Winter is coming......

Winter is coming......
How do I know this I hear you ask? Because I am currently lay down in my bed, next to my little man who is coughing his head off. Poor Ben was woke up by coughing, which signals the start of winter as this will happen frequently now, as it has done for the last 4 years.
We are cuddled up with Ben wrapped around me.
And do you know what? I LOVE it. I love his little body smuggling into me. Both of my children slept with me for years, and now that they sleep in their own beds (mostly) I do miss them. This time will never come back. When they are older they aren't going to want to snuggle in bed with their mum, are they?
So when it happens now I make the most of it and cuddle them close......

Alton Towers

We enjoyed a fab day at Alton Towers a couple of days ago, even though the weather was rubbish and alternated between torrential rain and bright sun! Did we let that put a dampner on our day?! Did we heck as like! We dodged the rain when we could and smiled when we got soaked! Maybe because of the weather, or being a week day, but it was the quietest we have ever seen it! So quiet that the were pretty much no queues for anything and we got to go round twice on a few things! We went into Storybook land and visited the farm animals, went on the tractors, nutty squirrel ride, barnyard boat ride and roundabout. We headed off to the other side and watched a pirate show while we had our picnic. We went in the 4d cinema to see ice age, went on the carousel, visited wobbly world and Charlie and the chocolate factory. Mr W went on Rita twice as there was no queue. Both Megan and Ben had their first ride on the Runaway Mine Train, which I think was a bit too fast for them! Ben and I went on the Flume. We all enjoyed the rapids and went round twice and got soaked! Especially by the people squirting water! We had a go at this too and it was really funny soaking everyone! To finish off we went into the Sealife centre, which we all love. Megan held a shrimp and we spotted sharks, sting rays, starfish to name just a few fish.
Even though the weather wasn't the best, we still had the best day out!

365 Project Week 37

I am taking part in the 365 photo challenge for 2013, linking in with The Boy And Me.

You can join in here.

I will add pictures each week.

365 Project

Week 37

Day 251
The acorns that we picked yesterday have now been thrown into the garden in the hope of squirrels coming to collect them.

Day 252
Ben decided to have a snooze before his first afternoon in nursery. That's what happens when you keep waking at 5am!

Day 253
Ben in his nursery jumper! So grown up...

Day 254
I collected some of the tomatoes from the garden, as quick as I pick them, Ben eats them!

Day 255
Ben's first creation from nursery! Can you guess what it is????

Day 256
Megan having a read of the book we recently got for review. You can read what we thought of it here.here

Day 257
The funny positions my children get into in bed!

The Anagranimals and The Wishing Well Book Review

When I saw a tweet looking for bloggers to review a new children's book, The Anagranimals and The Wishing Tree By Leith Moghil, I tweeted a reply quickly.

As you know, we LOVE books here. Reading is one of my most favourite things although I don't get as much chance to read now as I would like to. Happily Megan and Ben both seem to be following in my footsteps with their love of books.

When the book arrived it was beautifully wrapped in pink tissue paper, sealed with a couple of red heart stickers. As we opened it, both Megan and Ben were instantly drawn to the illustrations. They are just beautiful, Ian King, who has illustrated the book has done an amazing job. The animals look so lifelike, so like real animals, but so friendly too.

Of course we had to sit and have a read straight away. I wondered whether Ben would lose concentration as the book is aimed at a slightly older children, aged 5-9 years, but no, he was hooked!

The book is about six animal friends who all live in a mysterious land called Pogo Bogo.
There is Heidi the Hippo, Pedro the Pig, Lancelot the Lion, Ebenezer the Elephant, George the Giraffe and Rocky the Rhino.

One day whilst playing hide and seek they come across The Wishing Tree, a magical tree that will grant them a special wish!
They decide to wish for the best parts of their favourite animals!
When they awake the next day they have all magically transformed into unusual animals!
Rocky has become a rhino-parra-rog, Pedro is now a pig-orilla-roo, Ebenezer is a ele-zeb-zee, George is gir-osti-duck, Heidi is a hippo-croco-puss and Lancelot has become a Leo-tiga-mur!
They have an amazing time trying out all their new animal body parts and finding out what they can do.
The story concludes with the animals all going along to thank the Wishing Tree for his wish and him asking them to visit his cousin, the Weeping Willow who lives in the Serpent Mountains.

