Tuesday

School swimming with my rubbish blue hat....
Then after school it was gymnastics, lift sharing with Sasha.  We're starting to practice our routines for the upcoming competition.

Wednesday
Team Kennet was very late starting due to a football tournament running late. At least we had tour guide Ned on hand to show us the abridged highlights of Park House as we waited.  I'm enjoying working with my friends in our competition group.

Thursday
So it was finally the last day of term and a very momentous occasion in our household.  I bought home the mythical, fabled Golden Time Certificate!  We all actually believed that no such thing actually existed as Ned never got one during all his years at John Rankin.  So here it is:

You better take it all in as it will probably be the only one I ever get.

Friday
I'd got Mum to arrange a Morning with Amy for my first day off.  Brilliant, we had a great morning.

Mum came to pick me up after lunch and once Dad had finished work it was time for holiday to Tenerife.

We packed the car, went to pick Andy up and headed for Gatwick.  We were down numbers for this years trip as Kimi and Marny weren't coming which was a real shame.
We arrived at the airport in plenty of time, despite Andy flapping when the traffic got a bit slow on the M25 for a stretch.

We had time for a bite to eat, especially as the flight ended up being delayed anyway.

By the time we did board and get on our way it was pretty late,Ned decided to take a snooze with his head in his rucksack, resting on the tray table:

So with the flight being 4 hours, it was way past midnight by the time we landed.  Add to that collecting the bags, finding the hire car (a massive 9 seater van actually) and driving to the villa it was seriously late when we arrived.  Still, it had to be done....Mum was the first one on the pool  at 3:30 AM.
 
Saturday 
So after such a late night and pool based nonsense we weren't up particulalry early.
I loved my room, I even had my own desk to write at:

Then of course we had the lovely pool:

We made a trip out to the supermarket for some supplies and eventually had breakfast out on the balcony overlooking the sea....lovely.
We then took a trip out to the village centre, Callao Salvaje, and the beach.  The beach had black sand which looked a little weird to be honest?  Still, we didn't mind and went for a swim.  The waves were crashing in and it was pretty lively to say the least.
We didn't do much in the evening apart from some table tennis and pool back at the villa.  The standard of pool playing was pretty poor to begin with but certainly improved over the course of the week. 

Sunday
We got the snorkelling gear out and headed for a place just up the coast called El Puertito.  Apparenlty if you get there early enough you spot turtles......we didn't get there early enough.  We did however see loads and loads of fish going about their business.  Getting in and out of the water was a little tricky with the waves coming in and out over the rock slabs we were on.  We headed back to Callao Salvaje to take a leisurley meal at the beachside restaurant we had seen yesterday. We spent the afternoon and evening larking about in the pool back at the villa.  Sadly, Turdy the inflatable Turtle succumbed to three years worth of holidays and one of his legs somehow detached itself.  He went flat instantly......but the severed leg did make for a rather splendid looking hat!

Monday
One of the only things on our agenda this week was a visit to Mount Teide.  The volcanic mountain at the middle of the island.  The journey there took a little while but it was a pretty interesting route, past all the banana plantations lower down before the switchback roads as we gained a lot of height.  We knew we must be pretty high up when the shadowy areas behind rock formations were covered in frost.  
 At a very high 3,718 to it's peak, we were relieved to find that there was a cable car, even if Dad wasn't.
We got there nice and early and were on about the second trip up......and up it certainly was up!  The cabin swung pretty wildly as it rolled over the pylons which certainly added to the excitment levels.
When we arrived at the top and got out, it has to be said, it was pretty cold: 

So thats why there were plenty of enthusiastic european types in full on puffa coat mode.
It was so cold that there was actually snow lurking in shaded areas...great, snowball fight time!  We went for a walk around, yeah I suppose the view was pretty good really but I felt the whole thing was a little underwhelming to be honest with you.
The tut shop back down at the bottom was very cool though......
After another afternoon spent round the pool, trying to get through our ice cream supply in the freezer we took a trip down to Costa Adeje.  This was a very different prospect to our more civilised villa set up.  It was pretty full on, neon signs, lots of people, restaurants and all the rest of it.  

We had a lovely sunset swim though: 

Tuesday
We dropped by the village again to pick up a replacement Turdy, we'd spotted a shop That was selling exactly the same one.  We were pretty excited about that and couldn't wait to try him out in the pool.

