Has anyone seen a mouse?

Duet

To the zoo

We visited http://www.hamertonzoopark.com/ today, it was a good idea of Ellen's and I'm glad we went but.... not the greatest Zoo we've visited, at least not for kids. The website homepage features a cheetah in full sprint, the reality was mainly small nocturnal primates, birds and reptiles and a handful of cheetahs, tigers and donkeys. My favorite were the Vultures and Maribou Storks, the Maribou Storks were the most magnificently ugly birds I've ever seen. Apparently they hang around rubbish dumps and slaughter houses in Africa and considering they were almost as tall as me and were eyeing up Leon as a possible snack, I wouldn't like to meet them without the fence between us. Amazing to look at. Leon was more interested in pretending to be stuck in pretend mud, I think he liked the ring tailed Lima's when I pointed out they were like his cuddly pal Leroy we got at Amersfoort Zoo.
It was a reasonably fun day, I doubt we'll go back there, I wouldn't recommend it really. I like zoos with petting areas, visible keepers and a bit more imagination in presenting the animals. After all, their main target audience, kids, need to be drawn in. It was nice spending the day together with Ellen and Dan, as always. They are about to go and enjoy their 70th Birthday present to each other, so we won't see them for a short while. We went back to their's late afternoon and I sussed out a Hotwheels racing track Ellen had found in Oxfam for Leon and managed to put it together so it folded up properly. Me and Tobe had more fun racing as it was intended but Leon spent ages in his pretend world sending out repair vehicles and rescuing cars, it's really fun to watch him play.
Reuben is ever more getting about crawling now, he can pull himself up to kneeling and occasionally standing. I got some pictures of him standing by the pond, similar to some pictures we did of Leon at the same age.

Reuben in the same out fit, same age as Leon

Beep!

Reuben's getting up!

Leon at 10 months

Bat for Lashes

Tob and I went to see Bat for Lashes at the Junction in Cambridge this evening, thanks to a ticket that Sue couldn't use so she sold it to me and I bought another one for Tob. Tob hadn't heard of Bat for Lashes and at first did consider letting me go on my own but he said he enjoyed it in the end. For me, as someone who used to work in a venue similar in size to the Junction and would go to gigs about twice a week for most of the 90's mainly in Utrecht but also regularly in Amsterdam and Eindhoven, I had all sorts of expectations and observations having not been to a gig of this size since....ohhh....let me think...Lamb at the Kentish Town Forum in....2002, I think. Since then, smoking has stopped and camera phones have come in. The cloakroom was 2 quid per item so that was another £4 and tob spent over a fiver on a coke and a pint of piss/lager. Considering the audience just get to stand around, somebody must be doing pretty well out of venues like the Junction. The biggest difference was the lack of smoke, in fact the only smell I could smell was that smell you can smell when you walk past a Lush shop in a shopping centre.

The support act were really good. If Stereolab and the Cocteau Twins had...triplets they would be the two lovely looking girls and floppy haired bloke on guitar. Very nice. Then half hour wait and on came Natasha Kahn and her band, Bat for Lashes. The drummer was really really good, very Budgie like and...a little young lady about 19 in a little black dress. There was a girl on guitar and bass who also did backing vocals and a bit of percussion and keyboards, very accomplished musician, I'd say her bass playing was the weakest point but other than that a very good musician. There was a bloke on Keyboards, lucky bloke, some would say. It was nice to see a really quality band with one bloke rather than the usual ratio with one woman.

Natasha was sweet, dignified and much older than her years both in the way she's written some amazing tunes and in the way she carries herself. About 4 songs in someone shouted 'Stephen!' to which the reply 'Just coming' rippled through the audience, myself included. Natasha said there had been so many 'Stephens' and she was thinking of introducing a penalty. I think I will email Adam and Joe and report this 'Stephen' event to them.

