One word? When seven would do…

We had a plan this morning to be up earlyish and get to the allotment before it got too hot up there. Ady woke me with a cup of tea at about 930am so that blew that idea, until I got downstairs all ready to go in my old jeans and he told me he’d already been 🙂 He’d woken early so gone up there before anyone was up and done it all :). Have I mentioned he is lovely? 🙂

So that put us at a bit of a loose end and after discussions we decided to drive up to Truleigh Hill – much talked about this week in respect of Christmas Camp – and go for a walk around that area. I guess we got there about 1130am and despite plans for a short walk we didn’t get back to the car til after 2pm.

We paused at a bench to admire the view and have some food and drink and Davies and I spotted a fox shoot across the path infront of two horses which looked so odd during broad daylight. We saw loads of buzzards, a lapwing and a cuckoo too.

We then walked downhill for a while, knowing we would therefore have to walk uphill again. We were going through a field with access rights but didn’t want to take the logical footpath so carried on up what looked to be a well trodden path which took us past a really cool tree that was almost entirely hollow for most of the trunk.


The path sort of ran out but we were already far enough into the field to decide to carry on. We knew there were cows thanks to all the cow pats but no sign of them. We found the bottom of the field with no gate and realised we’d need to either retrace our steps or walk along the other fence to see if there was a gate so decided to carry on parallel with the open of crossing the field again later. In the end we nipped over the fence in a dip which made it easy to cross and took us onto a path. It didn’t seem to be a proper footpath though and took us through the middle of a huge herd of cows on both side of the fence (the field we were in and the one next to it). Aside from a couple of frisky calves they were utterly unconcerned with us but did make us think this wouldn’t be the right field to take Marcus, Michelle and Chloe on a nice countryside walk through 😉 😆

The heat and all the up and down-hilling of it had us all flagging rather by the end and grateful to get back to the shady car. We stopped at Shoreham on the way home for me to get a couple of bits for dinner today and a picnic tomorrow and then came home.

I made ham in coke along with various vegetables including our own broad beans from the allotment, which I didn’t eat myself and the kids were less keen on cooked (they like to eat them raw from the pod) but Ady told me were lovely. While it was cooking Davies DS’d (Ady got him Night at the Museum 2 and he was enjoying exploring that), Ady and Scarlett did various outsidey things including playing with the chickens and planting some stuff.

We had dinner and talked about various things including What We’ve Learnt Today (we forgot yesterday) – Scarlett had learnt it was the 150th anniversary of Big Ben starting to keep time, Ady learnt that the world record for the most tomatoes off one plant in a season was 10,000 fruits, Davies learnt the word and purpose of stillages and I’ve learnt a bit about the theory of cellular memory in organ donation cases. My learning led to all sorts of discussion including the term ‘anecotal’, the types of evidence you could cite in things, organ donation generally and how we all felt about it.

I was intending to cycle to the allotment to do the watering but everyone wanted to come and it was such a nice evening I decided the midday trek would be sufficient exercise for it not to matter if I didn’t bike and so we drove up and watered.

Back home the kids had showers and then a chapter of George before bed and I’m about to check train times for the morning and head for bed myself.

I worked this morning. I was fairly quiet and low key.There’s been a job swap of all the little tasks we take responsibility for so I get to learn a few new things over the next few weeks which is always nice. I had a bit of training today on the overdue procedures and I’m at a training session on Wednesday instead of at work to learn about the new system that’s being put in over the next few months too.

I got home at lunchtime to find the others in the garden. They had had a productive morning taking the drum out of our old washing machine. We’re going to take it to the allotment to burn rubbish and it will also be a firebasket for camping too. Apparently it was quite a task and took longer than Ady had expected.

They’d also done some drawing in the garden using the easel, Scarlett had built a hive for solitary bees, Davies had built a ‘spaceship’ and they’d been soaking a sponge bit in sugar water to set up a butterfly house Ady brought home. His work is selling various (very expensive) wildlife homes so he brought home one of each to set up here at home to test and take some photos and give feedback on.

We took the washing machine to the tip – it’d had 10 years service, moved to Manchester and back, washed all the baby clothes and finally sat in the garage for a good six months. I like the idea it will live on in our campfires :).

Ady had spotted a tent and camping show set up at a farm place a few miles away during the week and we are on the look out for a porch / canopy so thought we’d got and have a look at that as a lot of the tents there are Outwells. We didn’t get a porch but we did get a couple of other bargains. First of all a windbreak – this one but in blue I think for half price at £20. We’ve been wanting a decent one and this looks really good. My other want for camping this year was a decent set of pans. We’ve previously ‘invested’ in a cheap set of supermarket saucepans each year and just chucked them away at the end of the season but they are not practical when we’re trying to fit lots of things in and it’s a false economy really. I really liked a Coleman set http://www.amazon.co.uk/Coleman-Family-Cook-Set/dp/B000MRBMAI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=sports&qid=1243725259&sr=8-1 although they were selling them for £25 and we were debating them and then realised they had a special offer of buy a stove and get the pan set free. We do have a perfectly good stove that Chris (Ady’s brother) long term lent us but it is quite heavy and big so we decided to go for the deal and got the stove and pans for £40. So still no canopy but we’re pleased with those additions to our camping stuff. 🙂

We had a quick look round the farm shop (you pay to go in to the animals bit and we refuse to do that) including chatting with the bloke in the chicken feed shop who was really chatty until we said it was bantams we had rather than chickens at which point he got all snooty and said ‘oh bantams are just toys, just playing with chicken-keeping!’ 😆 so that told us then ;). The kids are interested in the idea of resucing some ex-battery hens so we might think about that although I’m a bit reluctant to run the risk of introducing disease to our gaggle.

We left there and went to the allotment via Tescos for a length of hose and McDonalds for some tea for the kids. Ady tried on some shoes in Tesco which had me crying with laughter (loudly and hysterically enough for people to avoid the aisle we were in) as they were just so funny. Made of this really thin brown material that was like paper or cardboard and took on every contour of his feet. They had sort of pointy toes and looked so funny on him it tickled me for ages. 😆

At the allotment we just did a really good watering job and are planning to return there tomorrow for a bit more tidying up.

We peaked early with our what we’d learnt today so consequently I’ve forgotten everyones and will have to add it to tomorrows :). We had one chapter of George and the children were really late to bed. All that galllivanting and unaccustomed to (these days) spending money has quite worn me out!

I woke up just after 8am this morning and considered and intended getting up but must have fallen asleep again as next thing I knew it was 830am and the doorbell was ringing. I ran downstairs, pulling on a dressing gown which I must have removed at the same time as a nightie last time I wore it as a nightie was trailing out of one sleeve, half blind without contact lenses and Davies was peering at the front door hissing ‘I think it’s Grandad!’ so he let him in and I went back upstairs to get dressed. 😆

We had a nice hour or so with Dad while the kids ate their breakfast and then he headed off one way and we headed off the other to visit Ali and Freya – and J too as it turned out :).

We’ve not seen them for quite a while so it was really nice :). Freya ran out to meet us and the kids went off straight away to Freya’s room. Scarlett reappeared but was in the main happy enough to play with the kittens and leave Davies and Freya to it (they were playing a W&G computer game on Freya’s laptop). Considering we were there for over 5 hours and she spent well over half of that entertaining herself I thought she did well really.

Didn’t excuse her carpet art but we’ll leave that as it’s been dealt with now ;).

Ali and I enjoyed some nice chatting including working our way through a list of Things We Should Remember To Talk About that I’d mentally compiled and Ali added to. Very theraputic :). J came home for lunch so he was about for a while. We all moved outside towards the end and the children all played together, something to do with George’s Secret Key. I did some knitting which was nice, I like knitting in the sunshine chatting to friends :).

We had a super quick drive home – half term does seem to mean less rush hour traffic, which was good as we’d been rubbish at leaving promptly so I was expecting to hit all the traffic. Ady was already home and the kids did something in the garden with him while I got their tea sorted. Our food shopping arrived so we were all taken up with putting that away and then it was storytime.

Ady had printed off the LSO booklet so I read some of that to Davies and Scarlett and we practised body percussion (clapping, finger clicking, thigh slapping and stamping) which was fun but we drew a bit of a blank at learning the song as I can’t read the tune to teach it to them. We got the toy keyboard out but it has 3 octaves all of which are squeaky and I just can’t remember enough about reading music to play it at the right speed which I found very frustrating. I can’t particularly say I regret not learning to play an instrument as a child and indeed I did learn recorder and piano for a few years but I do wish I could play now, especially this weekend at J&Js and again tonight when it would have been good to be able to sing the song or pick it out on a piano to teach the kids. I did find a ‘learn to play the keyboard’ book in our book stash but I think that’s a bit ambitious in a weekend 😆 I did impress the kids by being able to pick out a Katy Perry tune or two for them though so I’m not totally musically untalented 😆 😆

We had a couple of chapters of George and then what we’ve learnt today:
Ady learnt that it was the 65th D day anniversary which he sort of knew but surprised him.
I learnt the Mona Lisa has no eyebrows (but further investigation suggests that she probably did to start with and along with her eyelashes they were lost either in da Vinci’s own titivating with the work or some over zealous cleaning over the years).
Davies learnt how to google 🙂 I’ve never really shown him but watching Freya he picked up enough to come home and show me including using the drop down suggestion-y bit. I’ve said he can use the old laptop and I’ll set him up with an email address so I must sort that out over the weekend.
Scarlett learnt about how earthquakes and volcanoes happen as she was reading one of those little Usborne Science books at bedtime and brought it to me to ask a few questions about the pictures. I notice she is beginning to recognise sounds of letters at the start of words to try and decode them too and with minimal help she worked out the word ‘diamond’ by telling me the sounds for each letter.

