Hundred Acres Wood

We went to Hundred Acres Wood again today, at West Walk in Bere forest, Wickham is the nearest village. We arranged to meet with Alison's cousin Clare, her children Jessica and Nathan, and Alison's Aunty Sheila (& Uncle Mike). Alison, her mum, the boys and I went (Gareth was working).

We took a picnic and arrived at about 10:30 which was early enough to grab a picnic bench and table - a good thing too as it got very busy, much busier than it was on Sunday, mostly due to the weather as it was a much nicer day today. It is "half-term" week here so the schools are out.

The kids pretty much kept themselves amused so the adults were able to sit and chat without needing to chase around after the children too much. It was a really nice day, but the weather is very strange, oscillating between bright warm sunshine and cold windy cloudy times with occasional light sprinklings of rain!

Memorial Day

We arranged to meet with my sister Helen, my brother-in-law Darren and their 2-year old son Josef. We went to Play Shack, an indoor climbing and play place for the children - the weather forecast was for a high percentage chance of rain all day, and it certainly was very overcast and gloomy, though not raining, when we arrived.

Ethan and Owen took off like rockets in the play area; Joe was a little less certain but soon got into it.  Darren and I went in with the boys and followed them and chased them around, it was very much a good workout for us while the ladies sat and chatted.

From here we proceeded to a cafe at the local supermarket, really quite good, and this was a good choice as both Helen and Alison needed to also get a small amount of shopping done.  We had a lovely meal with Helen, Darren and Joe one last time before they needed to set off for home (a long car ride of about 3-4 hours).

I'm not sure if we are doing anything else today, will update when I get a chance.

Sunday picnic

Today we planned a picnic and gathering in the forest - we changed the location from the New Forest to Hundred Acres Wood in the forest of Bere as there is a great play area there, so there would be more for the children to do.  We arrived first, perhaps a little shockingly, and grabbed a picnic bench and table.  Again it was very windy, but this time instead of the gazebo we brought along a windbreaker that we staked into the ground next to the table - this allowed us to have a couple of the camping chairs set up out of the wind.

The playground was a bit like a mixture of what we found at Moors Valley country park and at the local Riverside Park, lots of solid wood structures with either wooden planks or chains to climb on, cargo nets and swinging baskets.  I took a few pictures of the boys (notice how they are dressed for the English summer):

Ahhh, lovely brothers

Ethan is a basket case!

Owen is a cheeky monkey!

They played hard and then it was time to eat the picnic and meet with the various folks that had arrived while we were playing.  The play area was relatively sheltered, but the picnic table and bench were exposed to some very cold blowy conditions.  After the picnic we went for a long walk in the forest to try to stay warm and out of the wind!  When we got back grandma had a drink and a snack for the boys and cups of tea all around for everyone! (We took along a single-burner stove and camping cook set so that we could boil water for tea, great planning!)  The kids had great fun and even built a makeshift teepee/wigwam structure:

Isabelle, Alex and Ethan in their wigwam

After such a busy day and long walk we felt sure that Ethan and Owen would fall asleep in the car on the way home, but amazingly neither did.  Unfortunately this meant that they were very tired and grumpy when we got home and in much need of a bath.  We had tried to arrange meeting with my sisters again and the plan was that we would go and meet with them after we got back.  However, due to their need of an early night, it was agreed that Alison would stay behind to feed and bath the boys and put them to bed while I went to meet my sisters.

I had a nice evening with my nieces and nephew, and my sisters and brother-in-law, they had cooked chicken wings and potato wedges which we had with salad (and a beer for me :-) ). Time flew past as we chatted and also tried to make arrangements for the coming days.  Before I knew it, it was time for me to leave so that I could come home and go to bed.

Friends and family

On Saturday we were invited to a family friends' house for lunch.  Since there were so many of us, the plan was that we would set up a gazebo in the garden.  It was so windy and it was very hard to put the gazebo up, and because the side panels of the hexagonal-shaped structure were all mesh, they did very little to cut the wind down.

We had a lovely lunch, there was plenty of food.  Despite the cold, we thought that we could take the children to the local park to help them burn off some energy.  So Alison's cousin Simon and I took their two, Isabelle and Alex, and Ethan and Owen to the park.  Here are all the pictures I managed to grab that day:

Owen on a bouncy rocking dog at the park

Ethan and Owen trying to balance things out

Later on, after we left, we headed back to Southampton where we were going to meet up with my sisters and their children.  I hadn't realized that I needed to book somewhere and so a last minute arrangement had us meeting at an Italian restaurant, La Fenice, in Eastleigh.  Despite all the children being tired from the travel, they played nicely while we waited for the food, and again after they finished eating. We all had a nice meal and it was nice to be able to sit and catch up.