Since having children and coming to the conclusion so often that I can hear something new and interesting then spend ages going through it naming the influences I can hear - no bad thing - It all goes back to someone, all the greats were influenced by other greats that came before them. I have invented a system (preview earlier in the post) where I work out the family tree. For example I worked out that Bat for Lashes, or rather Natasha Kahn in my head this is, was a result of a passionate affair between Kate Bush and Mick Kahn while they were working on Sensual World (Mick plays bass on some of the tracks you will hear). They have Natasha as a love child and make Budgie, Tori Amos and Sinead O'Connor god parents. Mick invites his mates Robert Smith and Robin Guthrie round for beer while he's looking after the little Natasha as she plays on her ELC dulcimer, they listen to records like Hawkwind, Pink Floyd and Kraftwerk. Then the little Natasha grows up to be the fabulous, beautiful accomplished musician she is now, Mercury Price nominee at the age of 17 bla bla bla.

The first time I adopted this method of describing bands was when Muse appeared on the scene back in 2001. I thought if Queen, Radiohead and Bethoven had a love child.... and it went on from there.

Christine and the boys on the bike

Easter Sunday

Woke up grumpy, I wanted to have woken up earlier but by 9am realised it would be a stretch to get showered, dressed nicely, get the boys dressed, make a picnic and load the car up for a day out by 10.30. I was right, we left about 11.10 having driven out of the drive way twice, first because I'd forgotten to change Leon before we left then second, I'd forgotten Reuben's muslin cloth. Then I left the keys inside and when Tob left me in the car with my head in my hands, informed me when he returned with my keys that I'd left the front door wide open. Not a great start. The boys fell asleep nicely as planned and I put the ipod on, first selecting Art Brut (imagine Sonic Youth and Carter had a love child in about 1990 and made Mark E Smith and Jarvis Cocker God parents). Then picked Arcade Fire, then Carter USM. Tob pointed out that I kept picking angry music. I realised this wasn't helping and finally settled on some early Cure which did the trick. The journey through Norfolk was nice, we didn't see any sun really all day but it didn't rain so nuff said about the weather. Bressingham Gardens and Steam Railway Centre was our destination for the day; an Easter gift from Ellen and Dan and a very impressive place it was too. First point we stopped was a picnic bench right in front of a beautiful Victorian Steam Merrygoround. The steam organ played a medley of Mary Poppins and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang songs and I felt so happy and moved it was as much as I could do not to start blubbering as I thought about how much I'd loved riding the horses on merrygorounds just like this one as a child and now I was riding a horse with my 2 year old son who was completely in love with the ride as I had been. He must have gone on half a dozen times after our first ride. I love the music from Mary Poppins and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. I think if the music had been from The Wizard of Oz I'd have probably collapsed blubbering with joy and nostalgia. Lucky for us all it wasn't. We spent the day going on steam trains, walking through locomotive sheds, admiring trains and walking around the grounds. The place was buzzing without being too busy so it was a perfect day really. To top it all off I spotted an Ivor the Engine section in the gift shop and bought Leon some Jones the Steam socks, an Ivor story book (the dragon story) and when I showed Toby the Ivor mugs saying how much I'd love one but couldn't really justify buying one, he bought it me as an Easter present. So all in all a good day out. On the way home, Reuben shouted and blew raspberries with a twinkle in his eye (he's such a happy chappy) and Leon winged about more chocolate milkshake, in fairness, he was hungry judging by how quickly he ate his tea when we got home.

Half way through Easter

Good Friday, the last thing I expected was that I'd be gayly pushing Reuben and Leon on the swings at 9.30am while the sun shined. Me with the boys on the bike with trailer and Tob had cycled down to the swimming pool, only to find it didn't open until 10am, it was sunny and mild and half an hour in the play park went by in a flash. We all had a lovely swim, highlights included Leon jumping in and landing in the water without being caught, coming up to the surface and swimming to the side numerous times with then without armbands (with tummy band vest). We cycled back home, Reuben crashed for a couple of hours sleep, Leon and I crashed on the sofa and slept through finding Nemo and Tob played Wow. Then Tob cut the grass and I did some gardening well into when it finally started raining. Considering heavy rain was forecast all day, the sun only went in about 2pm and the rain didn't start until about 4pm.