This ends this book, but leaves it open for the second story of The Anagranimals and the Weeping Willow. (And I hope it is published soon as Ben in particular, (and me!) are dying to read it and finds out what happens!)

When I asked Megan what she had liked about the story she told me that it was a 'proper' story, with lots of detail. She is quite into the description in stories at the moment and liked the way the setting was described in the book.

Ben really enjoyed looking at all the pictures of the animals and talking about what animals they were made up from.

You can find out more about the Anagranimals here.


We were sent a copy of this book for review, all opinions are our own.

365 Project Week 36

I am taking part in the 365 photo challenge for 2013, linking in with The Boy And Me.

You can join in here.

I will add pictures each week.

365 Project

Week 36

Day 244
Happy 4th Birthday Ben!
Ben had a little party with a couple of close friends at Ants play centre. He loved it, especially the laser quest!

Day 245
After picking our blackberries I made blackberry jam! It looks lovely, so I hope it tastes nice too!

Day 246
Grace was being very cheeky and climbed under the trampoline to sit in the unturned paddling pool and drink the dirty rain water! Lovely! She refused to come out, using her favourite phrase of "No, no, no!" so I ended up having to crawl in and drag her out!

Day 247
Megan's first day back in Year 4!

Day 248
Megan pushing baby Grace around!

Day 249
I went shopping with Laura and we were trying winter hats on Grace. This was her favourite!

Day 250
We found our first Autumn acorns on a walk this morning...Autumn is on its way...

Camping in Silloth

After arriving home from Barmouth on Monday afternoon, we had a quick stopover at home before setting off to the Solway coast with Laura, Darren, Jack, Grace and Darrens cousin Lee, Sara, Joe and Alex.
I was really pleased I had been ultra organised and already packed before we had gone to Barmouth, as I would of hated to have had to pack again!
When we arrived at the site I was really surprised that it was on the coast, I had thought we were further inland. We found three pitches and started to set up. Considering the others hadn't camped before they did a good job of putting up their tents.
As we were setting up, a huge old fashioned bomber plane flew right over our heads, really close! Laura said she had visions of 'Memphis Belle' going through her head and thought it was going to land on us! We later found out there is an unused air base just next to the camp site!
The kids were happy pottering around as they found a tree that was ideal for climbing, with a couple of tree swings to play on.
Megan did a great job of watching Grace as she was on a bit on a wander!
Once we had set up, we had a stroll around the site, checked out the pool and bar and walked across the road to a tiny strip of pebble beach, where the kids spent time trying to skim stones under the expert tuition of Darren and Martin!
We stopped off at the site playground, which was great as it had lots of climbing bits rather than the typical slide and swings.
Once we got back the BBQs were set up for tea.
Unfortunately the weather wasn't as nice as it had been, it was quite cloudy and cool but at least it didn't rain!
After tea, we headed over to the club house for a few drinks and the kids had a bit on a dance!
The following morning we decided to take the kids swimming which they really enjoyed as there were inflatables and swimming games...Darren won the dads race! After lunch we drove down the coast in search of a beach. It was a bit too cold for staying too long, but we had a wander a bit and collected a few shells. We then decided to go back to the town we were staying in as there was a small fair. The kids had a few rides and then we had a drink in a very nice posh hotel!
We had tea and went for a few drinks. This time, the lads were eager to play bingo, and Martin won so drinks all round!
The following morning another swim was requested by the kids and after lunch we went for a walk to the on site farm. That was lovely, and there was a miniature train that gave us a ride around the farm. We stopped at the playground again for another play, before heading out for tea.
We ended up at a lovely restaurant called Lakeside, where we had the most delicious tea. Even the kids chicken nuggets were home made! The restaurant was set next to a golf course and fishing lake and had great views.
We headed back and dropped Darren and Martin off so they could buy bingo cards! I think they will both be heading off every Friday night to bingo now!
Laura and I had a go tonight too, but Martin won again! We had a fairly late night as it was our last night and we had very tired kids. Ben flaked out in his buggy about 10pm, bless him.
The next morning we had to pack up and head home.
We had a lovely break and I think Laura and Darren *may* come camping with us for a couple of nights again at some point!