I worked this morning. It was really busy as being closed for Monday seems to make everything back up and remain chaotic through the week. I guess in terms of deliveries and reservations and things there probably is 6 days work to get through in 5 on a bank holiday week there. It was my all day to work day but thanks to getting pro rata bank holiday time off I only had to work til 130pm rather than 5pm.

Mum was here looking after Davies and Scarlett and I’d already said we’d do something with her in the afternoon so I suggested we go and visit my Granny (Mum’s mum) who we’re long overdue seeing and we went round there for a couple of hours.

She was really pleased to see us and we had the added bonus of my Uncle Tony being there too. Granny’s bungalow is built in what used to be grounds of Tony’s house although it’s all been changed on land registry etc and they have their own seperate gardens now. He lives for 6 months of the year in Thailand where he has a home and girlfriend but no visa for permanent residency and then back here for the other 6 months before going back to Thailand again. He’s been doing it for years having had a really shitty few years when my Aunt Elaine who he’d been with for years and years since they were teens died aged 40 of breast cancer. My cousin Dan, who is a year younger than me was only about 14 and Tony married again really quickly to a woman and they had a son, Jack. The marriage didn’t last and she now lives in Australia with a new husband (and Jack) while Dan lives in Tony’s house here and Tony comes back to when he is in the UK.

Tony and Elaine were real hippies and spent lots of time travelling. I used to really envy Dan his upbringing when we were kids and he was allowed to call his parents by their first names rather than Mum and Dad, get away with all sorts of high jinks and just have a much more relaxed upbringing. Elaine was lovely and always used to buy me the *best* presents for Christmas and birthday, which would usually be messy or inappropriate (eg plaster of paris model kits or make up) and end up being confiscated by my Mum fairly quickly 😆 I wish I’d known Elaine better really and often think we’d have quite a bit in common now and she would definitely have fully approved of Home Ed.

I think Tony has only seen Davies once when we was just about crawling and never met Scarlett so it must have been odd to be presented with two full size proper children for him :). He is a lot like Frazer (which given Frazer is a lot like Mum I suppose is no surprise) and Davies and Scarlett were instantly comfortable with him, asked to see his house and garden and got taken off next door for a look round. They stayed with him for ages helping him with some gardening he was doing and only came back to ask if they could go to the tip with him, a request I had to refuse for car seat reasons.

Granny presented the kids with their easter eggs (we’d not seen her over Easter due to us all being so ill) and there was a packet of mini eggs in there that she foolishly suggested she would have hidden round the garden if she’d known we were coming so they hid their eyes and told her to do it then! 😆 She did and they enjoyed finding them.

It was time to leave and we have very little food as the main shop is coming tomorrow and it was getting late so I stopped at the chip shop for the kids to get fish and chips for tea. I sent them in with the money but they came back five minutes later to say they were being ignored in the queue which was a shame 🙁 I suspect they probably didn’t stand very still in the queue and weren’t very assertive when it came to giving their order. So I went in with them and got it.

When we got home Ady was already here, Mum (who had left her car here) said goodbye and left and the kids cleaned up the whole load of fish and chips :).

Davies tells me he learnt some football tricks from Tony today, Scarlett learnt she has a Great Uncle Tony and he is cool, Ady learnt that 8 fruit trees make an orchard, I learnt from looking at some photos of myself that I need to get some better fitting bras and that you should soak runner beans before you plant them.

Scarlett went to bed rather than listen to stories (I refused to let her carry on playing with toys sitting on the floor while I read) although she stayed quiet enough in her room to hear it anyway.

We have my old laptop out at the moment as we’re using it to download music from a site Ady got a free subscription to with his new phone and it has a big memory but the screensaver is set to randomly pick photos so it’s like a digital photoframe and I’ve spent the last couple of nights getting really distracted by all these old pictures from my 30th birthday onwards. Loads of Manchester, various camps including the 2 Melroses we went to, the first 2 Kessinglands and the Hesfes we atteneded, Hunstanton and the Halloween Helmsley, our Halloween party, trips to Ireland, Centerparcs and other weekends away aswell as just loads of pictures of Davies and Scarlett looking so small and cute :).

I’d booked Davies and Scarlett into a Pulborough Brooks event this morning called ‘Hiss, slither, hop and croak’ about reptiles and amphibians. I wasn’t sure if it was a staying with them or a kids only one as I booked it ages ago but they were whisked away while I was completing one of those ‘I give you full responsibility to do whatever you want with my precious babies and promise not to sue you if you only give me one or part of one both back at the end of it’ forms.

This was not ideal as it didn’t give me time to a) get their coats from the car and give them to them or b)negotiate not staying on the premises for the full 2 hours. If the weather had been okay I’d have walked round the reserve but it was bucketing down and would have simply been an exercise in stamina and misery. Having said I’d stay around I felt duty bound to do so ‘just in case’ so took myself and the book I’d thought to grab at the last minute to the cafe and lingered over a pot of tea for one, alternating between my book and eavesdropping on all the elderly folk taking morning tea in the cafe – I was the youngest in there by at least 2 generations, if not 3!

I had stuffed the kids’ coats outside the classroom where they were, well Scarlett’s coat, I couldn’t find Davies’ so had shoved my raincoat there on the basis it would be super waterproof by reaching to his ankles, being able to be folded double back to his shoulders on the sleeves and suitable for accomodating at least 3 more children inside 😆 except they had ignored them when they ventured outside to do pond dipping and were standing forlornly, the only un-coat-clad children there fishing newts and frogs out of the pond.I spied them through the window and dashed over to put their coats on them just as one of the volunteers was coming with a couple of skanky lost property coats which Davies was already flatly refusing to have anywhere near him 😆 Having secured my reputation as SlackMom I went back to the cafe and rebelliously ordered another pot of tea and toasted teacake 😆 It might not quite be splashing the child benefit on cheap fags and cooking sherry while my kids go barefoot and coatless but it was close!

I sat outside the classroom for the last 10 minutes when I could no longer nurse my empty cup in the cafe while people queued for tables for lunch and I had exhausted browsing opportunities in the shop of tea towels with robins on, fancy handcream and those soft toy birds that you squash the tummies of so they play birdsong. It all sounded very rowdy in there as the teacher woman attempted to do some sort of round up quiz with them while battling with noisy kids and saying things to them like ‘come on, you need to finish this before you go!’. As the other parents joined me they were also listening in and commenting that it was a bit too classroom-y for kids who are supposed to be on half term holidays and that it seemed pitched a bit high for the age group of 6+. The teacher did look very harrassed when we went in to collect them.

Davies and Scarlett said they’d really enjoyed most of it although they knew quite a lot of the stuff that was covered and said they’d got really fed up with everyone not listening and being noisy. I rather suspect this was a bit of a fabrication as I don’t imagine they were being perfect angels but I did tell them that the bit I’d overheard had been exactly as I remember school being which rather shocked them. Scarlett commented that she’d been surprised that most of the children didnt’ actually seem to want to be there which I guess is different to their usual weekend and evening sessions in places where the children are there because it’s something they enjoy and I wonder if this morning’s session was rather more like holiday childcare in a lot of cases.

Davies said he’d read the quiz, Scarlett said she had no idea what it was so had just checked random answers (it was mulitple choice) although she said Davies had showed her which some of the answers were. We then talked about ways of working out words even if you can’t read them yet by clues of the sounds at beginnings and ends of words which she proved surprisingly good at. We had a very interesting discussion about exactly how the sperm gets to the egg when human babies are created which I kept factual but honest. I imagine we’ll be coming back to that one again and indeed we talked about it again later as I explained that I think that is the sort of information children should learn from their parents rather than other children and that I thought maybe they shouldn’t discuss it with other children incase they didn’t already know. Scarlett demonstrated she had the idea by asking ‘so is a penis like a cannon and the sperm like a cannonball shooting out then?’ which I sincerely hope she doesn’t repeat anywhere else!!!!

We also talked about different parenting styles, what is and isn’t okay from parents to children and vice versa, which other parents they know they think they wouldn’t mind living with and loads of other interesting chats like that. Davies told me he thinks we have our most interesting conversations in the car :).

Davies had an underwear shortage and I decided we should invest in new pacamac style waterproof jackets for them both so we stopped in Littlehampton on the way home. As we got out of the car Davies said ‘but our macs are here’ and reached into the seat pockets to pull them both out – meaning none of my earlier embarrassment had been necessary! We got pants for Davies, a couple of nighties for Scarlett and called into a wool shop where they had loads of 50p bags of ends of balls and balls that had lost their labels so I got enough to finish my scraps blanket hopefully :).

Back home Scarlett got out loads of toys, scattered them about and then got distracted by the tv so had to put them all away again, unplayed with at teatime. She did sit with me for ages all snuggled up too which was nice :). Davies watched some cbbc stuff including Prank Patrol which he adores.

They had tea, Ady came home and we all had to list two things we’d learnt today that we didn’t know when we woke up. Davies’ were that he has learnt that different people see different sides to others or that we bring out different things in people and that toads lay their spawn in a string unlike frogs who lay theirs in a clump. Scarlett said she’d learnt about how sperm meet eggs and how to spell ‘Davies’ (we were writing on the misted up car windows earlier and I challenged them to spell each other’s names). Mine were learning that there is a third snake in the UK aswell as grass snakes and adders called a smooth snake which the kids told me about from this morning and that Truleigh Hill is free for Christmas camp and Ady’s were work related, I know one was to do with excel. The kids really liked that idea and want to do it every evening before stories :).

We read a couple of chapters of George but got distracted by the chickens having a face off with a big fat rat. We watched out of the window as they sort of circled each other and the rat did jump at one of the hens but she held her own and the others all gathered round and saw the rat off. Go chickens!

I watched The Apprentice, Davies lingered even longer than usual over bedtime and insisted I go up to his room when he appeared at about 11pm to show me his exceptionally tidied up bedroom which does look great but I’d rather he did during daylight hours! :rolls:

I don’t want to jinx it but we’re definitely having a better week this week :).

