Tuesday

Into the final stretch of the holidays now, a day with Auntie Christine.  Todays highlight was a water fight:

And it was largely amicable too.  Well, sort of......

Wednesday

A day off with Mum, another lovely sunny and warm day.  We got a picnic together and went to the outdoor pool.  Ned din't come because he's ashamed to be seen with us I think.  It was lovely down there, even if we did have to wait a little while to get in as it was busy.

Dad met us down there after work and approved of our space under the shade of the big trees.

It was a return to Team kennet in the evening, although not many had turned up no doubt to it being the holidays still.  Still, we got to have loads more throws and jumps than normal!

Thursday

Another day with Auntie Christine, no Darcey this time though.  We had a trip to the cinema to see Finding Dory which we all absoloutley loved.  I even cried with happiness!

Friday

Bit of a novelty today, a trip to London with Anne and Mike.

Mum dropped us all off at the station,  and we went in by train, we even got a seat.  The day was off to a good start.  We went accross townin the underground and got to Science museum, brilliant we hadn't been there for ages and we loved it last time.

There was loads of cool stuff to see and try out, we even went on a flight simulator which is something Mum and Dad never let us do!

We had a a really great day and were full of enthusiasm when Mum and Dad came to meet us from the railway station.  Even Anne and Mike seemed upbeat about the whole experience which pleased Mum and Dad no end.

We had a quiet evening after our big day out.......

Saturday
I had a last minute invite to a sleepover at Sasha's, complete with a trip ice skating....cool!  I packed my bag and off I went for the night.

I didn't do particularly well at ice skating.....and didn't do particulalrly well at sleeping over either.  Well, I slept okay, but had a bit of a mishap involving my large tub of thinking putty, my hair, my eyelashes and my nice new pyjama's.  I found the whole thing really rather upsetting, but Sasha's mum and dad mamaged to get me looking a lot less, ummm, blue than when I woke up......

Sunday

We went straight to Lily's gymnastics party at KD from Sasha's.  It was good fun and thrn it was home for a rest in the afternoon.  In the evening we went round to Abbie and Faye's for the evening.  We had a Nerf war, did some fencing with a variety of foam swords and rhen watched the Dark Crystal, a film Mum apparently used To like when she was younger.....it wasn't all that.

Monday

It was a bank holiday weeken so we all had Monday off.  We didn't surface particularly early so our options for a day out were limited.  We drove out to Runnymede for a stroll.

It was by the Thames, so we wandered along the river between the hundreds of people having a picnic.  It's quite a famous place due to the Magna Carta being signed there or something or another, hence the statues and what have you:

The spot where it was signed is marked by twelve really uncomfortable chairs:

Then we wandered off across the fields, up the hill, climbed some trees:

Ned busied himself on Pokemon, we saw a calf we thouth was dead but was actually just having a nice snooze in the sunshine and Mum tried to ruin her nice new trainers by treading in a wet cow pat!

We got back to the cafe just in time for an ice cream....Dad was obviously feeling generous as he didn't decline my request for a double 99.....he had one too!

Saturday
So we awoke on Saturday after a decent lie in to the sound of distant crashing waves, and even better the rustling bags and packets of Mum and Dad unloading the monster Tesco click and collect order. Once we'd surveyed that, and supervised the military operation of putting it all away it was a bit of a meet and greet mission.  There were loads of us down this year, as well as the usual suspects Andy, Ben, Rach, Kimi, Marny, Darcey, Laura, Auntie Christine, Uncle Ian and Auntie Trish we also had Owen and Kirsty and Finlay, Millie, Chris and Kate!  Quite the invasion this year.

There were waves and sunshine so we headed for a day on the beach, a perfect way to kick things off.  We spent all day down there, pretty much until the sun went down:

Sunday
Another day on the beach, well the sun was still out and there were still waves.  With high tide around the midday mark though the beach did seem a little bit busier than we're used to:

We didn't mind though, it was lovely.

In the evening it was time for the annual barbecue, well, 'smores' event anyway:

It went down as well as ever of course, it's a real highlight of the week for us kids.

Auntie Christine had a few games lined up as well, no doubt inspired by the Rio Olympics that were going on.  It wasn't standard olympic sports though, there was the plastic cup seperate and restack race (Dad seems to have a very serious look on his face):

Owen let himself down on this one by cheating, what a low act!

There were also various bean bag themed events which were great fun:

I think I also made a new friend in Millie:

Monday
Guess what? The weather was still glorious so once again we hit the beach.  The waves had died off a touch so it was a good day to get everyone out for a swim.  Darcey and I particularly enjoyed doing an artistic gymnastics routine with seaweed that had to be seen to be truly appreciated.

