You'd never think that Ned has actually got a set of proper face paints would you? Quite why Mum decided it was a good idea to use felt tips for this is quite beyond me:

I added a few finishing touches of course!

Several hundred wet wipes later and everything was back to normal(ish).
I'm full of attitude at the moment, I never need any help with anything at all, I know it all and I don't listen to what i'm told. So much so that I actually went all the way to nursery in a t-shirt the other day (while it was freezing cold) because i wouldn't let mum put my coat on. Actually, i think I pushed that one a bit far, she was right, and i've made sure my coat has been well and truly on every day since.
And while we're speaking of outerwear, my coat came home so dirty yesterday dad had to put the washing machine on, all on his own (once he'd rung mum to find out what programme it had to go on). Apparently my coat was so dirty, even the inside was covered in mud!
Friday was the end of our school art week and we had a special assembly in the afternoon. I was really pleased to see Dad and Ellis turn up to see our work.
And I was just a little disappointed that we'd gone to a school assembly with no singing!
Anyway, back to the weekend and a trip to Warwick Castle:

The best bit was first, the park:

Yep, the park certainly passed the Ned test:

Next up was the stocks, fortunaltey there was no spare food to throw at us:

Unlike every other castle we'd ever been to, you could actually go inside this one! I loved it, there were swords to play with (sadly chained down though), loads of weapons lying around and two horses all dressed up in armour which we really loved:

We had a lovely picnic in the grounds and almost had our sandwiches stolen by the ghost tour people.

Then, fully fuelled up it was time for some proper exploring, up onto the ramparts. Of course, I was the advance party:

There were lots and lots of tight, twisty, steep steps to negotiate, but the views from the top were well worth it:

And it was great fun waving to the people down on the ground.

There was even a princess tower to keep the girls happy. We got to dress up as princesses and have our photo's taken.
Truth be told, I took quite some persuasion to get involved, unlike Ned of course, who was well into it:

We took a walk down by the river in the sunshine, but sadly the trebuchet wasn't working:

I spent some of my pocket money on a bow and arrow set. I couldn't get the hang of it to start with but soon caught on and became quite the hotshot with it...sorry cat!

Mum went to work on sunday, the rest of us didn't do much, we built a rather extensive camp in the front room and watched Keeping up Appearances (well I thought it was funny!)

I've been managing to get myself dressed for nursery in the mornings, but got let down badly today when Mum forgot it was fancy dress day at nursery...oh dear. I was distraught, until she left and then I was right as rain. Apparently she felt bad about it all day.....

I'm still doing very well in my swimming lessons, i'm wishing the weekends away so I can go!

This weeks big news...Chicken Pox!!!! Here I am during my recuperation at home with Mum in the mornings for a couple of days last week:

I've got a marvellous sprinkling of crusty scabs pretty much all over, but Mums been dabbing them with calomine lotion in her best Florence Nightingale style.
School news, i'm getting a lot more reading books to bring home now. When I can be bothered i'm actually pretty good but there's always better things to do...especially Mario & Sonic at the winter Olympics on the Wii. I'm addicted!
Things have finally settled back down at school after Christmas and the snow and i've even earned extra golden time minutes for being good.
And i've enjoyed being able to choose one of many many vehicles to ride to school to pick him up in the afternoons, even if I did manage to go over the handlebars of my trike and end up in a muddy puddle!
The weekend, finally we went out and about...even if it was to flipping Ikea!
Actually, it was pretty good, we went to Southampton which gave me a little time for some DS action in the car...
...and a kip for me!
The car park was brilliant, the curliest up ramp we'd ever seen, round and round and round up four levels right to the top. The views were even pretty good out over the docks on a lovely sunny morning.
The shop itself wasn't bad either, plenty of beds and chairs to test as well as the kids section.
Where I bumped into my friend Joe from school! Getting out of the shop was even better than going in, they had four escalators like the one at Sainsbury's (where you take your trolley on)!
We called in at a little park on the way back which was nice, if a bit cold.
It overlooked the train track and some of the trains leaving the docks were unbelievably long!
We had a look around a bike shop to keep Dad quiet, I trapped my finger in a bike's bell after repeated ding-dingings.....didn't get much sympathy even though it really hurt and made me bleed a little! I've tried milkng it ever since but still no-ones interested.
In the evening we had our belated family Christmas gathering at Auntie Christines, she loved it of course, dishing out the presents:

We had a lovely evening:

Until the electric shock game came out. I got zapped twice by my own doing and then once again when Dad stitched me up...I was NOT happy with him about that I can tell you!