I intended a good long lie in this moring but was woken by Scarlett shouting at Davies and Davies coming uptairs crying about it. He was justifiably upset as she was accusing him of something he hadn’t done but crying seemed rather extreme I thought. I decided to get up and deal with it rather than attempting to sleep and gettng fed up with the noise and was proud of myself for my measured and mature response which seemed to set the tone of the day really. We were all tired and rather intolerant but with careful calmness we managed to not fall out with each other at all for the rest of the day. Hopefully last weeks blip is over with.

It was pouring with rain so once everyone was dressed and breakfasted we decided to have a quiet day at home catching up with ourselves. I wrote myself a slightly ambitious job list but have actually ploughed through it today. It included chasing up all those promised I made to people to set up visiting over the weekend with emails detailing when we are free, getting our English Heritage membership forms sent off, emailing the local council to ask if we can borrow litter picker uppers (and hopefully gloves and rubbish bags too) for the kids litter collection alleyway walk for their WAA which I’d quite like to get done this half term before the summer holidays start, an online food shop for the month and finding out if Helmsley is free for Christmas camp. It also included laundry and thanks to the rain clearing up and the sun coming out I achieved that too :). I also got an unexpected but very nice facebook message from someone localish asking to arrange to meet up which I’ve responded to -loving all this socialisation ;).

Davies watched Meet the Robinsons several times and showed me two music videos which are on the dvd extras and also put on a bit of Indiana Jones he’d been telling me about and wanted me to see which he thinks is really funny. It’s interesting how his sense of humour is developing and he’s getting sarcasm, double meanings and visual or more sophisticated gags now. He asked me some questions about colour blindness that I couldn’t answer so we looked up some more information about that and are all now more informed about colour blindness than we were this time yesterday.

Scarlett asked me several unrelated questions that we had to look up information on or talk about further.One was about adoption (which was Meet the Robinsons inspired) so we chatted about that and the reasons a child might be adopted. They are both quite interested in the notion of children being the legal responsibility of an adult at the moment and had been asking at both the opticians and dentists why I had to sign forms on their behalf which has lead to interesting conversations about accountability, who is the boss of who and more. Yesterday at the motorway services they wanted to know why under 18s couldn’t gamble when we walked past some fruit machines which is all sort of related stuff.

Scarlett also, seemingly apropos of nothing but clearly inspired by something wanted to know about tattoo removal so we looked online for details of different options and found a video clip of someone having a tattoo done which we all watched. We talked about the reasons someone would want a tattoo removed and some more extreme methods such as limb removal 😆

Both kids did some drawing; Davies paused the dvd player on a scene with a spaceship and made a 3d model of it with some cardboard which he coloured in and fixed together with sellotape. Scarlett spent some time painting my toenails again and had intentions of doing a jigsaw with me but neither of us managed to be free at the same time so it ended up being put away again.

I made pancakes for lunch which went down very well and a sort of mini roast chicken dinner for them later as it’s been *weeks* since we’ve had a roast dinner due to being busy every weekend so missing our usual Sunday roasts.

Ady came home and I went over to my parents to return the battery charger and leads. Davies was in the garden with Ady as they’ve done a radish trial for Which? Gardening which involved planting 2 varieties then comparing them. There is a clear winner so they were pulling them, washing them off and photographing and measuring them to fill in the paperwork. Scarlett came to my parents with me and on the way home sat in the front and helped me change gear.

We had another couple of chapters of George before the kids bedtime and I cooked tacos and fahitas for our dinner. Davies came downstairs and was in the kitchen with me saying ‘this is just like Cooking Mama’ as I chopped the onion up 😆

Saturday In theory we were all getting up at 7am and leaving the house by 8am. In practise some of us were up at 7am, the rest were up by 8am and we left the house at 9.18am 😆

We had an okay run up although there were several slow bits on both the M25 and the M1 and we drove through all sorts of weather but as we were flatly refusing to believe it ever does anything other than wind and rain and Yorkshire it didn’t matter too much anyway 😆

We arrived around 2ish, thankfully in terms of bladder strength I am the weakest of the four of us and 5 hours in a car is within my safe zone so we didn’t need to stop for anything.

I think we were about halfway in the arrivals – Sarah, Babs and Katy were already there and Jax and co had arrived and gone again leaving Big behind. We had tea, hugs and my personal favourite greeting of all from Rachael Raine ‘Hello, Scarlett’s Mummy’, to which I could only reply ‘Hello, Barbara’s daughter’. 😆

I got distracted by the piles of clothes in Jan’s ‘not bring and not buy sale’ and started to fold while I browsed, which turned into putting in age bracketed piles (ish).There was a walk which I’d have gone on but didn’t want to abandon the piles so Ady and the kids went while I finished that and had a nice chat with Big and with Kirsty and James when they arrived.

The others had a nice walk with the requisite getting wet opportunities. Scarlett particularly enjoyed spending some time walking with Anna and looking at rocks with her 🙂

When they all got back we went and put our tent up. It’s the tent we bought last year with intentions of using in various places during August but as it rained for the whole week we ended up leaving the tent in the car and staying in people’s houses instead. It was a cheap tent to start with (£44) and we got it reduced even further to just £12 so I didn’t have huge expectations of it really but it actually was perfect.
I think it could do with a couple more guys so will get that sorted for next time and I doubt very much it would stand up to any sort of bad weather but as it is really just a weekend tent for use in people’s gardens or quickly sticking up for overnights and those are occassions when we will only be camping in good weather anyway I think it’s perfect. It has a small porch which we’ll get a groundsheet for next time so we can store clothes etc. in it and a large sleeping bit which took our two double mats side by side so the four of us slept together with plenty of space.

All set up we headed back to the house where it was declared wine o’clock (no idea what the actual time was by then, most of the weekend was sunshine o’clock, tent o’clock, cake o’clock or walk o’clock really) and we kicked off with some kir royales. The kids sort of wandered in and out all being fairly self sufficient. The theme of the evening was different styles of Ros, like Barbie which latterly moved onto alliterative styles of Ros. You probably had to be there though…. 😉

The last of us straggled down to the field about 130am and I read for a while and then managed to fall straight to sleep, which is very unusual for first night camping.

Sunday morning I woke really early (as I suspect most of the other campers did) as Scarlett had a dry cough that she was struggling with. I sat up with her awhile and then as she fell back asleep sprawled across my space and I was both too hot and thirsty I decided to get up and get a drink. I used the bathroom and got dressed but after Roxy and I spent a very long time looking at each other through the square window on the kitchen door with me eventually deciding that I could wait for a cup of tea 😆 My plan of a cup of tea and a read of my book didn’t happen as more people got up so I had the even more pleasant experience of sitting lined up along the wall drinking tea with friends long before 7am 🙂

More adults and eventually some children joined us and the sun reached the lawn so we got chairs out and formed a circle to sit in. I had a shower (thanks for towel and shampoo Ros :)) and aside from a pants related issue (as in the bag containing clean pairs had gone missing) all was well with the world :). We sat and chatted all morning, with it feeling like Pimms o’clock by about 1030am thanks to having all been up so early and it felt like those lovely couple of Kessinglands we had a few years ago where we all sat in a circle in the sunshine. Just blissful :).

We went inside for the cabaret which included Catie both singing and cornet playing, Anna singing and playing piano (unlike Catie’s instrument of choice this was possible to do simulatneously), Abbie playing the flute, Davies telling a joke and when he couldn’t think of another one doing a roly-poly for us instead :lol:and an impromptu performance from Roxy and a joke from Alex.

It was then Pimms o’clock so I mixed up the first jug of that, Ady found a new and dramatic way of cleaning a kitchen floor (dropping a bottle of beer on it so that fizzy beer and broken glass scatter everywhere). We had a quick drink and then some of us headed off for a walk / geocache. Scarlett stayed behind to be with Alex who seemed very unhampered by her pot but not able to long walks. Davies and I went along.

Halfway up the hill we spotted the sort of undergrowth that adders love to lay on and bask in the sun so Davies, Marcus and I went over to have a look. If there had been any I guess we’d all made enough noise to scare them off though. James waited for us to catch up and the four of us lagged behind meaning we missed the actual finding of the cache.

We decided to walk on to find a second cache at the cock crowing stone which was where Jan’s recently blogged sunrise service was held. Davies was struggling a bit with the uphillness of it all as he was very blocked up (assume it’s hayfever as both kids are pretty snotty with no real other symptoms although Tarly still has a nighttime cough) and was tired from a late night and too hot sunshine.

The view from the top was amazing and we all paused awhile to enjoy it

some of us from an even higher vantage point than others 😉

before heading back down the hill again. The kids (and some of us grown ups) played the waving at cars game to see how many waved back. The kids dubbed them ‘sweet’ or ‘sour’ accordingly. We had a few non-responders or scowlers but plenty of wavers and a couple of beeps too :).

I managed to perform my trademark turning an ankle and falling over trick which held out thanks to a couple of icepacks back at the house and although a bit swollen still isn’t too painful. Davies walked much of the way downhill with the group but slowly lagged behind again and eventually he and I gave up on walking with the group. He told me that he loves walking but he also loves looking and doesn’t see the point in just walking to get somewhere without seeing all the amazing things around him. I guess he has a pretty good point, especially when you are somewhere as beautiful as we were so we walked back at Davies-pace and saw loads of lovely things and chatted as we went :).

Back at the house we had lunch, did some more chatting, drank some more pimms and then went for a walk to the stream. I wasn’t going to go but Davies, Scarlett and Ady all decided to so I was persuaded to wander down too. Scarlett had managed to lose her shoes which we didn’t find until much later (when I offered cash incentives to small children they were found fairly quickly) so she went barefoot. I wished I’d have done the same really as it was quite boggy in places and put me in mind of Kessingland 😆

The kids had a whale of a time assortedly paddling, splashing and swimming in the stream. Just what kids should be doing 🙂
I really liked this pic of Ady’s which could have been taken any time in the last 100 years 🙂

Once everyone was suitable muddy, shivery and had absorbed sufficient levels of stream we headed back up again to shower them off.