We all know how Dad likes a dig in the sand but we rather stole his thunder with this creation:

It ended up as a makeshft hot tub, complete with steps down into it and fully tiled with slates from the beach.  In terms of creativity and ingenuity, my mini golf course idea was top notch:

We totalled five holes of increasingy difficulty and structural comlexity and all the lads certainly enjoyed play testing it!

Tuesday
It was still sunny......we decided to take advantage of the low morning tide by going for a dip in the pool:

It was as cold as ever!

We walked round to Constantine to meet up with Finlay and Millie who were busy fishing the rockpools.  They also had a pretty well stocked bucket of crabs from their bacon baited crab lines.

We didn't do as well with them though:

In the afternoon we had the most hotly anticipated activity of the week......the AquaPark at Retallack.  Basically it was an inflatble obstacle course in the middle of a lake.  Participating in this endeavour were myself and Ned, Mum, Dad, Andy, Owen as well as John and Sarah who joined us for the afternoon.

We had the luxury of bouyancy aids to wear, I love a bouyancy aid I do:

We got the briefest of rules outlined to us before we got to hit the water and head out to the good bits.  It was so epic, i'd been looking forward to this for weeks and it more than lived up to expectations.  I loved the balance beam (which I found much easier than anyone else), the trampoline and all the various slides.  The launch bags were quite a sucess too.  These involved a large grown up positioning themselves up a tower while a smaller projectile (myself or Ned) positioning themselves on the end of a bed sized air pillow.  Even getting yourself ready to be launched was quite an achievement and after an initial miss aligned leap from Dad, Ned was launched into a low earth orbit with a somersault for good measure before splashing down after re-entry.  My turn next afforded Owen the oppurtunity to fulfil his usual role of making one of the kids cry when he gave me a similar lift off.  It wasn't his fault though, and I did sort of enjoy it, on reflection.  There were also see saws to play on and probably best of all large floating pontoon that was quite wobbly froside to side.  This ended up being used as a giant sumo wrestling ring, with endless pushing and shoving and falling over.  Sarah particularly lost the plot and was laughing so hard she had no change of even managing to stand up.

At the end of our hour session we were all pretty much worn out:

I got to grill John for a bit as I always like to do, but now he's so tall I had to conduct most of the conversation stood on a picnic table.  Stay tuned for pictures to follow from varous other sources on this one.

We re-grouped when we got back to Treyarnon:

And then went out fo an evening group walk:

We picked up Dad and Andy on the way round as they had escaped for an evening surf at Constantine:

Wednesday
Well it had gone in a flash so far and sadly it was already time for Darcey to go home.  We made sure we took her surfing in the morning on her new board first though.

We waved her, Laura, Auntie Christine and Uncle Ian off and then I set about having a massive all day TV binge on the sofa......well it had been a pretty full on week so far, we all need to recharge.

Thursday
Well it had to happen, it turned a bit gloomy, grey, miserable even maybe?  So after a cooked breakfast we rounded up Trish, Owen and Kirsty and took a trip to Bedruthan to make the most of the low tide.

We had a lovely explore as always when we go there, it's a really cool place and always seems so remote and quiet.  We climbed, we paddled, we ate our picnic lunch and then had some afternoon sport.  First off it was gymnastics, with beams drawn in the sand.  This culminated in both Dad and Owen attempting cart wheels with varying degrees of sucess.

Next up long jump:

This was given whole new level of professionalism when Owen introduced a white and red flag system like they use at major sporting events.

We dropped into Anne's Cottage on the way back and spent a small fortune on clobber.  I did manage to secure myself a rather splendid winter coat from the sale section though, it's a beauty, i'm almost looking forward to winter now!

Again there were defectors, this time making their way back home were Kimi and Marny......

We spent the evening watching the Olympics, diving is our new favourite spectator sport.  We are all experts on splashless entry, under and over rotation.

Friday
So after a spell of bad weather we were back on form today with this surprise cloudless scorcher of a day:

Ned had a stand up surf lesson, as usual, he was annoyingly good at it, he got up first time:

While he was bending his instructors ear for extra tips and advice from his instructor we played boules:

Seeing as the weather was so good we decided to hit the youth hostel for lunch, sat at our favourite vantage point and having a good feed, perfect.

