Tuesday 12th

School trip to the panto today, and as Mum was coming along as a parent helper Dad and Ned were spared having to go at all this year.  Now the rest of the school is a three class year group we were too big to go to the corn exchange en-masse so this year it was off to the Hexagon in Reading.  Mr Tumble  starring in Peter Pan was a very different prospect to my previous visit here to see Frank Turner.

The show was the usual fun and games but being an experienced Panto attendee I could pre-empt most of the on stage action before it took place (like the tarpaulins coming out before the custard pie scenes).

Shame we didn't have some tarpaulins on the coach home as one of the girls was quite messily sick.

We were home way later than published as usual of course, but I think Mum enjoyed herself.

Thursday 14th

It was our school visit for the church carol service today, nothing much to report from that one.

I was finally getting my haircut today....i was terrified they would cut too much off.  They did. Apparently I had to have that much removed to get it in good condition or something.

While Mum and I sat in the hairdressers sipping nice hot drinks, Ned and Dad went off christmas shopping.  They came back very pleased with themselves too.

Next up, Christmas tree shopping.  Both Mum and I were already feeling very hard done by having to wait this long for a tree.  We were the only people over at Yattendon, well it was quite late and even icy in places.  We picked a tree and agreed very quickly between us that it was the one, now all we had to do was get it to the bagging station, it was a monster!

It was certainly cosy in the car with it wedged from the boot, through the gap in the front seats and pretty much up on the dashboard.

Friday 15th

Nate and Joel sitting tonght while Alan took Hayley out for her birthday.

Nate was on top form tonight.....well top form or borderline frantic depending on your outlook.  He was great fun, so full of energy and a real laugh:

He also got me to read his bedtime story as well, a Mr Man book.

Saturday 16th

Tree up day today.

I helpded Dad wrestle the beast into the house from the garage and get it in the pot ready to decorate.

We had ro trim the top a bit before operation empty the decorations box began.

There were no shortages of places to hang stuff thats for sure.

Then the most tricky operation, getting the cherub on top...our first attempt couldnt get me close enough:

But a bit of clever thinking on my part to use Neds backscratcher was a inspired idea:

And much safer:

Even Ned got involved:

And here it is, our finished masterpiece:

Emmas and Dean had a pre-christmas party, so a good chance for a bit of a get together with Leo and Max (now with a proper job and taking driving lessons) and Finlay and Millie. We had a great time larking about and chilling out in their new camper van.  It has to be said though, this handsome chap made my night:

He is so lovely, we played for ages before he cashed out cuddled up to me.

Sunday 17th

Football, last one of the year and Dad and I were quite looking forward to it for once.  It was on Henwick sports field where we still havent sampled the new pump track.  Sadly it was a wash out, persistant heavy rain meant the track was a no go.  We dropped Ned off and made a visit to the tropical fish shop which was a decent enough distraction.

It was a top of the table clash at the football, then end result, 3-3.

We did get a quick go on the exercise equipment though:

Monday 18th

Into our last week at school and a visit to Elsa's house after school, for gingerbread baking, tea, make up and hair styling.

Wednesday 20th

Last day of term today, last day at school this year!  A few of our classmates had been tasked with organising the party and had gathered opinions on the activities we'd have.  It worked out pretty badly though, too many opinions if you ask me....it wasnt the best event.  Still, we were done, and it was time for christmas....

Thursday 21st

.......In another 4 sleeps anyway.

Mum had also broken up too so we had a nice day at home, interspersed with a trip out to get our nails done.  I went for a nice blue shade and Mum went for black with gold sparkle over the top.

Friday 22nd

Dad's last day at work and he was involved in an ill advised bike pub crawl once they were finished.

So we were forced to go to McDonalds for tea......shame.

Saturday 23rd

It's amazing how quickly we slip into lazy morning mode during the holidays.  There was an appetite amongst us all to do something worthwhile though.  After some tense negotiations we settled on my suggestion of swimming over Neds suggestion of the cinema.  So off to the Coral Reef we went for our first visit since their extensive and very long refit.  It was worth the wait, although he pool itself hadn't changed the slides certainly had.  They were amazing, four of them you could go down in a two person raft and the other two were slide alone on your bum types.  I paired up with Mum and we screamed our way down each and every one of them.  Once the adults had enough I paired up with Ned in a most out of character display of sibling unity.