More sitting around chatting / playing and some food later it started to finally get a little cooler and after about 14 hours sitting outside in the sunshine it was finally time to come inside. The children persisted a little longer and a game of writing notes on post-its to affix to each other ensued. Scarlett seemed unfazed by the whole business but Davies got upset when he wrote ‘kiss me’ on one which he said was for Ady and it got thrown on the roof. Ady retrieved it and when it became clear Davies wasn’t going to get anything but upset over the whole idea of the game he spirited him off for a walk and some Daddy time. They had a great walk watching the sunset paint the sky and saw several bats.

Ady got a couple of nice pics of Davies, Marcus and Ben together


which nicely match the ones from earlier of Davies, Ben and Adam
and all of the boys together in the sandpit

There was a board game bonanza happening in the lounge until it became bedtime for the children and the final selection of cakes and crisps came out.

It was a very nice last evening with people gradually drifting off until it was suddenly 3am and there was only Ros, Jonathan and I left. I suspect I could have happily sat all night chatting but mindful of having been up for many hours and the tedious journey ahead the next day we called it a night and Ros and I headed for the tents.

Monday Dawned another lovely day.I slept in rather longer than the day before and packed up some of the contents of the tent before heading up to the house. Ady packed the rest up and loaded the car and we did the tent together. Much easier process when you have a smaller tent and no kitchen area to pack up :).

We’d planned to leave after lunch but locust-stylee we’d stripped the house of food and the kids were rather more subdued, especially once Alex and Marcus left, so as we were packed and our car was one of first out level of parking we decided to make a dent in the journey before stopping for lunch instead.

It was a very clear run back, under 5 hours even with a stop for lunch (KFC at Leicester services). Davies watched back to back Indiana Jones and Meet the Robinsons which he’d asked me to get from the library for him and has now seen about 12 times 😆 Scarlett was a bit complainy as she’d managed to forget to bring her DS. She didn’t miss it during the weekend but did wish she’d had it for the journey home again. She perked and when we put some music on though and was soon happily singing along to Love Cats which is her current favourite song.

We got home about 530pm and the kids had a bath while we emptied the car and put stuff away. Ady went to move my car to put the wheelie bins out and discovered I’d left the radio on and the battery was dead. While Davies and Scarlett had some tea I nipped over to my parents to collect their jump leads and battery charger, jumped it off Ady’s car and then put the battery on charge. Dad’s battery charger is older than me and I wasn’t at all sure it was actually charging but it started fine this morning when I took it off charge so I assume it is the gauge that is broken rather than the charger.

Somehow despite being home earlyish we still managed to not be eating dinner until 1030pm as I read a couple of chapters of which I’d got them to buy in at work and had arrived last week just in time for us to finish the Humphrey book we’d been reading. We had baths and a lovely curry (with still no bhajees as we had no onions. Really cross that I checked the freezer contents before doing an online shop today and found a whole container full of ones we’d frozen though so we could have brought them to the party after all! Grrr) and I had intended blogging and flickring but found myself sitting in the dark (the lounge lights are on timers from us being away) slumped over my laptop that had shutdown at 130am having fallen asleep on the sofa at some point before I managed it! 😆

Thank you to Jan and Jonathan for a truly fantastic weekend. We really missed absent friends but had an amazing time with those who were there, the wonderful weather and the stunning landscape. 🙂

Just wanted to get some dates written down of various things so people can express interest if they want to:

July 4th – 11th camping at Shell Island. you can’t book and if the weather was to be dreadful we might change our minds 😉
We’re planning to take in CAT while we’re there but I don’t think there’ll be enough of us to make a group booking although I will contact them in advance to check if we can get better prices or any additional stuff.

5th- 12th (ish – that’s Saturday to Saturday, might not do the first weekend and start from the Monday instead) at http://www.sustainability-centre.org/index.html and will do a day trip to Butser during that week sometime.

30th November – 4th December Helmsley for Christmas Camp. I’ve contacted YHA today to check price and availability so will post that up as soon as I know. I think we’re edging towards already full on that from initial interest but will need 25% deposits asap once I know prices so we can get it booked. LovelyEm has said she’ll coordinate monies again.

I’m debating parties for D and S again after a break last year, except both of their birthdays fall at the weekend end of a camp (D’s September and S’s December so wondering about small celebrations at camp and maybe a bigger party inbetween – Halloween maybe?

Off to work for me today.I had a really good day which was a nice end to what has been a shaky week. I wouldn’t normally be so full of myself but I’ve had some crappy moments this week so I’m going to copy out some of the comments I was given on my personal development review sheet which I had back this morning. In all of the targets I was set last year I have been given an ‘exceeded’ mark (failed, met, exceeded being the available options). In the ‘managers comments on overall assessment’ box I got the following:
Nicola has exceeded all of her targets, which considering she only works 11 hours a week shows her commitment to the job and the library service. Nicola is a very important member of the team at Lancing library. Her support has been invaluable to Y and me during a very difficult year during 2008. She has supported and encouraged new members of staff, of which there have been a few recently. She is always very positive and somehow manages to keep up to date with changes in routine and relishes a challenge.
She has helped take the pressure off Y by doing Rhymetimeand is always willing to help with other activities, when possible.
Nicola has also supported B (senior libararian) with the Lancing Library bookgroup and is always happy to run it, if B is not able to do so.
Nicola’s displays are always imaginative and she even enlists her children to help with them.
On a personal note, I would just like to say that it is always a pleasure to work with Nicola, which unfortunately for me, due to rota change, has become less over the last year’.

I’m really chuffed with that. I know it’s just an 11 hour a week part time job, I know it’s not what I want to do when I grow up but I am really pleased that the little bit of time I do have spare to do something other than Home Educating Davies and Scarlett brings in a good bit of spare cash each month (infact pretty much exactly what is repaying our debts actually), has excellent perks with all the free music, films and book reservations, mostly gives me a feeling of being part of the local community, helping people and making a difference while surrounded by something I love (books) and better still is recognised and appreciated by the people I work with :).

It’s not without it’s consequences -childcare is often a hassle, Davies and Scarlett would still rather it was me at home with them than anyone else, there are times when I wonder if it’s worth it and a bad day at work can have me really resenting being there rather than at home with my kids but as tightrope walking without a safety net goes I think we’ve got it pretty much mastered :).

So, boasting moment over with….

This morning I did the banking and then did baby rhymetime. It was an intimate one today with just 6 babies and parents so we did plenty of ‘baby rhymetime unplugged’ stuff. There were about 5 instruments each there were so few of us so we sang Twinkle Twinkle again with bells, Incy Wincy Spider again with shaker to make rain, all got up and marched to Grand Old Duke of York and then had a ‘requests from the floor’ section in the middle which mostly involved singing some of the songs we’d already sang again but also included ‘Jingle Bells’ 😆 which 2 year old Lily claims is her favourite song!

In the afternoon it was really quiet so I did some stock sorting and then had a brainwave about displaying some stock and posters for some upcoming festival events on a table so set that up. That had instant impact with someone asking if she could take one of the books, me telling her about an author event and her going straight to the desk to buy a ticket – result :).

Back at home Davies and Scarlett had been doing lots of crafts. I got home to be presented with ‘presents’ from Scarlett- one was a bottle of lurid blue glittering potion, the other was a box, all beautifully wrapped in tissue paper tied with bits of my wool that she’d nicked 😆 Davies had finished his Ben 10 comic drawing kit that he’d got for Easter. They had also been playing outside in the garden lots and had witnessed a hen actually laying an egg which I am very envious of as I’ve been desperate to see that for ages.

My Mum, who was here for the afternoon had also walked to the park with them too.

Scarlett had some tea, found her Rainbows top and gathered some stuff for show and tell and we walked her round there. Davies and I came back to do some baking for the weekend. I started melting stuff for rice crispie cakes and realised I didn’t have enough cake cases so Davies went back to the shop to get me some more. I’d just started to think he’d been gone a while too long when he got back and said he’d been holding the door open for people to be helpful and that’s why he’d been so long :).

I also made some cheese scones and debated making something else too but ran out of time. Davies and I walked back to collect Scarlett, Davies has his tea and Ady arrived home.

We finished reading Humphrey and the children went to bed, Ady and I managed yet another really late dinner and now I really need to go to bed myself aswe have this plan to be up and on the road super early in the morning.

I found myself being intolerant again today although I think I mostly either hid it or got over myself.

We picked up Tasha and co and went to Amberley working museum again. We had a really good day there a month or so ago with my Mum and I’d been quite keen to go back as they have a local residents discount which makes it £6 for us to get in rather than the usual admission price of £20. Last time by chance we went on a Wednesday which is apparently their school trips day so the place was swarming with small people but everything was up and running. Today there were a couple of coach parties but less things happening. I’d forgotten to bring any ID to show I was local but assumed Tasha’s id would suffice (she was paying for us both to get in anyway) but that caused a bit of an issue at the entrance. The woman was a bit sniffy with us generally and I got the impression she’d rather we just weren’t there at all with our children picking things up and looking at them in the gift shop interfering with her greeting all the coach party people we’d arrived in the middle of. Clearly we should have claimed to be a couple! 😆

We talked to the blacksmith, various wood working people (a man stripping bark to make brooms, a pole lathe worker who took a shine to me and gave me a tent peg he’d made himself and a man operating a machine lathe making bowls and wooden fruit) and were hijacked by the education officer who asked if the children running ahead were ours (yes) and were we on holiday? (no) although I’m sure she had already correctly identifyed us as HEors as she straight away started telling us about workshops we could arrange. I took a leaflet and may well think about organising one if I can rustle up the 15 or so children required. Another local HEor had come along with 3 of her 5 sons (the other two are now in school) although we didn’t spend the whole time with her as everyone was looking at things at their own pace.