We took a trip up the coast to El Gigantes, 'the giants' named after the big old cliffs. Nwe parked down by the marina, actually on the sea wall which seemed rather a tight manouvering space in our big old bus.

We peered over the harbour wall down inpto the water and noticed loads of very hopeful looking fish.  As luck would have it we had a massive sackload of some of the poorest tasting crisp type snacks we'd ever had.  The fish seemed to love them though, especially if we crushed them up first.  It also was enough to tempt a massive stingray that Ned noticed first, skimming along the bottom of the crystal clear water.  We took a wander through the town to the small beach at the foot of the cliffs.  The sand was black again:

It made my feet look filthy!

I loved laying on the beach reading my book after i'd had a nice swim.

Mum took a selfie with us while Dad and Andy were floundering about with their snorkels on:

It was a really cool place, we rounded the afternoon off with a nice ice cream.

We had an early Halloween sweet hunt as we realised we'd be staying in the hotel by the real halloween night.  It was really good, but we certainly my missed the added excitement of having Kimi and Marny around:

Wednesday

Dads birthday today, we gave him his token 'something to unwrap on holiday' presents and his cards.

We had a quiet morning around the villa before heading off for the main event...our boat trip.

Dad had found a place that were prepared to let us onto the open ocean in our very own motor boat.  We found the couple running the outfit on the pontoon in the marina.  They kitted us out with life jackets and an emergency phone (that an Italian family had apparently cleaned of credit the other week ringing their family back home).  Dad got a quick lesson on how the controls worked (which I don't think he really listened to) and we were towed out to the open water.  First on the agenda was to head to sea, about a mile to the offshore fish farm, the boat people told us that this was a great place to spot dolphins if we were lucky.  Our boat wasn't that big or fast but it certainly felt it as we jumped the waves on our way out to sea.  Best of all though us kids got to drive it, we couldn't believe how cool it was.  We made it to the fish farm in no time and saw a few other bigger boats circling about...we thought that must be a good sign so moved in closer for a better look.  Our boat was much more nimble than the bigger ones so we got ourselves into the best positions andwatched  the sea.......we didn't have to wait long.  There were loads of dolphins, popping up andthen  diving down again.  We couldn't believe it, there were so many and most of the bigger boats had moved on and missed them.  Once we'd had our fill of dolphins we carried on North up the coast and found a quieter cove to park the boat up and get in for a bit of a swim.  The water was so clear and so deep it was lovely even though getting back into the boat was a bit problematic.  We headed further out to sea and headed south again, passing by the fish farms and going further south again.  We saw some lovely catamarans and then some jet skis that were really going for it.  Our two hours were nearly up so we headed back to the marina.  It was so amazing, especially driving the boat.  We told the people all about our trip and they were so pleased about the dolphin spotting.

We wandered back through the marina area and found a top quality shopping establishment.....they sold lovely Spanish Style flamenco dresses....only 8 euros! I've always wanted one of them.  I also got a matching hair grip for another 4 euros on top.  I declined the shoes and also made sure that i bought the dress a size up to ensure maximum value.  The shopkeeper thought this was all very shrewd.  Ned also bought a pair of very high quality 'Oakey' sunglasses to replace the pair that fell to pieces earlier in the week.

We made Dad stop the bus on the way back at the supermarket to get him a birthday cake from the rather lovely looking bakery we'd seen on ourshopping trip earlier in the week.  Ome massive chocolate and oreo gooey gateaux piped with 'Happy Birthday Daddy' (which we had to write down for the piping lady) and we smuggled it back into the bus. 

We went back to the villa and hit the pool.....Ned was performing various leaps and stunts on Turdy mk2......until he managed to pop it!  Oops.

For our evening meal we ordered an Indian takeaway for delivery, well it was Dads birthday so we gave him the night off from cooking duties.we weren't really looking forward to it, but it turned out to be really lovely!

The cake was the main event of course:

It was a lovely cake too!

Thursday
We took a leisurely trip north to Alcala, where there are a number of rock pools, a bit like the Treyarnon Bay one.  The tide was coming inand was already too high for one of them, this one looked way too shallow to be of any real use other than a bit of paddling:

However the water was making it's way in as the tide got higher:

I stayed in for so long that the water eventually got up to my shoulders and had a lvely swim.  Andy was loving it too.