With the upcoming storm on it's way the surf was getting bigger and bigger so we went back to Harlyn for a dip with Owen in tow.  It was brilliant, I caught thousands of waves with Mum, Ned worked on his stand up and Andy, Dad and Owen got a few too.  The tide was coming in at a rate, making for some weird conditions where I was surfing (Hands behind my back) across varying depths of water before almost getting to the foot of the rocks at the back of the beach where the sand runs out.  This contributed to Owen managing to lose his flipper while taking it off and getting caught out by a sudden surging wave.  Trying to find a clear rubber flipper that doesn't float is very difficult......we didn't find it again.
Another departure with Finlay, Millie, Chris and Kate heading off.  It's the first time they've been down and I hope it's not the last, we had a lot of fun with them.

Saturday
Well the storm that was predicted arrived with a vengence on Saturday.  It was a Wet and wild day for sure.

We couldn't do much, the beach was red flagged so we took a trip to Padstow.

It wasn't actually that busy, we wandered the shops for a bit, ooohed and aaaahed over all the lovely little dogs out for a walk and ate Pasties.  I also bought myself the cutest cuddly bear ever from the utterly fantastic teddy bear shop, I could have stayed in there for hours test cuddling everything.

We went back to base to find out Kirsty had been taken ill, the poor thing!  It's not so easy to get to the doctors in Cornwall on a saturday afternoon so they had to wait until the doctor came to visit her.  She got an injection and got to ride all the way home to Newbury laid down on the back seat of the car under medical advice.  I hope ypu feel better soon.  So that left just us four and Andy, after Owen went home with Kirsty, taking Trish too.  We went out to take in the effects of the storm:

The foam being blown off the sea was like a full on snowstorm and the sea was crashing against the island, at times completely covering it with huge plumes of white spray.

We made it back to the shelter of the caravan in time to watch a good stint of rhythmic gymnastics at the Olympics, I loved it, Ned....not so much!

Sunday
It was a bit grim today too, we had a lay inthen started packing up our stuff.  The beaach at Treyarnon was still red flagged so we took Andy and Dad to Harlyn so they could get some waves.  Ned didn't fancy it for once, which was a surprise as he's pretty much surfed himself to a standstill over the course of the week.  He's been 'out the back' with the big boys and is very pleased with himself, claiming some massive waves to boot.  A yway, while they were in the sea we played a tense game of Dobble in the car......

Then it was back to pack up, tidy up and head home, another summer holiday completed.  As ever, a massive thank you to everyone involved for a brilliant week and thanks too to everyone who left us food parcels as they departed, we ate very well at the end of the week!

Monday

Although we weren't that late back last night it was good to have a lazy day at home with Mum.

We took a quick trip out for provisions and then I got creative with the cornflour:

I did make quite a mess with it.....the table and chairs, kitchen floor, conservatory, sofa, garden path and even a few items of clean washing on the line all managed to get mucked up.....oops.

We bought the film 'Goosebumps' on DVD earlier and watched that in the afternoon when Dad got home, I loved it.

Apologies, this post was supposed to be published prior to the Cornwall Holiday on below!

Tuesday
Outdoor pool with Auntie Christine, Auntie Trish and Darcey. 

As you can see, it wasn't exactly busy to begin with!
We had a lovely time, an extensive selection of picnic items and even a go at the crazy golf.
We had a lovely walk around the chase after tea, this Pokémon lark is having a very positive effect on Ned's participation on this sort of trip.

Wednesday
Another day off with Mum, this one day a week lark seems to be working much better than her having a whole week off.
We didn't do much today, lazy morning, then a trip to Mr Moo Juice. 

After much deliberating and several changes of my mind I settled on minty Aero flavour.  Dad met us on his way home from work and we all rode home together.....well, except Ned who kept darting off or lagging behind to catch Pokémon.  I settled down with Mum in the evening to watch the Olympics, we loved the synchro diving, especially Team GB's gold medal!

Thursday
Another Dragon Club day.  Then an afternoon of inactivity, followed by an evening walk and some more Olympics on telly.

Friday
Last day at Dragon club for the summer, there was a special goodbye party for one of the grown ups who was leaving which ensured we were all well fed.  We've really enjoyed it there this year but that's it now until at least February 2017 now.
We went home relatively early to get ready to go off on our annual summer holidays trip to Cornwall.  I threw a few things in a bag and then got ready to go to gymnastics.  I thought it was highly amusing to drive across town to the gym with a surfboard on the roof and our bikes hanging off the back of the car.  Gymnastics was good fun, I'm really liking the Friday sessions especially during holiday time as there's hardly anyone going....more goes!
I was picked up by the full family when I was done, in our laden car, complete with a delicious foil wrapped meal for everyone (pizza, potato waffles, Spring rolls, Samosa's) and after a brief pit-stop at Andy's (So I could get changed out of my leotard) we made our way westwards.  It was a brilliant journey, there was no traffic to speak of and I didn't need to stop for the toilet at all so we were soon there, drifting off to sleep with the sound of the ocean filling our bedroom!