We spent quite a while playing with the phones and switchboards again as we had done last time, were disappointed that the printing and the electricity volunteers were not working so we couldn’t do either of those and finally called it a day about 3pm.

I’d had enough really by then as Davies, Scarlett and Toby all seemed to be wanting to push the same buttons at the same time on all the interactive things and towards the end of a fractious week my patience for anything other than model behaviour had run out. I do think I’m being particularly intolerant though so am trying to hold some of it back. The dynamic of 3 can pose a problem too and Scarlett is feeling a bit delicate as a result of the trying week too so another meet up where she was sharing Davies pushed all the wrong buttons in her really.

We dropped Tasha and co home and decided to head up to the allotment for an hour in the sunshine. We popped home for me to change my jeans and Davies to collect his pocket watercolour pallette and postcards as he wanted to do some painting up there. I did some weeding and some watering and felt much better for being outside listening to the birds singing – even if they are the same birds who are probably stealing my crops! 😆

Home for Davies and Scarlett’s tea, followed by a bath for them. I spent yet more time battling with some software for Ady’s new phone which we’ve put on my old laptop in the end after it crashed my current one. It’s a Nokia deal that came free with the phone giving a years access to their music download catalogue and one million free songs.It has been worth it now we have finally got it sorted but I have used many swear words in the process!

I cooked dinner and Davies – who is trying very hard to be lovely inbetween making me rant and rave – set the table for us, brought our dinners in and set up things like finger bowls, napkins and flowers. He then put down a bowl for tips for service 😆 but got a quid out of me for sheer charm and cheek! He also brought down a present each for us – Ady’s was a cardboard plane and mine was a voucher for ‘1 cis’ (kiss).He has stopped kissing us. He will cuddle and sit on my lap and stroke my hair and is still very affectionate but has decided that he no longer wants to kiss. He sometimes forgets himself and does kiss me spontaneously and I got a lovely kiss on the cheek when I redeemed my voucher! 🙂 He’s quite happy to be kissed by us still and I’ve no idea where the reluctance has come from but we’re respecting it.

Tomorrow is work all day for me and then first thing Saturday we’re heading northwards for what I hope will be a relaxing weekend with friends – just what the doctors (and they’ll be a couple there present) ordered!

Suspect I’ve used that title before.

I had a good morning at work. The first half hour was spent doing some Speed Shelving with my friend S as there was loads left over from last night so we set ourselves a mission of getting as much cleared as possible before we opened.

Then I spent an hour doing on online training course thingy on Treating People as Individuals (or TIP as it’s apparently being called (by all the cool kids ;))).It was quite interesting, all about the councils policy on such stuff, their action plans to ensure everyone is able to access the councils services and that they are a fair place to work. It finished up with a quiz that we had to get at least 80% on, or keep taking until we did. I got 100% straight away which I was both expecting but slightly pleased with.

I had an hour on the enquiry desk (no interesting enquires) and the final hour on the counter where I had a few chats with borrowers including a woman who usually comes to reading group but missed last night’s. It was a quick morning.

I arrived at Liza’s slightly early and spotted Liza and the children walking down the road but ducked back out of sight to prevent them running to me and not paying attention to crossing the road. Davies and Scarlett were rather subdued and Liza looked pretty harrassed and confirmed it had not been a great morning. After the run up of the last couple of days when I got Davies and Scarlett in the car to explain why Liza might not have had a great morning with them and got stories of squabbling and petty arguments I lost my rag. I possibly overreacted but sometimes I think these things need to come to a head and it certainly did that today. 🙁

After a lot of ranting, loads of tears and some calmer explaining and serious chats they decided they wanted to ring Liza to apologise for being selfish and causing her to have a crap time in their company. I was actually very proud of them for being prepared to suggest something slightly scary, admitting they’d not behaved well and being up for apologising and trying to put things right. We discussed expectations of each other and what is fair and I reminded them that a ‘good’ person isn’t someone who never makes mistakes or gets things wrong, it’s someone who is able to identify when they have made an error and take steps to put it right, take responsibility for it and apologise. Utterly draining, upsetting and unpleasant for all three of us 🙁

I’d have happily cancelled our afternoon plans to meet up with Julie but I knew she’d already be on her way to Highdown gardens where we were meeting so we went. We arrived before them and after more chatting and some cuddles in the car we got out and as there was a handily placed icecream seller (with old fashioned bike) we chatted to him and got an ice cream each. I try hard to match Davies and Scarlett in resiliance and not bear grudges although I definitely find it harder than them.

Julie and co arrived and also got icecreams then we went for a wander round the gardens. Julie and I did some walking along holding Lorna’s hands as she is at that lovely toddling along stage and very close to walking unaided

A combination of a bit of a blogging apathy and the wireless internet connection crashing meant no blog post yesterday.

MondayWe had half a plan to go to the not bluebell walk place for a bluebell walk that may well have been a not bluebell walk as the bluebells bloomed early this year and I suspect they are going over by now. But it was another event I’d posted up details of and noone had shown any interest in so given I overslept anyway and it was a but damp and very windy we decided not to bother and took Tasha up on her invite to go round to theirs instead.

It was about midday by the time we got there and we had a very nice few hours sitting and chatting and knitting while Davies, Scarlett and Toby played. They spent much of their time in the garage and outside.

I’m sure there is a very good reason but Davies is being rather testing at the moment and argumentative with me for the sake of it. He then follows it up with being lovely and thoughtful and wanting to cuddle up with me so I wonder if it’s some sort of leap forwards he needs to make and is struggling with so veers between total independance and total regression or something. Whatever, it is very wearing and I have neither patience nor tolerance for it so I’m coming down quite hard on him over it. We’re also talking about it lots in calmer moments which is good but the odd flashes of having to deal with it by getting riled have me sighing a lot. Scarlett is of course doing testing of her own just to keep up so yesterday teatime I lost my temper with them both after hefty doses of warnings from me and preteen eyerolling, attitude from them and explained very clearly that Home Education entails spending lots of time with me and each other. If that works and we all get on it is great, if they piss me off (didn’t actually say piss me off but came close) and squabble with each other then it doesn’t work and as far as I’m concerned that’s the time for them to start school, have less time with each other and me and we can focus on making less time together more enjoyable rather than more time together hard work.

I am prepared for dynamics to shift, to go through tricky and challenging phases and have periods when we aren’t all living in peace and harmony but I’m not prepared to have our lives characterised by rudeness, disrespect for the other people in the house and me turning into some sort of shrieking ogre. I am pretty laid back and approachable I think and I refuse to allow myself to be turned into someone else by living in a life that doesn’t suit me. We seem to have shake up like this every so often (I think it was the year before last but it was around this time of year) and things usually settle down again so hopefully with a few more reminders here and there they will be persuaded to put sufficient effort into making our lifestyle work.

We had a couple of chapters of Humphrey before they went to bed and then my mood was further blackened by trying to install some software for Ady’s new phone onto my laptop which crashed it and killed the wireless internet thing too. I got increasingly fedup with it before giving up and going to bed in a foul mood.

Tuesday A much better day :).
Early start as we had the dentist first thing. Ady is very dentist phobic so I don’t tell him we have an appointment until a day or so beforehand to prevent him from getting all stressed about it. It’s just along the road so we walked and were slightly late. We were all four fine with no work needed and just a checkup appointment made for six months time :). She did ask me if I smoked – no it’s tea stains 🙁 and cleaned them up nicely but it did make me resolve to get better about cleaning (note I don’t intend reducing my tea intake ;)) with decent toothpaste and maybe 3 times a day rather than just twice.

Ady went off to work and we went off to Forest School. I’d said I’d stay this week so I made the hill climb (it’s incredibly steep and really, really hard work) and even chatted a bit to people as I wheezed my way up it!

They all had to gather firewood and tinder, learnt how to build an upside down fire
and use the firesteels to make sparks to add to the fire.

Today’s activities were learning about ‘fox feet’ (to go with deers ears and owls eyes) where you walk on the balls of your feet and explore your footing before putting your weight down. Everyone had a go at that before going to an area where they’d strung a rope between a load of trees which you had to walk along blindfolded. They said all the mums had to have a go but I think I was the only one who did. I really enjoyed it though – it was quite a long way and over very uneven terrain with slopes and holes and bushes. Amazing how your other senses kick in when you can’t see. I had my eyes closed aswell as the blindfold but you can still sense light and dark so the shady areas made me jump when the lack of light suddenly showed through the blindfold and my eyelids. I really enjoyed it 🙂 as Liza captured on camera 😉

The other activity was making spinners- they sawed a piece off a long stick, drilled two holes in it, strung it onto string and decorated it to make discs that spin and hum.

That was it for the organised stuff, there was lots and lots of playing in the woods. Davies and Scarlett are loving it, they have made friends with a pair of brothers and along with Andrew have set up a camp and passwords and stuff. I feel slightly frustrated at the cost of the sessions and the level of input and activity there is and did again today. One of the rangers was explaining that lots of kids who come to Forest school don’t get the chance to be out of the classroom in a free environment without rushing through a timetabled schedule and to play in the woods.I can see that but I do with they’d be playing to their audience more and realising that this group of kids can play in the woods whenever they like for free.

The rangers are being tougher with the group though which is good and I suspect the fewer parents around the better it works for them really. No FS next week as they are breaking for half term.

On the way home we called into Sainsburys for a few bits and then my parents house to drop off birthday cards for Frazer who is 33 today (just how did that happen? He’s my baby brother and should remain about 14. Actually I think he might have heard me think that and is acting like he’s still 14 in many ways ;)). Dad was there so we had a cup of tea with him before coming home to get ready for swimming.

