VISIT TO THE ARK - 18th june 2008

We went to the Ark farm, I had taken along one of my neighbours children also. The trip was organised by playgroup but we stayed on at the farm for a while after everyone had left - making the most of our tickets when the place was quiet.

At first Sol was nervous of some of the animals, but as the day progressed she came to like them all. she was particularly fond of the little chicks and got to hold one a couple of times to her delight.

The funny point of the day was lunch time when we got our picnic lunches out. the little girl who came with us had her own packed lunch, so I opened it and popped her sandwiches down in front of her. Then I had to do a double take - she was eating dry bread! further investigations lead me to a tin of vegetable soup in her picnic bag - DOH! thankfully we had enough for her to eat too. Story goes - mum was making the lunches and dad said "already done" so mum abandoned making the sandwiches trusting that the dad has it all in hand. I don't think he will ever live the day down when he sent his 3 year old on a picnic with a tin of soup.

here are the photos - well a couple of them ...

Seb, he is a bit nervous of the bunny.


Me - and Sol!


Sol at the farm park


Toni & Mag


An Alpaca




Hannah the girl from next door and Toni.

Dizzy Sol at The Ark Farm

Tally Ho (fathers day)

Fathers day started off with the whispers outside the bedroom door. The children had made a huge plate of toast with jam for Roy and some tea. To be perfectly honest I think it was jam with a little bit of toast stuck under it, and the teabag must have waved across the top of the cup too BUT you cant blame the children for making a real special effort. Soon the gifts were done and we had a debate on where to go for the day...

We plumped for Ward Park which is a bird park with lots of greenery and water flowing through. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ward_Park There are also tennis courts, and other sports areas joined to the park too.

We parked at the sports end of the park, as we had Toni's bike in the car. We took off her stabilisers and gave her a bucket full of encouragement, after a few wobbly attempts Toni mastered the art of balancing on her bike. this was probably the best fathers day gift of all for Roy, he was as pleased as punch that he had taught his daughter how to ride on two wheels.













This is Mag "twittering" about the event -as you can see he was terribly excited!

Quick rundown of the last two weeks - mainly photoss

The weather here has been so changeable, one day we are having delightful sunshine and the next monsoons!


On the days that were reasonable we did try to get out and about with the children. Rather than go over stuff that happened last week and to be quite frank there is far too much going on every day here to keep caught up, I will just post a few photos.



These are just some views around the harbour where I live.


No 1 son!















We also did visit W5 http://www.w5online.co.uk/site/default.asp?secid=home with a local group we belong to. W5 had the dinosaur exhibition on, and i have to say it was very very good.

NEW PETS!

I haven't blogged for ages so all this stuff is old news I guess but I am going to blog it anyway ...

A couple of weeks ago Roy went out to help a friend fix an oven and came back with two furry friends. Long story - but a couple of years ago we were visiting a car boot sale and Roy bought two hamster cages for a fiver. It came to be a standing joke how we have cages yet no hamsters. Over the years we had one cage stolen from our shed but still the joke stood.

So in Roy comes on a Saturday afternoon with two Chinese Dwarf hamsters named Tom and Jerry. they are cute little things but despite the long wait to fill the remaining hamster cage we realised it would not do. As the owner of two cats a cage with bars would just not do! So we had to go get a new hamster cage which is a rotastak creepy castle.

Here's Tom, or maybe its Jerry - they both look the same.

Walk in the woods

Today, Sunday, we went for a walk in a place called Strickland's Glen. It was pleasant enough, a series of pathways lead down through the woods eventually leading out onto the shore. There were some streams leading into a lake, you can see in one of the photos one of the little waterfalls. I thought it was pretty and I am only sorry I did not do some serious photography I guess I did not plan it well enough.

We had some maggots left from the children's fishing on Friday so we got rid of them today too - feeding the fish was a gross experience for me.

Sol walked great today, her two year old legs held up well. The sea was choppy when we reached the shore so she was a put scared of the sound the waves made, she managed though.

On the way back we thought we would be lazy and picked up a couple bags of chips, and some goujons for tea which pleased everyone, even if I have got indigestion now!





This evening was calm, we just sat in the garden savouring the last few minutes of sunshine. the children bounced on the trampoline and played on the kiddie cars until it was time for them to go to bed at 8 o'clock.

From bad to good

The week did not start off well! A friend passed away - in our old house just up the road from where we live now we grew to love the couple next door. I will never forget the support they offered us when our baby Molly was lost, those days shortly afterwards were pretty dark - and our neighbours were there for us. Good times and bad, and despite the age difference we had a laugh many an afternoon spent chatting. Robert Alexander Martin passed suddenly on the 15th May, the funeral was Tuesday, it was a sad day.



Monday - we got a visit from a friend. Not sure if the friend was visiting us or just wanted a run out in her new car teehee. It was a pleasant afternoon just sitting in the garden watching our nine children run round crazy. Those children are a hungry bunch too - you want to have seen the plate of sandwiches they polished off in ten seconds.



Tuesday was the funeral as I already mentioned, it put a damper on the rest of the day.



Thursday saw us head off to a neighbouring village with the children. Roy had left early that day to go to Manchester, so we had use of the big car. I had left the children's glasses prescriptions in at our optician so the plan was to collect three of the four pairs. I met with some friends and we had a very pleasant afternoon chatting and walking, while the kids munched away on crisps and ice lollies. I also picked up a couple presents for our friend whose birthday was Friday 23rd. We got her a ginger bread smelly candle, it was gorgeous and i could have easily kept it for myself. Far nicer than any of the yankee candles I have mmmm. We also got her a tiny glass perfume bottle for her dressing table, she loved it and I have to agree it was so pretty.



After getting the kids into bed I made our friend a birthday card. I used some pressed lavender flowers that another friend had given me and put it in a little vase on the front of some co ordinating lavender card. I also made two little sachets and put some dried lavender in them and popped them inside the card. Its been a long time since I made a card for someone - done plenty of scrap booking but no cards. I love spending time in my little craft room, its upstairs away from the rest of the house so I can just leave stuff laid out as I like.



here is the card






Friday - we visited the friend whose birthday it was and had the best morning sitting in her sun room while the children played out side. The friend was delighted to see us and it restored some spirit in us, we are not so bad after all. That was a nice ending to the week that started off rubbish. In the evening Roy took the children fishing, leaving Sol and I at home for some nice quiet 'sit down' time, I did a little scrapbooking and some laundry!

Saturday - the children did not wake early for a change so Roy and I had a nice cup of tea in bed and a read at our books. When we did make the effort to get up Roy cut the grass and I headed off into the town with two of the children to drop them at chess club. Instead of coming home I took a walk round the shops, picking up a few bargains from Boots and Asda. When we got home it was time to make tea, then time rolled on to the children's bedtime. Come 11pm we were sat laughing at how boring our lives were, Saturday night with a Muller chocolate corner yoghurt thing and a cup of tea with endless episodes of CSI and Criminal Minds.