Where they are. right now. #motivationalmonday #themondayclub #whatsthestory

This months theme on motivational monday is children. Hey..guess what…

I have a few of those 😉

So i thought i would give a little run down of each of the little folk who dwell here in this dwelling.

So first up. My guy. My only one.

Yes..thats right he is the only boy..

yes he is surrounded by women, yes he has lots of sisters, no he isn’t henpecked…

blah blah blah…

you can tell i have heard those sort of comments LOTS before right?!

We all know a baby doesn’t come with a ‘tick the box’ option don’t we. *stares*

A-n-y-w-a-y  (thats a whole other blog post) 😉

My pioneering child. Breaking all those first boundaries of parenthood. He is the one that we have had to scale that steep learning curve with and i reckon that fact that him and us are still all alive and vaguely sane is the sign of a success!

Yes?

Anyway our not so little boy is now staring down the barrels of 11.

Sweet. mary. jo.

We are so close to teenager it could spin my head clear off my shoulders!

But right now he is 10.

and right now he is:

 

  • Very very much into Minecraft, which is a game that i cannot understand the attraction in. He is asking me to download all sorts of guides to it on the Kindle and then spending hours working out how to make houses. The graphics remind me of something that was around in the days of the ZX-81 😉
  • Finished year 5 this year and waved goodbye to one of his favourite teachers. The teacher is leaving the school as well so there is no chance that my girls will have him which is a shame. We liked him a lot

  • He loves formula one. You could talk to him for ages about cars. He knows so much about cars, their makes, models and how fast they can go. Largely fuelled by his father’s interest in formula one and all things a bit petrol head ish. 
  • He currently wants to work for Nintendo and has taken it quite personally that the Wii U has bombed slightly! 🙂
  • He is a great big brother to his sisters and is pretty balanced about being a big brother to a bunch of girls. He is especially close to our youngest girlie.
  • He loves movies, and scripts. He remembers dialogue and quotes it often! Currently we are all about dispicable me 2 and Monsters U.
  • He is after a phone…we are resisting..we might meet middle ground with some walkie talkies 😉
  • He still likes trains
  • He has no love for girlie pop groups such as one direction and the like. Usually a point of conflict in our house!!
  • He has never ever tasted tomato Ketchup, he used to tell people he was allergic to it. He now develops a big kinship with anyone who comes to our house who feels the same. 😉
  • He is a natural musician and plays by ear, which sometimes frustrates his music teacher. He isnt, however, a natural practicer (is that a word?) so we have to use increasingly inventive ways to get him to practice!
  • He can be a bit ‘chickin lickin’ Which we laugh about but we sometimes have to have very serious conversations about how the wind outside is not going to turn into a tornedo!
  • He is, to date, the only one of my children who has had to endure a general anesthestic. (thank God). He fell onto a coffee table when he was 2 and has to have surgery as it had gone across the line of his lip. He now has a cute Indiana Jones type scar.

He is also turning into a little bit of a photographer and this weekend asked me to help him take this sort of shot. I think he did a pretty good job.

cthemondayclubMotivational Monday

Giveaway this month is for a fabulous luxury box of cosmetics from LUSH, that shop you can smell from all the way down the street. Just follow the rafflecopter instructions. Good LUCK

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 
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The magic of the slip ‘n slide! #countrykids

This summer the weather had been loads better than average. I know it is taking a bit of a downward turn and going back to the summers we all know. But while it was sunny, we did a lot of garden playtime.

This usually involves a lot of play with water! The kids love water and we are always telling them to stop flooding the garden and playing with the hose.

So this way we get to use the hose and the water and everyone is happy. Except the dog who hates the water antics and stands hidden at the back of the garden with a look of bewilderment on his face. Thats not the case with the slip and sliders though, they love every minute.  🙂

Country Kids from Coombe Mill Family Farm Holidays Cornwall

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Down on the farm #countrykids

Yeah okay so i went AWOL again from nursery and took my girls to a little inner city farm in the sunshine. I might have written about it before. It is a council farm that is run to provide occupation and training for young adults with special needs. There is some cute little petting animals there as well as some farm animals, particularly goats!!