I did some laundry processing, had a sandwich, faffed unsuccessfully with the laptop wireless and shouted at Scarlett before having to comfort Scarlett :rolls:

Swimming was fine – they had a good lesson while I managed to swim 22 lengths. I felt very wobbly of leg when I got out but I’m sort of enjoying it and hoping to pull off 24 lengths next time. Again, no swimming next week due to half term.

Back home again to more laundry processing, checking the chickens (three hens are being broody over 2 eggs they keep nicking out from under each other. I’m fairly sure they aren’t going to hatch but am traumatised over last weeks experience so am giving them a bit longer), making dinner for the kids and preparing a lasagne for our dinner.

Ady got home and I headed out to reading group. I was going to drive but decided that was lazy and it was a lovely evening so I walked instead. Double bonus of feeling virtuous about being green and being healthy aswell as meaning I could have 2 glasses of wine :). The book ()split the group in opinion which always makes for a more interesting meeting. I lingered chatting to a couple of women (one of whom has 2 children the same age as D and S, a daughter who goes to Rainbows with S and tends to go swimming with them on a Tuesday. I like her and had recommended a load of books to her most of which she enjoyed :)) before helping to tidy the library up and then walking home.

I spent the walk chatting to Frazer on the phone and then Julie so it went very quickly (and is probably good for my breathing too managing to talk and walk briskly at the same time). Davies and Scarlett got up when I came in and managed to wangle a chapter of story out of me before I had a bath and did dinner. I sorted out the wireless doodah and am feeling much more at peace with the world in general ;).

We travelled to Ipswich today to attend Eve and Rei’s seventh birthday party with a Stone Age theme. Lovely to celebrate 7 (eek, how did that happen?) with them, lovely to see Lovely Em’s Lovely parents, meet Lovely Oscar and lovely most of all to see LovelyEm 🙂

The children disappeared into the gang of children, marauding round the garden, we got to sit and chatter, coo over Oscar, drink tea and eat food and it was all very nice :). Excellent to see various friends and be knowing we’ll see some of them again next weekend too.

I’m uploading to flickr now so may drop some pics in later.

The weather driving up there was atrocious but we managed to get home without any more rain. We had good runs both ways and were home at 830pm. The children had some toast and I read them a couple of chapters of .

Bath, leftover curry for dinner and the season finale of Lost. A very nice weekend 🙂

Work for me this morning. We watched a video clip on the local paper’s website about a bloke who comes in the library quite often (and is a bit weird) who auditioned for Britains Got Talent. It made us laugh lots and we’re considering getting the music to play and dance to every morning before the library opens like those far east companies that make their employees do group yoga and aerobics before they start work for the day 😆

We also – not even sure why or how now – decided to all put a Mac infront of our surnames for the day. This had most comedic effect with the two Saturday assistants, one of whom’s name is Butcher and we thought MacButcher sounded very impressive and the other is McHugh so she became Macmchugh the noo. Ah the japes we get up to at that library 😆

Meanwhile Ady, Davies and Scarlett utterly failed to find the car park to meet YAC in so poor Davies didn’t get to go today 🙁 I felt really bad for him (not least because I am certain if I’d been around we’d have managed it) so he was a bit sad about that as he loves YAC and there wasn’t an April meeting so it’s been a couple of months.

When I got home they had eaten lunch,been bought a magazine each and were all out in the garden. I wanted to nip out for a couple of bits and assumed I’d be doing it alone but Scarlett decided to come with me and then at the last minute Davies did too so I had a full quota of children! We got the various things we wanted and came home. In town earlier this week Scarlett and I had seen some of the scraper foil pictures in an art shop and been talking about how they worked so when we saw some mini ones for a pound each I bought them one each today and they’ve been experimenting with those for a while.

I did some baking – gingerbread cavemen and cheese scones (which are to be cheesey boulders apparently) with occassional drifting through the kitchen help from the children. Davies spent some time outside with Ady, not sure what they were doing and Scarlett spent some time with the chickens.

I finished my baking and decorating and sat down with a cup of tea. The children joined me and we caught up on the last two weeks Primevals (Nightingale festival 2 weeks ago and camping last weekend meant we’d missed them both) on itvplayer so we were up to date ready for tonights. Ady and I had baths and then he went into the kitchen for his own mammoth cooking session of curry, bhajees, rice, bombay potatoes etc which is becomming a Saturday night institution with enough leftovers for another meal during the week.The children and I watched Primeval and Britiain’s Got Talent while I sewed up Scarlett’s costume and some furry bits to both their pairs of crocs to match and carried on with my squares knitting.

Curry was lovely, watched more rubbish TV and am looking forward to seeing friends tomorrow :).

We’d planned to go on a walk today to a local nature reserve but the crappy looking weather deterred us so instead we had Tasha and co and Lucy and The Rs over here instead. Given we all live within about a 2 mile radius of each other it seemed rather silly to drive to the woods where it might rain so we could spend time together really.

The kids played really well, mostly outside. Scarlett was a bit wobbly as I think Toby was hoping for some one to one time with Davies and Scarlett was hoping for lots of playing as a threesome. I thinik they mostly ironed it out between them though.

I was doing some knitting of square(ish) shapes to sew together for a camping blanket. I started it last year but got distracted with various other things but now we’re in camping season I’d quite like to finish it and sitting chatting to friends is the perfect time to be knitting so I did a few small squares.

I’d gone to fetch Tasha and the boys and as Davies and Scarlett were watching something on TV and I was only going to be 10 minutes they elected to stay home and save me having to mess about with seats in the car. It felt rather odd driving off and glancing in through the window to see them sitting there watching TV and I don’t know that I’d leave them for much longer than 10 minutes or so but it’s nice to have them growing up and feeling ready for these small leaps of independence. They did come with me to drop them home again later though as I assumed rush hour traffic would mean I was gone longer.

Candle went roaming and was brought back by David ‘Thankyou’ and some concerned passers by who’d happened upon her out on the road and were very snooty about her being out there when she’s blind. They were right of course but put my back up nonetheless.

Scarlett had Rainbows and I got drenched walking her round there and coming home. Davies and I chatted while he had his tea and then I went to collect Tarly (Davies stayed home alone again both times, only about 3 minutes each time though) and Ady finally came home after I’d already got in a hot bath to warm up.

I finished the Charlie Small book – I get a break now from him as the next book hasn’t arrived at work for me yet and the latest Humphrey book has so we’re back to hamster adventures again for a couple of nights :).

I’m not there!

Work all day for me today. It seemed to be lots of counselling a colleague who is really struggling and listening to another colleague having a moan about her really. My lunchbreak was interupted by the bloke who runs the computer courses wanting to chatter and ruining my treasured hour of peace and quiet reading Heat magazine in the staffroom.

Scarlett had been clingy this morning before I even left for work, she was clingy again this evening and it was one of those days where I think work is a waste of a day :(. Fortunately they are not too frequent.

I’m not sure what everyone did at home; Ady was here in the morning and my Mum in the afternoon. I think there was some chicken rounding up going on, some drawing, some Indiana Jones watching and Davies did some pictures of that and I have no idea what else.

When I got in I made their tea, chatted to them about various things, read a load of Charlie Small and then they went to bed. Ady and I watched Ghost Town which we deemed ‘alright’.

And that was Thursday.

All sounds a bit flat really and I’m fine, just relieved this isn’t what my life is about all the time. I hate the first bit of the morning and the feeding and getting to bed side of parenting so when that is all it’s reduced to for a day I always feel a bit blah about it, especially when I’ve not enjoyed the challenge and reward of a good and worthwhile day out at work.

so I don’t get behind again.

Davies and Scarlett had the opticians for routine eye tests this morning so we headed into town and fortunately found a parking space straight away as we were cutting it very fine for time. Scarlett went first and was a star 🙂 No problems with her eyes.

Davies has a really bad twitch at the moment which involves eye rolling so that made it hard for him to keep still and look ahead but he did really well. We’re going down the route of talking about his twitches and he sat tonight at dinner listing all the ones he remembers (licking his hands, shaking his head, beating his chest… ) I think he has a very healthy attitude towards them which is possibly helped by Ady having various tics too and us being fairly open and relaxed about them and talking it all through. Aside from slightly dry eyes the optician was happy with Davies’ eyes too and gave them both a call back for 2 years time.

We had an hour or so in town afterwards and got some more material for Tarly who has now decided she will have a costume for Eve and Rei’s party, a new DS charger in Game and had a wander round the charity shops.

Home for lunch and then back out again to the allotment for an hour. I need to catch up on that blog too really…

Back home again I sewed Davies’ caveman outfit and they both tried it on and Scarlett wants the same. I have enough excess material to attach some to their shoes for cavemen feet so that’s good. Tarly and I strung her polished stone with a hole in it onto some leather thong we’d bought so she now has a cool necklace too.

Ady came home and had many gifts bestowed upon him – from us he got socks, pants, chocolate and cards. Davies had also made him a football stadium which I must take photos of to do it justice and his main gift was an MP3 / MP4 player that he chose himself and is delighted with.

Off to Badgers for Davies and Scarlett where I believe they talked about hygeine while Ady and I had a long walk around the town including a walk round Debenhams which is open until 11pm 😯 😯

We collected the children, came home for speedy clothing changes and my parents arrived. We went to the local Harvester for a fairly average but acceptable meal and we took along a 4 and a 5 candle which Scarlett got the waitress to sneakily put in Ady’s dessert and bring out lit so we could all loudly sing Happy Birthday to him and embarrass him in the restaurant! 😆

Back home for coffees, the kids went to bed, my parents left about 11pm and I watched The Apprentice on iplayer while Ady played with his new toy.

There – 10 minute blogging indeed 😉

Technically it’s Wednesday but until I go to bed it’s still Tuesday as far as I’m concerned so there!

