Trains, crafts & Trecking!

Feeling better this week I decided to get myself into gear.

Yesterday I had a lovely afternoon with a friend who also likes to make cards and do crafty things.

But after being baby sat by the TV yesterday the children needed out. We decided to head off to Crawfordsburn Country Park for a trek this morning. The day was crisp with a little frost on the ground so it made for perfect weather for walking.

On the way we stopped off to look over the bridge at Bangor West Train station.

We fought our way through the roadworks that had the un-synchronised lights and eventually arrived at Crawfordsburn Country Park in one piece - that is after I complained to the guys who were digging up the road.

Can you see Mag?

We found a geocache up that hill, but I am not telling you where as that would spoil the surprise.

Ghosts and Teeth

I knew there was something I had forgotten!

Typical I scratch my head trying to remember the last weeks events to put together a blog post and I forget the thing that affected me a lot!

We have a ghost called Maureen in our house. Well one night last week we were awakened during the night to the sound of voices. Roy jumped out of bed wearing not much more than a smile to investigate ... he discovered the television and sky box had somehow managed to switch itself on. We have had the sky box for a year and a half and the TV for a year and not once did they switch them selves on. It was a frightening night for us from initial thoughts of us being burgled to bewilderment as to how such a thing could happen.

Oh and I went to the dentist today - no fillings for today!

Thirty Minutes with No Children

On Sunday last week we headed over to Ward park, as I already posted and it went downhill from there.

Tuesday Mag had a follow up appointment with the GP about his gastritis and other problems. Oh yes and the appointment went well, he is still on the medication for another little while but hes getting better.



Friday Mag was booked into to the library for an IT workshop. I dropped him off then found a girl's mobile phone - spent the morning trying to make arrangements to get it back to her. The children and I spent another couple of hours in the park and before we knew it the day was over. In the evening we found ourselves one child down - Toni was sleeping over at our neighbour's house as a sort of payment toward all the baby sitting we were about to do.



Saturday was pretty much a taxi day. The children had various clubs and birthday parties to go to. It was an interesting task with Roy and I both setting off in different directions to do the drop offs - we did manage to meet up for half an hour in the town with NO KIDS in tow. We stepped into a little cafe off the main street in Bangor, we ordered a 'late breakfast' (it was 2.30pm) and were looking forward to it until we started looking around the cafe. The cafe was filthy, the baby seat was filthy I would never have put any of my babies in it. The carpet on the stairs were black and the skirtings were not much better - to top it all I had to ask for clean cutlery. So we chocked down some food then ran for our lives. We met up with two of the children and took them to KFC, before heading back for the other two children once again in separate cars.

Seb slept in with Toni on Saturday night - you can imagine how much sleep everyone got.


Sunday afternoon found us looking after my neighbours two little girls while they went to a trade show in the city. We then looked after one of the girls from yesterday morning through to this evening because the same neighbours were gone at a wedding. The girl was good and our children too, but they are all very very tired now having had far too many sleep overs.

Trip to Ward Park, Bangor

We went to Ward Park in Bangor today.
Ward Park is lovely, water, birds, trees, play area, what more do you need for the children to enjoy. This post is all photos, there is not much to say about the day except that we had a lot of fun.
Oh and we tried to find a geocache there too but we we could not get the GPS to work, better luck next time I guess.

 having a little chat.

Seems it was easier to carry the scooter.

The Peacock was showing off to his potential mate, and she was taking no notice. (women are good at that)

Feeding the ducks, well trying to as the ducks already had their lunch by the time we got there.

A debate about where to go next?

I love this weather vane!

A week in photos - Helicopters and Snow

Well this is it the start back to a normal life - almost that is. Poor Mag he has been in the wars, from having appendicitis and getting emergency surgery to having a kinked bowel in the days that followed. Now Mag has a painful condition called gastritis -which is inflammation of the lining of the stomach and intestines.