Legoland, Windsor

It was a little cold and overcast when we set off for Legoland though we hoped it would brighten up and warm up. We arrived at about 11am and queued a little to get in.  We had some "2 for 1" deal vouchers that allowed us all to get in for about 116 pounds (about $185) - not bad for 3 adults, 1 senior citizen, and 1 child (Owen goes free because he is under 3 still).

One of the first things we saw was a small wooden play set with a slide, and then these Easter Island statues:

Then there was a cool dragon being captured by Lego men - we could look at this while Alison, myself and the boys queued for a parachute drop ride.

This was the first ride and it was good fun, we could pull ourselves up with a rope and then when you let go the carriage dropped (not too fast).

Unfortunately the next ride was not so much fun for Alison and Ethan (we split up so that I had Owen). It was a rubber dinghy water flume ride - Alison and Ethan went first and Owen and I followed.  When we got to the bottom we were dry but we found out that Alison had been absolutely drenched, and Ethan slightly less so.  It was still really overcast and not sunny at all, and being soaked through like that was not going to be any fun at all!  Luckily we could leave the park to go to the car, where we had a change of clothes for Ethan (just his jeans and underpants needed changing).  Since we know the area we knew that there would be some shops not too far away, so it was decided that I would take the boys back in to Legoland while Alison, her mum and Gareth would go out shopping for clothes and lunch.  I took the boys to lunch with me in the park, and about an hour later the rest rejoined us.

We walked amongst some cool models where Ethan and Owen were giants!

They've got that Leuven feeling!

St Paul's Cathedral

There were lots more, but I didn't want to go crazy taking pictures of everything, besides, some of the models were a little 'tired' looking, too much sun exposure?

 

Big Ben & London Eye

Buckingham Palace!

Later on it started to warm up a little and we headed over to the Lego driving school where both Ethan and Owen could separately drive cars for their age group.  This looked like fun!

One last ride on a "hot air balloon" with me, grandma and the boys and then we were almost done.

The shop was the last visit where we tried not to buy too much (it's all so expensive!), but at least come away with a couple of mementos of the trip.

Not surprisingly both boys fell asleep in the car on the way home!  It was a fun and action packed day, and overall a big success!

Nothing to report

A really dull day, both figuratively and literally. It was overcast for most of the morning and rained on and off for some of the afternoon. I played a little with Ethan on the Wii, Lego Batman - it is cool and fun to play, and he is certainly able to "keep up", if not actually lead the way!

A family friend dropped by and we chatted to catch up. The boys watched Bedknobs and Broomsticks (I think?) since it was not really nice enough to play outside.

What a difference from yesterday where we had lunch out on the patio with the umbrella up for shade, to today where we had long sleeved tops on and two layers and ate lunch inside.

Yesterday we had half of the strawberries after lunch (the rest were eaten after dinner this evening) and we also had a rhubarb fool, yummy!

We have a big day planned tomorrow, so I will sign off now.

Playing at the park, feeding swans and strawberry picking

This morning we went back to Riverside Park to play for a while, the park is really cool, as I mentioned earlier, here are a couple of pictures we took this morning (note the bright sunshine, we are having great weather at the moment!):

Next we went on to feed the swans, ducks and seagulls (not intentionally, but they are so cheeky and can even catch the bread mid-air, stealing from the swans and ducks!). This is a short walk (1 minute) from the park, so it is not far to go.

Then we went to a cafe for a cuppa (tea for Alison and I, coffee for grandma and "Capri Sun" juices for the boys) at a church near by.  We did not stop there too long though as we had another place to go; strawberry picking at "Pickwells", one more picture and I think I'm done for the moment:

Marwell Zoo

Today Alison took the boys to Marwell Zoo which is fairly close. She arranged to meet her friend there too, so she had some adult company in addition to the cheeky monkeys. Here's their logo which is cool and nicer to look at than just text (in the interests of copyright etc., all rights reserved and copyright of the image owner is acknowledged, please don't sue me for potentially advertising the zoo).
 


Alison took two whole pictures so I had my work cut out for me when I download them all off the camera, it took me many seconds, here is one of them (they are both very similar, so only one photo to share really):

Visit to the library

Monday mornings is often coffee morning at the library for grandma, so we all went to the library for this, and some books, of course.

