Category Archives: family/friends

Smile!

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Last week Jess and I were lucky enough to spend the day at Alton Towers trying out the roller coasters. My Mum and Dad were good enough to look after Emily all day… and they still live to tell the tale.

Whilst my parents were busy trying to resist Emily’s cheeky cuteness we managed to ride every roller coaster in the park (including the epic runaway mine-train – choo choo!). Pictures from our day of freedom below.

The Smiler - a 14 inversion roller coaster.

The Smiler – a 14 inversion roller coaster.

Still smiling after our second ride on The Smiler.

Still smiling after our second ride on The Smiler.

Jessica isn't scared of Nemesis.

Jessica isn’t scared of Nemesis.

Aaarr! (There's a pirate ride in the background)

Aaarr! (There’s a pirate ride in the background)

Costume making

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Hansel and a messy Gretel

Hansel and a messy Gretel

Since Sam started at school it seems like there have been quite a few ‘dressing up’ days where he has needed costumes for some event or other. One week it was a ‘cosy day’ where they had to wear pyjamas/dressing gowns (Sam was excited that he also got to take in his blue crochet blanket too).
But some have been a little trickier… like having to find a fairy tale outfit for a boy. So instead of dressing him like a knight like the rest of the boys in his class I thought he could be Hansel. Thankfully I was able to borrow some lederhosen from another mum and all I had to make was a suitable hat…
Hansel's hat
Then we had World book day and Sam’s class had to dress up as characters from Julia Donaldson books. Sam decided that he wanted to be the ladybird from “What the Ladybird heard” and this time I had him helping to make his costume which consisted of cardboard wings (painted by Sam and then decorated with spots and much glitter then applied) and a ladybird mask we had in our dressing up box.
Ladybird Sam
Now on to making up a Easter bonnet for the school parade…

Everything is Awesome!

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Jessica recently put all Sam’s Lego into a big box to see if he’d enjoy making something new. He’s already made some interesting contraptions but enthused by our trip to see The Lego Movie I thought I’d have a play too. See how we got on below.

Lego!

Lego!

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Master builders

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My car complete with retro spaceman

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Sam’s altogether more creative vehicle

Daddy’s little helpers

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We finally admitted defeat and decided we had too many books to go on our single bookshelf… so we bought another Billy bookcase. I tried to build the case whilst Emily was sleeping but she woke up in the latter stages and insisted on giving me a hand.

Emily was delighted with the hammer.

Emily was delighted with the hammer.

Sam helped too.

Sam helped too.

 

Emily’s nap

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Recently I purchased the camera add-on for the Raspberry Pi and eager to find an initial project, I took inspiration from a time-lapse video that I saw on-line. Once I’d tested it out I decided to place it Emily’s room to find out what happens in the time that she is supposed to be napping.

The video below shows exactly what happens… the camera took a shot every 10 seconds and the video plays at 12 frames per second i.e. every second of video corresponds to two minutes of real time.

Emily was ‘napping’ for 90 minutes but as you can see, the first 30 minutes was spent reading and generally messing around. During this ‘nap’ Jessica didn’t hear a peep from Emily so assumed she was asleep throughout.

Center Parcs

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Having missed out on holidays due to moving and the birth of Emily… we’ve promised ourselves at least two weeks of holiday this year. Last week we spent 5 days at the Sherwood Forest Center Parcs. We booked a 6-person villa which easily accommodated the family and my Mum and Dad. Through some fluke of the booking process I managed to get a villa very close to the centre so the bikes that we’d hired felt a bit redundant.

We took Sam’s bike along as he is getting pretty good on it. He still has a bit of trouble stopping but he can now ride pretty well without me supporting him.

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Sam riding at Center Parcs

It was great to see all the animals at Center Parcs. There were plenty of rabbits, ducks, geese, bats  and squirrels that could be seen from the villa’s ‘lounge’. Samuel quickly learnt what a Moorhen looks like and was keen to point out any that he saw.

Coot and young

Coot and young

As always, there are loads of activities and Samuel had his first go at 10-pin bowling and crazy golf. Emily joined in with the bowling and had her first proper taste of swimming which she eventually learned to like. And with all these activities on offer… what was the highlight for Samuel?

Breakfast time

Breakfast time

The holiday cereal of course! We always buy a variety pack on holiday and this is often the only thing that Sam remembers.

Balance

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Both Samuel and Emily have needed to practice their balancing this weekend. After a long wait, Emily has started walking as can be seen in the video below.

As you can see, she is still having difficulty with her feet but she is getting better at it each day. On average she doesn’t fall over half as often as she did in the video. Now she is getting finally getting the hang of it she is wants to walk all the time and I’m sure it won’t be long before she starts to run.

Meanwhile, Samuel has got his first bike and is busy trying to acquire the valuable skill of being able to ride. We’ve decided to try without stabilisers to begin so Samuel can learn to balance the bicycle. After two days of trying things are going O.K. but I keep having to remind Samuel to look where he is going and not at the pedals.

In the end we got the bike from eBay for the princely sum of £18. It needs a bit of TLC (new brake levers and a new freewheel) but I think it’ll be just fine. If you’re after a cheap bike for the kids then I recommend trying Long Lane Garden Centre.

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Sam and his new bike

On the move

On the move

Emily update

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DSC_4917Just a very quick update on Emily’s progress…

Emily is starting to say a few more words, as well as her much used ‘daddy’ we also have no, bye, quack and bis-cuit.

Though Emily isn’t walking properly yet we do have plenty of different variations of crawling & walking about on her knees. She can also climb pretty well – the minute you’ve forgotten to close the stair gate she is halfway up before you can blink, she can also use stools and boxes to climb up onto the coffee table.

 

Summary – we have one cute and very mischievous 1.5 year old 🙂