Back to rugby on tuesday night after school this week. Every week it goes on my boots get better and better value.
And every week it goes on I don't have to listen to Ned's whingeing about having to hang around waiting for one of my activities.
We had to make our own chocolate bar at school on Wednesday, I went prepared with a bottle of peppermint esscence.  I should have been a little more generous with it though, there was only the faintest hint of mint in the finished product.  Not that any one at home got to try any of course as the pieces i'd pledged to bring home for Mum, Dad and Ellis had mysteriously failed to materialise......
We had to have school dinners on Wednesday to ease the run around after school to get me back from ballet,  mum from work and then Ned to team Kennet.
I was not happy about this at all, it was even pizza day! Mum pointed out that I should be grateful as there are plenty of children in the world who wouldn't be getting a meal at all at lunchtime!
I was quite happy with the arrangement, vegetable bolognese very agreeable indeed.
It worked out okay in the end I suppose, we all got to where we were supposed to be with time for a swift sandwich and a pepperami as well.  We've merged the wednesday and friday night sessions at Team Kennet now, there was loads there! It was cool to see Maxim as well as Alexandria's older brother.
We had our sponsored bounce on Thursday, I think I managed around 62, I could have done more if i'd taken Ned's advice on board and kept my bounces low and quick, but I was enjoying my bounces far too much for that.
When I got home from school I made a series of self shot videos, starting of with me dancing to gangnam style and finishing with a few episodes of my very own TV show.
Then after tea it was time for my parents evening! I was sure I had nothing to worry about.....
I was.  Bit wide of the mark it would seem and it didn't perhaps go quite as well as i'd hoped.  They got to see my customised work book (staples removed and triangles snipped out around the edges of most of the pages).  They also got told about my general way of working which is to do lagely nothing throughout the lesson and then produce a beautifully written piece in a few minutes before i'm let out for break.  Oh dear.
I forgot to mention my parents evening last week didn't I?  Well i'll fill you in.....i'm doing really well!  I've already met my agreed targets for the year (which was to meet the standards for my age) and now i'm working beyond them!
Spurred on by being found out at parents evening, I managed to aquire 3 reward shells at school on Friday.
We had a visit from the sports leaders for golden time on Friday (kids from big school).  They did basketball with us, I really loved it and played really well.
And then it waas time for me to return to swimming lessons.  Green hat, level 4!  Eva was there too, how brilliant!  We wven got my favourite teracher too.
We went round auntie christines in the evening, in aid of her birthday I think?
Whatever the excuse it was a lovely get together.
We had a bit of a lazy morning on saturday.
Before going to pizza hut for lunch as a reward for my excellent parents evening. We even got to sit at one of the round tables as well.
We came home, had a bit more lazy time and the went to Kimi and Marney for a bit in the evening.
We had Anne round for lunch on sunday as a belated birthday gathering.
Alan and Hayley came too, Alan was forced to play Skylanders of course.
We rounded the weekend out with a few games of 7's.
I made quite a splash in assembly today having my feet washed by Mr Armstrong as part of the jesus story, mum was very pleased that she'd given my toe nails a trim last night!
Cross country training went well after school as well, I even took On Ella's twenty press up forfeit as well.
It was a good job it finished a bit earlier than normal too, as it meant that both Ned and Dad got to join in with our end of term dance routine (involving a big fish, a little fish and a cardboard box).

