Spot the Difference

On the left, Beri's birthday cake. On the right, the Supreme Dalek. Uncanny, isn't it?

A bunch of little boys, an indoor play frame, lunch and a cake, and I have a six-year-old. Who, in the event, doesn't appear to be all that miffed with the idea after all.

Then Jeremy and I took ourselves off to see the new Batman, which was astoundingly good. Pretty much made up for last week's excursion to see the Mummy 3, which was atrocious. Absolutely horrible.

I miss the Romans

And there they were, yesterday, at the Open Air Museum. Ideal opportunity to say thank you, after all. Or 'gratias tibi', should your latin (or your memory) stretch that far. But no, I couldn't go, BECAUSE I HAD A BAD BACK. Jeremy took the kids, while I stayed home and whimpered softly to myself. First coupla hours child free in FIVE WEEKS and everything just hurt too much. Still, some exercises and Ibuprofen later, things are looking, if not actually rosy, at least not so ouchy.

And tonight I have to be able to stand long enough to make Beri's birthday cake for tomorrow. He's decided he really, really doesn't want to be six. Not even a promised pocket money raise is changing his mind. Dunno how we are going to resolve this one. (I got so annoyed with the children's high-pitched shrieking, that I am now fining them a week's worth of money for every shriek. Sid tells me she is glad not to be old enough to get pocket money, as this means she can shriek as much as she wants. Oh frabjous day.)

Oh, and in the event, Jeremy said there were about four Romans. In total.

Spot the Difference

On the left, a picture of the Supreme Dalek. On the right, Kit's birthday cake.

He was ten years old today (blimey where did the time go etc etc) and wild with excitement about his new Nintendo DS. The wodges of cash he received left him not entirely unmoved either.

A couple of sessions at Quasar Elite with his mates, an Indian take-away and Back to the Future II (which it turned out I had never seen before. How on earth did that happen?) left us with an exhausted ten-year-old and, on account of the wodges of cash, not all that much tidying up to do.

Beri notches up another year on Wednesday, and earnestly requests a chocolate cake with a picture of the Supreme Dalek on it, and Back to the Future III, which is going to make next Wednesday's post extremely easy indeed.

We're Back

It's raining.



Nobody say anything.

Je Reviens

WE CAN'T DO THIS ANY MORE! It's too rainy and miserable! Apart from this afternoon of course, as directly we had remade our ferry booking for tomorrow night (rather than next Friday) the weather cleared, we had a lovely bike ride and a couple of hours on the beach. Never mind - hardly had we bought our post-prandial ice-creams and started our walk back to the campsite, when it started raining. Again.

Kit is distraught, Beri never thinks more than five minutes ahead anyway, and Sid is her usual cheerful self. We have promised them that even though we are at home, we will be On Holiday - trips to swimming pools, days out, and NO TELLY unless its raining really hard. (Jeremy pointed out that this also applies to us. I think he thinks he's going to get his own back on the Scrabble board. Fat chance.*)

So tomorrow, after five hours on the road, about six on a ferry, and then another couple of hours driving, God willing, burning buses permitting, we should be home,

*A couple of weeks ago, I chose the day before J's long weekend away to go on one of my (incredibly rare) I-really-can't-see-the-point-of-this-Groundhog Day-parenting-slash-homemaking-existence-one-more-minute-so-can-it-please-STOP jags. Once all three little darlings were in bed, J asked me, if I could do ANYTHING I wanted, what I would like to do. (The answer to this question is always Watch a Movie, or Read, or Play a Game.) Poor man took one look at my face and answered his own question 'You'd get in the car and just drive away, wouldn't you? How about a game of Scrabble instead?' Dear sweet man let me beat the c**p out of him. Twice.