Early start for Forest School today and we were cutting it fine getting out of the house but made it for 10am okay. I dropped Davies and Scarlett off, sat in the carpark and watched them walk up the hill and then headed off. I had an adventurous couple of hours kicking off with a wander round Matalan followed by a drive around parts of Brighton I am not familiar with at all with barely any petrol but found my way back and had a wander round Asda picking up exciting items like pants for Ady and Scarlett and trying on bras for myself and buying a couple – we are all suitably underwear attired to go out and have car accidents now ;).

While I was doing this I had a couple of texts from Liza to tell me that Forest School was including tools today which was slightly unnerving but I had one to tell me all seemed safe and everyone still had all their limbs. I sat in the carpark and read for half an hour before climbing the VERY steep hill to where they all were, barely ten minutes before they packed up and we all walked down the hill again.

Putting together what Liza whispered had been happening along with accounts from both children today was a good one. They did some sawing wood with bow saws to make small discs and then drilling it to make a hole to thread with string to make a pendant before decorating them. Davies also adorned his with a feather, Tarly’s had a tiger on it. Photos are thanks to Liza 🙂

Davies tells me they then had a story that was part factual all about animals and they had to use ‘owls eyes’ and ‘deers ears’ ie stay very still and quiet and focus on what was around them in the forest before coming to report back on what they’d seen and heard. He says he saw a magpie, Tarly is insistent she saw a badger and a fox and when Davies said she couldn’t have as they are nocturnal she said they were asleep 😆

They had their usual hot chocolate and plenty of free time playing in the woods but seemed to have had a good time as usual. I’m planning on staying next week to watch again aslong as the weather is nice.

I had half planned to go to the allotment but it was so windy I don’t think I could have got much done so we came home instead and I drank lots of tea while the children did drawing and made birthday cards for Ady (45 tomorrow!).

I wasn’t in the mood for swimming today and wanted to watch their lesson and see their progress anyway so I didn’t go in the pool. They both had a good lesson although I notice they are probably the best two in there again so fingers crossed they’ll go up together in September. I think having each other for healthy competition does them both good.

Home for their tea and I made quiche for our dinner later and an apple crumble in lieu of a birthday cake for Ady :). We read some more Charlie Small , Julie rang to cancel meeting up tomorrow (a relief as it was going to be a bit of a rushing around day and now it will be a peaceful afternoon at least as we’re all going out tomorrow evening for a meal) and that pretty much brings me up to date. Hurrah!

A perfect day for washing thankfully so I was able to clear all the smokey smelling camping washing. I rang Julie first thing as she’d left a message on the answer phone over the weekend asking if we were going to Pulborough Brooks. I was half tempted not to bother and to have a quiet day at home but decided it was too nice a day to waste indoors so persuaded Julie who was having similar doubts to come and arranged to meet there in a couple of hours.

We headed off with a small picnic and waited in the play park for Julie and co to arrive. Katy, who organises the monthly walks was there with her Mum and 3 children including her brand new 10 day old baby boy. She wasn’t doing the walk but wanted to come along and say hello to anyone who was so we got to coo over baby O 🙂 (not the same O as Em’s baby O). Also there were Kent and his two children all the way from Lewes. We’ve met a few times at various places but the children have never really registered each other and didn’t seem particularly interested in doing so. His daughter is 7 or 8 and his son is much smaller – 3 or 4 I guess. I felt quite sorry for them really as they usually go to Magical Mondays but had come over for the Pulborough Brooks walk and there wasn’t anyone they’d obviously been hoping to see.

Julie and co arrived and we chatted with Katy a while longer before she headed off for home and the rest of us headed off for the walk round. Davies checked us in while Tarly and I nipped to the loo. I love the small flashes of independence and indeed the fact that Davies and Scarlett know so many of the staff there and feel so at home. We paused awhile in the shop as there was a puzzle of all the counties in the UK which was very tricky and we all gathered around to complete

it was amusing that of the group of us doing it the best were the two adults who aren’t from UK (Denmark and Germany) and the children who couldn’t read yet – the kids were looking at shapes rather than words and clearly geography is better covered abroad than here at home 😆 My own geography tends to extend to places I’ve visited but was much improved a few years ago by spending time playing County Countup.

The walk round was fairly uneventful -we saw some deer but not a lot else but the children were running ahead anyway so would have probably chased off anything like adders that we might have seen. Julie and I caught up on each others news and we had an hour or so in the playpark afterwards. Scarlett took a real interest in Lorna which she’s not really done before and had a cuddle and spent some time walking with her (she’s at the holding your fingers and toddling along stage) and sat on the grass with her for a while. She is a very smiley baby and very used to be carted around by Maisie so tolerated all this with excellent humour.

We left and headed into town as Davies wanted to get some material to make a cave man costume for the weekend. The whole stone age thing is tying in really nicely with Davies and Scarlett’s own current interest in all things caveman and stone age and oddly enough with my own ploughing my way through the Jean Auel series of books (I’m on number four) about clans and mammoth hunters. We found some fleece with animal print and bought half a metre of that. It is so nice and snuggly the plan is to just tack it together for an outfit and then unpick it afterwards for Davies to have as a blanket for camping. Scarlett has now decided she might have an outfit after all so we’re off there again tomorrow to get some more.

We had a quick look in some charity shops while in town and Scarlett found a TY soft toy tiger in immaculate condition for just 50p so she was happy :). I had a quick look in a couple of clothes shops and Scarlett and Davies trailed behind me. At one point Scarlett called out to me ‘does this shop have little black numbers?’ which made me turn round in shock as to where she’d heard such an expression (I am so not someone who has any little black numbers in my wardrobe :lol:) only to discover she meant quite a different little black number:

😆 She does now know the expression ‘little black number’ aswell as I had to explain just why I was laughing so much!

Davies reminded me they both are due for eye tests so we called into the optician and made appointments for Wednesday morning.

Back home I did more laundry rotation and stuck some cookies in to bake from some dough I’d made last week and put in the fridge. They came out better than when it’s freshly made so must make in advance and chill in future I think. I then decided to clean out the chickens houses which was a long overdue job. All five of the brown hen had gone broody and we stuck eggs under them with blue marker pen dots on them about 4 weeks ago (maybe slightly less I realise now). I decided they were all long overdue hatching and must be no good so took the first five out from under the hens in the big house and turfed them out to run round while I scooped out all the old bedding and poo ready to take to the allotment (excellent composting material) and put new clean stuff in. Scarlett came out while I was doing it and asked to break open the eggs to see what was inside. She’s not remotely squeamish and is genuinely interested so I said she could do it over to one side but to stand back and do it gently as if they were bad they would smell dreadful.

The first egg was really interesting – it had clearly been fertilized but not got past the first week or so of development. Picture is blurry but you can make it out:

The next one was fairly fresh still but yolk and white, the third was yucky and a mass of yellow and blood but the fourth starting cheeping as Scarlett broke it open and was an all but formed chick! 🙁 We debated whether to open the fifth and she decided she wanted to although we instantly regretted it as it was another almost formed chick. We had a quick discussion about what to do and decided to put them back under the hen and see if they were far enough developed to survive. We couldn’t bring them in as the incubator takes a full 24 hours to heat up.

When we checked ten minutes later the hen had rejected them so we tried with a second hen. I’d not cleared out the other house and left the couple of eggs still being sat on in there incase there is something odd going on with dates or hatching times or something. Sadly the first one died pretty much straight away and the other one followed not long afterwards. Having looked at them closer they were not formed enough to survive and I wonder whether they’d have made it to hatching anyway. Scarlett felt very bad but we talked about it and she seemed okay later. Life lessons eh.

Davies and Scarlett had tea, Ady came home and we read loads of Charlie Small before bed. I’m sure I’ve missed loads but I need to finish so I can get onto today before it’s yesterday again, or something!

Friday
I worked in the morning. It feels like a long time ago now and about all I recall is that I did Baby Rhyme Time. I’m sure there was more but it’s all forgotten now :).

I finished work at 130pm and came home. Mum had been here with Davies and Scarlett for the morning and as Ady had packed up my car the night before I just had to chuck in a few last minute bags and bits and we were ready to go. I managed to get all that done while D and S put the chickens away and we were on our way just after 2pm. We then spent a frustrating half an hour sitting in traffic on the way to my parents house, collecting my Dad and then sitting in the same traffic between their house and ours twice more as Davies remembered he’d not picked his penknife up and being just a mile or so from home I agreed to come back for it.

We had a nice straight run after that though, arrived on site, finally found someone to check in with and get shown to our pitch. Last year it was only us and one other family pitched for the weekend, this time the campsite was pretty much at capacity and we were given the biggest individual bay pitch to share with Chris and Helen. In preparation for the Green Fair there were a load of portaloos blocking the entrance to to the bays so I had to park there and we carried all our stuff across. At the same time two other people were pitching nearby.

My Mum did most of the unloading my car and bringing it over to put on the grass, my Dad mostly stood around looking suspiciously at everyone with their bell tents and long hair muttering about hippies under his breath 😆 He did help me with holding a corner of the tent while I pegged it in but I more or less got it up on my own. One of the bracing straps across the front that holds the four main corners square has broken and I’d managed to not quite pitch it square so the back pod we use for the loo and storage wasn’t quite true but the rest of it was pitched fine.

Dad and Scarlett went off to the cafe for a drink (which my Mum was *really* pissed off about), Mum and Davies finished unloading the car and I got all the bedding set up before Ady arrived at 5ish. He looked very relieved to have missed all of that as he finds it really stressful and worries about me shouting at him – no idea why ;). I took my car back up to the carpark and we all went for a wander round the woods to show my parents the whole site.

We lit the campfire – it was still quite windy so it smoked a fair bit- had sausages in french bread and a few beers and whilst they didn’t really get it or show any signs of ever wanting to come and visit us at a campsite ever again it was a pleasant couple of hours 😆

Just before it started getting dark Chris and Helen arrived and my Mum and Dad left. We helped unload their car and get pitched up and enjoyed an evening of the kids playing DS in Chris and Helen’s tent while we chatted round the fire.

