Tuesday 5th

We had a day off with Mum, awesome, lie in's!

We've been having a bit of a retro playing with cars session as well.

Yeah, all the old Lightning Mcqueen cars have come out, Dad's like super stressy about me clattering them together though.

After a bit of discussion we went to the pottery painting place.

Yeah, i'm finally calling in my treat for my excellent school report and parents evening.  I settled on a two part ice cream sundae, I thought it would make a great place to keep my stray hairbands:

Seeing as i'm such an old miser I thought i'd do myself another piggy bank:

The lady in there was a right old grumpy so and so.

But rather than spoil it, it just made us have even more of a laugh.

Dad turned up for a flying visit during his lunch hour too, which was really cool.

Once we were all painted out we had a look at the fish shop next door.

We got to feed the carp their lunch:

They were right greedy little devils as well!

We made a pitstop at sainsburys to buy some bacon for lunch.

And also bought ourselves a few more Neon Cars for our collection.

We had a lazy afternoon, Ipad.......

Snuggling, tv, before it was time for gymnastics.  Lucky we made the effort, it was badge week!  So i'm now the proud holder of a level 2 badge and certificate.

Everything went down hill though when Dad tried to poison us with tea...

Yeah, a pizza with ONION on it!

Wednesday 6th
So despite the fact we'd been hastling and hastling and hastling Mum to take us to the library, we couldn't really be bothered to get our butts off the sofa and actually go on Wednesday morning.
Mum even tried to encourage us by saying we could ride down if we liked....
But we did eventually get ourselves going and had a nice ride into town.
The library itself was heaving, it was some sort of toddler morning, there were buggies strewn everywhere.
Still, we managed to get ourselves some new books to keep the summer reading challenge going.
We were allowed lunch in town, rather unsurprisingly we couldn't agree on where to go.
I wanted a toasted panini from Costa, because i'm really rather posh.
I wanted a sausage roll from Greggs, because i'm really rather not (it's excellent value in there, I like that).
Mum came up with a compromise, a trip to weavers walk cafe.
They sell sausage rolls.
They sell toasted sandwiches.
Everyones a winner, we even got to sit at a cool table upstairs where we could look down into the kitchen.
We had a mooch around town before buying picnic stuff for tea.
It was a logistical nightmare to get it all home on our bikes, especially with all the library books too.
But between Mum's basket and our back packs we had it covered.
We went home to get the car and then picked Dad up from work.
We made our way to Hungerford for one of our river picnic's:

There was actually other people there this time, they were in our favoured spot too!
I suppose thats the price we pay for going on a genuinely nice, sunny day.
We had a paddle, a splash and a lovely picnic.
But also managed to wind Mum and Dad up a bit with a bit of low level nonsense.  
Well, it is the school holidays after all!
We made our way from there, straight to Team Kennet.
Yeah, summer holidays, no chance to kick back and take things easy!
I made my return this week, I was dead keen to get stuck in.

I had Abi to keep me company which I really liked.
As luck would have it, we got divided up into three teams and had a sort of mini team competition.
We did a load of events, long jump, vortex throwing, standing long jump, bean bag target throwing and the 400m, which was a very, very long way round.  I did have quite a sprint finish on me though.
I loved it, put in an excellent showing on my long jump, an epic couple of vortex throws and largely brilliant 400m, until the stitch kicked in.  I also made a friend, a new boy who was a bit of unsure of everything.
We ended up on the winning team and got a smart little pin badge each:

And something we haven't had for a while, how about a quick video?

Thursday 7th
Mum had to go back to work, much to her displeasure.
So we had another day with Auntie Christine.
A trip to the cinema to watch How to Train Your Dragon 2!
All three of us were super excited, even though we felt a bit sorry for Mum and Dad who would like to have seen it too.
Yeah, tough luck, Auntie Christine showed us the first one so it's fair enough and anyway, we couldn't possibly deprive her of the trip.

We loved it, there were a few surprises, some twists and a very sad bit.

It was brilliant, we raved about it afterwards to Dad, hope he didn't want it to be a surprise when he watched it.

We had a Costa's for lunch (so I got my way in the end, still no dodgy quality Greggs for Ned though) and then we went back to Auntie Christines house.