Leon must have caught a tummy bug at some point because we had histrionic nappy changing sore bum complaining just before bedtime, then a long and drawn out not wanting to go to bed and finally when he got into bed, he was sick all over the bed, himself, miffy, then me and the bedroom floor. Having changed us all and the bed, I went back up to check on him only to find him being sick all over the clean duvet. I managed to confine it to the duvet so I only had to replace the duvet. He ended up sleeping under a double duvet from the spare room while the rest duvets and all have all since gone through a 60 wash and gone in the drier - this is one of the handfull of times I get to use the drier we have stashed in the garage. I said if I never used the drier, we'd get rid of it but it definitely has its uses. Leon was back today in his bed with clean everything fresh out of the drier. I'm still working my way through the back log of washing.

Last night saw the return of Red Dwarf. A brand new series, I watched with interest but other than the fact I will probably watch this new series, I'm not really impressed. It's like Mr Kiplings cakes, they are really not that nice but you just can't help eating them if they are put in front of you.

Today, I wanted to get into town early like we'd done yesterday but it didn't work out the same. Reuben showed signs of needing a bottle and a bed about 9am, earlier than usual, so I obliged him and woke him up to go into town about 11am. He was happy to be woken and the boys were both happy to go into town in the back of the car. Again, the forecast yesterday was rain all day which is why we drove but it stayed dry. The traffic jam into Waitrose carpark went quickly while we sang old macdonald to the boys and Leon made up the animals. We had tractors (of course) then cows, tigers, caterpillars, monkeys, bunnys and crocodiles I recall.

Leon is really good in town now, without pushchair, he'll hold our hands and cooperate pretty much most of the time. He's very helpful in Waitrose and will fetch and carry with instructions. In the library, Reuben demonstrated his readiness to start cruising and I am beginning to suspect he might skip crawling and go straight to walking. He has started commando crawling (belly etc) but he pulls himself up on everything he can. So cruising will be the answer I suspect.

On our return home, this time after lunch, first Leon went to bed, then Toby, then Reuben leaving me to watch Finding Nemo, do a bit more gardening and chill out. Suddenly it was 4pm and I'd promised Sue I'd pop round with Dylans birthday present and pick up details to pick up our Bat for Lashes concert ticket for Monday in Cambridge I'm buying off her because she can't go. I could hear Reuben had woken up so I went into each bedroom one by one, first Leon's to open the curtains and say rise and shine! we are going out! then our room, where Toby lay tucked up, then Reuben's, opening all three sets of curtains. Within minutes we were on our way to Sue's where we spent the rest of the afternoon chatting with Sue and Jame's and Sue's mum while Leon played out in the garden with Dylan and Edward and Reuben made his way round their living room floor finding things he wasn't supposed to eat like newspapers, Dylan's books he got for his birthday etc.

The boys are both in bed, Doctor Who is waiting on Sky+, Tob is cooking a stir fry and the chocolate nests I made for tomorrow's outing to Bressingham are cooling in the fridge.

must buy creme eggs

http://tinyurl.com/cdn8wu

Count down to Easter, I've even cut down on the amount of chocolate I consume so I will enjoy my egg all the more.

I have an interview the end of the month for a part time post at the tourist information office in Ely. Fingers crossed. I absorb facts, especially historical so I'd be in the right place. As much as anything else I will become a font of knowledge on all the things to do with kids round here which will be no bad thing.

Last Sunday we were on our way to Anglesea Abbey for a walk when we stopped by in the centre of Ely, where to our delight, we found a collection of vintage cars and tractors on the Market place. Leon had a fantastic time riding tractors. I love the smell of engines, I have no idea why but even going in the shed in our garden, I take a moment to savor the smell of the lawn mower. I hate the smell of petrol at petrol stations but engines and bikes I love. At Anglesea Abbey we had a sunny afternoon and I managed to pick up half a dozen knocked down hellebores and half a dozen other herbs and flowers, mainly for the front garden. The front garden is my project for this year, I figure we see more of the front garden all year round so lets make it as pretty as possble. The back garden is pretty much established and really just needs maintaining. Which reminds me, I should ask Toby to mow the lawn this weekend, Easter or not.