I got a day away from school on Tuesday, some of us were picked for 'Geek Jam' at Park House school.  It was a day of computer related stuff.  We got to do all sorts of cool stuff including making our own game.  There were loads of other schools there too and I knew quite a few other kids from my various out of school activities which was nice.  Mum walked us up to Park House in the morning, Hugo came along with us too so the walk up there was certainly fun.
Now Ned has no rugby practice on Tuesdays he had to come with me to Gymnastics for the full duration.  He was a very unhappy boy about that.
Yeah, I seem to spend an increasing amount of time sat about in cars waiting for Ellis these days.  My request to got to Sainsbury's and look for Skylanders while Ellis was doing her gymnastics thing fell on deaf ears, instead we went to the post office, then Halfords and then the Specialized bike shop.  The bike shop was pretty cool though I have to admit.  Especially the Carbon Demo Troy Lee frame they had hanging up.
I had a rare non-early night as I managed to perform my morning duties in a timely fashion so that was quite a novelty.
We made my cupcakes for the school comic relief competition on Thursday.  They went very well it has to be said....
I made Ned sit in the car again on Wednesday for my ballet lesson, which I really love at the moment!
And while we sat in the car reading it was really quite nice and sunny....but it was also snowing at the same time!  How does that work?
Once tea was done and dusted it was time to ice and decorate my cakes.  I decided that I wanted to do a really nice low level stipple effect icing in bright red.  I was then going to add a silly face and a joke on a flag.  Sounded perfect, what could go wrong?
Too much red food colouring.
Yes, although the colour was fantastic, it tasted truly awful!
But they did look really good and the joke flags were funny.
So we decided we'd enter them anyway and just warn everyone not to eat them.

I was pretty pleased on Thursday then to get second place for my cakes.  In fact, everyone else seemed to think they tasted okay.
I rode Ned's race BMX to go and pick him up from after school dancing.  I loved it and made sure I told everyone who would listen that it was my borthers BMX and I was going to go racing on it!
We wore red to school on Friday for red nose day and in the afternoon we had an open afternoon to go through our learning logs with any parents who fancied coming in for a look.  We also had cakes that we made at school on sale, this was a pretty decent bribe as it turned out as there were loads of grown ups in our classroom.  Best of all we got to leave a whole ten minutes early.  
Which was a bit of a result as we had to get packed up and head off to Cornwall as soon as Mum was finished working.
We picked Andy up and hit the road.
With a picnic in the car and a lot of chatting to do.
This time we were staying with John and Sarah, and Tiger, their new cat.  
I was so excited.
We got there at about 9, so even though it was sort of past our bedtime we still managed to get stuck in to a full on Skylanders session, comparing our characters and getting some valuable tips from John, with his Yoda like wisdom on the subject.
Sarah wasted no time in getting me aquainted with Tiger, he was sooooo cute.  I got to sleep in Sarahs room with her too, this was brilliant, as not only did she have a lovely little camp bed for me and a brilliant cieling covered in glow in the dark stars that made it feel like you were outside but she also likes a chat!  Brilliant, she reckons the last time she looked at her clock was 1:20 am......
On saturday we played some more Skylanders and some Blur on the Xbox.
And I got to give tiger his breakfast and play some football with him.
Then we went to the races, Point to Point at Wadebridge showground:

I loved it of course, well, it was horses after all.  We stood in the middle of the track to watch the races themselves and you could see the whole track.  The ground was really soft and the hills in the course were really steep:

We had £5 each for betting purposes, I won on the second race and decided to stop while I was winning and kept my winnings and what was left of my original £5.
I also had a winner but kept on betting on all the races.
The weather was pretty wet, Mum took me back to the car before the last race.
I stuck it out until the bitter (cold) end.
We went back to warm up, have some tea and then get stuck in to some Just Dance action on the Wii and play some cards.
Interspersed with Tiger loving,
and Skylanders/Blur.
We had a bit of a lie in on Sunday morning.
Before heading over to the caravan so Andy could do a couple of odd jobs before the season starts.
And of course, because it was Cornwall, and indeed Treyarnon Bay, the sunshine came out:

It was so good to be back and be outside.  The site was actually quite busy with people getting things ready, the buzz of lawnmowers meant it even sounded like summer.