So after a stupidly late night (gone midnight) what does Dad decide is a good idea on Sunday morning? A walk up Beacon hill of all things!

It was for my school project though, we've been looking at landmarks and places of interest around Newbury. I set off at quite a pace:

I didn't....

And soon took the Mum carry option:

But I managed to keep on keeping on and reached the top first:

We were so high up, we could see for miles:

Yeah, it was okay at the top, I did have to have my hood up though, it was a bit blowy!

We contemplated the scenery:

And then headed down again with as much energy as we had on the way up:

Which meant Dad carried me, but couldn't manage Mum as well.

An afternoon with Mario and Sonic saw the weekend out a treat, before it was back to school on Monday.

And I went back to nursery with my nicely crusty scabs!

Well we're really light on content this week if truth be told. Must be because it's January and cold and dark and wet and horrible or something?
School started out on reduced hours last week due to the snow hanging around, as a result Hugo came home with us on Wednesday afternoon. The teachers gave Dad a mixture of looks from surprise, through fear to all out pity as we left. He played a blinder and picked us up on the sledge to drag us home. I must also thank Ellis as she carried our book bags home for us while we slid all the way home.
Well, I didn't much fancy the sledge still to be honest.
We had a good afternoon, we played with the trains, the lego, dived around the sofa, played Super Mario and even watched G-Force on DVD.
I was still going into nursery with Luca and Matice as the paths were deemed unpassable by buggy, the novelty had worn off this week though so I wasn't quite so happy about it. Especially when their dad got the car stuck in the school car park. Mum helped by pushing and laughing, i'm not sure how much the laughing helped though really?
Straight onto weekend action then I think? Hugo's party on saturday afternoon. How exciting.
Mum, Dad and Ellis hung round long enough to see us settled on the bouncy castle (not quite the all out mindless violence of previous years) before dragging Ellis away for a trip to the town...unlucky sis!!!
Yeah, what a shocker, strapped into the buggy and dragged round town....I did not want to get off the bouncy castle! Still, my time will come i'm sure!
We had a great time at the party and played games and all the rest of it, in fact i didn't want ot leave to come home.
It was a quick turnaround though and we were soon round to Abi and Faye's for the evening. After playing loads of Abi's cool games we settled down to watch Pinoccio.
While the grown ups watched rubbish telly and ate stinky curry. Both Ellis and myself were soon asleep on the lovely snuggly sofa/blaket/cushions that Nick had sorted out for us, chers Nick! It was only Abi who managed to stay awake to see the film through to the end, so well done to her.
Sunday, we went bowling in Reading, which of course means the most stylish of footwear:

And the oppurtunity to see the grown up's pants:

Even Mum joined in with the bum showing (bum crack airbrushed out at her request on this one):

I was at total fever pitch about the bowling, I was just so excited.
And I thought the bowling was okay, but not as good as the fact that it was glow bowling (in the dark) and they were playing some really good music (like Cheryl Cole) to dance to.
Once the lights came up and the music stopped the next best option was the arcade:

And then it was Monday, and back to swimming lessons for me! I was pretty nervous about going back before I went. I don't know why, as soon as I was in the pool I loved it and really tried my hardest, our instructor even got me to show the other kids how to do pushing off backwards from the wall and kicking as I was so good at it.
Dad and I sat right next to the pool, we issued thumbs up and thumbs down depending on how well he was doing.
I'll round out this week by telling everyone to switch off your lights and to walk everywhere instead of driving, to save the polar bears...my latest crusade. It doesn't apply to my Scalextric (now installed in the bedroom...vroom vroom) though.....