Tuesday

Another day lined up with Auntie Christine and Darcey: 

It wouldn't be the holidays without a trip to Four Kingdoms woukd it?

We loved it, thanks for taking us!
I also got mum to buy me a hair doughnut thingy in the afternoon:

How cool does that look?  Not bad for our first go either!

Wednesday

Day off with Mum today.
I got a bit creative first thing and made a very structurally saound and well balanced swing for Panda:

Next on the agenda was bowling, Dad had pinched the car to go and learn how to ride a bike at Tidworth Bikepark (so god knows what he's been doing over there once a week for the last couple of years).  So bikes it was for us, I'm riding a lot better these days even if I am still a little bit too 'stop and start for Mum's liking.  At least when we ride Mum can't take her ball with her.....she still own of course.

Candy floss was very agreeable as always:

After a bit of a a tip off from Auntie Christine we made a visit to the Pineapple Café which is just up the road. It was lovely, with riverside seating:

And some of the best Panini's we've yet sampled!
Ned is suddenly really into toasted cheese and ham Panini's.....we've been telling him how good they are for years.  He can be a bit slow to catch on sometimes.

Dad came home in one piece from his bike trip so that was a bit of a welcome surprise.
Then it was off to Team Kennet.  There's not many going during the holidays so we get loads of goes.  Ned also got pulled to one side and asked if he'd like to attend the more selective Monday night sessions for some sprint training, he was overjoyed to be asked.

Thursday

Dragon club today and we are loving it this year.  We are having such a good time there that it's a shame to come home.....unless of course you're going straight to Legoland.
We got there at about half past three, meaning we had pretty much three and a half hours before it closed.  We got on plenty of rides as a lot of people seemed to be leaving for the day.  It was brilliant, there was even a bit of drama on the water cannons on the rapids ride with some ludicrously overprotective mum having a go at some kids for getting her daughter wet.....on a water ride...oh dear.

We went on the spinning spiders without Dad and Ned got it going at a hell of a rate:

It was supposed to close at 7, but we were still going on (queue-less) rides for at least another 20 minutes before we had to dash home, via McDonalds to get back in time for the Tesco delivery....we just about made it.

Friday

Dragon club again, Fridays are always good there.  We put a long stint in today and didn't get picked up until quite late (our choice).

It was also the day of the Olympics opening ceremony.  I really wanted to watch it but got packed off to bed....I was not happy, but I later found out that it didn't even start until midnight!

Saturday

It was up early for a trip to London, on the agenda the BFG Dream Jar Trail (or Pokémon Go if you asked Ned).
It was a lovely day and we were soon parked up and on the underground, Ned decided to not use the escalators and instead ran up this monster staircase:

He's obviously gone quite mad.
It didn't take us long to find out first dream jar either at Hyde Park Corner:

They were a good bit further apart than we might have anticipated....so there was a lot of walking.  Next up South Kensington:

Then we looped back round as there were three in Harrods, which is apparently just like Camp Hopson's or so we were told.  It wasn't, it was way cooler.  I mean, just look at these Ipod docks:

The food hall was pretty amazing, with caviar at £300 for a little tin and some of the nicest looking quiche I'd ever seen.
The Dream Jars were of a similarly high standard:

The toy department was brilliant too, there was fake snow that actually felt cold and a massive selection of TY toys, albeit £2 more expensive than their usual prices (which was enough to put me off any impulse purchases).

We had a picnic for lunch in Hyde Park on the bank of the Serpentine which was rather lovely.

Next on the list, Buckingham Palace:

It was quite cool I suppose, especially the guards:

But it was pretty busy and we couldn't find the Dream Jar.
So we carried on to St James' Park, it was a lovely walk round:

But we couldn't find that jar either!  By this point Ned had bagged several thousand Pokémon, including the three he really wanted to try to find.  We were also pretty tired so decided to head back for home.
I got dropped off at Amy's just before 4 for our sleepover...what excellent scheduling!
It was great fun at Amy's.......

Sunday

I got dropped off at home just before lunchtime and we managed to spare Amy a trip to the retail park with her Mum by having her stay to play and have lunch with us!  We trampolined and ate outside.