Andy and Mark ended up with a bit of a jaunt to Homebase to get some bits they needed, after a bit of a conflab it was decided that the best course of action for the rest of us would be to head off to the pub for lunch.
How cool, we got to get the seats in  the boot out and drive to the Harlyn Inn with a full complement of seven of us in the car!
They met us there and we had a bit of lunch and a lot of pudding before heading back to the caravan to finish off the jobs and then heading down to the beach.
Yes, we had to take Andy for his swim of course.
I decided to join him:

Yeah, I suppose it was a little bit cold, but I love it!
I decided to remain clothed:

I had to climb some rocks of course:

And there was also the matter of a game of Danish Longball:

It was pretty much like a full on holiday compressed into one day.
We headed back to John and Sarah's house to gather up our things and set off for home.
Andy called his Mum as we left, she said it had been chucking it down with snow all day in Newbury!
We couldn't believe it until we arrived home and could see it still lying about on the ground, how weird!
So we must say a massive thanks to John and Sarah for showing us such a good time (and Mark and Amy too).
Yes, thanks everyone, and you as well Tiger!
We were pretty tired specimens on Monday it has to be said.
Yep, we were indeed.
Not as much as Dad though who managed to sleep through bathtime rather convieniently.
We did get involved in some energetic stuff during the day though, we did a rather cool Bollywood inspired dance routine after school.
And I did cross country, putting in another strong performance!

My tooth is finally out! It certainly didn't put up much of a fight as it was barely attached.  I used a smart little official tooth fairy envelope that Ned got from the dentist years ago to keep it safe.
I got to wear a proper leotard to gymnastics on Tuesday, I was proper pleased about that.
While this was going on I had my last rugby practice before the tournament.  I also got to christen my new boots in the mud for real.  I even managed to do up the laces almost unaided.
So Wednesday was the day of the tournament at the rugby club.  We played 3 games in our pool and won them all, but got knocked put in the quarter final.  Not bad for a new team, we were all very pleased with ourselves anyway.  Well, we'd had to have lunch early and then got the whole afternoon off.
Sadly by the time Dad had picked me up from school and we got up the rugby club they'd finished their matches and were just having a muddy bundle on the field instead.
It wasn't just a bundle Ellis, we did use a rugby ball to kick it off.
We saw Max on our way home, he was walking home from school.
His bags looked so heavy we had to give him a lift home.
Turned to be a good idea, we stopped to have a bit of a play on their trampoline and have a bit of a catch up.
I'm not looking forward to big school if I have to lug a bag like that about though.
Friday then, seemed to come around quick this week.
I got to go up to the infants in golden time, i really enjoyed that.
When we got home we got busy with the art and craft supplies making mothers day cards (even though i'd already made one at school along with some rather spectacular flowers made from straws and tissue paper).
I had my last Friday night team Kennet session on a Friday night as we're merging with the Wednesday night group.  I had a very proud moment when we got asked who had entered the cross country race last week and I was the only one who could put up their hand!
I got packed off to bed early for another day of not getting dressed for school.  I'm genuinely not bothered about this as a punishment though.
I then finally got to play The Ticket to Ride grown ups board game with mum and dad.  I'm really into board games at the moment so I was loving this.  I loved it even more when I won the game, not bad on my first attempt.
We went to he Oasis on saturday morning.
We did, I didn't even whinge about going either.
The wave machine had been fixed.....
.....really fixed as well.  It was really pumping the waves out.
I made friends with a boy called Max, we had a great time going on the slides together and having a competition   to see who could pull off the silliest jumps into the pool.
I was a bit under par, so I rather uncharacteristically got out earlier than Ned.
I stayed in for ages until my friend had to go home.
We had a quiet afternoon before it was time to go to the school quiz night with Andy, Ben, Rach, Kimi and Marney.
It was a good night out actually.
I loved it, I got to contribute a few answers to the quiz and almost started a riot when I helped myself to a history text book from the nearby library to help with some of the trickier questions.  I hasten to add I didn't get any answers from it, it was only supposed to be a laugh.
We came third, which was pretty good I reckon.
We went home and had a play even though it was rather late....
Hence our lie in on Sunday morning.
We even forgot that it was mothers day, good job dad reminded us.
Of course we didn't really forget at all, it just slipped our minds for a bit.
We gave mum her presents which she seemed to like.
We finally got ready to leave the house for a late lunch at Costas in town, we know how to give her a treat.
We visited a few shops and then came home again to do some baking with Mum.
We made maltesers cup cakes, and despite a few frayed tempers we made a good job of them.
Dad reckons they are among his favourite cakes of all time.
I thought they were far too sweet.

