So, Kessingland then…

Inbetween carrying on the whole talking to Ady rather than being an occassional raised set of eyes from behind a laptop screen pattern that I quite enjoyed last week, Fathers Day and post camp come down this weekend I have also been pondering on how exactly to blog last week.

I could do the day by day blow by blow account, I could do the brief roundup, I could do a positives and negatives, I could do a post in pictures, I could do the entire week in verse, in secret code (;-) ) or simply leave it at the below two posts and move on. I can’t really be arsed to sit here and try and work out what happened on each day, photos are on flickr and my creativity is sapped by a week in the sun doing mindless practical crafts followed by an ironically crap nights’ sleep last night when back in my own bed, loads of Big Stuff being skirted round with a view to a proper chat about it very soon chez Goddard and a day where I was having a little taste of the fruit punch with added alcohol I knocked up by just after 11am!

So, I’ll answer what I think would be your questions if you were to pose them to me – if you have one I’ve not answered feel free to ask 🙂

So, how was the potty then?
Bloody fantastic actually! It made (and pardon the pub) the only potentially crappy bit of the week a breeze. It sat happily in a corner of the tent, it categorically did NOT smell, at all. It was emptied twice by Ady who agreed it was not a pleasant task but far less pleasant than numerous trips to the loo with little people at bedtime. I used it for my last thing at night and first thing in the morning wees and any I had not managed to synchronise with Layla :-).

Camping then. In a tent. What’s that like?
Utterly, utterly achievable and managable and actually very nice indeed. I’ll save you the whole philosophising about material possessions etc but suffice to say for a week for the four of us we truly wanted for nothing. Sleeping was easy and comfortable and dry. Eating was only very slightly limited on a two ring stove with grill, toiletting we’ve covered above and every other of our needs was more than met under canvas. (Insert a 😉 here if you like!)

What was dreadful then? Something must have been?
Nothing springs to mind. Minor irritations all of which can be explained away by tiredness, over excitement, too close proximity to other people and particularly their children 😉 but certainly nothing I wanted to commit murder about.

And the weather? It was said you wouldn’t be a real camper until you’d weather storms, floods, tsunamis and freak weather conditions for June in Suffolk?
Well, we had rain and a touch of a breeze. Overall the weather was pretty fab – we had fine weather for putting up and taking down tents, cooler for Africa Alive! which meant no smearing sun cream all day, sufficient sun for us to all look tanned and healthy, sufficient breeze to fly kites on kite making day, fine weather for tie dye, sandcastles and other requiring outdoor activities but the obligatory rain and thunder to say we’d ‘done’ a storm. To be honest if I didn’t experience sufficient to qualify me as a ‘real camper’ I will simply direct you back to my saying of the week ‘just because you sleep in a tent it doesn’t mean you have to be a camper!’

Highlights?
Location 🙂 Being next to Layla and Alison was ace and having Kirsty and Babs – therefore Ben, Marcus and Alex next to us was great for the children. The field was great for the children to have lots of fairly unsupervised playing in, nice to be opposite Lucy to keep a friendly eye on her and make sure she was doing OK.
Crafts – tie dying and needle felting were fantastic! 🙂 I got my annual basket fix by making some bases for Jax as I simply could not justify making and bringing home another one but seeing Helen & Elinor’s creation and Babs’ handle was great. Loved tie dye and we already have plans to do that again here and I think needlefelting may well become my this years scoobidooing! 🙂
The cabaret was fab, a real tear jerker. All the children were fab and it was so touching to see how some of the shyer and quieter ones were so happy to be stood at the front performing to a crowd. Clearly my most heartwarming bit was Davies being my warm up guy and presenting the crowd with magic tricks, getting them shouting and participating, dancing around and finally playing the harmonica. Can’t quite believe that’s the little boy who will be insisting that I wait in the car for him at Badgers tomorrow – thanks all for being his extended family that he feels comfortable enough in the company of to really be Davies. 🙂
Africa Alive! was good too. Thanks to Babs for stirling money collection duty and certainly to all the children in the talk we went to for being so sensible, knowledgeable and such fab examples of Home Ed children. 🙂
Watching Scarlett really come into her own for the first time at a camp. At Melrose she is always so much on the periphery, it is probably only Layla, Alison, Ali and Lucy who see her regularly that know she is who she is so it was lovely to see her as much a part of the group as Davies this time. Davies made firm friends with a couple of new children to the group as well as continuing to bond with Marcus and Ben. I adored listening to him and Maddy talking about Wallace & Gromit, watching him draw and label a picture of Small which he then presented to Jax and a cuddle between him and Elinor at the lions at Africa Alive! Tarly bonded well and truly with Alex – I think they spent most of their time hiding out in tents eating cereal and excluding ‘the boys’ 🙄
And loads more I’m sure

Do it again then?
I think that’s a given! 🙂 Watch this space…