To set about some cake making, first up, some decorated cake pops, my rabbit was met with widespread approval:

And then a proper big chocolate sandwich type cake to take down to Cornwall for the family holiday.  I'm looking forward to it even more now!

Dad came to pick us up and we had a few jobs to do.

Fill the car with diesel, check the tyre pressures that sort of dull stuff and then the car wash!

Which seemed particularly noisy and fun today!

Friday 8th

Well we had a lovely ride in to Dragon club for the last time this summer holidays.

It was superhero day, I made myself a lovely mask and then started face painting the other kids.  I had quite a queue as well, my work went down very well with the other children and they loved my creations for them.

We were both made Super Dragon for the day as well, due to our general kind nature and our efforts to get involved in all the activities on offer.

That made our day pretty much.

Well, that and the epic game of hockey we played, I seriously loved that, and developed quite a few flair moves to outwit my opponents.

Dad came to pick us up and we headed home to load the car up ready for Cornwall.

Yep, how exciting.

Once Mum was home and changed we hit the road.

And with Dad having cooked us pizza and garlic bread, all carefully wrapped up in foil we didn't even need to stop on the way for tea.

Which was just as well as we were both pretty tired and used the time wisely for a decent kip.

Considering the time of year we had an record breaking trip down with no traffic hold ups at all.

We got there with just the last few rays of daylight left which was lovely.

Andy had gone earlier in the afternoon and was already there.

As were Abi, Faye, Nick and Carol.

We got our stuff unpacked and particularly liked putting all our books and things on the shelving in the bedroom.

Before settling down for a nice nights sleep.

Saturday 9th

Oh how we love to wake up in the caravan, with the sound of the waves crashing in.

And the wind, it was pretty blowy it has to be said.

With Tesco deliveries banned on site this year it was click and collect for Dad and Mum, we stayed in with Andy.

They were soon home with a truly magnificent bootfull of stuff, masses of it.

Mum did her usual magicians act by making it all disappear into the fridge.

Except the pork breakfast products, we decided we should really cook and eat a lot of those right away!

Everyone else must have smelt it cooking, as within half an hour of each other both Auntie Christine, Uncle Ian, Laura, Darcey and Auntie Trish turned up, closely followed by Kimi, Marney, Ben and Rach.

We wasted no time getting busy with the loom bands, Rach has got serious skills on the loom band front.

Once everyone was unpacked and sorted out we hit the beach.

Climbing to upset Auntie Christine of course!

Plenty of plundering the rock pools.

We netted some splendid specimens, from decent size fish to some cool looking stripey shrimps.

Unusually for August, there were waves, decent sized waves too.   I wasted no time getting out on the stand up board.  I got to grips with it again and stood up more times in one session than all my others put together.

Sunday 10th

Well hurricane Bertha was supposed to be coming through, and although it was a bit on the blowy side, it was certainly dry so we went on the Constantine loop walk.

We stopped off at the surf shop, they had some well cool looking buckets in the shape of a castle turret and section of wall.  Andy said it would never work for a sand castle......it was a challenge we couldn't possibly resist.

By the time that was done the sun was well and truly out, down the beach we went:

We explored, we created a sancastle village, the new bucket turned out perfectly!

We had a great time splashing in rhe waves and playing with Darcey:

John, Sarah, Mark and Amy appeared on the beach with Connie which was a lovely surprise.

We all met up for tea down at the youth hostel, we had our annual photograph at the request of Auntie Christine:

It was lovely all sitting together:

Taking in the view over the sea:

It got pretty chilly later on, so we headed inside with Auntie Christine and Uncle Ian for another drink when everyone else went back to their caravans:

We felt proper grown up.

We did eventually head back for a game of Dobble and a little game of Uno.

Monday 11th

We had pretty much a group outing to Bedruthan Steps.

Yeah, once we'd convinced the Aunties they'd make it down and more importantly back up again afterwards.

The advance party hit the beach after our long and steep descent:

Abi and I loved exploring the caves:

We slipped into our wetsuits and after a brief pose or two on the rocks it was time to get wet!