My only homework for the holidays was a list of hings to do before our trip to Rhos.  These ranged from the mundane (making beds, emptying rubbish sacks) through a load of stuff we had already done before and then a few things we hadn't.  Like going out for a torchlit walk in the woods.  Armed with a dazzling array of torches, headtorches and high powered bike lights we went for a wander around Snelsmore in the dark, and without the lights it was seriously dark.

We found a couple of cool new swings to try:

The darkness certainly added a whole new element of excitement to them, especially when going really high out of the pool of light.

Sunday 24th

Christams Eve was finally here, so it was last day for the advent calendars and chocolates.  I wasn't disappointed with my very large and thick chocolate santa from my calendar which I had long been hoping for.

We did some last minute baking (most importantly, my meringues) and I had to help Ned wrap some presents as he was struggling with the whole thing.

In keeping with tradition, the grown ups sat in the Craven Arms:

While us kids played outside on the playground or on the football pitch.  There were a couple of lost ball incidents as usual which Ned remedied by dismantling the goal to use as a tree prodder to get them back.

Hopefully next year Joel will be big enough to come out with us lot for a bit:

During the present exchange I somehow got put in the boot of the car!

We wished everyone a merry christmas as we made our way off to our Christmas dstinations.

Next up, Pizza Express for a binge of dough balls and pizza:

Then home for a bit of last minute prep and putting the Santa sign out and a visit from Uncle Den.

(Note, no carrot/mince pie/drink left out this year for the first time).

Monday 25th

Christams Day, and as usual the disparity between what time we are getting up.  I can understand Ned not wanting to be up too early now he's a working man and all that.  We managed to find some common ground without too much trouble though and it was stocking time:

We had also sourced and wrapped a few presents ourselves this year, my gift tags were a particular highlight:

Main news, i've finally got my own longboard:

Ned fitted very nicely in the box:

But he struggled to keep it upright:

Silly games, check!

Onesie, check!

The weather was good enough to get out for a bit of a roll:

Then Nate, Joel, Hayley and Alan arrived for lunch.

It was lovley to see them and they were full of fun.

Lunch was just a roast but with rubbish turkey instead of chicken, at least there were sprouts though.

Ned got creative with the puddings:

We had a rather quiet evening....

Tuesday 26th

Which was to be the theme of this Christams really.  Mum was super poorly and didn't make it out of bed all day.

Ned took Dad on his paper round and then he retreated to his bedroom, leaving me to have a go with my new glue gun for a bit:

Before I too sloped off with my laptop.

Wednesday 27th

Another day of inactivity, despite the early morning snow.  By the time I had surfaced it had all but melted.  So nothing to report until the evening when we went to Untie Christines.

This years highlight game was the gymnast flip thingy, just look at the concentration:

It was fiendishly addictive:

But the real highlight was the present game, as gloriously random as ever:

I think it's fair to say the standard of prizes was on the whole higher this year, the standard of foil wrapping...not so much.

Thursday 28th

More nothing.

Oh, except ice skating for Dad and I, mum was still laid up and Ned couldn't be removed from his room.  We timed it badly, the next skating session was a bit of a wait so we perused Asda, managing to find myself some rather lovely big fluffy warm slippers for Rhos.

Skating was really good, if a bit busy.  I was really on it this time, everytime Dad looked round to see where I was I blew him away with a massive turn of speed!

Friday 29th

Nothing.

Room, you tube. That is all.

Saturday 30th

Guess what? Nothing.

Until the evening when Andy came round to look after us while Mum and Dad went to the theatre (mum's christmas present).

We had a cracking time, i showed him all my cool christmas stuff, we played with water balloons, we made pizza for tea and I stayed up really late.

Sunday 31st

And another day of.....nothing.  This is far easier to write when nothing happens......

