Witch Pirate, eh?

Went to the Zoo Sunday...

Monkeys!

Red Pandas

...we came back and suddenly a Pirate and a Witch appeared!

...but luckily, all they wanted to do was some gardening.

Use of Weapons

Lollipop exchange scheme

Nerf!

Hmmmm....

Check out those shoes!

Goopy Beard

Feeeeeeeessssshhhhhh!!!

Today Ian and I took the kids to the heinously expensive Blue Reef Aquarium that opened a few weeks ago in place of the old "Wild Walk"....I say it was heinous, but to be honest I thought it was brilliant, though typically the girls weren't as impressed...well not all the time.






Still, I found it a thoroughly entertaining way to spend a good 2-3 hours, and the best bit was watching Flo interact with the 3D IMAX film about whales and dolphins and that....reaching out to stroke them, recoiling from huge whale flippers and trying to catch pieces of floating seaweed. It was awesome.


Esmae took her 3D glasses off because it was too scary.

All of Ian's pictures are bound to be better.

Testing the "rock" ;-)

In other news, my brother just asked (via email, because he's either in Sumatra, Russia, or (last I heard from him South Korea (for a day!))) if I thought a 1.4GHz laptop processor was slow/crap....the 1st 'laptop' I ever had (15 years ago) had an ~50 MEGA HERTZ processor!!

Typhoid Mary

Despite a head full of snot and a throat full of barbed wire I had a considerable amount of fun today.

Once Flo had it in her head that I wasn't speaking all that often, she pretty much entertained herself for the morning...doing jigsaws, pretending to be a cake seller to "The Silent Prince" (my crowning role), and taking turns using the laser pointer to annoy Moshi. We almost didn't notice the rain.

After lunch we headed off for Esmae's party where I adopted the role of Science Professor and the assorted kids made various machines, models and other contrivances....I should have taken photographs (I will next time I do it), but here's a small highlight of what was constructed with apologies where I've forgotten names:

• A bird like structure complete with eyes, beak, teeth, arms, hat and antenna [Felix? Small, sweet boy. Maybe his name began with R]

• A brainwave detection device which could tell what someone was thinking (yay for a microphone glued to a wire then to some headphones!)...which doubled as a Karaoke machine [DeeDee...not the Ramone...but she was punk, that's for sure. Awesome!]

• A Hamster Run (2 flashing RGB LEDs glued to some circuit boards attached by wire, and a plastic box) [Also DeeDee]

• A rocket [Flo]

• A robot brain. This was a truly awesome mini construction, with a big switch a flashing flight and a weird arrangement of magnets and wires... [Isaac]
  

• "A real computer" (broken graphics card with a button and a light attached [Gracie & Flo]

• An MP3 player (a mobile glued to a headset, and an RGB LED) [Mathew]

• A robot in a jacuzzi (various resistors, caps, etc wired together into a doll, in a plastic bowl) [Scarlet]

There were a few other things, but my nose is running on the keyboard now....hang on a sec...

Anyway, it was great! I always forget how creative kids can be when you say "here's a load of stuff, let's make something"....some of them have a problem not being told what to make, but eventually they all get really into it.

If only I had 4 pairs of hands, and 3 glue guns (thanks for the loan Rosie!)...Not sure Esmae was impressed with the book of greek & roman myths I got her this year as she was with the netbook last year ;-)

Was too fucked to carry the 6 boxes of bits back, so am now horizontal on the sofa in front of the fire hoping I this isn't manbirdpig flu and that whatever it is it fucks off soon...before Wednesday anyway.

You say hello

I wave bye bye...

It has been an odd week. I felt a bit "not guri" on Wednesday (which I put down to poor blood sugar) but having rushed back to pick up Flo, cook dinner &c, I eventually spent the evening throwing up and attempting to go to bed at 8pm...[draws veil]

Thursday was much the same, though I spent a very strange ~10 hours lucid dreaming/hallucinating while twitching and sweating in bed....Friday I felt like someone had driven through me with a truck, but managed to hold it together enough to look after Flo eventually.

We spent Saturday doing our usual thing (alien tree hunt, cafe for cake, playground, park, trampoline) and observed an afternoon-long kinda fight thing between Moshi and "Tabby" (a decidedly un-tabby cat recently arrived, that believes it has rights on Moshi's yard, food & bed....Flo named him...though he is sometimes called "Sparkles", depending on her mood). Seriously, we came back from the park and he was asleep in Flo's bed while Moshi sat on the window sill and watched him! He'd already eaten her leftover breakfast....stupid cat!

Dancin' to the dub while we await CAKE!

"Look dad, I am a picture!"

Communing with the cats

I lunched-out my Saturday night (thanks, illness) and slept another 10 hours...Flo, Es, Ian and I did the "standard Sunday" today: Boston Tea Party for breakfast (number 2), Ashton Court (as opposed to Blaise Castle), Ice-Cream, more Ashton Court, my house...wherein I made coffee for adults, frozen banana pancakes for children and hilarity, newspapers, ipods, chumby & some shouting ensued.

Esmae is rowing the "boat" to America....

Now. If you will excuse me, I'll go back to my two current books: one apparently about unicorns and ninjas & the other about the fuckin fuck word you fucks!

