Saturday

It took Chips under 4 minutes to fall asleep tonight,it's been a busy day.

 Up at eight,after a week of settling into his new school,and then a trip to the library,breakfast out,the weekly shopping trip and that was just the morning.

 In the afternoon we had swimming lessons and then a family party at five,busy,busy busy but good too. 

I've spent most of the time people watching.
 Catching smiles. 
Taking in the interaction between members of the family,the chatter,the laughter,the casual way they sit together squeezed two to a chair made for one,perched on the arm of a settee,sat on the stairs,sitting on the floor colouring and rolling cars to each other,taking crisps so carefully off a party plate that consisted entirely of crisps,stood in a line holding plates of party food waiting for a chair to become available and then diving to get it. 
Some people got chocolate cake all over,some people ate two dishes of chocolate cake.

It was noisy and voices drifted all around the room,voices of family,the people I love. 

Sometimes,when you are quiet you end up seeing and hearing a lot.
 And the memories stick in your head.
 You feel the vibe of the room.
 And that's what happened today. 

Swimming Update

Today was Chips first real time to swim at a level five stage.

In the blue hats group.

Chips has been venturing into this group for the past two months,

but today he was officially a member of the group

and was able to wear his new blue swimming hat with pride.

The blue hats swim in the deepest part of the swimming baths.

The deep,deep water.

Where you cant touch the bottom of the pool.

Even if you try.

So you have to be a pretty competent swimmer,

And thats what you are,Chips.

We have come a long way from the teaching pool.

We are now swimming at the deep end.

There is no stopping to take a rest.

You stop swimming now Chips and you will go under!

So please dont stop,will you,your mum would jump too much if you did.

So the group comprises,at the moment, of three boys and two girls.

Five is a brilliant number.

Enough to make a proper group but still get a lot of individual attention.

We have not met the new teacher yet as she was on holiday.

Today Chips did front crawl,which is probably his favourite stroke.

He swam for half an hour and did some pencil jumps to finish with.

The new swimming trunks looked good.

The new goggles were a complete pain.

They just kept letting water in no matter how we tried to adjust them.

Not so cool.

But apart from that it was cool.

Well done Chips.

Mummy is so very proud of you. 

(as always)

 

The Weekend Post #1

Yipes I know the weekend seems far,far away,

but here are some snips and snaps from our weekend

 It was very damp,showery weekend.

But that did not matter too much.

What did matter was that we had four days off!

Yep,four days!

Four days to relax and be with our family.

We got the homework out of the way on the first night off.

 This was a first!

Then we spent the whole weekend relaxing.

 I wish there were more four day weekends!

 Linking up to A Rush Of Love 

And Write Like No One's Watching new linky ~ The Weekend Post.

 

What We Are Reading #1

I have been wanting to join in with this linky for ages.

It is hosted by Carie from Space For The Butterflies 

Every Tuesday she invites people to link up and tell each other what books they are reading.

Last night was quite special here.

It was the night the bedtime stories began again.

 After a break of four months!

Due to my eye operation bedtime stories had been put on hold.

Well any reading has been put on hold.

And for bookworms like me and my son,this has been hard.

I have wanted to read and he has wanted to listen.

We had not abandoned books entirely.

 Chips carried on reading Harry Potter.

Doing a sterling job of reading book five The Order Of The Phoenix

And then starting book six The Half Blood Prince.

And we spoke about books.

And I kept up with supplying Chips with good reading material.

Because as you might already know,bookworms devour books at a rapid speed

But nothing is quite the same as a bedtime story.

And the story I chose was 

Four Children and It by Jacqueline Wilson

Jacqueline Wilson is an author that I really like.

I have not read many of her stories to the boys mainly because 

usually her main characters are girls (don't hate me for saying this)

but at a certain age my boys preferred books where there were more boy

characters or at least a good mix of boy/girl roles.

We did read Cat Mummy.

It made me weep buckets!