I also got rather interested in watching England play Italy at rugby as well.....
How cold was it on Monday?
Too cold.  Much too cold.  But not too cold to put me off cross country after school.  
As usual I came home from dancing in my shorts, Ned's mate Ella thinks i'm hard as nails!

We had an extra day tagged on the end of half term last monday.
What better way to spend it than to go to Autnie Christines for Darcey, baking and quality sofa time.
In a seriously shocking move I actually took my homework with me and did quite a lot of research for my Lion project as well as a full set of written notes to make things easier for me.
Back to school on Tuesday, but we didn't mind really, it was nice to see all our friends again after all.
Yeah, it was a pretty good day actually.  I wasn't allowed to wear my new trainers for rugby practice after school.  It didn't really impede my efforts though, this week we worked on dummy passes and I got complimented on my ability to find space on the field during play.
Gymnastics was really good again this week.  What was even better was seeing loads of my new gymnastics club friends in Sainsbury's after we'd finished, I thought that was really cool.
When we got home we were sort of pleased to find that we now had a full collection of working doors that were actually attached to their frames.
Yeah, thanks Chrissy, hopefully I won't try to close anymore doors that are only propped up against the wall, narrowly missing my head).
It's mad any chase around the house games a lot slower now though.
Dad challenged me to a few games of Skylanders in battle mode....I thrashed him 7-2.  He's rubbish.
Wednesday then, my second wobbly tooth was now seriously wobbly.  It's a miracle it's stayed in with all the fiddling I did at school.
I got picked to go to a special one off day of ICT (computer stuff) at Park House school in a week or so's time.  I'm so happy about it, not only do we get loads of time off from school we get to do computer stuff all day!.
And at ballet I must have been really giving it some as i've managed to dance a hole right through the bottom of my slipper!
I found out on Thursday that i've been picked for the rugby team.  We have a tournament to play in up at Newbury Rugby club, thats even more time off school, how cool.  It was swimming again, which went well and dancing after school that Ellis and Dad missed due to us finishing a bit earlier than usual...or them two being a bit later than usual.
I've been doing loads of junk modelling at school.  Todays effort was a rather splendid traffic light which I bought home to finish off and put in my bedroom as a secret storage place.
In light of the upcoming rugby tournament Dad and I went to the sports shop at the retail park to get me some football boots, with studs and everything.  I got some well cool ones, not the £100 versions I liked the look of though.....now all I have to do is learn to tie the laces unaided.....
And while Ned was shopping I was packed off to bed straight after tea as punishment for not getting dressed for school in the morning despite endless requests from Mum to do so.  I wasn't bothered, I was pretty tired anyway.
I got my Lion project marked on Friday, another house point for the cause.  I was really pleased though as this is pretty much the first piece of work i've done under my own steam with minimal help or guidance.
We had our class assembly in the morning and seeing as Mum or Dad couldn't be bothered to come it was lovely to see Auntie Christine there.  She loved it by all accounts, even if I thought my bit was a bit boring.  I did however thoroughly enjoy having her come back and visit my classroom afterwards where I got to show her my sketch book (that i'm most proud of) and  eat cake and biscuits!
I did cross country in golden time in the afternoon which was cool.
My wobbly tooth still hadn't come out.
Team Kennet in the evening.  They mentioned there was the last cross country race of the season on Sunday morning and that they'd like as many people as possible to enter....that sent the cogs whirring.
Within a few minutes of him coming home though we were squabbling like mad.
Which resulted in an instant trip to bed for both of us.  Rubbish.
We had a trip to Monkey World on Saturday.
We did, and Auntie Trish came along too.
Which we were very excited about.  Even before we knew she had a load of sweets on her bag for the journey.
We were on a mission to try and get her a monkey boyfriend too, which provided a lot of laughs throughout the day.

