which was nice; the children haven’t seen him for a while.

There was plenty of eating, chicken watching and general lazing around and the day seemed to go pretty quickly. We’ve decided to just go straight to Cornwall now so have a long drive ahead tomorrow but felt we were going to lose too much of what was already a reduced time away in packing up and pitching if we went with a two site trip. Plus the places we want to visit in Dorset are only a couple of hours drive away so doable in a day or certainly a weekend camping later in the summer.

I read a pile of books to the children at bedtime and my parents stayed to listen to about half, very obviously listening and my Mum even commented on one afterwards which felt a little strange to be reading stories to my parents but quite nice somehow. Ady often sits and listens when I read the Famous Five stories and given how popular audio books are with adult borrowers who listen to them while they do their ironing etc. at work I guess its something we all still love but don’t often get the chance to be read aloud to once we are able to read ourselves.

And now, I really am signing off until next weekend :).

We’re now officially on holiday. But due to it being Fathers Day tomorrow, an effort to stretch finances and knowing that my parents will sulk if we are away for that we are not going on holiday until Monday. The plan if the weather remains halfway decent is to head to Dorset on Monday and camp for a couple of nights. I’ve an eye on Tom’s Field for that but we’ll just turn up and hope for the best. We want to visit Corfe castle so the children can get the whole Enid Blyton experience and just enjoy Dorset, then we’ll head to Cornwall on Wednesday where I have another couple of campsites jotted down and we’ll again hope for the best. We have Eden Project tickets from Tesco clubcard points so that is our plan on Thursday or Friday before heading home again on Saturday. There are various NT places and we have guide books for Dorset and Cornwall so we’ll make our way in finding things to do as we go along. I had got half a plan to visit Stone Henge on the way back but have realised doing that on 21st June is probably not a great plan! 😆 I’m really hoping for good weather and the relaxing getting away from it all-ness that good camping provides.

Today I’ve worked the morning while Ady and the children did various things in the garden including mending the windbreak that took such a battering on the cliff top campsite in Swanage that finally finished off the Crap Tent last summer. I got home at lunchtime feeling a bit rough (suffering with hayfever, a slightly dodgy stomach and general not-right-ed-ness) and was imediately came at from all angles with Ady and both children trying to tell me things and demand my attention. The children settled down to do more painting and pastels, Scarlett spent some time putting make up on me and Ady and I attempted to plan our packing strategy. We decided we really needed a new table to replace the fold up picnic bench and (unusable for adults anyway) chairs and Ady found one for under a tenner online at Woolworths and tracked one down at the local branch and had it put by.

Scarlett and I went to Tescos for barbecue food for tomorrow, camping essentials like small jars of peanut butter, ketchup and marmite and then collected the table on the way home too. Very pleased with it, it’ll be perfect for camping and come in handy indoors too for those table moments that we’re always having round here ;). Down the back streets back to the house I let Scarlett change gear as she was sitting in the front with me and it was merely from 1-3 and back again on empty roads. The worst that could have happened was crunched gears. Both the children are fascinated with driving and very keen to learn how although from their examples of proficiency at Legoland driving school and again at the stand at Ardingly their steering leaves a lot to be desired so there is no chance of them being ready for at least the next 10 and 12 years :lol:.

Ady cooked their tea, I had a bath which both of them got in with me and then we watched Doctor Who and they made fathers day cards for Ady for tomorrow. Scarlett continued to be delicate, I’m sure it is merely a combination of small things and I have been deliberately tough on bad behaviour from her lately which seems to have worked as she is proving less challenging but perhaps slightly more needy emotionally, so being able to have an hour or so off with just her today was nice. She spent ages brushing my hair when we got out of the bath and telling me how much she loves being like me and wants to be like me when she grows up :). Not at all sure which bits of me she wants to be like but I’m very aware that a daughter thinking her mother is wonderful and wanting to be just like her is a very limited period only happening so I’m making the most of it while it lasts before she realises the error of her ways and starts to blame me for all that is wrong in the world, her life, hates me and puts a hex on anyone even daring to suggest she is anything like her mother! 😆

Today was the day we finally got to meet Lorna. Due to having visitors at the beginning of the week, working in the middle and Julie having prior engagements too today was the first day we were both free. Davies and Scarlett have been so desperate to meet their new cousin and were really looking forward to it.

The plan was to meet at the stables so Julie could feed Honey with spare arms to cuddle Lorna then to have a walk in the woods. We arranged to meet after lunch which meant we got to have a quiet morning at home. Tarly’s new dress arrived in the post, very gratefully recieved and pranced round in for a while :).