So that was the last day of 2017, no parties this year, no staying up until midnight either.

Monday 1st

Welcome to 2018!

Our Rhos trip is even closer and I'm ramping up the excitement to previously unimaginable levels.

We finally booked up to see Paddington 2 today, one of our main objectives over the Christmas break.  Newbury only had one showing and that was full so it was a trip to the out of town cinema on Basingstoke instead, what a novelty!  It was a brilliant film and we all loved it (even Ned, but don't tell anyone).

We dipped into Morrisons afterwards to pick up something for tea (another non standard venue) and took in the symbolism of smashed chocolate snowmen in the reduced aisle.

We went home and watched the final of the Worlds Strongest Man.....excellent. 

Tuesday 2nd

So Dad's gone back to work leaving us lot at home still.

Mum still isn't feeling very clever and Ned, well he's in his room of course.

So it was nice to get a call from Auntie Christine to see if I wanted to go to the Panto at the Corn Exchange with her and Darcey and Auntie Trish (Poor old Laura was supposed to be going but she is ill too).

Mum and I spent the evening packing for Rhos....unpacking, re-packing and talking about packing and labelling my stuff.

Wednesday 3rd

Last day of the holidays......and it was actually dry and just about light enough for a bit of skateboarding:

Thursday 4th

First day back at school, I was really excited to go back so we could start talking about our Rhos trip!

Friday 5th

Last at school before...Rhos!  We are all so excited and can't wait to go!

Saturday 6th

So we spent the morning doing the final bits of packing for my trip.  With only one day to go it's finally almost very nearly here.

We went bowling in the afternoon which was great fun:

We then had a couple of games of pool too, with mixed success and a lot of laughs.

We stopped in at Waitrose on the way home to pick up some packed lunch specialities for tomorrows coach journey (chorizo and satay chicken).

We finally got round to having my reward for my recent good efforts at school so it was Domino's delivery tonight:

Then we watched some proper rubbish Saturday night TV, Catchphrase, Take me out and the Voice.

Sunday 7th

Well the big day was finally here, time to venture off to North Wales for a week!  We all met up in the school hall, it was buzzing with excitement.

We handed our party food in, handed our purses in and hung around excitedly until it was time to load the coach up.  I seemed to have one of the largest bags, but as Mum told me, looking as good as I do doesn't happen when you pack light!

The bags securely on board, next up it was us, so after a quick cuddle with Mum and Dad we took the stairs to find our seats.  I got about halfway down the coach and sat with Sasha.

After a short bit of sitting, head-counting and getting settled we moved off, waving frantically out of the window as we left the Crescent.  Heading for adventure and excitement and having to make our own beds and empty our own rubbish!
So that's me signed off for a week of radio silence!

Happy New year everyone.

Friday

Last football training sssion of the year.....it was FREEZING!

It was Rach's birthday, rather than get a babysitter we were allowed to go out for a curry.

Now Ned and I operate on a pretty narrow band of food tolerance so this was going to be a bit of a test.  Turns out the starters were an absoloute treat, sheek kebab, onion bhaji and chicken tikka were all totally delicious.  The curry itself wasn't quite as nice but I think we probably picked the wrong thing, the Naan bread was a triumph though.  So happy birthday and thanks for inviting us out we loved it.

Saturday

A slow start to proceedings today, but we did finally get round to putting uo some outside lights in our tree by the driveway.

Between myself, Mum and Dad we were making a good job of it on our slightly wobbly step ladder.  We were all glad when Ned came back from football training just in time to do the last and most dangerous placement...well he still had his bike helmet on so had more safety gear on than the rest of us.

Luca came by just as we were finishing off, he came in for a few games of Wii party with us which was great fun.

I decided to take Dad rollerskating in the evening.  We hadn't been for ages and it just so happened to be the Christmas party week too.  I won a few sweets some of the games before Lola and later on Libby turned up which was fun.