There's always one lot that always seem to put on a great show at Monkey World, this time it was the gibbons:

They were brilliant, climbing right to the top and swinging on the thinnest of branches.
And fighting with each other and falling off.
When we got home we had a slouch about and laughed at Dad laughing at You've been framed and then Ant & Dec's Saturday night Take Away before bed....perfect!
I decided to go through with the cross country race on Sunday, so we got in the car and headed to Harwell.
I rather fancied staying in bed really.

I found the Team Kennet tent, got myself signed in, stuck my number on my vest and went and did my warm up with my team mates.  Maxim from school was there too so it was nice to have an even more familiar face to give me some advice on what i'd let myself in for.  The race itself was 1300 metres long, which according to Maxim was about the same as 5 or 6 times around our school field. I was pretty happy about that and couldn't wait to get stuck in.

The starter fired his pistol and we were off!
I hadn't considered the use of a starting pistol, I didn't like it much.
I was really pleased not to get caught up with a few fallers at the start and also managed to steer clear of a few potholes that caught some of the others out.  I really enjoyed the race, it was over so quickly though.  I made sure I had enough left in the tank for a bit of a sprint finish:

It's fair to say I finished nearer the back than the front but I wasn't bothered at all as I hadn't come last which is what concerned me most before I started.  It was also an under 11's category so they had a good few years on me anyway.
He did very well, I loved cheering him on but I wanted to go home.....for some sofa time.
Well you didn't have to wait long Ellis, we were home again just after 11.  Very convenient this cross country racing you know!  Sadly it was the last one of the season so it'll be November before it starts again.  Well, except the schools competition next month that is.....
We really enjoyed the rest of our day doing homework and watching telly.
But best of all was a game of Catan after tea, I love that game.  Mum won, but I beat Dad by miles.
We both got dressed for school really nicely on Monday so no early night for me.
We had to go and do our class assembly again for the old people at the Argyles home.  I was pretty pleased as my part was much expanded with more facts than the version we did at school.
I took my cuddly monkey from Monkey World into school, and miraculously bought him home again unharmed.  He's lovely and i'm really enjoying showing him around.  He particularly enjoyed street dance after school I think.
And I enjoyed cross country as well after school.  I had a lot more confidence following my race on Sunday.  I think the team is going to be picked soon, there's 13 boys and only 12 places available...
I can also now claim to be able to actually tie shoe laces properly unaided.  This has been bought about entirely because of my new football boots.