Davies did some more painting and finished off a Ben 10 picture he was copying from the front of his DS game;

We talked a bit about trying to very accurately copy something like a cartoon character and I used some watercolour pencils to have a go. I really must do more of that sort of thing with Davies as it is a skill I do possess in some capacity and one he would like to have and I’m sure would come fairly easily to him. He did a few more pictures including some pastels of London being bombed and then a still life of an orange, some grapes and a Wonka bar, all strangely from memory rather than a still life infront of him but all very good. Tarly did some experimenting with pastels and blending colours. I don’t like pastels as they are very chalk-like but I did admire the results from afar.

We sort of watched various things on TV including some Way Things Work (class tv type stuff) and and extreme animals or similar which included sloths, platypus (which are on Tarly’s zoo game) and chameleons. Then the tv went off, the art stuff was tidied away and they got out the blocks and built bridges. I read my book :).

We had lunch and Scarlett managed to cut her leg by standing on an upturned plastic box which promptly split and she fell through. It’s one of those accidents I have described the possibility of happening to one or both of them many times over the years so as it was a clean scratch rather than a stitch requiring gash I was quite pleased to have at last been proved right. 😉

Scarlett is rather a mess at the moment though; She has her three patches of impetigo / whatever it is, two long scratches lower on the same leg, a big graze on her elbow which looks to be turning infected despite her being on ABs and various miscellaneous cuts, bruises and minor injuries. The impetigo appears to be clearing up but not quite as speedily as I had hoped and as the AB course finishes tomorrow I can’t help feeling this isn’t the end of it. We’re away next week so I’ll see how it pans out and make another drs appointment if it isn’t cleared up by the time we come back. She has also been rather ‘not herself’ this week which has had me wondering if the ABs are having an effect on her generally.

After lunch we headed off to Slindon. Davies and Scarlett ran ahead of me at the stables and I spotted Jack and Maisie down at Honey’s field so went down to meet them there and found just Jack and Maisie there. I found Davies and Scarlett backup at the tack room admiring their new cousin who was having a feed :). The four children ran off to play while I caught up with Julie and then I had a lovely cuddle while Julie went off to feed Honey. All photos are arms length with one hand while cuddling the baby so looks of wonder at the miracle of new birth are slightly staged 😉


Julie says she looks like Maisie but I didn’t spend much time with J and M when they were newborns as we were in Manchester until they were nearly 2. I can certainly see Chris in her though and slightly surprisingly nothing of either of my own two babies, which odd given I see lots of similarities in Ady and Chris and of Ady in Davies and Scarlett. As lovely as she is and as pleased as I am for Chris and Julie and also pleased to have a new niece and baby around I felt no tugs at all myself either and although Scarlett was quite smitten with her and delighted to have a cuddle she is quite happy that the baby isn’t going to be living with us. She has never expressed any desire for baby siblings (which is just as well!)

Davies wasn’t interested in cuddling although he did lots of stroking and hands and feet inspecting. He was more interested in having found what he proclaimed to be ‘the biggest pill bug in the world!’ and it certainly was a good size:

He did have lots of questions for Julie though and wanted detailed explanations of the choosing of her names 😆 He said afterwards she was very cute but not what he’d been expecting although he couldn’t quite explain why not.

We had a walk down to the woods through a long grassed field and paused at the duck pond which was nice. Davies, Scarlett, Jack and Maisie enjoyed lots of running around and getting grubby before we walked back again to the stables to collect our cars. We left Julie feeding Lorna again and popped into the chicken supply shop which is closeby to get a couple of new feeders and a sack of feed for while we’re away next week. The shop is ace, loads of intriguing chicken related retail opportunities, all of which we resisted of course.

We hit some traffic coming home which would have meant we were cutting it fine to get Scarlett fed and changed ready for Rainbows but Ady had beaten us home and got their tea on so that was fine. Tarly had her tea and went to get her Rainbows uniform on but came in clutching the jam jar she’d been keeping a single tadpole rescued from Caz’s garden in. She said it had died and seemed fairly philosophical about it as she generally is with such things and said she wanted to empty the jar out in the garden. We told her to wait and do it after Rainbows but she insisted so off she went. She reappeared a few minutes later with a crumpled face just at that about to cry any moment look, folded herself into my arms and sobbed :(. She continued to sob all the way round the corner to Rainbows, through meeting Lucy and Rebecca up the road, through signing in at Rainbows and sitting on my lap there while a steady trail of other Rainbows came to ask what was wrong with Scarlett and the leaders threw enquring glances over her head at me. I thought we were going to have to come home again as she simply could not be pacified and was crying about how it had been too young to die, why it had to be her tadpole, why it had died when she loved it and so on.