We had a great time splashing about with Abi and Faye.

We all took a picnic and sat around to eat it in the sunshine:

After lunch we scoured the beach for decent sized pebbles to make an extensive set of stepping stones:

They certainly proved popular, even strangers couldn't resist trotting accross them.

And I very carefully carved all of our names onto a nice flat stone inmybest handwriting to commemorate our day out:

Tuesday 12th

This far into the holidays the late nights had started to really kick in and lay in's were becoming the norm.

But when we did finally arise we made our way into Padstow with Nick and Faye in tow, it was speedboat day!

Except the tide was out, right out.

So far out that the boats weren't running until 3 hours time.

After a bit of hanging about we decided to come back later rather than wait around for ages.

It was a bit of a blessing in disguise though as I managed to snag myself a nice new bodyboard (black of course).

We stopped in St Merryn for a bakery visit and a trip to the park:

We did some good three at a time carves around the bowl on our scooters with Dad on his skateboard. 

We headed back to the caravan and I took my new board out for a trial run, it was brilliant.  So much better than my old one and I was whizzing right up on to the beach just like Ned does on his.

We made our way back to Padstow later in the afternoon, once the tide was back in.

It was a reasonable walk, especially as it was our second visit of the day:

Faye wanted to sit with me, Ned, Mum and Dad up front in the bumpy seats, meaning Nick and Andy were relegated to the back, in the splash zone.

We made our way out into the open water before the driver really opened it up, the front came high up out of the water and the big carving turns started.

Sending plumes of water all over Nick and Andy, much to our delight looking back at them.

It certainly blew any cobwebs away and we seemed to go much further than any of the trips we'd had before:

Wednesday 13th

Having been told we weren't going this year, it was a welcome surprise to us that it was Crealy day!

Yeah, we still love it there.

I'm not sure Auntie Christine particularly enjoyed the drive there though.  The more direct route involves a short stretch of very narrow road.  As luck would have it we encountered a car travelling the other way mid way along it.

Luckily for us, there were three of us in convoy so he had to to do the backing up.

Sadly he made a right hash of it and it looked like it ended up with him reversing into a drystone wall and us passing him on the wrong side of the road.

Auntie Christine was in meltdown by this point by all accounts and was going to have serious words with Dad for bringing us down such a narrow road..........

I don't know what she was so worried about, being a passenger in Laura's superbly driven monster truck!

Anyway, we got there in one piece and she calmed down eventually, once she'd asked if Ben and Rach could take her home the long way round.

Things got off to great start with Swampy's Enchanted Wood or whatever it was previously called having changed into a rather cool reptile house (the old enchanted woods were quite frankly terrifying).

The horse ride was of course brilliant:

It was that good that even Auntie Christine had a go.
It wasn't as good as the real thing though:

We still really love a pony ride:

We also like the kiddies rides with Darcey:

Especially the (little) big wheel, that Laura and I got to really rock all the way around, Darcey loved it!

Amazingly, the rollercoaster didn't break down:

And we had at least three goes in a row on the pirate boat:

And I finally got over my drop slide phobia, after a bit of coaching and some tough loving from Mum.
We had a great day, but there were a couple of disappointments to report.  Firstly the big bumpy slide was in desperate need of of some polish, we stopped way before the end.
Secondly the donuts.  Now we had got used to their lovely freshly cooked, deep fried sugar encrusted beauties over the year.  But this time?  None of that, just rubbishy little ones, pre cooked out of a packet, not warm, and not much sugar clinging to them. 
What a let down.
We headed back to camp and with the sun still shining we went down the beach with the Hardy's.  
The tide was stupidly high and crashing onto the steep bank at the top of the beach, giving people a right old pounding.
So we played in the dunes instead.
And did some pretty high dune-leaping, impressing a couple of teenage girls with my daring athleticism.
And after our tea we took to the lawn to have a game of kingball using a court I helped dad make with a ball of string we bought from Gary's shop:

Thursday 14th

Zipline Day!

Yep, high excitement indeed.

We stopped by Wadebridge to collect John and Sarah (and get myself some swim fins that John had long since grown out of, thanks, they are EPIC!)