It's half term week.
The rubbishest of all the school holidays really, too cold, too wet and too dark and lacking in the excitement of the Christmas break too.
So it's good job we can still have a great week off at this time of year.
We spent Monday with Auntie Christine and Darcey which was lovely.
When we got home we'd had a new carpet fitted...apparently  we have to be really carfeul with our drinks and food now....I wonder who will 'christen' the carpet first?
Anyway, it's so 'luxurious' that the doors won't fit any more and need to be skimmed off. 
In the meantime we have thoroughly enjoyed having no doors to impede our inter-room progress.
Especially as this has coincided with us removing one of the sofas, all bar it's cushions which we've really enjoyed arranging as various obstacles.
Tuesday was Dragon club.
We scootered there in the morning with Mum.
We had a great day, there were some of our old friends there and I spent the day playing X-Box with Marcus as well as a game of football out on the field.
I made some lovely jewellery, played on the adventure playground and loved playing just dance.  It's better on the X Box as you don't even need to wave the controller about, it just recognises your body movements.  This suited my style a lot better.
Even though it was school holidays Ellis still had gymnastics club.  It wasn't a total disaster for me though as we sneaked off to Sainsbury's and I bought another Skylander with some of my Christmas money (thanks Laura).
I had a great time at gymnastics, no name calling and the parents were allowed into the gym to watch the last 15 minutes.  This gave me a great opportunity to enjoy a sneaky cuddle with Dad and Ned.  This weeks highlight had to be learning to do a forward roll on a balance beam...albeit a special low one, with a little help.
Wednesday saw a return to Auntie Christines.
Indeed it did, we went to Darceys nursery for the morning.  We did plenty of drawing and making and best of all cornflour and water (that Auntie Christine had never seen before).
This was followed by a surprise trip to Pizza Hut, brilliant!
I lost the spaghetti eating contest to Darcey by quite a margin.
Team Kennet was moved to Wednesday night for the holiday week and instead of having all the events going on we had team relay races, with a variety of obstacles thrown in for good measure.  It was done like a proper competition with all the team scores noted down.  Our team did really well and finished in second place overall on the night.
Mum was off Thursday, so it was a lounge around kind of morning.
That was until the new sofa's and telly table were delivered,  I know, amazing scenes eh?
And another restriction on food and drink no doubt....
I was exceptionally excited about the new sofas for some reason and made sure I was first to get a sit on them.
We had a trip to the park for a bit until Dad got home from work.
And then we went to the Cinema to see Wreck It Ralph.
We loved it of course, we really love the cinema.
By the time we got out it was way past tea time so we had to make do with a McDonalds...shame!
We spent the last day of the week at Dragon Club again.  There was only 5 of us there, so it was pretty quiet.
Suited me fine, more X-Box time.
And in the afternoon we made the nicest rice crispy cakes ever.
Which had to be very delicately packed in Dads rucksack as he came to get us on his bike straight from work.
Yes, we decided we wanted to scooter all the way home as well.
Dad was very sceptical but we made it easily.  
It was really rather pleasant actually.
And as a special treat when we got home we had hot chocolate, squirty cream and marshmallows to accompany our rice crispy cakes, which survived the journey home intact.
In the evening we got to pester Andy, Owen and Alan....yay.
But we were packed off to bed pretty sharpish...boo.
We had a trip to ruddy Ikea again on Saturday.
But it was a good trip for three reasons, firstly we got some proper storage units for the conservatory to help tidy up our toys (meaning my room can be decorated), secondly we got some curtains to match my new duvet and thirdly we didn't eat any of their meatballs.
And there was also the face painter in the children's area:

We also got to go to Toys R Us so I could spend some vouchers I had still left from Christmas (spent very wisely on a Barbie dog playground).
We had an easy afternoon before Auntie Trish came round to babysit on Saturday night.
We hadn't seen her for what seemed like ages so we were well excited about her coming over.
We watched some cool stuff on telly and then dropped off.
Sunday then, weird scenes at home.....tidying up.  
Not a common activity in our house, but once the racking was up (no detectable bad language from Dad either) we were quite keen to make use of it.
We sorted loads of things out that we have grown out of to take to the charity shop as well.  We really got into it actually.
But fortunately normality kicked in again later in the afternoon and we made a flying visit to the retail park for a few items of clothing for us kids.
And a new pair of trainers for me..again. I can't help it if I keep wearing them out with all my sporting activities.
We rounded off the weekend playing Just Dance 4, there are some really good songs on it.
But sadly, Dad can still beat us all....

Had a great day at school on Tuesday, what with it being pancake day and all we actually got to make pancakes.  I had them with lemon and sugar on and surprisingly they were really lovely.  I usually treat thin traditional style pancakes as a vessel for carrying ice cream and chocolate sauce in massive quantities.

Rugby club after school was once again a whole lot better. We made good progress and really enjoyed playing a proper game for the first time amongst ourselves.

My second week at gymnastics and I really enjoyed it again.  All except for a small incident when one of the other girls decided to be really quite nasty to me for no apparent reason.  Her best insult was 'poo poo head'

Well, she'll need to try harder than that to put me off, ha!

When we got home I gave Dad the pancake recipe we used at school (done up as a maths problem, Dad had to check my sums with a calculator, he needn't have bothered of course, they were all correct) and we made some pancakes.

I didn't like them.