Sunday

We had Nate, Joel and Alan round for lunch which was great fun.. Nate loved the Nerf stuff as usual.  Joel was much happier with a. It of a snuggle instead which suited me fine:

There was a Lantern parade in town later in the afternoon and when the rain/snow let up enough we dicidd to take a punt and fo down for a look.  It was really good too, I was really jealous of the people who had made lanterns,some of them were briliant.  As well as the normal sort of pyramid shaped ones there were fish, squid, birds, dogs, pigs and even a pikachu.  I am doing one ne t year for sure.

Monday

Ned made gingerbread at school, much as I hate to praise him for anything, it was delicious.

Tuesday

It was Watching week at gymnastics, and in a rather radical turn of events my group wasn't doing floor work and we were in fact doing the vault.  I made a decent attemot at a handspring too on numerous occasions.

Wednesday

We had a Five a Side Football tournament at Trinity school afainst a load of other primary schools.  We didn't exactly set the football world alight but we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.  We actually got our act together and played well in our last match.

Thursday

Painted mum's nails tonight, in preparation for her work christmas party on friday night.  I selected a nice deep blue colour to go with her dress.  Two coats tonight to be covered with two coats of glitter clear coat tomorrow night.  Stage one looking good.

Friday

We had a mufti day today in aid of the school fete tomorrow.  I love a mufti day I do.

It was also school disco night, but with Mum and Dad going out for the night I had Alan to come and pick me up when it was finished.  We went over to their house.  Nate didn't recognise me with my glow on the dark moustache.  Joel has seemingly mastered sitting up all on his own too, how cool is that?  I got picked up very late.....

Saturday

A nice lay in after last nights late night, before heading out to the school christmas fete.

Mum was helping out on the book stall and I was down for helping in the games room.  There was a bit of a mix up with start times so I had a bit of a stint to endure.  Still, i had time to have a go at plenty of games as well as get a henna tattoo and have my hair Dutch plaited.

We broke out a few moves to Just Dance in the afternoon, was great fun as we hadn't done that in a while.

Sunday

Ned football again.....but at least the pitch was in clear view from where we parked.  It was actually good fun, we sat and ate our picnic and got to make as many silly comments as we liked without getting into trouble with the football Dad's.

Ned was very pleased as not only did they win well but he was awarded man of the match.  Quite a result for the bench warmer in chief.

I added the finishing touches to my Amazon River project:

Monday

We did some Map reading practice today, ahead of our Rhos trip.  I rather enjoyed it actually ans was able to pick out a lot of local landmarks and places I was familiar with.

We also had a visit to the Wash Common church for a Christmas themed visit.  It was pretty good actually and we even got to make (and eat) some mince pies!

Dentist check up today, glowing feedback for mine!  Ned still has to wait for all his milk teeth to fal out before he can have a brace and Dad is luxky to have any teeth at all at his age.

Friday

I was awarded my Orange badge for house points at school, i'd already got my red one a little while back.

Saturday

Shopping trip today, with Mum and Dad to amazingstoke.  

It didn't get off to the best of starts when we parked for the park and ride.  I declared that I felt sick just as we puuled into a space....no one took much notice.  I got out of the car and I almost immediately puked on the road.  That was a bit of surprise to everyone, despite my warning.  I felt better straight away and we still managed to get on the waiting park and ride bus in time.

The mission agenda, to get me some more stuff for Rhos and to get Mum a dress for her work christmas party.  Despite my best efforts to hijack the trip for far more exciting things we remained on track.  I got some lovely warm legging things though.  Mum on the other hand went wild and bought two dresses and a top....how did that happen?   We had a lovely day though, it was all very Christmassy and a Greggs for lunch too.

Sunday

So Ned didn't have football today, family day out then.  After a near miss when London was mentioned we went to the beach instead, a walk out to Hurst Castle.  It was on the end of a big old gravel spit out into the sea so we had a bit of a walk.

It was a steep slope down to the water, making chasing the waves in and out a rather perilous game:

There wer also loads of Portugese Men of War washed up:

Weird looking things they were too, and apparently they can still sting even when they are washed up and dead.