We had our lunch in a really nice looking cafe overlooking the beach.  It took a while to fet our food but it was a nice place to sit for a while.  Once lunch was done it wasback onto the beach, the pools were all swamped by the incoming tide and Ned was getting stuck in to some pretty wild looking bodysurfing.  I swam a long way out, past the breaking waves and bobbed about for a while before heading back to my towel and my book on the beach.

We went out for a meal in the evning in the village. We found a little play park,some friendly cats and Dad pulled a ridiculous wheelspin in the bus for reasons best known to himself.  As was the norm in Tenerife, Panda was a real hit with the waiters whenever we went out.  This time he got himself his own chair, place setting and very nearly my drink!

Friday
Our last day in the villa but not the last day of our holiday!

We packed up, played our last few games of pool and then locked up and left.  We were headed for Siam Park, the waterpark.  After a lap around the perimeter looking for a parking place Dad took the law into his own hands and sneaked into the carpark through the exit.  Not only did this save us three whole Euros it meant we got to reverse the loaded up bus right up against a well shaded wall thus protecting our Ipads and halloween goodies from thieves and harsh sun.  He was very pleased wiith himself.  We made our way round to the entrance gate where quite a queue had developed half an hour before the park even opened.  It was the first time we'd been among any real crowds all week, being used to our nice villa in a very pleasant area.

Once the gates opened we were relieved to find out that our pre booked discount tickets were actually legit and we were in, sorted ourselves out a fast pass each (at Dads insistance) and got our stuff stowed away in a locker before getting all German like and reserving sunbeds by the beach pool.  The first slide we came accross was the Naga Racer....it was a brilliant 6 lane head first one.  Next up was the Jungle Snakes, a more traditional tube ride slide which I wasn't so fussed on (don't like the dark ones).  Then it was a lap of the lzay river which was really long.  The others went on some really big scary ones without me for a bit before we hit the wave pool.  It was amazing, its nothing like other wave pools we've been in that produce gradually bigger waves.  This one just fired a massive wave straight at you, it was amazing and really powerfull.  Once we'd been battered senseless and knocked over a number of times we decided have some lunch and regroup to form our plan for the rest of the day. 

So, waterpark assault phase two.......

Another go on the Naga Racer to kick things off followed by another lap of the lazy river, but this time we took the additional loop of the rapids section.  This involved a tight weaving bit of lazy river that lead to an upwards conveyor belt.  It was soo cool, you stayed sat in your ring all the way to the top.  Then it was another section of meandering lazy river for a bit before the rapids! A downhill section in shallow water.  There were banked corners, drops and even a couple of jumps and it was epic.  It finished off going under a great big tunnel beneath the aquarium tank with massive sharks in it.  Next we went to the Lost City, a water playground with a massive monkey head water bucket that tipped up and soaked everyone.  Then there were a few more goes on some big scarey ones for the braver members of the group before we found the Sawasdee area, mini versions of the big scary rides....I loved it and got a lot braver.  So we went for the Mekong Rapids which was a four at a time flume....it was a littke scary but I loved it, so fast!  With my new found braveness they convinced me to go onSingha with them...it was fast, noisy and pretty wild with it firing you up uphill sections of track like a rollercoaster.  Dad and Andy then went on the biggest slide, the tower of power we were interested to hear all about but the feneral consensus seemed to that it wasn't as good as it looked.  The rest of the day turned into a blur of rides, we started using our fast passes to fly past loads of bored and jealous looking people.  It was brilliant, we went on so much and most of the time the attendants didn't bother to tick our wristbands off at all.  As usual with us lot at these sort of things we got there when it opened and we left when they kicked us out.  In fact just after that as we managed to make one more sneaky lap of the lazy river.  

With no villa to go back to we made our way to the hotel we'd booked for two nights.  Mum wanted to be near the airport so it was easy for our homeward bound journey....it was certainly near, in fact Dad had got a good visual of it when we flew over to land last week. 
We found it relatively easily and checked in, which took a while.  It looked pretty posh and swanky so we were happy with that.  Our room was certainly very spacious and pleasant, with a nice big balcony overloking the pool and a good vantage point for viewing the passing aircraft making their final approach.  We headed down to the dining room for our buffet supper.....it wasn't bad on the whole, at least there as help yourself ice cream and self serve squirty cream.

We were soon asleep after a pretty full on day, the planes didn't bother us.