In my usual manner I answered as honestly as I could and said that I didn’t have a reason and sadly often people and animals die young and that in choosing to love someone or something you have to be aware you could lose them and weigh up whether the happiness of loving them will outweigh the sorrow of losing them. I reminded her to think of happy times with her tadpole rather than sad ones and through her tears we talked about how there was nothing I could do to put it right or make it better which is a life lesson that I don’t recall learning quite so early myself about the lack of omnipotence of my parents but I guess is a valuable lesson just the same. Finally I gave her the choice of joining in or coming home and she went off still sniffing and with utterly defeated and sorrowful body language but was quickly recovered to her usual sunny demeanor and seems to have gotten over it now. She was 100% genuine in her distress but it was very out of character and I wonder what else was going on with her for her to take it so badly?

The activity was decorating cakes for Fathers Day and then decorating a paper plate to put them on. They moved through into the anteroom and played a running around hugging each other game and then had circle time where Tarly brought her huge stuffed dog. It always amazes me that the most confident and articulate of little girls slightly go to pieces with the focus of the whole group on them and Tarly is no exception. She often reverts to baby talk and nonsense speak infront of the group as several of the others do. So although I find it personally irritating it is not concerning.

Home for bathing, Davies had already had one, and then the end of Famous Five 6 – we have 7 & 8 to take away with us. Ady and I had a lovely dinner of slow roasted pork with loads of garden herbs and potato gratin, delicious :).

Ady has finished work for holidays and I just have tomorrow morning to work – we’re keeping watchful eyes on the weather forecast for next week and hoping for the best.

I’ve been at work today. It was a good day, busy and bustling and it went very quick. I had my 3 month review of my progress after my annual review (they do a big review each year and then a mini quarterly check in to ensure everything is on track). I have nothing positive to say about appraisals and reviews really as I think they just add yet more to the workload of the managers who have to conduct them but I guess it was nice to be told great things and praised for half an hour. Oh and asked yet again if there was any way I could work more hours -no :(. It is ironic but the children seem to miss me more than usual at the moment with Ady doing most of the time here when I’m working. I suspect (and indeed hope) this is more because they feel they are missing out on family time for all four of us rather than not enjoying having more time with Ady.

They had done gardening with Ady in the morning and I’m not sure what in the afternoon with my Dad. Scarlett had a graze on her elbow from bouncing off the mini trampoline and a wine glass had been broken but there was nothing else to report. The impetgio continues to clear up well and is completely dried up now which means I am happy to keep it covered with clothing and let Scarlett meet baby Lorna tomorrow without risk of problems – especially as we are meeting them at the stables anyway which is hardly a sterile environment! 😆

Scarlett put a load of make up on me while Davies talked to me about Ben 10 and then they did some painting, Davies did an amazing picture of a tank against a black and grey smudged background. He has decided to try and do a series of war inspired paintings to display at the library next. I’m not sure what his inspiration is but it was a very atmospheric picture. I’ll try and take a photo of it tomorrow.

We had stories – a couple from a collection of old folk tales from around the world and a couple of chapters of Famous Five.

Come with me, I’m off on a meander down memory lane again 🙂

It’s 17 years ago today that I passed my driving test. Not quite precisely half a lifetime ago as I was 17 1/2 but pretty close.

I was always desperate to learn to drive and for a long time had an ambition to learn to drive a bus or a HGV too, hey, maybe one day I still will. I used to have a recurring dream as a child that I was in the driving seat of a car going along and road but didn’t know what to do to make it drive, steer, stop or go. The nightmare part wasn’t the driving, it was the not knowing how to do it.

So as soon as I could I got my provisional licence through and I was off. I was I was adamant that I wanted to pay for my own lessons though, I had in my head that it was a life skill and one which would take me places and I wanted to do that on my own rather than it be something my Mum would take credit for – I could picture her saying ‘of course we put Nicola through her driving lessons…’ so for my 17th birthday when they were all geared up to pay for a course of lessons I asked for a tv in my bedroom instead, with teletext and funded the lessons myself. It took 6 months and I think I had about 20 lessons. It didn’t come easily and I was keen to be ready to pass rather than try endless attempts as some of my friends did and suffer the upset of failing. My driving instructor was called Andrew and was very sweet, we used to chat about all sorts of things while I was having my lessons in his little red Peugeot 205. My test date came through for Wednesday 12th June and as you probably already know I don’t like Wednesdays. This didn’t seem sufficient a reason to change it though so that morning having ignored the advice of friends to wear a miniskirt, my parents to wear a suit and worn my usual ripped jeans, DMs and tatty jumper I had a half hour lesson before the test and then on to the test centre which happened to be across the road from my sixth form anyway.