Mum only had a couple, but Dad and I kept on making them and making them and making them.  We flipped them, we experimented to see how thin we could get them, how quick we could cook them but the best thing was that I managed to do one all on my own from start to finish.  It was also probably the best one we did as well, all golden and lovely looking.

No one called me a poo poo head at ballet on Wednesday which was nice.

I might have done, under my breath while we had to sit in the car and read.....grumble grumble grumble.  It must be said, I have lost a large chunk of my reading enthusiasm I had earlier in the school year.  But having said that, i'm doing a lot more of it on a regular basis during everyday life so I reckon it evens out nicely.

Thursdays are great, I mean it's almost Friday and I get a free run of the TV after school while Ned is at dancing class.

I on the other hand had a rubbish Thursday, when I managed to get myself a red card issued to me for a bit of rough and tumble.  Oh dear, Dad got told all about when he came to pick me up.  I was really down about it, and felt that i'd really let myself down.  It took quite a while before I cheered up.

One thing we do both like on Thursday though is hot school dinners.

The pizza's are lovely!

And the only thing better than a school dinner pizza?  Ciabatta bacon rolls and potato waffles for tea on a Friday night.

Yes indeed, our appetite for potato waffles mystifies Mum but remains as strong as ever.

We had a visit from Laura and Darcey after school as well, was a lovely surprise.

Even if I did get a bit worried that Darcey was going to trash all of my stuff!

Then it was off to team Kennet, we got there a bit early and I had a great time by joining in with a game of basketball with some older boys.  The athletics was good too of course.  I put in a few strong performances and impressed Dad with my speed and agility in the last relay race of the evening.  When we came out it was  dark, but a lovely starry night.  We decided that it should hurry up and be camping season.

The weekend then, and for what must be the first time since July last year it wasn't raining!

Amazing scenes.  It's always a bit of a double edged sword though, because a weekend morning is a marvelous thing to spend in your PJ's watching a little television. 

It really was too nice a day to squander though so we headed out.

After a bit of slouch and a leisurely breakfast though.

Our destination the Moors Valley country park.  Dad had planned the whole thing with meticulous precision even going so far as getting a postcode for a Marks and Spencer's nearby so we could have a luxury picnic for lunch.

He was however mortified to find out that the postcode he had punched into the sat-nav was merely a Marks and Spencer's 'Simply Food' shop attached to a Petrol station on a stretch of crappy dual carriageway.

I don't know what he was so worried about, they had the usual individual fingers of strong cheddar and lovely grapes for me.

And I had the added bonus of being able to indulge myself in the dubious delights of petrol station warm sausage rolls from a fresh bakery counter (which were not as nice as the ones from Gary's shop in Cornwall by the way).

Anyway, the country park turned out to be rather brilliant, even if Mum did have a small issue with the extortionate  price of car parking.

The main draw for us initially was of course the miniature steam railway:

We loved it, even though we don't look like it in this picture.  So Dad took another one:

Which was a little more convincing.

The train didn't got that far, along the side of the lake and past the picnic area.

But there were plenty of onlookers flanking the line, all keen to be waved at!

And a couple of decent tunnels to go through!

The carriages also made a really brilliant place to leave a bag of rubbish, or so Dad seemed to think anyway.

He still claims it was unintentional......

As a rather splendid side order to this railway lark was a really rather brilliant playground.

And a woodland walk.

Yeah, a woodland walk sounds pretty standard doesn't it?  But this one had a series of one off play structure in a clearing every 5 to 10 minutes walk.

There were about ten of them in all I think and they were really brilliant.  We especially liked the wooden snake tunnels where you could climb into the snakes mouth and go all the way down to the furthest exit near his tail.

Which we obviously decided was his bum hole.

There was also a Go-Ape course in the tree tops.....this looks very promising as a birthday activity for me and a few friends.....i'm going to start applying the pressure to get this one sorted out I think.

We came home, watched You've been framed for a bit and then headed off out again to Kimi and Marney's place.

Abi and Faye were there too and we had a lovely night.