Saturday
Well it was a cloudy day today, but not bad considering it had been lovely and sunny all week.  The breakfast buffet was a lot more palatable than the evening version so that was a bonus.  We settled back down the room, flicking through the numerous spanish channels until we came accross one in english...we were set for the day.  Sadly the grown ups had other ideas so were forced out for a walk.  It was rubbish, we only found a wafty little stoney beach and a rubbish marina.  I dont know whywe couldn't watch tv instead.  We went to the pool inthe afternoonbut the water seemed pretty cold.  We played a few games on the outdoor pool table instead.  Dad gave us a couple of euros which we managed to eek out for ages due to a combination of the wafty table and shoving our hands down the pockets to prevent the potted balls from disappearing.

We took a trip out to another nearby beach in the bus in the late afternoon.  That was rubbish too, windy as anything and actually pretty cold.  Back to the hotel then, when we parked up Dad decided not to bother with the hand brake for some reason?  It was hilarious watchinghim chase thebusdown the road, stopping it just before it made contact with the bottle bank.

It was the real Halloween day too, so I wore my cat mask and Dad wore Neds vampire cape down to dinner.  Dinner was much better than last night, there were a number of halloween themed embellishments on offer like severed fingers, spiders and eyeballs on the puuding items.  The scary lunatic member of hotel staff was pretty terrifying though.

Sunday
Time to Fly home, so it was up earlyish, breakfast at the hotel (including making ourselves a packed lunch to smuggle out with us) pack up the van and get to the airport.  Which obviously didn't take very long considering our proximity.

So a shame then that we had an almost two hour delay before we tookoffbecause of thick fog at Heathrow.  We did get to make a visit tothe cockpit though to ask some questions and kll some time.

The view of Mount Teide was pretty impressive out of the plane window as we left:

We knew we were back home as we entered the murky grey clouds.  They went really low though, we only just saw the runway before we touched down.

Monday
We had an inset day, so spent the day chilling out and doing the washing with Mum.  We did take a trip into town for some new school shoes.  They are nice little lace ups,proper cool.

So, here's a video from Dads New video camera he got for his birthday:
 
tenerife 15 from Part Time on Vimeo.

Tuesday
I got a teacher to help me put my swimming cap on for lessons and between us we ended up ripping it!  Oops.  Should have done it alone I suppose.

Despite being told that I could re-do my gymnastics badge this week it was in actual fact full on practice for the upcoming competition week.  Not happy.  Got told off for mucking about with Sasha as well.

Wednesday
I had my second week with the competition group at Team Kennet as i've signed up to do the Indoor Sportshall season this winter.  It's really good though, all my team Kennet friends are doing it too.

Thursday
Charlies after school, just for a change.

Friday
All a bit of a rush after school to get us to the hairdressers on time.  We made it though.  Ned and I both had it done at the same time next to each, my god does that boy talk!  Anyway, once it was cut she did me proper platt:

Dad left before it was finished to meet up with his old work mate Graham who left work (well told to leave work) at the start of the summer.

When he got home a couple of hours later he made a most out of character suggestion, even more remarkably Mum agreed with him and we went to the fair!

I can't remember ever going to the fair, apparently Ned might have gone when he was really small but it must have been a seriously long time ago.

I wasn't sure I much liked the look of it when we got there if im honest, it was quite an assault on the senses with all the loud music and bright lights.

The chair-o-planes looked too good to resist though:

They were epic, soaring really high and swinging out over the fair where you could see everything glittering in the dark.  I loved it and was on such a high there was no stopping me, next up what must have been the most snazzy looking waltzer in the world:

It was so cool and really spinny.  Too spinny for Ned who pleaded with the man not to give us any additional spins when he came round near the end of the ride.  Next up was the dodgems, I went in with Mum and we made sure we gave Ned and Dad plenty to worry about.  We went on a weird ride that span round and bounced up and down, it was really fun and I didn't ever want to get off.  We watched the firework display while we were going round which added another level of coolness on top.  The ride finished off by going backwards, how cool is that?  We managed to spend the last of our money (£50 stars s fans) by getting Mum and Dad to come back on the chair-o-planes with us, they loved it too!

Saturday
We had a bit of a lay in on Saturday morning after our late night at the fair.  I needed a recharge anyway, in the afternoon I went to Matilda's birthday party at Gravity Force.  It was really cool and we had a great time.  There was just enough of us going to make it fun without it being too many.  We wentback to her house afterwards for pizza, more fun and a cake with no jam!

We missed the vast bulk of rollerskating by the time I got home so had to make do with watching Strictly instead.  It was a nice peaceful evening as Ned had gone to Roberts.

