Perrygrove Railway

At last! I have some time to tell you more about our holiday, oh so long ago! Monday 17th August saw the Davies tribe excitedly making their way to Perrygrove Railway just round the corner from the holiday cottage. Perrygrove is a miniature railway which has steam & diesel engines running on it. Lee & I had visited once before with our friends Angie & Christian when Jordan was 9 months old or so. We boarded the first steamy & set off to the end of the line!
It was so much fun on the trains! The engine driver even pulled the chain to blow the whistle at the boys request & Jordan got to wave the conductor's green flag to let the driver know the train was ready to leave. He had to jump back on the train quickly! Jordan made friends with a little boy & his grandma so spent a lot of the train rides sitting with them. They got on really well & had a lot of fun playing together. Do click on the photos to see them in more detail if you'd like!
Annie-Joy loved the whole train experience & 'choo choo-d' her way through all the journeys. She loved the chickens from the farm that wandered about as we ate our picnic at lunch time.

The boys did a treasure hunt too. They had a clip board & a key each with different questions & things to look out for on the train rides & through the woodland walks. None of the treasure hunt clues are the same on any given day. It was a little tricky helping 3 boys collect separate clues but also lots of fun! Jordan especially enjoyed collecting clues & writing them down. When all the clues were collected we had to go to the secret village & find the right little house. Inside there were lockers that only their key opened. Inside was their very own treasure!

There was much excitement from all the children as they explored the secret village with all the hidden passageways (see the photo of Timmy above!) & they were over joyed to play in the treetop adventure play ground! There was even time to play with the wooden train tracks.

We stayed all day & went on the very last train back to the main entrance. Annie-Joy wanted to walk so Lee went with her through the woods from Oakiron Station down to Perrygrove Station. It was like a little race to see who would get back to the start first- the train or the toddler! Much to the train drivers surprise (& Timmy & Luke) Annie-Joy & Lee got back first! You can just see her feet at the bottom of the fence next to Lee if you click on the photo to make it bigger! She's a great walker! Anyway, Perrygrove was a fantastic day out enjoyed by all! We would definitely recommend a visit if you are over that way. TTFN! :o)

Happy Birthday Mum!

It's my dear Mum's birthday today! We hope you are enjoying your day.
Luke keeps asking if he can come to your party! I keep explaining that we saw you on Sunday for your 'party' but that just makes him ask if he can come to your party next year! Anyway, in the mean time, would you like a cyber cake? Annie-Joy & I made them last week. They have real strawberry icing on them- if you look closely you might even see some strawberry seeds!
I made my mum a bag for her birthday. I started with a bag that Lee got from one of his Health & Safety conferences. Lovely bag, but very annoying that it has IOSH plastered over it! So with the help of Heather Bailey & her fabric flowers I transformed it into....

...this!

I like the ripped flower very much but I expect Mum prefers the non frayed ones!

The little flower at the top is also a broach! Quite sweet I thought! I hope you enjoy using your bag Mum. Happy birthday again! We love you! Speak to you later. :o)

He's Eight!

Jordan was eight today! It doesn't seem a minute since he was born early that sunny Saturday morning in 2001. Look at him now- aged eight & standing in front of his first car with personalised reg plate too!! Hee hee! Jordan was SO excited to see this car near my parents house when we visited them on Sunday.
Jordan has been spoilt rotten today. He opened some presents in bed with us before Timmy & Luke were awake. Annie-Joy thought the presents were for her again! She has been singing 'Happy Birthday' on & off all day! All three boys were very excited about the box of magic tricks that Jordan's Godmother gave him! What fun eh? As soon as Jordan walked onto the school yard this morning he was swarmed by girls all singing Happy Birthday to him! He went all shy & ran off & then got chased around the yard!
Annie-Joy & I made Jordan's figure of eight cake at lunch time. I iced it while she had her afternoon nap. I must add here that Lee really liked Jordan's cake because it reminded him of his 8th birthday cake which was also a figure of eight cake! It was the first birthday cake he remembers.
Lee's parents came round after tea to help eat the cake & sing Happy Birthday AGAIN!! This was rendition number four apparently. At school he had to stand on his class teacher's chair while his class sang to him & then at lunch time the whole dining room sang to him again!

Jordan cut the cake & served it to everyone. Timmy & Luke wanted to have a candle of their own so we put a lit one on their slice of cake. Timmy sang happy birthday to himself before blowing out the candle! Then they wanted to do it all over again so we did!