Maiden Voyage

Well today was our first trip out on the bike with the trailer and it was really good. When Leon first sat in the trailer, he had his mouth open speechless face like 'wow! this is a car for me?' I asked him if he liked it and he said YES! with a big smile. Reuben didn't like wearing his helmet and there were more than a few tears shed while getting it fastened under his chin. I succeeded in not pinching his chubby chin even if the angry cries suggested otherwise. He seemed to enjoy the ride and was happy with the whole experience. On the way home at lunch time he fell asleep so he must be pretty relaxed. I left the bike out the front at lunch time and in a relaxed and dignified fashion was able to do lunch and get them both rested. Leaving the house in the afternoon for coffee at Hannah's was pretty stressful, Reuben was all dressed up and ready to go, I was strapping Leon in the Trailer and came back in to get Reuben only to discover he'd pood again so, back out, un-strap Leon bring him back inside, strip Reuben back down, change and dress him, he didn't like that, then the helmet again . I was not popular with him at all. We got to Hannah's OK, it was very windy but otherwise fine. I detect a significant level of passive aggressive behaviour from Hannah most of the time, and today was no different. She let me in, told me to take of Leon's shoes and walked back into the living room leaving me to keep Leon's shoes off her precious carpet, get him out if his coat, hold Reuben, get him out if his stuff and myself. Forgive me but if I invite someone over for coffee, I would at least offer to hold the baby so they can get coats off witout a juggling act involving a 9 month old and a toddler. Then it took an hour to be offered a cup of tea. I can only deduce that she doesn't like me but the only way she chooses to show it is in a way that only I can notice. This is apparently passive aggressive. She comes across as very timid and shy, I am of course, not so is this her way of dominating me? I feel very dominated and small, so I hope she's happy.
Boys are in bed, all's quiet upstairs. Tonight was the first time Leon's gone to bed without stories (something he really looks forward to and enjoys). We've threatened if he was naughty during bedtime hour this would happen but he's never pushed it to the point where we had to go through with it. Tonight it took the form of tipping water out of the bath onto the floor, on the third time, that was it, he'd been warned. He didn't like it but equally this should hopefully go a way to him realising what we say, we do. We got alot of crying and shouting but he got the message and went to bed.
Lots of preparing to do tonight, Penguin and Emma's wedding tomorrow. I'm really looking forward to it. After my pizza, I'm off upstairs for a bath, a soak rather, and then I'll have to do my hair so that tomorrow morning it should hopefully need a touch up along with makeup. I'm still not 100% sure which dress I'm going to wear so once I'm showered I will have a try on and ask Tob what he thinks. Very much looking forward to that pizza.

Trailer!!!!

I am very happy and excited, I have to admit on many levels I've been waiting to get a bike trailer for kids ever since they were first invented way before I had any kids to put into one. I should make clear at this point that this was not the reason I had kids but you get the gist.

I took it out of it's box this afternoon, first the two 20" wheels and then the folded body, it folds really nicely. I just put it down, and instinctively it could be unfolded and secured together mostly with pins that go through joins. The cover has so much Velcro on it I began to wonder if cycling in general would be the same these days had Velcro not been invented.

Then I went into the garage and put the thingy that goes on the 'host' bike's rear axle on my bike once I managed to find a dumbell spanner in the bottom of a box. God knows what's happened to my bike tools, that garage needs a sort out and we've only been here just under a year.

My Brompton high pressure mini pump pumped up the two 20" tyres in no time - I have a spare brompton pump as my first brompton was nicked and all I have to show for it is the pump. This will stay with the trailer. It's been persisting with rain all the time I was in the doing this but I was far too excited to wait for a break in the rain so I went out for a spin anyway. It was beautifully smooth, if light without the boys in it yet. Reuben will go in the seat behind me on the bike for the time being - research shows he'll be safest there until he's a year or so. Although saying that, if it was really raining I'd put them both in the trailer as otherwise Reuben would be pretty miserable and wet in the seat. I bought him a bike helmet today £25!!! I forgot how dear they are. I'm almost tempted to cycle round to Ellen's and put them both in it now regardless of the rain. I will resist this and make a shepherds pie instead. They can have a first run tomorrow me thinks.