Snow then, lots and lots of it! It's been pretty weird around here for sure.
My scheduled return to school didn't happen due to the snow so that was a waste walk to school for mum and me. Still, on the upside, we had plenty of mornings with Mum and afternoons with Dad.
And seeing as Ned wasn't at school I didn't go to nursery either...which was good for a while but in the end became a right pain as I missed Suzy and Eva so much! Not only that, Dad decided to smack me in the nose with the sledge:


Here I am after the tears and massive amounts of blood had subsided, thank goodness Mum was home when this happened. After a long cuddle and a bit of a snooze things didn't seem to bad and Dad was forgiven.
Yeah, it was all rather a shame, I only got one go on the sledge before we had to go home and clean Ellis up. Still, there was better sledgeing to come on friday, Dad had the day off so we took Ellis to nursery, Mum to work and then headed to Northcroft:


We had the place to ourselves (unsurprising as it wasn't even 8:30 yet) except for a few people walking to work with envious looks on their faces.
once I was at the bottom, it was quite an effort to get back up again....still Dad met me half way and dragged me back up:

But even half way was a long way for his old legs:

We had a little play on the park, but evrything was a bit slippery:

We had been there for over three hours when I was finally convinced it was time to leave, lured away by the promise of a sausage roll from the pasty shop!

And while all this was going on I was at nursery, having a lovely time. Well I certainly didn't want to go near that sledge again and anyway, i'm not keen on the cold.

Mum had to go to work on Saturday to make up all the time she'd had off with us over the week so we helped Dad get ready for our visitors, The Halfords and Andy came for the night on Saturday:

We had a lovely time and stayed up really late of course. Max was also much better at Super Mario than Dad!

We didn't do a lot Sunday so yet another weekend has passed with minimal out and about activity.

But it was back to school on Monday, even if it was for reduced hours! It's the first time we'd been back since we broke up for Christmas so we had a lot to catch up on!

So then, New years eve, the last day of the year.
We had a morning trip out to the castle with the Halfords, it was great to catch up with them and have some youngsters to play with.
We went to meet Mum for lunch at the restaurant in her shop, we love it in there, it's so high up and you can see loads of interesting things from the window...not to mention the lovely chips!
We had a low key evening, with a couple of visitors and some Wii action, all topped off with some late presents:

Friday was of course New years day, the first day of the year...not that it made much difference to us at all really. Anyway, we headed off to Grandad and Anne's for lunch with Alan and Hayley. There was some more late presents too....wahey! And because we were at Grandads it was 'screw up the wrapping paper and throw it at each other' time:

We had another game of my Lego Minotaurus game in the afternoon, it was great fun playing with Alan, he really gets into it!
Then it was the weekend, so there was a lot of sitting about to be done of course:

But the most exciting thing of all was a trip to the cinema to see the new Alvin and the Chipmunks film!

I'd never been to the cinema before so it was even more exciting for me. We had really good seats right at the back in at the top of the walkway so we didn't have any big heads in the way. It was a bit like watching the telly, but much much bigger and I soon settled in. I did hold dad's hand though...well it was quite dark!
The film was brilliant of course, I was soon out of my seat and dancing along to all the songs.

Yeah, I liked it too, but I got a bit restless towards the end.

We walked home via the new park in the City Playground:

I hurt my delicate bits on the see-saw:

Sunday we went to Auntie Christines for lunch as we hadn't seen her all over Christmas. This of course meant more presents! Here I am getting down to the serious business of Hama beads:

It's the only time i've ever seen Dad with the iron!

And i've been turning myself into the glove footed monster, scary or what eh?

Dad was back to work on Monday, so that was me back to nursery as well. I enjoyed being back truth be told, but it wore me right out. I did love being re0united with Ned though, I missed him after being together at home for so long.

Yeah, I had a couple of mornings with Grandad and Anne which was good, but it's back to school tomorrow....if it isn't snowed off!!!

So we must issue another huge thank you for all the late presents we had over the last week!