Sunday
The day of my first indoor sportshall competition.  I had decided that I was excited and nervous in equal measures.  Our little team was made up of 8 year olds...so we were a long way under the upper age limit of the under 11 girls.  Some of the girls in the other teams looked like fully grown ladies.  I did triple jump:

My practice jump was shocking but I managed two good ones when we were being measured.

My target beanbag throw left a bit to be desired but I put in a reasonably good effort in my relay and upped my personal best in speedbounce.

Ned was competing too, he was an old hand at it of course and he put in some good performances.

Here we are in our matching kits:

Wevmust have done well as we were treated to Pizza Hut on the way home!

Monday
It's not all glamour being Sports Councillor, today we had to help Mr Gilham clear up the sports equipment cupboard.  Apart from lots of messy sports equipment there were lots and lots of spiders!

After school it was Halloween dance week.  I took my cat costume in, and as is traditional qe danced to thriller!

Tuesday
It was badge week at gymnastics, but there must have been some sort of mix up so I got tested for a badge that i'd already got.  I was rather displeased about that as you can imagine.  Mum set it all straight hopefully by emailing them a full list of my achievements...... 

Wednesday
It was the first Team Kennet indoor session of the season, I prefer the indoor sports hall stuff as there's no 600 metres!  It was pretty cool doing it all in Ned's proper school hall as well, moreso for him than me I think?

Thursday
We had sonething to look forward to after school, a trip to the dentist!  I think for tye first time ever neither one of us got any sort of negative comment regarding our brushing skills this time.

Friday
I was at fever pitch levels of excitement today, our trip to France was finally upon us.  We'd seen a CBBC show called All over the place where they had ridden on a massive mechanical elephant someplace in France.  It looked epic, and because Mum is a little bit epic too she had managed to sort us out a trip there (with a bit of help from Dad).

All I had to do was get through my school day first.....

As soon as we were finished with school we bundled in the car and set off for Gatwick, hoping the traffic woukdn't be too bad.  It wasn't and we were actually early.  Just as well we were too as the fancy meet and greet parking that Dad had stumped up for in an effort to streamline the whole operation and save us time didn't quite work out like that as it took a while to sort out.

Seeing as we had no baggage to check in or anything we just went through security and had time to have a meal in the pub, Ned certainly approved of his Eton Mess!

So after a nice leisurely meal we thought we'd see if the plane was boarding...it wasn't, there was a two hour delay.....not good.  Especially as France is an hour ahead and we weren't going to land until 11pm local time.

Anyway, once we did take off the flight went very quickly and we were soon touching down in France.  We had no baggage to collect so it was straight to a taxi and into Nantes.  We were dropped off by the taxi driver in the vague location of our flat (which was in a pedestrianised area as it turns out). We wandered around for a bit trying to find it, called the lady that was supposed to be meeting us there but the phone didn't work......it was pushing on for midnight by this point and things weren't looking too good really.  Then, out of nowhere a rather stylish french lady appeared asking us if we looked lost!  She studied our paperwork and tried to work out where we should be headed.  She said that if she couldn't get us to the flat we could stay with her as she had plenty of room at her place!  She tried to ring the number on our paperwork and she got through, result.  They waffled on in French for a bit and she gesticulated to follow her up the square where we could see a waving figure two floors up, she'd found it!  It was a place we'd already consideed but with about twenty doorbells on the keypad were unsure of which one to press.  We thanked her wholeheartedly for her assistance and she assured us we'd have a lovely time in Nantes, even if she was a bit unsure of sending us down a pretty grim looking alleyway to the rear steps up to the flat:

As grim as the alleyway may have been, the flat more than made up for it, it was well smart. Late as it was we were still pretty excited about it and more thsn a bit relieved to get to bed at last.

Saturday
So our beds, they were so epic!  I took this rather smart 'pod' type thing, complete with lighting, shelves and a fully enclosed curtain:

I loved it, I thought it was the coolest thing ever and had a lovely sleep.

Ned took the sofa bed, right by the window overlooking the sqaure down below:

While Mum and Dad had this upstairs one, like some sort of castle rampart:

We had to be up relatively early as we had a 10 am appointment with the reason for the entire trip.  France looked to be just waking up as we made our way through the squares, a busy market and along the banks of the Loire:

It wasn't far to walk and we were soon waiting for the elephant to appear.
We didn't have to wait long, I think Ned's worried it was going to creep up on him:

There wasn't much chance of that, it wasn't exactly fast!  It was however truly massive:

He parked up and made himself ready for his trip:

We couldn't wait to get on board and Ned made sure we were right at the front of the queue so we got prime spot at the front of his upper deck.  He's really good at that sort of thing, working out what he wants to do and then carrying it out in a subtle sort of way without being too pushy.  