I had just bought my first car -a bright yellow mini which cost me £450 and almost as much again to insure it and had one brief drive in it with my Dad who clutched the edge of the seat throughout and told me I was destined to fail the test but should view it as a good practise ready for the next try.

My highway code knowledge was dire, the examiner was very dry and gave nothing away so it was almost a complete shock when he turned to me at the end of the test and said ‘I’m pleased to tell you you have passed’. I walked back into the test centre, chucked the keys to Andrew and told him he’d have to drive as I’d be far too giddy! He dropped me back to my parents’ resturant where everyone was incredibly chuffed for me and probably quite surprised given my parents expectation of failure.

I remember sitting in my little mini later that day and feeling the most excited I’d ever felt before. To me this was the key to freedom, my own car that I could drive all on my own anywhere I liked. It was my first ‘official’ possession with a log book and all sort of proper paperwork in my name like insurance documents, all paid for by me and my own little domain that no one but me had the keys to. I’ve still never lived on my own but I imagine it would be like an extension of that feeling I had for my own car, mine all mine!

I do recall certain dates every year when they come round, various birthdays of people, some of whom aren’t even in my life anymore. Anniversaries of events; some good, some bad, some largely irrelevant now but still etched in my brain when I see that date on the calendar. 12th June is one that always makes me think ‘oh that was my driving test date’ and come next year I’ll have been driving for over half my life.

We all slept in this morning and Scarlett woke with a runny tummy. I suspect it is a side effect of the antibiotics as she is otherwise fine and unbothered about it, just very frequently visiting the loo :(. The patches are already looking like they are healing though so fingers crossed it is working and she will soon finally be free of it. She claimed not to be up to our planned arrangement of going to the beach with Lucy and The Rs and Davies was fairly reluctant too so rather than force socialising and deal with the consequences I agreed and we stayed home. And I bowed to their request of staying in their pyjamas until they needed to get changed for Badgers. Although I confess this was partially with reducing the amount of laundry to do before we go away next week :).

Davies played some DS and some X box, did some drawing, watched some Ben 10 and did lots of flopping about.

Scarlett played loads of DS -and having looked at the box again I notice it is Zoo Hospital she has, not Zoo Vet and it continues to be a hit :). She is recognising words like ‘panting and sweating’ ‘laboured breathing’ ‘blood and skin’ and so on. No idea if she would recognise them out of context on the DS but it’s still good. She has also got quite the little expert on diagnosing symptoms too and appears to be checking things in response to what the animal is suffering rather than simple random choices so that’s good :). I’ve never limited DS time before, as indeed I don’t really limit any activities but I did remove both their DSs from them tonight when I discovered they’d both taken them to bed and were still playing them at 9pm!

I’ve given lots of cuddles, watched a really interesting programme about volcanoes which the children also dipped in and out of, spent ages online looking at fancy dress sites, ebay and costume ideas for a couple of things we have coming up to wear fancy dress to. Davies is fine for both as he’s still not totally outgrown the dressingup clothes we have that will be suitable, Scarlett has outgrown all of them so I’ve just got her something off ebay for the most pressing one and can sort the other one out later, I’ve an eye on something for me if a charity shop trawl in my lunchbreak tomorrow doesn’t prove fruitful and Ady is likely to be sporting something made from curtains as I can’t find a ready made costume for what he wants anyway. Might ring round a couple of fancy dress hire places tomorrow and see if I have any luck there.

I also spent some time plotting our week away next week. We have a couple of firm places we want to go, I wanted to have a list of other possibles and some venues for camping lined up along the way. We won’t book anything as I’m guessing nowhere will be full next week, particularly if petrol continues to be an issue but we wanted to have some postcodes of decent looking sites to stick in the satnav to head towards.

Ady surprised us all by coming home for lunch and then he was also home in time to come to Badgers so I didn’t do my usual brisk walk / run but we did spend the whole hour and a quarter the children were in Badgers walking to three different supermarkets and doing a route past a few old haunts from our younger days and quite literally walking down memory lane as we talked about times gone by and friends we’ve had. We also bought an apple each to eat in the last supermarket so I got an extra fruit portion too 🙂

Davies and Scarlett finished off making some puppets at Badgers they’ve been working on. They don’t get to bring them home til the end of term but we got a sneak preview of them through the window and they look excellent. They are felt puppets they’ve sewn themselves (through I suspect pre made holes) and then stuck on details. Davies said he did most of the sewing himself but had to be helped when some of it got a bit muddled! 😆 He is not fantastically coordinated with skills like that so I’m not surprised, he still struggles to cut with scissors without using both hands and holding each finger hole of the scissors with a different hand, like shears!