I walked down with Ethan and Owen, and as we arrive at the library we see the side view first:

Side of Cobbett Road Library

Alison and her mum drove down since there is a car wash very close by and our car very much needed a thorough cleaning:

Our car, a little dirty!

We boys got to the library first since we can take a slightly different route walking.  It was a good plan to have the car cleaned while we picked out story books and had some tea (or coffee) and cake!

Here's the library from the front, though it is not very exciting:

Front view of Cobbett Road Library

This was a great activity for a slightly cold, overcast Monday morning!  We were able to borrow a couple of DVD's too, so that will help to keep the kids occupied.

That's it for now, Lawrence out...

Weymouth beach again

One last stop at the beach for the boys to look
for shells, or so I thought, but grandma's presence
seemed to encourage paddling. Owen was
really cold afterwards, but we stopped just in
time - it started to rain. Once dried off and in
the car they warmed up pretty quickly though.

Abbotsbury Swannery

They are two-thirds of the way through hatching time at the swannery.  

Ethan and Owen both got to feed the swans with scoops of wheat.

Later we got a closer look at some of the swans and their nests, some
had as many as seven eggs.  We saw some cygnets catching a ride:

Weymouth beach

Another sunny morning! Yesterday we travelled to
Moors Valley country park. Today we are in Weymouth
and we are going to Abbotsbury Swannery.

Hopefully pictures to follow, if I get time and an
Internet connection.

Beach at Weymouth

Moors Valley Country Park

This place is cool!  There are lots of things to climb on, 
up and through, the first we saw was the Ant's Nest:

After that we saw a really cool area with platforms, 
bridges, walkways and so on, here are Ethan and 
Owen enjoying the climb

... then on to the Owl and other structures like a frog, 
a centipede and a snail.  Here's Alison, Owen and 
Ethan on the Owl:

Arrgh, snakes!  Don't get eaten up:

Owen and Ethan in snakes

Then we spent a while climbing on a large spider's
web and cargo net bridges, really cool:

and another spider's web made entirely of wood: 
 

Lawrence and Ethan - wooden spider web

A crocodile pit with elevated wooden walkways
was next, Alison, Ethan, myself and Owen all went
across these to avoid the large wood crocodiles!
 
There was another cool area after this, totem
pole type structures with footholds cut into them
and log bridges to walk across. (Sorry, no pictures
of these last two).

This was a great visit - we stopped here and had a
picnic before making our way on to Weymouth.

Friday

A bit overcast this morning, but promising
to be a fairly nice day nonetheless.

I have taken the day off as we are
planning to visit a country park.

More later, I hope, lots to do...

Beautiful day!

Wonderful weather today. Ethan, Owen, myself, Alison and her mum drove down to the local park that is right next to the Itchen river (+50° 55' 36.60", -1° 22' 43.71" (50.926834, -1.378807), next to the aptly named Riverside Park). We played in the park for a while, which was lovely. Then we fed the swans, ducks and other Angry Birds (seagulls mostly). Unfortunately Owen tried to rescue a piece of bread that dropped near the edge of the pontoon and got his finger nipped by a swan that was going for the same piece - his finger bled a little, but luckily no lasting damage (apart from a more healthy awareness of swans that is!).  I think that Ethan ate a similar amount of bread as the swans :-)

We had great weather all day - I am working in the converted loft (attic) and took a moment to look and photograph out of the roof window, here is one view, mostly behind the house:

Cool huh?

Second day

We all slept through the night, awaking fairly early, though in daylight hours.  Owen was a bit sick and looked white as a sheet in the morning, I had a bath with him, since he fell asleep eating his dinner on Tuesday night and missed bathtime!  Later on he took a much needed 3-hour nap while Ethan, Alison and her mum went out for a shopping errand (needed to buy nappies/diapers).  I was able to work for much longer.

Adjusting...

Alison and I took a 2 hour nap when we got in. Everything is a bit fuzzy!  I managed to work until about 9:30pm (3:30pm Central US) but eventually had to give in and go to bed, hoping for more productivity tomorrow.

We've arrived!

Our flight was a little delayed getting in, but only by about 30 minutes.
Around 10am BST (4am Central US time) we landed at London Heathrow airport.
The boys got some sleep on the flight but neither Alison or myself did, so
we both napped a bit in the car on the way down to Southampton where we are
staying with her mother.