What I remember about Jacqueline Wilson 

is that she writes about the nitty gritty stuff of life.

Which may be a bit uncomfortable to read sometimes

but also throws up brilliant topics for discussion and this is 

happening already as this book touches on the subject of blended families.

This is the main reason 

that I chose to read this book to Chips.

Its contemporary and miles away from magic and wands

 (I'm starting to grin now as I could be very wrong about the magic)

Don't get me wrong.

I adore magic and wands.

But we have been reading that in abundance.  

And I thought something different might be just the thing.

Right...the characters...

Rosalind 

Rosalind is the eldest child and she tells the story.

She does not really like being the eldest child.

She really misses her mum and dad being together

and she likes to read - a lot!

Robbie

Robbie is Rosalind's brother.

He seems quiet.

He is scared of his step sister 

and likes to carry a collection of toy animals around with him.

Smash

Smash is Rosalind and Robbie's stepsister.

She is trouble!

Loud and brash and totally aggravating

She seems to be desperate for her mums approval

and has a real soft spot for her baby stepsister.

Maudie

Everybodys step-sister.

The baby of the family

and much loved by everybody! 

 Alice

Smashs' mum

She seems a dubious character!

She does not seem to like children or walks or mess.

Will she change?

Dad

Rosalind and Robbies dad -married to Alice.

He tries hard to bring all the family together.

Will he succeed?

 The Story So Far

All the children are staying at Rosalind's dads house.

Its overcrowded and much to Rosalind's dismay there is no privacy at all.

Smash is already causing trouble...

biting Robbies precious animals and provoking Rosalind into pushing her over.

Their dad decides that they should go out together on a walk.

And so they all trek to a local wood.

And that is where we got to!

Isn't it amazing how much you can pick up from just one chapter!

I'm looking forward to seeing how the book develops.

Linking up to What We Are Reading 

Easter Hols - Part One

Well we are half way through the Easter holidays,eek.

It feels like it has been the Easter hols for a long time though.

What with Sharky breaking up a week earlier,it will mean a month of 

one or another of the boys being on holiday,which of course I adore.

I always want these boys of mine at home whenever possible.

 

We are still surrounded by Easter eggs.

I don't think that we have had as many Easter egg as this for years - if ever!

Even now I'm astounded by the amount of eggs that we have got left

and believe me there has been some serious chomping of chocolate going on here. I think we had more eggs than Asda did!

Easter day itself was lovely.

We had a early egg hunt,followed by a chocolately breakfast

and a laze around in our jammies and then it was off to my mums for dinner.

the dinner was huge and scrummy and i could eat it again right now!

It is so nice to have a dinner put infront of you,I don't think the novelty 

of that will ever fade.

The children played nicely together.

Chips played a epic game of Ludo,this game either makes or breaks you.

I think its the time it takes that leaves everyone mentally scarred,

but hey,Chips loves it!

My little toddling second nephew entertained us with his cuteness.

He is just adorable and never fails to make me smile.

We stayed for tea and that was yummy too.

The dessert I chose was called 'Eat and Mess' and mmmmm is all I'm going to say about it.

A big thanks to my mum for putting on such a fantastic day for 

all the family,we really do appreciate it. 
Thinking back I have just found a old post from 2013 about
going to my mums for Easter dinner it seems its a real tradition for us.

On Monday we went for a walk around a local country park.
It was a sunny day and the park was absolutely packed out with people and dogs. I think everyone had taken their dogs for a walk that day.

 It was a beautiful day and a beautiful setting.

 Chips played football with his dad and had a lot of fun throwing sticks 
and stones into the lake - he got very grubby hands!

 The next few days were a mix of hairdresser and dentist appointments.
I also bought Chips some tee-shirts,which we were both pleased with.

Thursday was a big day.
The boys went up to Liverpool  and went on a tour around Anfield.
This was Chips birthday present from his big brother,so it was very special.
They all had a great time and came home safe and sound and very tired!

