And what a good mix it was too!
It was total bedlam in my house first thing yesterday morning. Dad arrived too early at 8.30 ish, we had no bread – needed for breakfast toast, sandwiches to take with us for lunch and sandwiches to leave behind for Dad and Tarly’s lunch, the kids seemed incapable of getting their pjs off or their clothes on, Davies kept asking to play with things like playdough or brio and simply could not grasp that we were aiming to leave within the hour, he then unravelled a whole toilet roll (why???? that is *so* not his normal behaviour!), Jenny rang to ask for some phone numbers to cancel WAG for the day due to small numbers and Dad, oblivious to it all sat there waiting for a coffee and trying to chat!
Finally got out of the house just before 10am but were still in Portsmouth within the hour by about quarter to 11 where we parked in a dodgy carpark (but being Portsmouth I’m not sure there is any other kind!) and set off to the dockyard. Saw a bright red mini with Clarke children frantically waving out of the windows and got into the dockyard to see skinny Layla waving.
The journey had been nice, Davies sat in the front with me and we chatted, listened to Shakin Stevens and Toy Story soundtrack and he told me some (very unfunny) jokes (example – knock, knock, who’s there? red car, red car who? red car infront of that blue one. hahahahahahahahaha!!). I did try a bit of history preparation for the day but fell down badly as I had not looked at anything to enhance my own knowledge and ended up waffling about lots of years under the sea, watching Blue Peter as a small girl and school trips of my youth! God I’ve become a rambling old loon already 🙂 I blame my blog habit!
Anyway, we got to meet Simon (and lovely man he is too – very ‘Ady’! 🙂 ) and Ros arrived shortly afterwards. Davies clung to my coat for a little while before running off to play with Josiah and Buzz. We lurked for a bit to see if any other puddlers were coming but decided they weren’t and we wouldn’t know what they looked like anyway so went in.
I had wondered whether Davies would get much out of it educationally really as we have not done any real History stuff yet, let alone the whole Tudor fest that everyone else seems to have done, but I figured it would be a nice day out for him and me, I’d get to chat with my mates, we might as well go to something organised all but on our doorstep, he’d get to play with a couple of the small boys in his little MP circle and hey all little boys like war ships with guns and cannons and stuff right?
We did The Invincible, The Victory, The Mary Rose, The Mary Rose Museum and Action Stations – all of which are blogged about and linked to else where on Sarah and Ros’ blogs – have also shamelessly nicked pics off both of them as Ady had the camera in his car and only realised when he arrived at Reading yesterday morning! I remember going to The Victory at least three times on various school trips as a kid, and we went to see the Mary Rose soon after she was raised and was still upside down, but possibly because we were a small group – and cos Ros asked – we got lots of attention from the guides and the kids got to have a go in one of the hammocks, sat at the tables and pretended to eat with the metal or wooden crockery and generally had quite a hands on experience.
Davies really enjoyed being with Joe and Buzz (at one point he came over and said to me ‘today I am playing with TWO friends Mummy’ in a my cup doth overflow type manner, so that was nice!), he walked holding hands with Joe at one point and I overheard their conversation about going to school (Joe goes sometimes and stays for lunch, Davies never goes, not even to eat lunch!) and rechristened Josiah ‘Joey’ – not sure why he needs to have nicknames for his friends but as the first time he bonded with Buzz he called him ‘Dylan’ all day I think its a complimentary thing 🙂
I’d felt bad leaving Scarlett behind for the day as I hardly ever split them up and I felt guilty at enjoying being without her (not a reflection on her, but it was so relaxing only having one child to watch out for, especially when that child is sensible, comes when he’s called and does not have tantrums like my other one – and yes I know thats an age thing rather than their actual personalities) but we had a really nice day and she had enjoyed being with Grandad and monopolising him and getting him to do what she wanted all day (reading books to her mostly I believe!), so I thought that was all good stuff too. I rang a couple of times to check on her and Ady actually beat me home so she was ready for bed by the time we got back at 6.30pm ish.
In all a really nice day, the little group we were with was a really nice mix, lovely to spend time with various MP folk on a smaller scale group basis again (which was one thing I really enjoyed at HESFES) , the weather was good and I am pretty sure it had some good educational value too 🙂
Looks and sounds like a great day. Another one I’m sad to have missed…
One day, one day, one day…
Comment by Jules — 26 May 2005 @ 9:12 am
So if Si’ is very Ady, what am I?
Comment by Chris — 26 May 2005 @ 10:18 am
very Chris of course ..
was lovely to see you Nic – see you next week 🙂
Comment by layla — 26 May 2005 @ 10:21 am
Hmm, no comment, Chris!
It was a lovely day – I definitely enjoyed seeing the boys get along so well – I’m used to seeing my girls make friends easily enough and less used to seeing Joe do it (mainly cos the poor little chap doesn’t have many friends his own age here, girls or boys), so that was one of the best bits for me. As was the chatting and seeing my friends. Educational value was sort of secondary, I decided!
Comment by Sarah — 26 May 2005 @ 1:58 pm
well you have elements of Ady but I would say you are more of a Jim (which means nothing to you of course, but I do like to categorise people!) did i ever blog my theory about there being a finite amount of personalilities and most people you meet reminding you of people you already know?
Comment by Nic — 26 May 2005 @ 2:10 pm
I really enjoyed watching the boys together too. One of the things which MP seems to have done IRL for Davies is give him some peers and friends. When asked to name his mates he comes straight out with Buzz, Lije, Barbara’s B and now ‘Joey’. It’s so nice.
Will be interesting to see whether Tarly does the same with the girls contingent as they get older – the obvious choices in terms of age are Lulah and Ammi but I think there could be some serious personalities to have in one little group there 😉
Comment by Nic — 26 May 2005 @ 2:15 pm
So I am guessing an Ady is someone who has a vivacious, unreasonably demanding, overspending wife but who is good with kids. So let me see, that’s Ady, Steve, Max, Simon, Tony.
That must make me, a Tim or even a Bob, but a minority at the very least 😉
Comment by Chris — 26 May 2005 @ 4:49 pm
what Joyce isn’t unreasonably demanding? (in the nicest possible way of course)
Comment by layla — 26 May 2005 @ 7:05 pm
We (the wife and I) have now excluded Steve from being an Ady as he does not fullfil of the criteria.
Comment by Chris — 26 May 2005 @ 7:47 pm
wouldn’t be my definition exactly (after all my Ady was still an Ady before he had the wife!) but the positive attribute – good with children – is certainly one of the key ones.
Where does Steve fall short then?
Comment by Nic — 26 May 2005 @ 8:45 pm
sarah’s not unreasonably demanding … how ’bout adding drunken wife to the criteria?
Comment by layla — 26 May 2005 @ 9:21 pm