I must send this picture to my Dad who sponsored this acquisition along with the DVDs he got me to order for him last week. Very chuffed indeed.

I finished my job application last night, at least to a point where Liz can give it a read through, it's nice to have a friend willing to help with things like that. She works at Ely Council and can give me some idea of if the application would look attractive to them. She did a good job last time, I got short listed and even though I didn't get the job, I was a close second and the feedback was I'd interviewed well and should keep applying for work there.
Reuben's just got his 3rd tooth, just as I was putting the finishing touches to the aforementioned paperwork last night, Reuben was being sick on Toby and refusing to drink any milk so I was asked to assist and provide that 'Mums opinion' on how to proceed further - you know, does he have a temperature, try and isolate what is making him upset. My diagnosis was teething and a blocked nose = snotty tummy hence the mini sicks. By then Tob had left me to sort Reuben out (how did that happen?) The teetha and bonjela worked until about 1am when he started up again. I was just in process of getting a duvet from the spare room to sit under on the rocking chair in his room when his protests got less and I thought it likely he'd settle back down if I left him, which he did. He hadn't had any Milk since 7pm so I was expecting him to wake at some point hungry but he didn't wake until gone 8am. By then the white bit of gum top right had turned into a tooth showing through. He had a yogurt for breakfast but still only a couple of ounces of milk so I would guess this teething stuff is suppressing his appetite, poor mite.
During his morning sleep, Leon was bored and really ought to have gone for a sleep, but wouldn't, so I did a search on You Tube for tractors and then car transporters and we watched videos of car transporters being loaded and unloaded much to Leon's delight. Then I had a cunning plan to get Leon to sleep. We lie on the sofa cuddling, I watch Bones and he falls asleep as it's not very interesting for him. This works to plan and within half an hour he's snoring away.
After lunch to music and the library with just Leon as it's Reuben's turn today to go to see his Nana for the afternoon.

Church farm on Saturday

We went up to Church Farm in Norfolk on Saturday, first time this year. I dare say we will be going there on a fairly regular basis as Leon talks about it all the time now.

Teeth again

Reuben is in process of pushing his 3rd tooth through and it's made him pretty miserable and put him off his food and milk. He's still having some, but probably about half his usual bottle, this could mean a growth spurt too. I hope he doesn't grow out of his posh outfit before next Saturday's wedding. I've shortened Leon's trousers; the outfit is age 3-4 having found that Monsoon size 2-3 was pretty tight on him. I think they will both look lovely in their velvet suits.
I've been on Ebay again and got a couple of pairs of skater shorts - I like them long to go some way to protect his knees. They might do two summers too. I have a feeling there will come a point in about 3 years when Leon and Reuben basically have a collective wardrobe.
Leon has started the unfortunate habit of putting his hand down my top which when wearing cowl necks means if I don't watch out he pulls it right down. Usually when he wants a cuddle he will put both arms straight down in front of him and as close to my skin as possible.
It's quite sunny today, really nice. I looked on the forecast and the weekend is going to be a wash out, which is a shame. I'm really looking forward to the wedding, I'm sure with Penguin's organisation skills they will have it sorted no matter what the weather.

Spring came last week

Last week we got a taste of what spring could be like, it's not so good looking this week but it was lovely last week. Dad came on Tuesday and stayed until Thursday. On Tuesday I took Dad along to Leon and Reuben's swimming lesson, Dad took Reuben but it wasn't that comfortable for him as the pool is quite shallow and his knees aren't great at the moment. I think he enjoyed seeing the boys bob about I'm glad we went. Wednesday I asked Ellen to take the boys and we went to Cambridge on the bus, the bus to Cambridge is a fiver return and stops outside the house pretty much and takes us all the way into Cambridge. Dad and I are very much into our Trains but this was just to good to bother getting across Ely to pay more to go by train. We went round Kings College Chapel, something I've been meaning to do and had a wonder around the Fitzwilliam Museum which I like to do given the opportunity as there's loads of good stuff to see there, it's a very under exposed museum considering what they have there. It was great to be going to Cambridge without a list of stuff to buy and a tight time schedule.