I'd been up for this during the build up, but now, there were doubts starting to creep into my mind.

I on the other hand could not wait to throw myself off a cliff.

It didn't take that long to get there and we excitedly signed ourselves up and got trussed up in our harnesses and went up to the start.  

First up was myself and John, we didn't muck about, got clipped on and launched ourselves over the lake....it was epic!  

Next up was Sarah and Andy, they went for it and were soon flying accross the water.  Then, it was my turn, alongside Mum.  Because i'm so light and it was a pretty windy day I had to have a small water barrel attached to my harness to give me a bit more oomph.  Once I got to the edge and was about to be launched I lost my bottle and just didn't want to go.  The man tried, Mum tried and Dad tried to convince me but I wasn't having any of it.  I got unclipped and climbed down and waved Mum off on her own.  I hung around with Dad at the top and we had a chat about it, waiting for the others to make their way back up.  Dad gave me some pretty useful advice and said if I wasn't sure, I should try it first and then i'd know afterwards for sure if I really didn't like it.  With this pearl of wisdom I decided I would indeed give it a go.

So once we were all back at the top, we got ourselves another go to accompany Ellis, bonus, two goes for me!

I made my way up once again, with Ned alongside me, got my barrel attached:

And we were off with no hesitations or second thoughts.

Flying accross the lake, I loved it, it was awesome!

We were seriously buzzing afterwards.

Buzzing enough that despite the rain shower, we decided a lake swimming session was a great idea.

John and Sarah showed their hardy locals credentials by toughing it out without a wetsuit.

The water got seriously deep within a few metres of the shore, so it was a full on swim out to the floating pontoon in the middle.

It was great fun hauling ourselves up onto it and then jumping, diving, falling or cartwheeling off of it again!

All standing on side of it was cool too, it really made it lean over until one of us would invariably fall in...

...or run to the other side.

After that we got changed, and there was a full team effort to retrieve my football i'd kicked over into a bramble patch (thanks Andy).

Then it was off to Morisson's Cafe for lunch.

Which was huge fun with John and Sarah on board.  

The main topic of discussion being one chocolate bar vs another or whether Jaffa Cakes were actually cakes or biscuits.
They came back to the caravan with us as well, which was cool.

We had a trip down to the beach for a quick surf with Sarah and Owen who had just appeared after he came down late on Wednesday night.

Sadly though we missed Auntie Christine, Uncle Ian and Darcey going home.

And also Abi, Faye, Nick and Carol had also headed for home.

We headed back up to have some tea and watch the music channel for a bit on TV.

The highlight being Will I Am's Birthday song, especially the bit where he appeared to be born in a hospital room and just said 'Aiiiiiiiii'

Friday 15th

On one of trips into Padstow i'd noticed the hair braiding people on the harbourside.  I pestered and pestered mum and Dad ever since to have mine done.  They finally gave in, and we went in early morning.

Leaving me back at the caravan with Andy.  We were going to have an early surf and set up base camp on the beach.

We went to one of the chaps doing the braiding to ask about getting one done but he pulled a concerned looking face and asked Mum if my hair tended to get pulled out easily with brushing out knots or in hair bands.  We had to say yes of course.  He then said that he wouldn't really recommend I have one as it puts a lot of tension on your hair and it would most probably just pull a clump right out of mine.  I was devastated, but I really didn't want to end up with a clump of missing hair.  I got a ready made one on a hair grip instead, at least I can put it in and take it out when I feel like it I suppose.  I also got a cool glittery flower tattoo on my leg, this helped me get over the disappointment.

While all this was going on, Andy and I hit the beach in the morning sunshine.  We took the height of the tide, the wind direction and the sun into consideration before settling in the cove just under the youth hostel and occupied enough space for the others to join us later on.

We weren't far behind them though, we thought they'd done well and settled down for a day on the beach.

We were soon joined by Trish, Owen and Laura too.

We played cricket.

Ellis and I did a bit of squabbling.

We got my kite into a massive knot.

And we sampled the delights of the Pink Ice Cream van up on the hill.

It was a bit of a wait, and it was a bit chilly in the wind.

But there were blankets you could wrap yourself in and a lovely doggie with a couple of loom band collars.