This is the piece of cake Jordan cut for himself. Yummy! After the cake the boys played Jordan's new game of Operation that Nanny & Grandad had given him. It went down a storm! I have just tucked Jordan up in bed with his latest Dinosaur Cove book that Auntie Helen & Uncle Ian sent in the post for him. He only started reading it at 5pm today when he got home after Judo class. He has almost finished it already!

Ah well, time for a cuppa me thinks! Hope all who read are well & enjoying the week so far. TTFN! :o)

You're The Voice

We heard Liam Moore speaking at a church we visited over the summer. He was promoting the work he has been doing with children & youth in Norris Green & Croxteth (areas of Liverpool that are notorious for gun & knife crime). Liam has recorded the song 'You're The Voice' with hundreds of children from Liverpool to raise money for projects helping to reduce knife crime as well as for The Rhys Jones Memorial Foundation. The single was released for sale today. Please go to You're the Voice website to download the single or buy a 'real' copy of it at Asda, HMV or Tescos. Thank you!

She's Two!!

Can you believe it? Annie-Joy is now two years old! And what a cutie she is!
The postman delivered many parcels & letters for Annie on her birthday & she had a fabulous time opening them all up! She loves the teddy bear book that Grandma & Grandad gave her...

...and the Ninky Nonk train from the Walsh family. she loved the tights from G & G as well & put them on herself straight away & said 'Nice!' (It's her favourite word to use when she has got dressed!)

Annie-Joy received many lovely cards too. Jordan made her this one. It says 'Joyday! Wihoo!' & has a picture of a 'frobry' on it. 'Frobry' is how AJ says strawberry. She has strawberries on her new shoes so now instead of asking for her shoes she asks for her 'frobry'. AJ's word for strawberry can easily be confused with her saying 'Straw please' when she would like a drinking straw to drink her juice with! :o)

Annie & I had a lovely day. The sun was shining & after the gas safety inspection man had been for the annual test of our appliances we pegged out the washing & had fun playing in the garden. Then we made birthday fairy cakes!

Annie-Joy loves teddy bears so I made the cakes into little teddy bears with chocolate buttons & chocolate drops. I did put teddy mouths on some of the cakes but it was a bit fiddly & quite honestly the cakes still looked teddy like without them so I left them off most of the cakes to save time!

Lee's mum came for birthday tea which was Annie's favourite Chickpea Cous Cous. We had a lovely, relaxing time together.

Annie is good at blowing out candles now! You can just see Luke helping her too!

We all enjoyed eating the teddies! Hee hee!

On Saturday we had a few friends round for cake & the singing of the jolly song 'Happy Birthday'. It was a really lovely time, so relaxing even with 8 small children & 5 adults present. It was great to chat & spend time with everyone.

As well as the birthday cake I made some teddy biscuits with my new biscuit cutter which Lee had to collect from the sorting office at 8am on Saturday! So these really were hot off the press (what is the baking expression I'm looking for here?? My mind has gone blank). I had also planned to make chocolate teddy lollipops but the moulds didn't arrive in time so I shall do them another time.

Annie-Joy loved her teddy birthday cake! My mum bought a teddy shaped cake mould years back from a charity shop I think but I hadn't quite plucked up the courage to use it until now. Much to my relief the cake turned out of the tin perfectly & I happily iced it with a piping bag full of chocolate fudge icing! It got quite messy but it was very easy.

We all sang a very rousing rendition of Happy Birthday much to Annie's delight....

...and then the cake was cut & eaten- much to the boys delight!! They also enjoyed some fizzy pop which is something they usually only get at birthday parties!

Luke was quite excited about eating the teddy cake & kept looking for teddy bones!! He had just recently been for his spine x ray & check up at Alder Hey so I think that had a lot to do with it! The party guests left with bottles of bubbles each (another of Annie's favourite things). The sun was shining brilliantly that day, as it had done two years ago when AJ was born, so after lunch we headed to the park with some other friends & had fun playing in the play area & eating ice cream in the scorching heat! What a fun way to celebrate I say! :o)

Beechenhurst & The Birthday Barbeque

Day three of our holiday began with a trip to Beechenhurst Lodge. We got there early so it was very quiet which was lovely. Family tradition (going way back to last year!!) dictated that we must have a group photo sitting on the huge log!