Here he is, in all his glory, you can see us, tiny against his front leg:

It was really cool plodding around, there were so many people taking pictures from the ground it was like being famous!

As well as the upstairs deck there was a inside bit down below, you could see all his workings and controls as well as down to his legs and feet clomping on the ground.

It took him nearly half an hour to make his way over to the carousel where we got off.  So that was the main part of the trip mission accomplished.
We hadn't thought much about the Carousel to be honest, but it turned out to be even better than the elephant!  Spread over three levels it was quite simply amazing.  The top layer had all sorts of weird creatures on it with varying attributes.

The second layer was suspended vehicles of various mechanical properties and the bottom layer was a member mixture of creatures and machines.  We had two goes each on any layer we wanted.  We decided on the top floor where Ned and I teamed up on a rather splendid dragon creature where i got to control the smoke coming out of his mouth.  Mum and Dad chose a pair of galloping horse-fish things with wobbly heads.  Quite quite mad.

We gave the middle layer a miss and headed to the bottom floor.  I chose a crab, it had at least five levers that you could control his pincers and legs and goodness knows what else.  The ride attendants were brilliant as well, they fully explained every lever and told me what everything did before the ride started.

The others opted for a fish diving bell, lured in no small part by the fact it actually went completely down underneath the floor and then the trap door it went through closed up over the top again:

Ned said you could control his eyes, his mouth, his fins and his tail.

Here's my epic crab:

I loved it so much, it was way better than a diving fish.

So, the carousel was completely brilliant:

The branch was next on the explore list, a weird metal tree with plants all along it.

It was a lovely thing to explore:

The gift shop didn't seem to have much in it at first glance but I eventually found this rather lovely tin carousel:

It went round at a hell of a speed, we all decided we wouldn't like to ride on it very much.
We wandered back across the island, played on the park for a bit and then got invited to shoot some hoops with a French bloke who was playing on his own.

We wandered back to the aprtment via the supermarket (bit of a jaunt, Dad's map was pretty wafty). to pick up some lunch supplies.

We sat in the apartment eating cheese and baugettes like proper french people.

I pottered around the appartment for the afternoon, hiding in my cool bed, fiddling with batheoom fixtures and fittings that sort of thing.  Ned Ipadded himself into oblivion while Mum and Dad had a snooze I think.

We went for a wander around the town in the afternoon, browsing shoe shops, listening  to buskers and watching a vaguely unsettling protest march.

We made a stop for pizza at a funny little place in a side street.  They had no tables left inside so outdoors it was.  It wasn't actually as cold as i'm making it look here:

It was a funntpy setup, the waiters wandered around with plates full of fresh, hot pizzas with various toppings.  If you liked the look of them, you could have a slice:

My favourite was the carbonara, white sauce and little bacon bits...lovely.

There was even pudding pizzas, weird or what? Chocolate, pineaple, smarties and tiramisu!

We had our fill and then retired back to the flat where I was still really excitedto get into my fantastic sleeping quarters.

Sunday
A little vely lay in in my epic bed.  Followed by a nice shower and a lovely blow dry, all set.

We were going home today so 

I helped pack and sort things out while Ned tended to his Ipad......

We nipped across the square to get a McDonalds breakfast to take back to the flat.  We were mortified to find that they only did bacon and egg mcmuffins or pancakes.....so no flat sausages. Boo.  We made do with pancakes and maple syrup instead.

Our flight wasn't until 6 in the afternoon so we had the best part of the day to enjoy still.  We made our way past a rather splendid looking chateau before arriving at the Jardin de Plantes.

We ween't sure what this was all about but Dad had seen it on trip advisor.  Turned out to be pretty cool:

There were some cute goats to fuss and feed:

and loads of weird plant sculptures:

There was a rather cool oversized bench to try out for size:

And an even bigger one:

There was a little park to play in as well:

Complete with a really funny little french lad who loved bossing us about in French.  We couldn't understand him and he couldn't understand us, but we had a laugh all the same.
We went back to the airport on the bus, we got there a bit early so sat inthe warm sunshine outside clearing up the last of our food provisions before heading for home.