As always I had a really lousy first night of camping sleep. I’ve no idea why but I always seem to lie awake on the first night and then am fine. It’s odd because I’ve never suffered from sleeplessness and never do at home but there must be something that bothers my brain on some level as it happens every time. I drifted off to sleep as it started to get light and didn’t wake up til about 930am though so managed a good 4 hours or so

Saturday Was near perfect I think really. The weather stayed lovely although it clouded over a couple of times and looked a bit dark once it never came to anything and we spent most of the day sitting around chatting and enjoying being outside in the sunshine in great company. Davies, Scarlett and Elinor went off for over an hour on their own and we did start to wonder just where they’d got to so went off in different directions to find them. They came back and we said they could go off again but this time armed with a phone so we could contact them. They prepared properly for ‘An Adventure’ this time with rucksacks filled with food and drink and other essential supplies and went off for another 90 minutes or so on their own. We did ring them after an hour, mostly just so they’d feel very independant about getting a phonecall. Chris, Helen, Alys and I bumped into them as we went off for our own walk leaving Ady to listen to the football on the radio. I loved that D and S got to fill their rucksacks and go off on their adventure just as they’ve been longing to do since we started reading Charlie Small. It was a real highlight of the weekend for them and for me too :).

They also spent quite a bit of time with one of the blokes who lives on site – Peter – who carves wood. He makes chairs and other furniture which is gorgeous but pricey and also wooden flowers and sharpened Davies’ penknife for him and taught him how to do it too. Davies came back and taught us and we sat for quite a while whittling and making impressive looking things 😆

Davies also spent a fair bit of time with Peter on the Sunday and having checked with Peter and been assured that was fine I left him to it. I like the way he befriends people and learns from them like that :).

I introduced Chris and Helen to Sue’s Bench and we had a short wander round the woodland.

We’d had our fire dish taken by Hazel earlier in the day for one of the tipis with the promise that more were being delivered and she’d bring one down later but as the afternoon went on it became clear there was a potential issue and we were worried about not being able to have a fire at all. Chris and Ady had been casting around the area looking for alternative ideas and we’d decided to use a metal barbecue lid instead if all else failed but when Ady and I went off to check with Hazel that would be okay an old washing machine drum had been dropped off with us to use instead.

Ady shared Chris and Helen’s camp curry and Davies and Elinor began playing with group of much older children who seemed to be on some sort of trip there for the day. I think things got rather out of hand and Davies ended up very upset having felt he had to defend himself and Scarlett and Elinor aswell as another small boy who was being teased for having long hair. He didn’t deal with it in the best way and knew that himself afterwards but the older girls seemed fairly contrite and possibly didn’t realise the full impact of how upset he’d been. Scarlett had not really played with them as she’d said they’d scared her from the beginning. Ady and Davies went off for a walk together and Elinor came back also upset from the older girls who again came over to apologise but by that point I think it was obvious that they weren’t fully compatible playmates for our children really. 🙁 It was the only tricky point of the whole weekend though and certainly in Davies’ case easily enough recovered from to dimiss it.

While Ady and Davies were off and Helen and Alys were busy with something Chris, Scarlett and Elinor became ‘Fire Man and the Twiglets’ and collected loads of kindling and firewood. Chris has a wafting technique while Ady favours a wadding style. I think after the fire demo on the Sunday we’ll all be using cotton wool and vaseline from now on though!

The children toasted some marshmallows on our washing machine fire before being packed off for an earlier night (it was still about 10pm I reckon though). Davies and Scarlett DS’d and listened to very quiet music in the tent.

We had another very lovely night laughing and chatting with Chris and Helen round the fire with the sound of the bands practising for the next day, another large group of people sitting nearby with their own campfire and a few furtive forays under cover of darkness to gather firewood ;).

Sunday Poor Elinor awoke feeling unwell which resulted in an earlier start for everyone as the sound of Helen reading woke me. Odd how you can tell from the rhythm of someone’s voice that they are reading 🙂 It wasn’t disturbing and infact was quite lulling as I couldn’t actually hear the words but once awake in a tent it’s hard to just lay there. I tidied up inside the tent a bit and repacked all the clothes ready to bring home.

Chris and Helen had packed up in case of a need to rush off but Elinor perked up and remained fine thankfully. It did mean they were ready to get away earlier later in the day though so wasn’t a bad thing.

We really enjoyed the Green Fair although I think there was slightly less in the way of activities than last year. I love the laid back feel of it and being able to go back to the tent for a drink / food / sit down is lovely too.

First port of call was buying one of the flowers each from Peter for Davies and Scarlett. He’d told them they were a pound each and we’d agreed they could buy one each but he said they could have them for 50 pence each 🙂 He later gave them another one each for free so they were chuffed 🙂

We listened to the first bit of the storyteller who I think it pretty good. He was telling the same story as last year so we didn’t find our way back there for any more of the sessions but I love the way he dances all around the audience, handing out multi sensory stuff to pass round to support the story and getting everyone to join in with movements and chanting.

Next it was the fire demonstration which we’d also done last year but thanks to Forest School and all things wilderness related the children were even more interested this year. Davies even helped with a demonstration using a fire steel

and we bought one from them there having been looking at them online which we’ve all had a go at making a fire with back at the tent and managed, even Tarly so are looking forward to using for real soon 🙂

We watched a demonstration of friction started fires using the more traditional method of rubbing two sticks together. Davies and Scarlett weren’t as interested in this method and didn’t want to have a go themselves so we wandered off leaving The Beans still watching that and waiting for a go.

We found a free kids activity – there weren’t so many there this year as there have been before – which was being run by some of the people from Steward Community Woodland who were also camped near us. The activity was playing with huge lumps of chalk and clay and loads of tools – handdrills, saws, hammers, chisels etc. Not really my sort of thing for obvious dirty hand and chalk dust issues 😆 Both Davies and Scarlett went for clay rather than chalk and Davies made a teardrop shaped pendant with various twigs and other bits pushed into it to form a pattern. After several false starts and a bit of an upset when it didnt’ pan out as she’d planned Tarly made a cat, well actually three cats. Ady and Davies went back to the tent before us as Tarly was still working on hers and I chatted to the man there about how the community works. I always think I’d love to do something like that and then Ady reminds me about how I get fed up with everyone at youth hostel camps by day three and have to go off and find my own space and I realise he’s probably right 😆

Scarlett and I rejoined Ady and Davies back at the tent for a while and all had a go with the firesteel and some food and drink before heading back up again for another look round. This time we stopped at a stand where they’d taken a couple of trays of pond water from the wildlife pond at the centre and were asking you to try and find some pondlife in it to identify. Both Davies and Scarlett found loads of things and we took them up to the counter where the man helped us identify them and then took a couple of creatures out of each of their pots and put them in a pot next to a microscope which was projected onto a big screen so you could see everything in huge detail. Both of them found something each that hadn’t been found before so had it written up on the board – Davies found a soldier fly larvae and Scarlett a water beetle. We learnt about toad tadpoles and frog tadpoles and the differences between them. We really enjoyed this and Ady and I were particularly interested as we’ve already got a similar type of microscope probe that you plug into the tv for the children for Christmas (I know, we’ve started very early ;)).

We got ice cream next, I bought some ointment from a stall selling this stuff to try and ease my eczema which has flared up on my feet and knees and is driving me crazy. I had to hide it from Helen of course 😉 😆 as it is all hokum! It does seem to be moisturising and easing the itching a bit though. We chatted to the people on the bat stand and cooed over the little pipistrelle bats and had a look round the bees stand where we learnt that it takes 3 bees their whole life time to produce 1/4 of a teaspoon of honey:shock: I’m still quite taken with the idea of beekeeping but it’s not a cheap hobby and we don’t really have the right space for it. Chris (Ady’s brother Chris) has started beekeeping and I might just have to indulge myself vicariously through him instead!

Ben Law (of Grand Designs fame) was there signing books but we didn’t see him. Davies and Scarlett both did a compost lucky dip (you could either rummage with gloves on or use a grabber) and got a free bookmark made of recycled plastic. We tried some cooked seaweed (which was actually quite nice) and admired the spinning wheels and rugs. Ady was accosted by Fun Dad (TM) and family from September camping who had come for the day and I caught a glimpse of the other family that had camped with them too. It didn’t feel as though there was as much to see and do this year as last year and we wondered if perhaps there was something else on locally that was competing with it and taking potential stallholders away.It was still a very enjoyable day and we’ll definitely do it again next year.

About 5pm we could get the cars down to the campsite again and we waved goodbye to Chris and Helen before beginning a very leisurely packing up ourselves. Davies and Scarlett went off to play with various other children who turned out to be the children of one of the campcraft teachers who had been saying to his partner (I got chatting to her) that he suspected D and S were Home Educated. She said it was their confidence and willingness to chat to anyone which gave them away although I suspect their rather unkempt look helped ;). They were also playing with some of the children from the Steward Wood community too – all blonde haired, Home Educated, rainbow dressed children with bare feet having a ball together :).

I took down the tent and packed everything up while Ady packed it all into the car.We were a bit worried it would be a squash as it had all come in my bigger car but we are clearly getting better at not bringing too much stuff, only having enough food to last so we don’t need to take any home, and more proficient at putting it all away again afterwards. I think the only thing we still could do with is a decent set of camping pans although I still hanker after a fancy camp kitchen.

We said lengthy goodbyes to all the childrens’ new friends and finally left just after 7pm and were home by about 830pm. The kids had a bath followed by a very late dinner. We had a bath followed by an even later dinner.

It was a fab weekend. We really love it there and it’s nice to share it with friends. The kids got to have the ‘Adventure’ they’ve been desperate for and we got to kick off the camping season with a near perfect weekend :).