We had a bit of a gathering in the afternoon at the Pub in honour of Abi's birthday.
It was an exceptional turnout and a really good afternoon, Owen was on top form:

 

Monday

Day off with Dad today, so it was his usual trip of BMX track and Asda for lunch.  We rode and rode and rode, Ned even let me wear his old BMX outfit that's too small for him on the condition that I went from the top of the start hill.  I did that easily and was really pleased with myself.  After a good long stint we were pretty hungry so it was a quick change of clothes in the boot of the car, load up the bikes and Asda time:

I love their eclairs, but this one was actually too chocolately!!!

Once we were refuelled we decided we had a few more laps in us, so it was back to the track, quick change and bikes out again:

We rode pretty much all afternoon until it was time to go home and collect Mum from work.
 

Tuesday

A day with Auntie Christine.  We got to the cinema early doors for Angry Birds which was great fun!  Next up, Wetherspoons for lunch and then we even managed to get a trip to Mr Moo juice for afters.....we felt a little bit sick after all that lot.

Ned recovered quickly enough to go out biking with Dad to Tidworth.  Mum and I took a more sedate ride into town.  I bought a squirty bottle from Wilko's, i've always wanted one of my own and I was thrilled with it.  When we got home Mum crimped my hair beautifully, but I soon uncrimped it again when I got carried away with my new squirty mist bottle when I was supposed to be watering my plants.  I rather soaked myself as well as the plants.

Wednesday

Mum off with us today, so no hurry to get out of bed.  Her scheduled activity was going to be a trip into  town and a visit to Mr Moo Juice, but as we had already done that yesterday we didn't bother going again.  Ned and Mum tidied his room a bit....I didn't fancy tackling mine.

We managed to fit Team Kennet into our busy schedule, we had a new coach, as usual they were rather taken aback by my throwing prowess the first time they saw me with the Vortex.  Jenny, one of the regular coaches gave me a knowing smile.

Thursday

Keeping the hoildayarrangements mixed up it was Dragon club today.  It was good to be back.  We took our bikes, which was great until one of the other boys ploughed into my back wheel, bending my gear mech quite badly, stopping the wheel from going round...oops.

As well as the outside stuff we also had arty stuff covered with some stone painting which was good.

Friday

Dragon club again, today with my scooter as I needed a new part to fix my bike.

It was disco day which featured Now 94 rather heavily.  Tom went in the stocks to round the week out.

In the evening Mum and Ned went out wandering the streets looking for Pokemon while Dad and I had a game of swingball and then rigged up a limbo pole with our garden canes we'd used for the den building.  He didn't even try but I got pretty low!

Saturday

A nice lazy morning,we didn't really know what to do today, a commin problem during the holidys when we do cool stuff all week.

I here was a brief break in the cloud so we made a quick oicnic and went down the outdoor pool.  We had it pretty much to ourselves!  I learned to dive again, I used to be able to years ago but seemed to have forgotten somehw.  I also did a lot of dive stick collection down the deep end which made my ears hurt after a while! Just as we left Finlay and Millie arrived (and the sun came out) so that was a shame.

We had time for a brief rest and change before going out to meet up with Ned's friend Kieran, his Mum and Dad and best of all, Kieran's younger sister!  I'd heard a lot about Lydia and was seriously excited to finlly get to meet her.  After a brief spell of initial awkwardness we soon found out we had a lot in common (KD gymnastics, a past dalliance with ballet, a lot of mutual friends and of course, annoying older brothers).  We went to the bowlers arms, there was a cricket match on so,we had to be a bit careful until that was finished, but once they were done we had the run if the field and the crease covers that were still on the side of the field.  We stayed for tea and everything and had a great time.  We didn't leave until 10pm

Sunday

Bit of a late decision again, but we got ourselves another picnic together and went to Dinton Pastures.  We hadn't been there for ages so once we had filled ourselves up with grub it was on to the playground:

The climbing seemed just as challenging as ever:

We had a walk around the lake which gave Ned plenty of chances to snare some Pokemon.  The highligt of the walk was a couple of grumpy swans near a bench who hissed like mad every time a dog came to say hello to them.

We rounded the weekend off with a game of Dixit (Mum won, boo).

Monday

Another day off with Mum today.  The weather wasn't up to much so it was round Tesco cor a DVD.  We actually agreed on what to get, Kung Fu Panda 3.  I also treated myself to a small box of Fererro Rocher and most excitingly, a doughnut for my hair.

The film was really good, my hair was even better: