The Duckpond

Let me take you on a little adventure and introduce you to a our local pond, which for a long time I had no idea was there!

We live on a new estate on the edge of village and tucked away behind the houses and between the bypass, there is a wonderful pond.

It is firmly becoming a favorite place for me and the boys to visit after school, as it is only a three minute walk and it is often deserted.

We are the only people there feeding the many ducks, duckings, geese and goslings.

Locomotion - A great day out

The boys took me to Locomotion, which is part of the National Railway Museum, but based at Shildon, as they had a steam gala on today and the Tornado Peppercorn Steam Train is there this weekend.

Yes, even though it was raining, we decided to make the most of the holiday weekend and take a picnic anyway!

So I made chocolate cakes and biscuits with the boys first thing, we packed a flash or two and also took some hot-dogs and buns in our food flask and set off.

It is a great place, with loads to do for the children, games of all sorts and we had a great time.  In the photo above Mini and Maxi are setting the table against the clock in Hackworth's cottage.

There is lots of small interactive games scattered throughout the place, which is great for keeping the boys occupied and of course it is full of trains!

And even thought it was cold and a little damp there is a fantastic play park, which the boys really enjoyed.  A perfect day with my boys regardless of the weather.

Easter Plans

Easter starts for us today.  Maxi had his first ever assembly all about the First Easter.

MadDad made it back from work in time and we both really enjoyed watching our boy, who had a wonderful strong and clear speaking voice.  It was such a joy to watch a group of four and five year olds clearly enjoying themselves.

MadDad is off for the week, so we are planning on lots of family time together and with this in mind, I have exchanged some Tesco Vouchers for some restaurant ones, but even though I did this over a fortnight ago, we are still waiting!

Our Plans include, but are dependant on weather:

Egg hunt at National Trust - we have annual membership

Visits to English Heritage sites, again we have annual membership (via Tesco vouchers)

Easter Dance Party at my Brother and Sister in Laws Club, including Bonnet competition and egg decorating competition.

Decorating bonnets and eggs for the Children's Dance Party

A trip to Fardale to see the daffodils

Making a start of Easter Egg mountain!

Car boot on Sunday, we are going to take the boys with us.

Visits to Kirkleatham Museum, Preston Park, Mima and Wet and wild.

Danby Moors Centre

Saltburn Valley woodlands centre

Duckings swimming

Day learning to crochet - yes I am so excited about this, yep almost giddy

Bric a Brac sale at the Club.

National Railway Museaum at York

Baking, making and lots of cooking and creating

Visit lots of local parks.  The mini's have a list and they like them all for different reasons.

DVD's, popcorn and cuddles

Whitby

Plus we have plans to get some seeds planted and also we do need to repaint the render outside.  Oh and I also have paint for the sitting room and dinning room too, but I am not going to make MadDad do everything in this week, we have had the paint since the January Sales!

So I am planning on having a great Easter and I hope you do too.  I will be posting, but possibly not commenting due to time, so please don't be offended.

Following the Sun

The forecast for today was not great, however, that is not unusual for a Bank Holiday Monday, but we are trying to make the most of every day before school starts next week, so decided to pack a picnic and to follow the sun via a trip to Ikea to check out beds for MiniMad!!!

So we looked and the bed we liked was out of stock - boohoo, but that means we can have a trip to Leeds on Wednesday to get it - yippee. The boys were very well behaved, but the promise of ice cream and play area might have had something to do with it (not that I am one to resort to bribes and emotional blackmail - oh no, not I)!!

We then decided to make the most of the warm weather and sun and go off to the coast and headed to Tynemouth for our picnic (yes we were at Ikea for opening) and spent the afternoon at Tynemouth Priory and Castle.

The boys loved running around the castle and really enjoyed the cannons and the gun battery. MadDad enjoyed telling them all about the reasons they were named (size of their ammo).

I just loved running free with the children and taking lots of pictures to remind me of a fab day. The beauty of English Heritage sites is the children can run and explore, climb on the ruins (within reason) and have a hands on experience of the wonder of history.

Best of all the day ended as it had started with ice cream and ice Lolly's, but unfortunately the rain caught up with us. By the time we got back to the car we were soaked though our rain coats and the boys traveled home in just T-shirts. But soon warmed up with a feast of crumpets and hot chocolate for supper.