Home for stories, I read a Joan of Arc book and one of my favourites ‘ Diffendoofer Day’ which was a story Dr Seuss had started but never finished and got pulled together from his ideas and completed after he died by a couple of other authors.

Ady cooked a lovely dinner and I watched The Apprentice and all the various after The Apprentice shows (you’re fired, you’re hired etc.). I’ve done some flickring from the weekend that I missed doing on Sunday night for some reason.

Not the promptest of starts given the lateness of everyone’s bedtime yesterday but Scarlett and I went over to the doctors at about 930am. She has had a patch of skin on her lower leg since Christmas which is itchy, scaly and just isn’t healing. It will look almost healed for a while and then erupt into weeping and bleeding again. Swimming at the pool seems to aggravate it but no amount of various creams and potions I’ve tried on it have had any real impact and over the last week or so two other patches have developed on her bum and the base of her spine. The GP took one look at diagnosed impetigo. I have to confess I am not completely convinced of this diagnosis however he has prescribed a 5 days 4 times a day course of oral antibiotics which appear from the instructions to treat all sorts of skin infections so hopefully even if it is a misdiagnosis the Abs will kick it into touch whatever it is. She is delighted with her own bottle of lurid pink medicine that tastes nice and has to be kept in the fridge and has thus far been very diligent at bringing it to me for her regular dosings. She is slightly affronted it means no sips of wine for the next 5 days! 😆 😉

Scarlett got stuck into Zoo vet and although she needs some small level of supervision with it she is loving it so that was a good replacement choice for the evil dolphins :). Davies and Becca did all sorts of dual DSing and pictochatting which was great as Scarlett is still not at that level yet really so it was ace for Davies to have a peer to do that with.

Lucy came over with The Rs for a couple of hours and unfortunately the dynamic of the 5 children didn’t really work so well so after far more intervention than I expect to have to carry out we recommended Davies and Becca go and play DS together quietly and Scarlett, Rebecca and Richard play together elsewhere. Although the younger ones seemed slightly lost without the older ones for a while this eventually seemed to work and harmony was restored. 🙂

As promised to Becca we went to Worthing an hour before swimming lessons so they could have time on the beach altogether, which they spent playing chase the waves before Davies,Scarlett and I walked back across the road to the swimming pool leaving Katy and Becca to carry on playing in the sea and then meet us back at the car with chip shop chips for their tea. Swimming lessons were okay for Scarlett but not amazing or remarkable – I did take her over to the people lane swimming after her lesson and show her how they coordinate their breathing, arms and legs which hopefully went in a bit for her. Davies did really well though and with 3 others swam the 10metres across the pool longways. The instructor said she wants to see them do it a couple more times before signing off their 10m badge but Davies is chuffed to know he can do it now :).

Then followed a slightly manic hour of getting everyone home, the children and Katy eating their chips, me changed for work, Ady home and showered and dinner on for later, my Dad arriving and Ady and I leaving again with Katy shortly afterwards. I was working at and Ady was attending an evening talk about local history through books. It was a really good talk by the Local Studies librarian from Worthing and was quite well attended. I rather enthusiastically poured several glasses of wine in red, white and rose not all of which ended up being drunk. I managed to pour the rose and white back into their bottles but the red had come out of a box so despite already having had 2 glasses of white my boss *insisted* I have one of the glasses of red as Ady was driving home. Ady got to meet Mike and Rose, my favourite couple from Reading Group and he stayed behind to help put the library back together again after everyone had left. He and I were the last out setting the alarm etc which brought back memories of keyholding B&Q stores from many years gone by together.

My parents had been here with Davies and Scarlett so Dad took them off to bed carrying them the same way he’d carried me to bed as a little girl while Mum and I put the finishing touches to a curry for us all.

So another late night for me and the children which we will probably all pay for tomorrow and I should therefore get myself to bed in order to limit damage as much as possible!

It was lovely to see Katy and Becca who were the first other Home Educators we ever met in real life, which we were fondly reminsicing about last night. Becca is excellent company for both Davies and Scarlett and slots in with them really well in ways plenty of others struggle to do so it was just nice, easy company that we all enjoyed being in :).