The kids had a fabulous time in the play area. The boys did obstacle races a la Total Wipe Out! Some how Jordan climbed on top of the wooden miner sculpture! I still don't know how he managed it! One minute he was riding the wooden horse, the next he was on the miner's head saying 'I did it! I won!!' Annie-Joy had a great time following her brothers down the fireman's pole with the help of Lee & Jordan. All of a sudden she is big enough to go on a 'grown up' swing all by herself without falling off! She can even swing herself too!
At lunch time Helen, Ian & Dave (Ian's dad) came round to the cottage for a barbeque to celebrate Helen's birthday. We had a lovely time together.

Lee always loves getting the barby going!! This was his second attempt as the first disposable barbeque didn't light properly & fizzled out to nothing within seconds! Although a bit smokey to begin with the second tray did a great job! We all loved the toasted marshmallows for pudding. Can you believe that Lee had never tried one before?

The boys played brilliantly together. Jordan organised some races & ball games. They were so fast at running I couldn't get a good photo!

I loved watching this bumble bee gathering nectar in the garden. I feel a little sad that the bee population is in decline. Hope they don't become a thing of the past! Take a look here for some fascinating bee info! I never knew there were 250 different types of bees in the UK! Did you?

This is Helen modelling the earrings I made her for her birthday. I don't think the photo does them justice! (Helen looks nice though!). I also made her a matching necklace. They were a lot of fun to make.

We gave Helen a caterpillar birthday cake. I had hoped to make her a cake but that never happened! Anyway, Mr Caterpillar did the job just fine. There was much hilarity during the singing of Happy Birthday as Lee got the words wrong by accident!!! It was very funny! I have a cracking picture of Helen doing one of her really enormous loud laughs but she wouldn't be impressed if it found it's way on here! Hiding behind Helen is Uncle Ben who joined us later on in the afternoon.

Helen did a great job of blowing out the candles & we all enjoyed a slice of very rich chocolate caterpillar! Mmmmm!

When everyone had gone home we settled down to watch Ice Age 1 which the boys were very excited about! We hadn't watched it before. They laughed & laughed at it & thoroughly enjoyed it. Lee fell asleep! (I should point out that Jordan & Annie aren't as close to the tv as the picture makes it look!).

After baths & all that jazz Lee read the boys a story on our bed. they had a lovely chat & pray together before everyone jumped into bed. Another fun day away! Lee & I watched Spiderman 2 in the evening. Again, rather a good film! :o)

Knockley Patch & Josie

Day Two of our holiday was a little bit 'functional'! In the morning we took a trip to Lidl in Cinderford to get the week's food & supplies. A watermelon got dropped between shelf & trolley! Oooops! It made the aisle smell delicious! I cooked our main meal at lunch time & then we headed out to Knockley Patch for a walk. (Last year's piccies are here). I love how the boys climbed over the fence...
... Annie-Joy isn't big enough to climb over just yet but she gave it a good try!
It's always good to explore the forest. We heard crickets in the bushes & then saw them! They are hard to photograph! As soon as they camera beeps off they spring!! I think they are a bit scary!

Luke collected a huge number of pine cones. He tells me he loves trains, snails, bees & pine cones best in the whole world.

Red cuckoo pints. At least I think that's what they are called. They remind me of my childhood in Ardeley.

Annie-Joy loves sticks & stones. She carried this one for a very long time swinging it somewhat wildly & giggling lots!

We had lots of races on the way back to the car (we did a circular route) as there were some steep hills & some rather weary children. The boys enjoyed cheering Annie on as she ran towards them for big hugs. I always came last! At the beginning of our walk a couple with two dogs asked us for directions to the camp site. We gave them directions.... they didn't follow them.... we kept seeing them crossing our path in the distance. They reminded me of the two lost cars in the film Cars ('We have the GPS honey! Never get lost again!'). I wonder if they are still wandering the forest?? I hope not!!

After our walk we went for tea at our friend Josie's house. We had a lovely time with her catching up on all the news etc. The boys love her very much. Jordan called her Grandma throughout the visit & didn't even realise he'd made a mistake! I think that's really sweet!

Jordan played a game of Snakes & Ladders with Josie. He loves board games!

This one was Josie's when she was a child. They certainly don't make them like that any more!

The children had a great time playing with all Josie's children's old toys. I was very happy to see these little people! I had a set of them when I was a little girl & I loved them!! They stack in all kinds of different ways so you can make towers & patterns with them!

Annie-Joy took a shine to them too. Funny how things come full circle.... We had a really good afternoon with Josie. She is such a lovely lady. :o) After we had bathed the kids & put them to bed, Lee & I watched the first Spiderman film. It's been years since we last watched it! I had forgotten how good it is. We all slept like logs that night. I didn't even hear closing time at the pub next door! :o)