Thursday Dad got me to look up loads of stuff on the tinernet and order a film from the US and some stuff from Amazon, he's kindly paid for a bike trailer for the kids so I can get around Ely better. It's arriving tonight, I'm really looking forward to putting it together in the living room!

Reuben is 9 months today and I caught him not only getting from sitting to his front but back again to sitting! He's getting pretty fast at shuffling around. He's started to grab the bars on his play pen and in the hand rail in the bath so he'll be pulling himself up soon too.

Twitterbug

It has been far too long since my last confession. I have to confess that I have been bitten by the twitterbug; micro blogging inane stuff and reading about what some of my mates are up to and a whole lot of celebrities getting serious ego massaging. It's not a true representation of life reading about what my mate Sue is up to, then the next one down is Phill Jupitus or Stephen Fry.
I applied for a job in February, a part time job at the Council in Ely with a good benefits package, I was short listed and was in with a good chance. Not good enough sadly but I'm not going to let my new suit go to waste and I'm applying for another one, also part time, also for the council, also with benefits but not quite as well paid at the tourist office. I rang the woman who interviewed me just now and she said I interviewed well and there was no reason I wasn't going to get it other than there was someone else who was even closer, it sounds like I was a close second. She said I should keep trying for jobs at the council as there was a good chance I'd get one eventually.

Tractor Leon

Yesterday, I left my keys on the inside of the front door and shut the door potentially meaning we'd have to break in. Luckily Tob managed to push the key out from the outside with his key. I was also lucky in that both Children, our swimming stuff, food, nappies, my handbag and my mobile phone were on the outside. The only thing I missed was my hat and scarf. After swimming I bought a hat to cover my wet hair from the perishing cold wind.

After swimming, instead of taking Leon back home, I went back to Ellen and Dans to wait for Toby's return. We are so lucky to have both Ellen and Dan so close to us but more than that, they are so up for it and the boys have alot of fun round there. No money can buy the love and fun of loving grandparents. We are very blessed indeed.

I got 3 keys cut today and gave them one of them.

Today, they had Reuben for the afternoon so I could have the afternoon with just Leon, precious time we need together. I walked into town with Liz, Mike and Harriet. Well, Leon and Mike trailed ahead, Leon pushing his own little pushchair with upsydaisy in it and Liz and I walked with Harriet with her pushchair. Their paces are very different! Harriet chose to make a dignified journey by getting in the pushchair half way, Leon soldiered on running and screaming to a halt at every puddle on the way.

During music, the rain started to come down in buckets. Leon didn't have his usual sleep at 11am, choosing to play with his cars but once I wrapped him up in the pushchair, raincover on and we all headed out into the rain, he was fast asleep inside about 2 minutes. He woke up an hour or so later as we got home and went into a rage such like I've not seen for oh at least a day, because he'd been going on about going into town all morning to buy more cars and here we were back home and he'd missed town, the shops and any opportunity to buy cars (he wishes). I am to blame for this connection between town, shops and cars as our local Oxfam is a brilliant source of excellent dye cast cars, we have some great ones. It's always pot luck and we are more often than not lucky and they only cost a few pence most of the time. Trouble is, as he gets more understanding of things, or thinks he has, he expects a car like most kids expect a pack of chocolate buttons. They cost about the same but he gets the buttons too!

Toby is sleeping soundly in a hotel room in Copenhagen, I should go to bed and get some sleep, I dare say, Leon will be up early as usual.

Oh the video, yes this was taken on my mobile on Tuesday evening as Toby walked in the door at Ellen and Dan's with the news that the front door had been saved and we could get back into our house.