Friday was spent catching up on school work...it is taking shape,
doing numerous amounts of washing  (seriously where does all the washing come from) and just chilling out after the day at Liverpool.
The boys played on the wii together and fun was had.

So that was our first week of the Easter hols.
Today Sharky goes back to uni,he will be missed and that is a complete understatement.
Chips and I have another week off - lets see what we get up too!

Dear... #1

Dear Tigs

 Can you remember the day that we went to King Georges playing field

and played with your parachute man on the big slide...

probably not,let me tell you about it...

It was the sort of day that was warm enough to go out in just a jumper

but not quite warm enough for just a tee shirt.

I can remember the actual feel of the day.

The air was still.

No wind.

And no sun either.

Quite a grey old normal British day. 

At that time we lived near three parks.
One was quite close to us,it had a bit of play equipment
but no trees or pretty bits - not much soul.
One was quite a walk away - maybe half an hour to get there,
it was beautiful,with woods and a big duck pond
but no play equipment....lots of soul but no toys.
And the third park was the one in the middle,
it had a few trees and maybe one piece of play equipment,
a big Wickstead Slide,so it had a bit of everything...
a toy and enough soul to please your tree loving mummy. 

Now,some of you might know what I mean when I say a Wickstead Slide.
They were very tall slides,with at least twenty small steps
and at the top was a tiny platform that you stood on before 
sitting down on the slide and pushing off on the journey to the bottom.
These slides were not for the faint hearted,they were tall 
and once on the steps it was virtually impossible to turn back
and go down to safety,as there were usually a queue of people behind you.
No,once on the steps the only way off was to climb to the top and whizz down
that shiny,silver slide,no matter how terrified you were.

Well on the day I'am talking about there was no queue of children
jostling around the slide,we were the only people on the whole park.
This was not unusual,we would go to the park most days,
no matter what the weather was.

Lots of the actual details of this day are vague,
it was probably nineteen to twenty years ago 
and it was not a particularly special day like a birthday,
so there is no reason for me to remember it so well,
but I do,
even now,
after all these years.

 I remember you,
standing at the top of the slide,
holding a little parachute man.
One of those cheap party bag toys that promise so much and then never work.

You were launching it over the top of the slide,to see if it would fly.
You had the biggest smile on your face.
I stilll see that smile,even to this day.
You wore a little cap and you were so happy.

I sat on the grass below the slide and looked up at you.
There was no one else around.
Just me and you.

I remember looking up at you and smiling.
I wasn't worried that you were stood on the top of the tallest slide ever.
I didn't even twinge when you dangled your parachute man over the edge 
and grinned and threw him down.
You were a capable child and I obviously trusted in your abilities,
or I would not have been sat down at the side of the slide,
smiling up at you.

Why ever this day sticks in my head I reallly do not know.

Tigs,we went to that park countless times.

But i do recall that day and it makes me smile...

A young mum and her young son playing on the park.

Thoughts

This week I have been reminded that;

Sweeping leaves up on a windy day is pretty near impossible

Even the tinsiest drop of surplus water will make mixing icing sugar pretty impossible. Hence the use of a whole box of icing sugar and lots of stirring.

Buying enough cream cakes for the family becomes very unhealthy when you end up eating more than one just because the date is running out.

How powerful book four,in the Harry Potter series,is. Wow! It's been brilliant! And the last two chapters that we have read were incredible. The amount of detail and the twists and turns of the plot had us both spellbound.

 We were wowed.

Unbelievably I had forgotten some of the plot too! I truly did not know what was coming and that was good in way and funny in another,because how could I have forgot something like that...? This brings me to say....write it down folks,write those memories down any way you care to,be it a blog,a diary,a old scrappy notebook,because memories do fade and we can forget stuff quite easily,even of we think we never will.

Having a project deadline anytime in December is going to be stressful. How can you think about Christmas when you are researching Hitler and Messerschmitts.

 Yep,I can spell Messerschmitt without even looking if up #proud