We carried on until we got to the castle itself, right on the end of the spit.  It was really cool with plenty of oppurtunities for climbing and exploring:

As well as a few photo oppurtunities:

The most exciting bit was where the path narrowed, so much that it was completely flooded when the waves surged in.  After careful consideration and sending Ned as our test pilot we decided it was game on and made a break for it.  We all got across safely, with only mum getting a slighty damp shoe.

We got back to the car just as it got dark, cold and wind battered. We were certainly glad that Dad had packed a flask of hot chocolate to help revive us.

Monday

More tests at school, we seem to be on a right missionat the moment.

We had a Football match after school, against Fir Tree.  Depsite us losing 3-0 we actually played quite score didn't do us justice really.  I really enjoyed it too, despite it being cold and pretty much dark by the time we finished.

Tuesday

Well we joined forcs with cross country club after school instead of our usual sportshall athletics training.  Im not much a runner as we all know but I did really well, even Mr Percy told Mum and Adad how good I was at it.

Despite these extra exertions I still made it to gymnastcs too.

Friday

I was presented with this today:

I gave football a mss after school to go and hang out with Luca instead after he assured me that Friday was the only afternoon he was about.  He was nowhere to be found!

Saturday

Sportshall competition today, I was proper excited about it all, no nerves at all.

We met up nice and early and got our numbers pinned on.  I dd the under and over race (which was a mixture of hurdles and a tunnel), I did very well and came a good second in my heat.  Next up was the chest push (a throwing event where you, well chest push a basketball as far as you can).  You dont get a finishing position as such but I was well up at the sharp end with the longest throwers on this one.

My final event was a two lap (a lap being two lengths of the sportshall) relay in a team of four that also went well with some nice crisp changovers.

We finished an overall 9th out of 24 teams, an improvement over last year too.  We were very pleased with ourselves.

I had a bit of a rest in the afternoon before packing my things for a sleepover at Sasha's.

We went rollerskating with Lola which as cool.

Then it was back to Sasha's, for all sorts of fun and games.  The highlight (for us anyway) was launching water bombs from the bathroom window......ahem

Sunday

Well I stayed at Sasha's dor lunch which meant that by the time I got home my planned shopping trip with Mum wasn't quite as long as we had pethaps hoped.  I tried a lot of stuff on but didn't buy anything.

We all reconvened in the evening for a meal out.  Lovely, and once we'd got over a little bit of bickwring we had a lovely time, a good laugh and a proper good feed. 

I rounded out the weekend by removing yet another tooth!

Monday

We had to stand up in assembly in recognition of our sportshall efforts which was nice.

I had a total homework mountain though which wasn't!

Tuesday

Athletics club is week, last sessionbefore the team is announced for the competition.  It's getting colder and darker outside so it's just as well really.

Wednesday

Ball club, this week was cancelled this week due to parents evening, bit of a shame.

Thursday

My parents evening tonight, got a lot of postive feedback from Mrs Rance so thats good.

I also volunteered as a helper on the door, meet and greet the parents, get them to fill in satisfaction surveys and deliver them to the right classrooms. It was fun and nice to have a bot of responsibility.

Friday

Well it's taken nearly 8 months but we've finally finished Mum's birthday jigsaw.

Saturday

Shopping this morning to get some items for my trip to Rhos in January.  I need to be convinced that it isn't a high fashion event and that warm stuff is going to be my priority......a tough gig but I think we found some common ground and got a lot of the basics sorted.  The hiligt so far is some rather smart skiing gloves.

Inthe evening we went to visit Abi and Faye.  We started off watching the film Grease which I really enjoyed.  Next up a bit of retro just dance action on the Wii:

We finished off playing the game Linkee with the adults which was great fun, thanks for a great night girls.

Sunday

Dropped Ned off at footbal and then went out for a walk across Newtown Common, it was lovely on a crisp, bright sunny day.  There were a few trees to clamber up:

A few leaf covered big holes to run into:

And some more trees to climb:

We watched the end of the football match and for once Ned's team won!

Monday

Had another crack at the SATS revision stuff tonight, actually begrudgingly enjoyed it, working through it with Mum and to a lesser exrent Dad.  I've got a mountain of homework at the moment.....not impressed really.