We discovered a little fairy glen walk and the girls followed the numbered route around and looked at the different flowers and trees. It was a nice to have a little shade.

We finished it off with a play on the tractor and then an ice-cream.

More fun than nursery?

Well it was for me!!

🙂

Country Kids from Coombe Mill Family Farm Holidays Cornwall

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On yer bike #CountryKids

I have a feeling that throughout the summer there is going to be a lot of my Country Kids that feature bike rides. We have really discovered what fun it is to ride as a family lately and i think a lot of that is down to the fact that the older kids love the independence. The younger ones get to come along without us worrying if they are going to moan and whine about getting tired. So everyone can keep up. I got a fabulous birthday present from a friend of mine of a funky on the front basket for my bike which makes carrying the essentials, juice, wipes, biscuits…that bit easier!!

It is also ticks the green and cheap day out for kids box which is SO important to us at the moment. Saving the pennies is high on our agenda and once you are set up with bikes and a packed lunch you can set off for the day and it not cost more than maybe an ice-cream. Little note..i know its not PC but the golden arches are SUCH good value for ice-creams. We can get the whole family an ice-cream for less than a fiver. You wont get that from an ice cream van!

The other week we went  for an impulsive  trip to New Brighton promenade. It was getting towards the end of the afternoon so the sun was quite low but the wind was up so it was a little on the cool side as well. I really love ‘proms’ when it comes to cycling with the kids. It is so flat and easy going for them that they can literally cycle for miles without realising it. We set our sights on getting to the lighthouse and off we went.

The only down side to being beside the sea was that occasionally we came across areas of sand and i suddenly discovered how hard it is to ride a bike (and stay up) when riding on sand!! Also it can be pretty windy by the sea and one of my girls did struggle a bit as we were cycling into the wind. Made for a fast ride back though!!

 

Family Farm Holidays Cornwall

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Chirk Castle #CountryKids #Nationaltrust

A few weeks ago we went to Chirk Castle. It was a beautiful sunny day and we had heard really good things about the castle. It is a National Trust property and so we knew that we would be able to spend a lovely time in the gardens with the kids, especially as it was such a hot day.

It is a little over and hour away and we we drove into Wales, the landscape really does become ‘this green and pleasant land’  Which when you mostly spend all your time in a large urban area it is lovely to see the space just opening up before you and galloping off into the distance.

Chirk is a 700 year old castle that is apparently one of the only ones in Wales that is still lived in today. We didn’t see any of the residents..im not sure who they are, but i do wonder how they don’t get lost in that huge building and the 3 mile driveway must make popping out for a pint of milk a bit of a pain in the ar** 😉

You get a real impression of its bustling castle courtyard where there was a very enthusiastic member of the Chirk Castle team getting the kids into teams and having a go at being at attacking the enemy the way they would have done so many centuries ago. He was really very good and had us and the kids laughing and smiling. Even my 4 year old got involved, though i think she preferred to smile at me a lot than do lots of charging and yelling that he was asking them to do. The kids got to try on some armoury, man that is heavy stuff and then ventured inside to the deep dark dungeon. If you have a little one that loves all things medieval then this is the place for a visit.

It has a lovely little cafe and play are where they were toasting marshmallows on an open fire for the kids and then acres and acres and acres of land to explore. We went for a long walk through the woods and found a little spot for some lunch amongst the bluebells.

You can visit the castle but we didnt go in this time, instead choosing to explore the beautifully manicured gardens which also afforded themselves well to some rolling down the hillside activity! The gardens also had some little ponds that the kids spent lots of time playing around and seeing of their various toys would float. Not all of them did  *oops*

We finished off our time there by walking through the prettiest wild flower fields that overlooked the cheshire countryside. There just isnt much to not like about this national trust property. It is a perfect balance of space, things to do and a little bit of shopping and playtime.

We will be going back.

🙂

 

Country Kids from Coombe Mill Family Farm Holidays Cornwall

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