It was well worth the wait, the fully topped hot chocolates were lovely.

As were the ice creams.

In the evening we decided it was high time we had a barbecue:

We stayed out for ages, but eventually had to admit defeat when the sun went down and it got a little bit chilly.

Yeah, and Auntie Trish's hands turned blue.

Once inside the caravan we had a few hands of Dobble and a game of nommies.

Although I preferred to spend my time drawing portraits of everyone instead.  I think they went down well, well they certainly caused plenty of laughs anyway!

Saturday 16th

The weather was okay so we went off down the beach.

We finally got some Kingball action in on a proper sand court. 

As the waves had calmed down a bit for the first time all week we too the dinghy out.

It was great fun out in the sea with it, it was surprisingly good at riding waves in too.

Unless it turned you over of course.

But it was even better as a place to sit and eat your lunch, bobbing around in a big old low tide pool.

We went off for an explore down the gap, it was super rocky down there.  Looks like the stormy winter has really stirred things up.

There were plenty of fish to catch and some little crabs.

That took quite a fancy to the fish...for their lunch! 

Owen, Laura and Auntie Trish also decided it was home time in the afternoon, so that only left us lot and Andy.

As the tide was very low, the swimming pool up in the rocks seemed a good idea.

We got kitted up with masks, snorkels, the dinghy and a couple of nets:

We made our ascent up the rocks, there were quite a few people up there, including, yes, this is true, a dog standing up on a surfboard being dragged across the water!

Ellis got in the boat and I paddled her across the water at very high speed using my flippers.

We went back up to the caravan for some Saturday night telly...Tumble!

Sunday 17th

Our last day, neither of us wanted to go home, we'd got used to our late nights, lay in's and hanging out with everyone.

We watched the recording of Great British Bake Off from earlier in the week.

By the time we'd finished that the weather had smartened itself up a bit so we headed out for a walk to Mother Iveys bay.

It was a pretty long, but very nice walk.

When we got down onto the beach we were pretty much the only ones there and the sea looked lovely.

So we were overjoyed when Dad produced our swimmers and a towel each from his backpack.

We were soon in the crashing waves for a lovely dip:

Then a bit of a sit on the beach, just taking in the view and enjoying just being there:

Try as we might, the fact that it was going home day couldn't be ignored.

We headed back to the caravan to pack, clean and tidy up.

We even helped, a bit.

Then it was off down to the Youth Hostel for an evening meal, overlooking the sea for one last time before we also headed off home:

We were quite late home, but it didn't really matter as Mum had all of the following week off.

Monday 18th

Well first day home after a late night and there wasn't much going on.

Nope, very much a slouch about day.

Except for Mum sorting out all the washing of course.

Although we did go and collect our painted pottery, which was surprisingly good it has to be said.

And pick up a few bits from Tesco's to keep us fed.

Once Dad was home we did go down the park for a bit as well.
So that's it for our first installment, stay tuned for part two which should see us back up to date.
And a video of the holiday at some point too!

Tuesday
It was animal day at dragon club, I marked the occasion by wearing my best animal print clothes and having my face painted as a pink, sparkly Leopard.  Hayley's sister Chloe was working there, here face painting is AWESOME!
I was named Super Dragon of the day for endless enthusiasm for all proposed activities.  I was rather pleased about that.
The afternoon film was The Lion King!
And we had our love of Hama beads well and truly re-kindled.  Minecraft characters a speciality!
We had to ride home on a pretty tight schedule, as I had gymnastics to go to as well.
We might have sneaked off to Sainsbury's for a sly slush Puppie while she was there, ahem.

Wednesday
Todays Dragon club theme was the circus.
I got made ringmaster for the day, I had to have a lovely moustache drawn on and got to introduce all the acts and be in charge!
I was of course one of the acrobats, in strking eye make up!  It was great fun.
We also had a game of three legged football, I teamed up with a left handed boy, so we were quite a skilful combination.  It wasn't until afterwards that I realised how much our leg tie had rubbed my leg off, causing a rather nasty blister!
The afternoon film was Frozen, how epic was that?
We stopped off on the ride home in Sainsburys on the way home for.....A Slush Puppie!!!!
It was my athletics debut this week, Team Kennet, with Abi as well, how exciting:

I looked really pro in Ned's old vest.