Was Pulborough Brooks day, the once a month HE get together at the local RSPB nature reserve. It’s a great HE get together really as if no one else goes we still have a nice walk round and it’s a fab place to note the changing of the seasons in plants and flowers, wildlife and general scenery as well as things like how wet the ground is, how warm the walk is and so on. They also flood part of the reserve at certain times of the year so the landscape changes quite considerably too. There seems to be an almost ever changing cast of attendees too which is great as sometimes it is thriving and there is a big group of us and other times it is more intimate and you get to have proper one to one chats with people and get to know them better when perhaps you wouldn’t normally meet up with them one to one otherwise.

This month it was just us and Katie, the women who organises it. Katie is on EarlyYearsHomeEd and as I have possibly blogged before reminds me a lot of HelenHaricot (in all good ways :)) so I feel very affectionate towards her to begin with quite aside from her being a lovely warm, interesting woman anyway. We’d gone on ahead and she caught us up about halfway round which was nice as I got to chat to my own children about things first. They both did spotter sheets this time, which were special signs of spring ones and there were leftover posters from the Springwatch event they’d held there over the weekend about baby animals. Davies stunned me by reading pretty much all of them pretty fluently – they were all ‘what is a young x called?’ questions with multiple choice answers but he knew ‘what is a young called?’ straight away, had a good go at most of the animals although he stumbled slightly on words like ‘stoat’ and read most of the answers like kit, pup, chick etc. and could guess words like ‘tadpole’. Just like all the autonomous people promised he is reading at 7 – blimey! 🙂

Katie and I had interesting chats about autonomous education and autonomous parenting and various other things and then we arrived back at the centre. I popped off to the loo while Davies and Scarlett handed their spotter sheets in, chatted to the volunteers about the various things they’d spotted (no snakes but we did see and get very close to a rabbit, see deer and Davies was fairy convinced he’d seen a bird of prey doing it’s circling thing over a field) and then we headed off for home.

Katy and Becca (yes, way too many people called Katy / Katie and Becca / Rebecca around us this week :lol:) arrived moments before us at home so in we came together and the children pretty much straightaway disappeared, only coming back eventually for food. The weather has been lovely so they spent the whole afternoon outside playing with the chickens or in the front garden and generally having a lovely time. Katy and I chatted, at length :). Ady popped home and then out again with my Mum to get my Granny’s birthday present and return Dolphin Island and get Zoo Vet in it’s place for Scarlett. The children went to bed in Davies’ room altogether with a dvd but still took several hours to finally fall asleep (I think it was around 1130pm), we did our usual hosting trick of feeding Katy more alcohol than she’s used to along with a very late dinner 😳 she held out well though 😆 and her and I were up to around 2am putting the world to rights :).

First updates on serious stuff!

The chick not only survived the night it had sufficiently recovered to be reunited with the other chicks this morning despite our initial plan to keep in inside the house for a day or two. It is eating, drinking, scratching around, not getting picked on and appears to be pretty much okay. It does have a very nasty wound to the side of it’s head and it’s beak doesn’t fully close anymore which suggests some serious damage to it’s jaw but it appears to be functioning okay despite this. It will likely be in the same camp as Spatchcock and have to be a ‘keeper’ here regardless so hopefully it’s a hen and we’re not in the early stages of some disabled cockerels retreat home set up :lol:.

I’ve spoken to Julie tonight and she safely delivered a baby girl around 9pm yesterday. A very impressive 9lb1oz named Lorna Rose Goddard :). Very much looking forward to meeting her sometime this coming week. Julie and Lorna are fine, it was a very, very fast delivery with the midwife just about arriving in time and Jack and Maisie meeting their baby sister when she was just a few hours old. That brought back the wonder of introducing Davies to baby Scarlett when she was just a couple of hours old and he woke at about 4am as he was still in the habit of doing aged 2 only to discover we weren’t in bed where he normally found us but were downstairs with a brand new baby. He gazed in wonder at her for long moments before asking if he was allowed to open door number 6 on his Bob the Builder chocolate advent calendar! 😆

Back to the far more trivial business of blogging our days and we were off to Springwatch today. My Dad called over first thing to ask a favour of me which I did for him possibly against my better judgement but we’ll see whether it has repurcussions or not I guess…

We finally got going and were slightly later leaving than planned but still arrived before 11am and as parking was being charged for this year and all the ‘free’ parking at the university had been blocked off we had to pay a fiver but did benefit from parking very close this year. I did actually ponder getting there by public transport, partially to keep in the spirit of the whole event and partially because if we were paying for parking anyway I’d rather pay for transport and be green about it but I don’t think the four of us could have got there for under about four times what we paid for parking and it would have taken about four times the time too as we can drive there in about 20 minutes.