Well we're a day late this week, but it's been Christmas in case you hadn't noticed?
Mum was off with us in the morning last wednesday, she dragged us to the shop on the sledge through the snow.....how christmassy!
It was, even though I didn't fancy it and decided to walk instead. Although I did let Ned pull both me and Mum.....yes, i'm very strong don't you know!
We had to take Mum to work in the afternoon, which was a shame.
Especially as Dad insisted on driving really slowly in the snow....the boring old git!
We had a visit from Sue in the afternoon, Ned missed it all though as he was fast asleep, I had her to myself! Good job he didn't see the huuuge bag of presents she'd bought in, he'd never have kept it secret like I did!
Thursday then was Christmas eve, the excitment of the last fairy drawer and the last window of the advent calendar...
....unless, like me, you'd opened 24 several weeks ago, oops!
We had a visit from Rach, kimi and Marney, always great fun, especially when there's presents involved of course!
Then Dad came home from work, finished for christmas!
We had a visit from Slim and Trace in the afternoon as well, we love Christmas, we get to see so many people!
Andy also put in a brief appearance before he cleared off to Cornwall for his winter surf!
It was a McDonalds for tea, dad reckons it's good to get a proper meal in before christmas as it's a difficult time to get a decent feed.
And after thet we dropped in on Abi and Faye to exchange gifts and for Mum and I to make a fuss over little Faye.
And a great oppurtunity for me to ransack Abi's toys!
Sounds like a pretty packed day doesn't it? Not for us, we carried on and went to the pub as well! How about that?
We had a quick drink with a few of the gang that were out and snowball fight before being dragged off home before the disco started...boooooo!
We had urgent business to attend to at home though:

The santa sign of course!
And the sprinkling of the reindeer food on the drive:

And then in side to leave a carrot for Rudolph and a mince pie and glas of Ribena for Santa:

With all that taken care of it was time for bed, after quickly checking Santa's progress on the NORAD website.
And then up again at 3am!!!! I was informed this was far too early and was sent back to bed. Spoilsports. I managed to nod off again and tried again at a far more reasonable 7am which was met with approval. I fetched my stocking and got busy with the little things first of all. Santa had done very well with the stocking stuff and we had a nice game of happy families in bed while we were waiting for that lazy slug Ellis to surface.
I had to give in and get up in the end, so I dragged my stocking in and was as pleased with Santa's gifts as Ned was, if a little more bemused about what on earth was actually going on.
Once that was done, it was time to get downstairs for the main event:

Big presents:

More big presents:

Presents you could wear:

And then lots of smaller presents wedged right at the back of the tree:

What lovely stuff we had!
Auntie Trish came over, result. We only normally get to see her when mum and Dad are going out or something. She had a lovley Santa hat that she had worn all the way from Amazingstoke too, a great effort that didn't go unnoticed.
Uncle Den made a very brief appearance, but it was obvious he wasn't staying at our house for long as he was far too smartly dressed!
Then Alan and Hayley arrived with Grandma and it was lunchtime, here's proof I did eat a carrott:

And here's proof that Mum undermined Dad and put a sprout on my plate, I ate half of it to keep them both happy:

I think Alan ate almost every single pig in blanket that I lovingly hand rolled!
So once lunch was done and dusted it was present time again:

Hooray!

Ned makes sure i'm looking my best:

He's done a good job i think?

We stayed up pretty late but eventually it was time for bed. We'd both been really good all day though and didn't mind too much.

I let Trish sleep in my lovely bouncy bed, I hope she liked it. I got to sleep in Mum and Dads room on the ready bed which was most exciting!

Here we are in some of our new snuggly pyjamas before we turned in:

Boxing day then, supposed to be all round to Auntie Christine's for the day but her and Uncle Ian were so poorly it was all called off. What a shame! Fancy being poorly for christmas?

I'm sure we'll catch up with them soon enough.

So what did we do? Sit about, eating:

And playing with our toys. Dad and I had a mountain of Lego that wasn't going to build itself!

And a baby with a tricky to fit nappy:

Mum was still off work on the Sunday and she was itching to get out and about. We decided on swimming and headed off to the Coral Reef.

I was pretty worried it would stil be closed but was assured everything would be okay this time, it was!

We had a lovely swim, loads of jumping in and splashing and retrieving our little seal thingy's from the bottom of the pool, which I was particulalry good at, even if it did make my eyes go bright red in the end.

I also had two goes down the flume with Dad and loved it to bits, squealing for speed all the way down!

Mum was back to work on Monday, booo! We had a quick trip out on the bikes so i could try my new helmet:

We went to see Mum for lunch and took her to the pasty shop in the pouring rain!

Yesterday we had a proper visit from Uncle Den and Auntie Gail. We got to show them all our presents and what have you properly.

Today we had all the excitmement of a Tesco shopping trip, yay!

And the completion of my last Lego set....boo, back down to earth with a bang!

Of course we need to thank everyone for our lovley gifts and their splendid company over the last week or so, we've had a really lovely time and consider ourselves very lucky indeed!