The flight wasn't delayed which was a bonus and we were soo home.  Sadly the valet parking wasn't any better on the way home and we had to wait ages for our car to be returned, Mum was not happy.

One quick pitstop for a McDonalds on the way home and we were all done.  What a weekend!

Monday

I was pretty excited about school today, we had our first Sports council meeting.

Then after school Maddie and I continued our dance partnership which continues to be a lit of fun.  I think this is showing in the standards of the performance too.

Skylanders got a revival after tea as well, I forgot how cool it was.

Tuesday
Swimming, week three I think? Nothing much to report other than my group has had to move down the pool from the very, very deep end to the marginally less deep end......not happy about that but there's so many of us that are really good at swimming it's over crowded.

We went up to watch Ned's first home rugby match, a friendly against Kennet School.  I got to hang out with Ella for a bit, she showed me some cool videos on her phone, the best one featured a baby panda sneezing...cute overload!  The game was pretty good, but 

I had taken the Ipad so did some of my valcano project instead of giving the match my full attention.  I had to leave before the end of the game to get to gymnastics, as we walked off we did see Ned narrowly missing a try.  They won the game though.

Wednesday
Well Ned has started his fancy school cookery course and managed to get this beautiful looking creation home:

In one piece, coming home down the hill on his bike, quite the miracle that it wasn't just sludge in the bottom of his backpack.  They made it with fancy organic, locally sourced ingredients too....woooo.  Trouble is, neither of us really like apple crumble very much.  Mum and Dad on the other hand couldn't believe their luck.

It was the last team Kennet outdoor session and another lovely, sunny evening.  We've been really lucky this season it has to be said.  I managed a slightly better 600m and am now looking forward to hopefully resting my poor old painful heel a bit over the winter.

Thursday
Dad sloped off on his bike before I even got out of school today, how rude.  I didn't really care though as I made myself scarce down the park with Charlie and Luca leaving Mum to her own devices as Ned was at rugby practice as well.

Friday
Mum went out for her quiz team curry, so, it was sausage burgers for three, yes, result, the same mixture but shared three ways instead of four!

Saturday
Had a bit of a lazy morning before heading off to Anne and Mike's for lunch.  He livs in Bracknell so we headed east up the M4 instead of West.  The traffic was hideous though, i buried myself in the ipad for what I considered a good long while.  I surfaced to ask if we were nearly there yet and realised that we were actually only just gone past the hospital in Thatcham! I was devastated.  The traffic on Bracknell wasn't much better either.....although we did have some fun with a very rude lady pulling out on us.....ha ha.  We had a lovely big lunch and I reckon I was pushing double figures on the yorkshire pudding front.  We had a walk over to the park afterwards, it was well cool, a lake in the middle and evrything.  The actual playground though had been torn up and was in the process of being replaced which was a bit of a shame.  We played with the vortex and the rugby ball instead.  I did managed to hit Anne right inbetween the shoulders with the vortex which gave her a bit of a shock while her back was turned.  Oops, sorry Anne.

In the evening we went to see Hartley, oh, and Max and Leo of course.  Hartley and I had a lovely time and played together pretty much all night, he has so much energy.  The poor old boy managed to cut his ear at some point too, not that he cared.

We rounded the evening out with some of Leo's hilarious 'fill in the blanks' stories he had written and some rather off colour youtube videos.....

Sunday
Well I had a minster lay in, it was gone 11 by the time I finally surfaced all bleary eyed and bushy haired.  We had a leisurley lunch and then set off for Lepe, we hadn't been there for ages.

We had a lovely walk up the beach and enjoyed nearly getting cut off on this little slab:

We carried on along the waterside, where I practiced my beam work with this really long sea wall:

When we got far enough along, we lobbied hard to return to the park and the ice cream van:

It was a lovely afternoon out in the warm autumn sunshine.

When we got home we finally watched the DVD of Ned's leavers play, it did go on a bit in places but it was pretty good it has to be said.  It certainly fired me up to try out for our christmas play that will no doubt start being worked on very soon.

Monday
So after yesterdays lovely beach trip, today was a whole different proposition.  A dark, wet, Monday........yuck!

I am still loving my sports council hoodie though, putting that on certainly lifted my day.

After school dance was great fun again, Maddie and I are really having a laugh with it this term.

Ned came home looking a bit soggy but quite pleased with himself as he's now he's been allocated to the top sets in both maths and science...