I think I might want it back next week though.  I realised I quite missed it and made a few enquiries about making a return......

I really loved it, all the other new recruits seemed a lot bigger than me so I got beaten a lot.  Not that I cared of course.  It was lovely having Abi there too.

Thursday
This was the one we'd all been waiting for at Dragon Club.......Water day!
Oh yes, we took the super soakers in, which was quite an achievement in itself on the bikes, along with a change of clothes each and our packed lunches.
There were water bombs, water pistols, filled squeezy bottles all of which ensured we got soaked, seriously soaked!
It was fantastic fun.

Friday
Arrrgghhh, Pirate day at Dragon club.
And because it was Friday, it was adult in the stocks day.  Tom was this weeks victim, he dragged Becky in too as she had got no real votes!
We did an exceptionally good job of riding in today, we're starting to get used to it I think.
Shame about the way home, it was all going so well until I fell off for no apparent reason by the city playground.  It was a bit of shock to be honest, but i was soon back up and rolling again.
That rounded off our whole week at Dragon club, I declared it 'awesome' I really loved going.
And we rode there and back, every day this week, which I thought was really cool.
We made a quick dash up to the hospital in Reading to collect Andy, he'd spent the day up there as he'd managed to get glass in his foot somehow.
Despite a few people trying, it was still quite firmly stuck in there!
He wasn't best pleased to be coming home with it still lodged in there, and on crutches too!
Especially with it being so close to holidays as well.
We bought him home and gave him some tea, but I hated hearing about it while he was telling Mum.....eeeewwwwww!

Saturday
With the realisation that I actually only now had three pairs of shorts it was time to go shopping.  The problem is of course that the shops have all now sold out of shorts, but are doing a good line in jumpers and other winter attire.  How helpful.
We did eventually find a couple of pairs hidden at the back of the rail in Next though thank goodness.
Just as we were about to head off home, it rained, not normal rain, mega rain!
It was so hard we hung around in the shop for ages hoping it would pass.
Even I didn't go out in it for a run around.
It didn't stop, so we decided the best course of action was to go to Sports Direct for a golf umbrella and make a mercy dash across the car park to McDonalds.
It was a good idea.  My friend Lilly had also had the same idea, her Dad was also sporting a brand new umbrella.
Once we were fed and the rain eased off we headed to Dad's work charity fun day down at Thatcham football club.
There were loads of people there, but we missed the football matches, there were plenty of old men limping about so they must have enjoyed themselves a little too much.
I settled for a go on the speed detector goal shooting:

I managed 31mph!  Dad was too chicken to even have a go.
With the help of Mum we managed to get the bouncy castle dry enough to have a bounce on again, it was seriously soaked to begin with.
I had a good kick about with Dad in goal, but he kept getting interrupted talking to people, so I had a kick about with the CEO's son instead......
We had a go at the name the teddy and the guess how many sweets were in the tub games, both of which we have previous for.  
Hopes were high.
But ultimately unrealised, we didn't win either, although Dad's number was pulled in the raffle.
He burst out of his chair with the loudest whoop of the afternoon, I don't know why, the Ipad had already been won.
He only had eyes for the extra days holiday though.  
Even though there was still a massive tin of biscuits on offer?  Despite Dad's warped priorities, I thought it was an Epic afternoon.
We had the rare luxury of tea on the sofa watching saturday night telly.

Sunday
A full day out on the cards!
Bucklebury Farm Park, haven't been for ages, Mum and Dad a little bit worried we were too old for it.
No chance, we loved it.
Indoor playground and drop slide...check.
I'll come back to it...
Outside playground, check!
Obstacle course.
Pedal go-karts.
Cutest donkeys ever.
Crazy wild boar babies pegging it around their enclosure hastling their mum.
Lovely reindeer with fluffy anlters.
Noisy pigs.
Greedy goats.
Tractor ride out into the deer enclosure.