We did however manage to get out last weekend before his latest condition got bad - on Saturday Mag and I went to the shopping centre while Roy took the other children swimming. While we were there we noticed a helicopter outside, and a very cold man guarding it! They were doing a prize draw thing for a free ride on Valentine's day. We got talking to the man and he seemed a nice chap - so we went and got him a big mug of hot chocolate to warm him up. He was really grateful and allowed Mag to sit in the helicopter in return, it made hiss day and after all he had been through was nice for him.

On the Sunday we were going to head to the retail village but the weather reports suggested that we should not risk the journey. It was snowing so we took a drive a couple of miles up the coast to Crawfordsburn Country Park. There was snow on the beach!

We stopped off at Grey Point Fort

For the virtual visit click here ...

http://www.virtualvisit-northernireland.com/gallery.aspx?dataid=45801&id=869&title=Museums+and+Galleries

Otherwise you can enjoy our photos!

Situated within Crawfordsburn Country Park, on the headland to the east stands a wartime relic, Grey Point Fort, a most interesting and unusual visitor attraction with great surrounding views. This gun site was built to protect the mouth of the Belfast Lough from enemy invasion and now houses a little military museum. Centrepiece is a 12ft by six inch diameter naval gun which was installed in 1992. It is nearly a century old and was brought from Spike Island in Cork Harbour which also had a defensive fort. Grey Points two guns were sold for scrap in 1957 after the disbanding of the coastal artillery. (source visitbritain.com)

Other than the trips out last weekend we have been virtually house bound since then. Waiting for a break in the weather and waiting very patiently for Mag to get better.

They would get you into trouble ...

Kids that is, they would get you in so deep if you were not careful.

This evening I popped out for an hour. I needed to go stick my head round the door of  Mag's Boys Brigade club because they were kind enough to send him a card last week. I wanted to talk to them about what Mag can and cannot do when he starts back. Mag came with me to get out of the house, we had not planned on being out long but we ended up making a pit stop at the local shop on the way home.

While we were gone Roy was dealing with Seb, Toni and Sol were already in bed so no issues there. Seb is a different matter, for anyone who knows Seb he is an active, chirpy sometimes quirky boy. You cant leave him, he just is always on the go.

Seb was getting his pyjamas on while Roy ran up the stairs to switch on his computer and put the little heater on. He must have been gone for just a couple of minutes, when he came down stairs again he was in for a shock. In the dining room stood a very good friend of ours, he happens to be a neighbour too. He had popped over the wall to get something of his daughter's that was left in our house this morning when I was looking after her. Seb 'explained' to our neighbour that daddy was not there and that daddy had left without giving him kisses. On further quizzing Seb had announced that mummy wasn't there either. So our neighbour was stood there feeling a bit flummoxed by this, he was just wondering what to do when Roy appeared back down the stairs.

The Boy is Home

Mag is home at last. I want to thank all of my friends on line and in real life for the messages of kindness given to us during this week.

Mag, as you have read earlier in the week, had his appendix removed last Sunday. Mag then suffered post op complications with a kinked bowel and some infection in his wound. Anyway after a few hard days he turned the corner and yeserday he was allowed to come home.

Mag now is still pretty sore, he is tired and not on full strength but this is all to be expected.

He has had some surprising restrictions put on him, he is not allowed to do contact sports or anything strenuous for six months. He is allowed to resume 'gentle' sports after three months so at least he wont be curtailed for too long. The weather is too cold for him to be out cycling or trampolining anyway. He is also disappointed that he has had to cancel his climbing wall course and not go swimming with the other children but I guess it is a small price to pay compared to what would have happened had he not got the surgery.

We have been overwhelmed with the kindness shown to him by virtually everyone we know. The cards and calls have flooded in from his various clubs and activities, even people who we had not told directly got to find out about him being laid up. It just shows what a popular boy he is, and I would imagine if the same happened to me I would struggle to have the same following.