We learnt from previous years that the free activities get booked up pretty quick so we had a brisk walk round the whole thing and earmarked things to come back to and booked Davies and Scarlett in for a couple of workshops before going round again at a more leisurely pace. We did the usual tree leaf spotting Breathing Places thing where pictures of leaves are stuck around the place and we all got cotton bags. As our main food shop comes home delivery and I send the carriers back with the driver and I am getting better and better at remembering to take cotton bags with me to the shops or carrying things loose if at all possible the cotton bags will come in handy.

Davies and Scarlett took part in an underwater mural painting activity and were among the first to add to it – Scarlett did a couple of rainbow starfish and Davies did a starfish and a shark. When we passed it again later in the day it was looking fabulous with the collaborative works of many children painted brightly all over it – really made you smile to look at it :).

They made seahorse pencil toppers and cuttlefish finger puppets.

We all took part in a taste test of tap water versus bottled water and all four of us could easily tell the difference. Davies was the only one who prefers bottled water although his qualification of his preference was that it was colder rather than it tasting better. We got a teatowel and met Duncan Goodhew who was helping to man the stand with his medal. Ady later got a signed teatowel for Davies from Duncan and took the childrens’ picture with him too. I’ve promised to find them some video footage of just who he is and what he did 🙂

We stopped for our picnic at that point before moving on to the pot making stall. After being given lumps of clay both children confessed to the woman they’d rather make something other than pots which she was very laid back about and showed them some other clay techniques to fit in with what they made instead. Davies made an elephant and Scarlett made a duck, duckling, nest and eggs :). There was a popular sheep shearing demonstration which we have watched there before but having seen a very comprehensive sheep shearing session at Open Farm Sunday last week we skipped that and move to the Sussex Wildlife Trust session they were booked on instead. The meet and greet guide was very friendly and chatty which rather dangerously set the tone for Scarlett who for the rest of the session never quite grasped the put your hand up to speak and only speak about something relevant to what the guide is talking about idea which was of course utterly necessary for managing the group of 10 children but nevertheless something Scarlett would struggle with when completely prepared for it let alone given the idea that the guide wants to chatter about the colour of her dress, what stickers she’s been given and where from and other such trivia :lol:. They were handed spotter sheets and walked a small trail looking for signs of wildlife. It is no criticism of the way it is run but neither is it something I consider a failing or issue for D and S but this deliverance of information is something so alien to them that they never really respond that well to it. Simply having facts shoved at you is something I find hard to process as an adult and that way of talking where you leave gaps in what you’re saying every so often so children can put their hands up to fill in the gaps like a sort of junior Blankety Blank somehow feels really patronising to me, especially when done with a rather blatant disinterest in what the children might have to say. Anyway minirant aside it was good and they saw various skulls of various animals and were told about teeth on skulls giving away information about feeding habits, looked for clues such as droppings, feathers and footprints and finished up with a game where they were blindfolded and had to walk along a string tied round some trees using their other senses to compensate to show them how badgers operate with limited eyesight. They were then given small pieces of card with a sticky strip to attach interesting grasses and flowers to bring home. At the end, despite Scarlett having been a bit of a pain with her yelling out the answers and random anecdotes the leader did come over to chat to us and talk about their family activities and holiday clubs though.

We had time for a brief sit down before heading off again to the other activity Davies and Scarlett were booked in for which was making an underwater sea landscape. This was done in a shoe box with cut out lid and portholes with blue cellophane and was excellent. They used all sorts of materials from clay and chalk and sand to ribbons, raffia and pompoms to make their underwater worlds with loads of information and facts thrown in as they went along. I was asked on several of the activities if the many photos taken of Davies and Scarlett doing things would be ok to be used either by the people running the activities or on one occassion a freelance photographer so will have to watch out in any coverage of the event for their pics :).

Ady popped the shoeboxes back to the car and the children and I had ice lollies then we had a final walk round handing in spotter sheets, collecting clay and lastly watching the tail end of a bird of prey talk. We were home too late for the children to join us for roast dinner (wouldn’t have been cooked in time) and it was too hot for roast dinners anyway so I cooked the gammon in ham as planned and Ady and I had it later with jacket potatoes instead while the children voted for pancakes for their tea. They had a bath and I read a pile of books to them before they went to bed.

Another busy week about to start and then this time next week we’ll hopefully be off on holiday :).