Savages

Friday night's Microrave at Carnyville was mind-blowing, as soon as Jen manages to get me some of her photos I'll post 'em.

It rocked!

Savagely!!

"Look at my chocolate beard dad!"

Speaking of savages, I spent Sunday with both kids (and Ian) and then they both stayed Sunday night...I was on the verge of collapse by the end of the day, but luckily I had yesterday as holiday....so I surprised Flo by picking her up after nursery and we spent a lovely afternoon messing around with my new chumby and the ipod while we listened to TMBG (again!).

I managed to convince Flo to at least put some trousers on for dinner.

But it didn't last long...

Oh, and here's my entry for "You've Been Framed".....

Combo-Breaker

So. Ian and I finally got round to taking the girls to Cotswold Wildlife Park after saying we would do so for almost a year...couldn't have picked a better day for the weather, and despite my google based insistence that we basically "go to Winsworth (or something) and turn left" [turns out you can't really base a car journey on those kind of directions], we got there OK.

Apparently, Esmae was underwhelmed by it all but they certainly enjoyed it at the time. Flo insists that all Lemurs are called "King Julians", Es apparently knows "all the birds there are, so these just look a bit different"....Ian and I know that if you can stand the whining then Ice Cream promises are worth it in the end.

Here's some pictorial evidence...Pics or GTFO!!

Stator vs Rotor

Yesterday featured a 5 mile hill-laden cycle-ride in the morning. It almost killed me. By which I mean, remember to eat before expending calories!!

The farm fair in the afternoon was pretty cool though. We definitely arrived at about the right time (2 hours in) because when I left with Esmae in tow and Flo 'pon shoulders at half 5 it was MENTAL!

In the morning, we got our attitude on...


...and we went to the park...


Where Flo demonstrated her new "grown up girl" skill...

The queue we saw (to get into the fair) was at least as mental as the queue (that went, literally, round the block!) for the Banksy exhibition at 10am this morning. We commented upon it as we dined upon smoked salmon, eggs, toast, jam, coffee & frothy milk, and bacon....then...

...Then we went to Blaise Castle park.

In other news, I am making a new costume in preparation for the next 8bit MicroRave (more on that later)....Professor Robot-Head will be in the house!

Smiffs!

Faaasands of 'em!

Helpfully photographed by "friend of Harriet", I present a bevy of smiffs...Miles, Sam, Harriet, Olivia, Jessica and Flo....all Smiths....though I may have got all their names wrong ;)


Flo and I shared a twin room in a local B&B...."I got my own mirror dad!"


"And my own lovely bed....you sleep in that other one, OK?"

There were some negotiations over trouser-ware in the morning...we reached an arrangement: you can wear your pyjamas to breakfast if you get dressed properly afterwards.

Copacetic

Doesn't mean what I thought it might. I was hoping it was something to do with being good at coping....not that I am. But, in fact it means "completely satisfactory" (which sounds boring).

So as not to bore you with the boring words I was going to write, I'll bore some holes into your brains via the medium of dance....

Or maybe just post some pictures...

Carnival Of Sorts

ZOMG, that title came to me from nowhere and makes me feel all content and slightly highbrow and whatnot....then I wrote the word "whatnot" and remembered I like watching American Chopper! And felt all lowbrow and shit....

And whatnot...I'll be here all week. Feel free to drop by! Boxcars...This was supposed to be about something else...oooohhh Ctrl-V!!

[interlude]

People are like plates; they often have patterns and can be more delicate than they look. Sometimes they break. You can wash them....If they're of the same ilk they stack nicely.

There are two children finally asleep upstairs. We tried stacking like plates, but in the end they each needed their own cupboard to sleep in.

Esmae now gets to sleep diagonally across my bed and Flo gets a cat on the end of hers.

I get the sofa.

Does this sound like complaining? It shouldn't...I love this kind of shit! Especially when I know I'm back at work next week and my trip to Slovakia is postponed (almost) a month :)

Here are some pictures for you...

Semi-nude toddler wrestling! SNTW09....The THUNDERCLASH!!

The pre-match build-up was fuelled by cabbage soup & cider!!!

Or apple juice.

I was too busy herding or identifying shrimp vs dragonfly larvae to take pictures in the park. I think we invented a game though: "What am I pointing at?"
[extralude]

Sometimes plates break...but with some sideplates to copy from....I dunno I went off into some Antiques Roadshow comparison between having wonderful children, a not-quite complete dinner service...THEY MADE ME SMOKE IT!!!!

Someone once told someone I was "a brick". Well, a brick is no good without decent mortar. And I know a good wall when I see one!

[overture]

Now, to make a "duvet of cushions"....away!

The Easterist

Eggs, I said. Eggs!

And chocolate....and sugar.

And some more sugar please!

Oh and an egg...not a hurty thunb.


Personally, I prefer Tangfastics! But here's a short example of "The Hunt"...

...thanks to Ian for organising that, 'twas awesome! Baboo hosted marvellously (of course) and there was only the expected amount of crying/arguing given the amount of chocolate around (thanks also there to Kathlene)...

Eggs!

This also happened:


You want some stones Mosh?"


"Well, you can't have any!"

I also saw the extremely rare Esmae-Parrot-Peacock-Bird!