Yes, the catering that was laid on was top notch and Kimi seemed quite happy to watch me play computer games for ages and ages and ages.  Perfect.

We were all very well behaved, unlike the grown ups who sat around, feeding their faces and drinking booze.

It was of course....a very late night!

Which was fine as the only thing we had on the agenda was Ali's party at the gymnastics club that Ellis goes to.  Ali's been going for years and he's really pretty good at all that stuff.  The party was great fun and we got to loads of larking about.  The icing on the cake was that we got have McDonalds for the meal as well.

I had a leisurely picnic egg themed lunch with Mum and Dad before heading out to play in the garden in the sunshine.  That makes two whole days without rain, amazing.

After coming home from the party Ellis and I made an amazing army base out of sofa cushions with Nerf gun implacements all along the front.

It really was quite the fortress...but sadly no one had anywhere to sit.

Yeah, bit of a flaw in the plan that one.  It may have been why we were forced to go out for a ruddy walk I reckon!

So then, my first week at gymnastics club......I think I could claim that it went rather well:

It just so happened to be an assesment week, nothing like going in at the deep end eh?  I managed to get myself a level 8 proficency award on my first session.  I was really pleased about that it has to be said.  the coach came out afterwards and told Dad on two occasions that i'd done really well and we should keep a watch on my prgogress.  Anyway, the gym itself is really cool and there were even a coupel of girls from school that go (in year 2 though).
While all this was going on, it was rugby club again.  The standard of behaviour was much better this week and I enjoyed it all the more.  I think this may have had something to do with Mrs Douglas watching over us as well as our rugby coach.
Once rugby was done I had to rush to finish my school project on the journey of chocolate from bean to bar.  Even though i'd had almost two weeks to do it I like to make sure it's a fraught and panic riddled event.  It paid off though, I got 3 house points for it!
My projects are a lot more easy to complete so I have to make up my own...this week, glittery girl:

I though she looked lovely:

And once i'd finished so did the table cloth, and indeed, myself with my glittery chops:

Uncle Den came with Dad to pick me up from school on Thursday.  It was lovely to see him and I got him all to my self while Ned was still at school dancing away.
We had a great day at school on thursday, we did a bit of maths in the morning, then it was off to to the swimming pool and then in the afternoon we had a class disco as a reward for prolomged good bahviour.  The disco was good but would have been a lot better if anyone had bothered to do the catering sid eof things.  As usual, there was a talent show (popularity contest), and although Maxim and myself had by far the best act, we of course only came second.
This good run at school continued into Friday with cross country for golden time and some chocolate cake making!
Saturday, we had nothing to do really which was odd for us.
I did my Moshi Monsters 3D ball puzzle that I had for christmas.  It went okay, until I tried to titivate it one step too far and it kind of exploded all over the floor.  There followed floods of tears and general despondancy.
Mum and Dad helped put it back together again, before Ellis decided that an ideal form of retaliation to a minor disagreement between us was to give it a good old whack.
Yeah, well, there you go. 
I think as a punishment to both of us Mum and Dad made us go shopping to Kingston.
It all started off really well actually with lunch in a cool american diner place.
The milkshakes were awesome, Mums coke float was a bit weird though, I imagine it's an aquired taste.
It all went downhill after that though, with outburst of stropping and what have you.
It didn't go well.
We all came home empty handed!
Still, at least we got to play Rock Band with Owen on Saturday night.  I loved it, I had a bit of a sing to Beetlebum and Don't stop believeing as well as sharing drumming duties with Mum.
We popped round to see Sue on Sunday, she's had a bit of an operation recently apparently.  Not that you'd really know it to look at her.
Get well soon Sue.
After that it was Hugo's party, a disco at the school no less!  It was brilliant, well except for a bit of a fight, not that I was involved in it. 
When he got home we cracked the Cluedo out.
And I won!!!!!
Then it was monday of course.
So dancing for me.
And more muddy cross country for me.
After tea the Labyrinth game came out.
I won that too!