The stags had massive antlers and certainly weren't shy:

We had a lovely chat with the driver afterwards, they had a collection of shed antlers that we got to examine and ask questions about, I lapped it up.

But the highlight had ot be the egg collecting.

Yeah, in the chicken enclosure!

I found the first one out of everybody and then worked out that the henhouse was the place to be after that:

I did some more drop slide......

...I didn't.  I sat on the top for ages and ages though.  I don't know what the problem was, i've been on bigger ones before but I just couldn't do it.
We were pretty much the last ones there at the end of the day.
We made it home in time for Catchphrase though.
There was a bloke on it who was even better than Dad!

Monday:
A day with Auntie Christine at long last.
Yeah, we've been on school holidays well over a week after all!
With Auntie Trish and Darcey on board too we were all set for a good day.
Yep, 4 Kingdoms was the venue, very agreeable!
They get more cool stuff each time we go.
Darcey and I loved wandering around the woods fairy spotting.
But my favourite was definitely the laser tag!

Thanks for another awesome day everyone!

Tuesday

We were well until the final stretch of the school year.

Yep, we had a rounders match which I loved.  We also got to paint some nice big, round pebbles.  I did one side as a ladybird and the other as a happy looking fish.  It was great fun, and we were really grateful to our teaching assistant who had collected 60 pebbles, enough for both clsses.

We watched Romeo and Juliet as we're a cultured lot.  We did some colouring too.

It was hot hot hot at gymnastics.  The side door was open which meant Dad and Ned got a good view of me bouncing down the tumble track at high speed prior to my jump into a forward roll.  It ended up a lot more like a flip, albeit onto my bum.

While she was in there, Dad and I sneaked off to Sainsbury's for a sly slush puppie in their cafe.  It was utterly delicious and as it was self service we could have a mixture of blue and red!

We had another family bike ride after tea, a trip off round the estates and nearby alleyways between the houses.

As usual we ended up in the city playground which was cool.

Wednesday

Well it was finally here, the last day ofterm.

The last day of infants school for me too!

We'd got Mum to buy us a little box of chocs for our teachers (Marks ans Spencers, no naff stuff).

I also created a loom band for Mrs Tichband, a really colourful and a very nicely constructed one at that.

We had our usual early finish, straight down the park with Dad, showing off my still exciting big bike to admiring glances even from year sixes.

I stayed on for a football tournament that Mr Gilham had very kindly sorted out for us.  We had a great time, it was a great way to end the term.

I think Mum has got ahead of herself this year and came home with a whole load ofback to school stuff already!  I was dead excited as I can start wearing a proper shirt and a tie in year 3.  I had to unpack it and try it on:

Thursday

First day of the holidays and Mum was off with us.

So a lazy morning was had by all, just what was needed.

But she got the water slide out for us, we love the water slide!

Ali and Robert came round in the afternoon, I leant them a pair of trunks and a towel and they joined in too, brilliant.  Later on we went to Ali's to play in his pool.

And I had a quiet afternoon with the Ipad which I could finally get a look in on while Ned was out.
In the evening I conducted a couple of guided laps of the Croft Mountain bike trail in Swindon with Dad, Andy and Owen.  I loved it, we did about three laps in the end.  I was hitting all the jumps and drops full on, unlike Owen and Andy the big chickens.  I only fell off right at the end after a session of silly skidding started....

Friday

I had Amie round to play, we played on the water slide, although she didn't go for it quite like the boys had done yesterday.

I disappeared round to Roberts for the day.  We had a Nerf war, played XBox and went to McDonalds for lunch and a McFlurry.

Amie and I had a very picnic at the park with mum, the council had just dropped off a fresh load of bark chippings for the playground that had yet to be sprinkled around.  It made an excellent climbing feature:

Once Amie had been dropped off home, Dad had finished work and Ned returned from Robert's we packed up the camping stuff, picked up Andy on the way and made our way to Woolacombe for the weekend to stay at Twitchen House Campsite.

We'd been warned the traffic might be a bit sticky and we could be in for a long journey.....

But it turned out that it wasn't bad at all really.

We were down there while it was still just about daylight, even with a stop for food (an outrageously expensive Costa's in a service station, it was nice though).