I worked this morning, my Saturdays have been jiggled about for the next few months as we are short staffed due to a couple of vacancies on my Saturday off and it is mainly staffed by relief workers so they wanted a ‘second in command’ type person to be around for the morning and to cover lunches – and asked me! 🙂 Due to being on leave and having a couple of weekend things booked (like Kelmarsh) it wasn’t a straight swap though so I think I am on a sort of two on, two off type arrangement.

It was uneventful anyway, I spent two hours on the enquiry desk where I was shamed by a small girl (couldn’t have been more than 8) who spelt out ‘tutankhamen’ for me when neither I not her parents could spell it 😳 She’d been learning about it at school but I was still very impressed :). I then spent an hour piddling about doing things like clearing out my work in tray and throwing away loads of out of date paperwork from one of the folders I have have taken over dealing with (faulty cds and dvds) as someone has left. Finally I spent my last hour on the counter doing yet more sorting out type stuff. I like the way Yvonne runs the library at Lancing, she works in a similar way to me and we were talking yesterday about how she made lots of changes when she took over as supervisor.

I came home and we had lunch. Ady and the children had been in the garden most of the morning and Ady had made some bread rolls (that I’d meant for Davies and Scarlett to make actually but never mind :rolls:) – it’s the third morning out of four he’s spent with them alone and it’s interesting to observe the change in patience levels when it is the norm rather than a novelty… 😉

We went off to Beach Dreams which is the annual Shoreham (neighbouring town) festival and part of the Adur Festival. It was the tenth one and somehow the first we’ve ever made it along to. There wasn’t much going on to interest us really, it was mostly stalls selling things, beer tent and a very loud drumming session, although I think we’d missed lots of earlier stuff happening. So we walked along the houseboats instead, a couple of which were open displaying artwork. The houseboats at Shoreham have been there for years and always formed part of the landscape from my childhood when I spent time in Shoreham as my Granny lived and had a shop there but I’ve never walked along so close to them let alone been onboard. Do click the link as they are fascinating and a real interesting way of life with some amazing work gone into their construction. Some of them contain things like half a car, a washing machine and so on in their structure and one has a microwave as it’s mailbox. Inside the couple we went on was equally quirky and interesting – both had pianos in them, wooden flooring, bright colours, interesting shaped space and a real cosy feel to them. Shoreham Beach altogether has a real community feel and the boats are an extension of that with most of them having connecting planks between neighbouring boats.

We left there and popped to Tescos to get stuff for dinner and look for shorts for Davies who doesn’t have any and has finally grown out of most of his trousers too. They had nothing so we went over to Asda instead. This was slightly hellish – packed with people and as we were with Ady who’s shopping style never goes much past browsing level we were doing lots of aimless wandering with the children dozily just missing being bashed by people’s trolleys until I took charge and marched round, child on each hand while Ady trailed behind me with the basket.

Home for their tea of lincolnshire sausages as enjoyed at Ardingly and requested each night since. They both went out to play with the chickens until Davies came in for Doctor Who. Scarlett was dragging out coming back inside despite having been asked a couple of times and then I suddenly heard a dreadful shriek and looked out of the window to see her looking horrified. Ady went out and she had run (her default setting) and either trodden on or skimmed over one of the chicks who was badly hurt. Ady dealt with the chick while I dealt with Scarlett who was very shaken, utterly horrified and in a bit of a state. I calmed her down, assured her it was an accident and although it doesn’t make bad things get better or make you feel any better there is no blame to be placed in accidents. Ady thinks the chick will be ok – it’s inside for the night in a crate but does seem perky enough despite a fairly nasty head injury. I guess if it lasts the night the signs are good for it. I have been telling Scarlett not to run near the chicks since we had the first hatchlings last year though so maybe sometimes things need to be that illustrated for her before they finally sink in. Hopefully there will be no lasting consequences and she’ll have finally learnt her lesson.

Davies and I watched Doctor Who and Doctor Who Confidential while Ady read Scarlett some stories in bed. She’s had a bad week really as she’s been playing up and I’ve been coming down hard on her which has resulted in a couple of nights unbroken sleep with nightmares anyway so I anticipate her waking again tonight. When I say I am coming down hard I am just applying zero tolerance to things I might normally let slide but I’m still not using punishments etc. She is just being told very firmly once or twice and then I am either shouting or changing my tone of voice with her. I’m sitting with her and explaining everything afterwards and she is fine but she tends to do quick recovery from upsets in the day and then obviously dwell on them in her sleep – she’s always been the same.

I have RSI on my wrist from holding the DS and I am still not passed Day 29 on Dolphin Island. I have possibly spent more time rearing the sealife this week than my own children but I can’t put it down! 😆