We were a great help setting up camp for pretty much the first time ever.

Yeah, we have a good idea of what needs to be done now, and inwhat order Dad wants it done.

Not only that, we can't wait to get tucked up in our super cosy bedroom for a lovely sleep.

Saturday

We had a great sleep, and a bit of a lie in really.

Yeah, compared to other campsites we've been to, everyone seemed to be late risers and there wasn't much early morning noise.

We had breakfast outside in the early morning sunshine, mulling over our plans for the day.

We decided on beach in the morning, swimming pool in the afternoon, bbq for tea and then an evening walk.

So off to the beach we went.  It was a lovely big beach and there was hardly anyone else there.

We set up camp and headed straight for the surf.  

I was all over it, catching waves left right and centre.

I didn't fare quite so well, kept sliding off my board and generally finding it all rather hard work.  Once I ditched the board though it was much better, just jumping the waves.

Lunch was next on the agenda.

We sent Mum, Ned and Andy off with a wishlist.  Dad wanted a pasty and I wanted a jacket potato with cheese.  A tall order, but they delivered!

Yeah, and we got chips too, what a result.

We had a few games of kingball:

Dad was shockingly bad.

I was feeling rather creative, I kickedthings off with a picture of a cat, constructed entirely of letters:

Then we undertook a crocodile, he looked rather happy and even cuddly rather than snappy:

The texture work I did on his skin was really rather good.  We certainly got a lot of comments from passers by.

And then I went small scale, for this mouse:

Beach well and truly done, time to head back to the campsite and the pool.

We do like a pool, especially and outdoors one.

Add some nice sunshine, a nice bit ofgrass to put our blanket down on and a long conversation about what we'd spend a massive lottery win on and I was loving it.

We made our way back to our tent, there were quite a few people pitched up now so we spent the afternoon hanging out with a load of girls who were now our new neighbours, doing loom bands on the grass bank.

We had a barbecue for tea, mostly chorizo and bread rolls for me of course.

After that we went for a walk, down to the beach through the woods.

It was about twenty minutes, all downhill.

We found a little cove and did some skimmers:

Then we made our way back up, which was of course all uphill....

It was quite a slog.

And I blamed the effort required for making me get up to be sick at 1am.  Luckily I made it out of the tent.....it was a proper good hurl too.

Sunday

I woke up like nothing had happened the night before, I felt fine, which was a relief for everyone.

And another lie in was had, very civilized.

Another one of our neighbours turned out to be Amber from my other year group class.  We loved showing each other our tents.  What a coincidence!

The tent had to be packed away, we were even helpfull during this task as well as setting up.

Once that was done Andy disappeared off for a surf while we hit the arcade!

The 2p falls were the biggest attraction.

I managed to win a smiley keyring then gave all my left over coins to Ellis.

I was trying to win a sparkly strawberry keyring and with Ned's extra coins I managed that too! Thanks Ned.

Next up was the Pacman smash air hockey.

We love this, like air hockey, but much more crazy, with loads of pucks.

Anyway, it was Dad and I against Mum and Ellis.

And after a whole load of frenzied pinging and whacking we ended up with the following score:

An amicable draw!

In our role as unofficial swimming pool testers we had another dip in the outdoor pool before then sampling the indoor pool too.

It was very nice, there was a sauna too which we were actually allowed in.

We decided it was time to leave and went for a pub lunch, there were lots of lovely little doggies sat with their owners.

After that it was into Woolacombe for a bit of shopping (a couple of t shirts) and an ice cream overlooking the sea.
But try as we might, we couldn't really hang on any longer and we had to go home.
The drive back went quickly enough and we were home in time to watch some rugby sevens at the Commonwealth games and enjoy a mum's toastie.

Monday
A whole week at Dragon club, I was pretty excited about the whole thing.
I was a bit more hesitant, but still up for it on the whole.
To make matters even more exciting we had to ride there with Mum.
It was pretty cool riding there, we did very well and got there really quick.

We had a fun day, playing on the adventure playground.
Scooting around the playground on the buggies and scooters and trolleys and any combinations inbetween.
I watched frozen with some of the girls.
And I played football and tennis.
So pretty good all round really!