Holly's Summerhill Colouring Competition

Last week Holly completed a colouring competition for Summerhill Nursery where Auntie Lisa works. She took her time and coloured the tree characters really neatly and then Tina submitted the entry for her. From the moment the entry was submitted, Holly was excited about the prospect of winning and kept asking when her money would arrive and if the postman had been to deliver it or not.

Needless to say she was over the moon when it was confirmed she got 2nd place and won a prize of a £20 voucher card for Summerhill. She couldn't wait to get down there to collect her reward and loves the fact it is a card and not cash as she thinks she has a credit card now. It sounds like all the staff at Summerhill took a bit of a liking to her down there as well!!!

Holly's Miss Summer Hill Colouring in the red, white and blue.

And here is her "Leafy" character.

A very happy Holly collecting her gift voucher at Summerhill.

In other news Holly made these rather tasty sushi sweet treats in her Zoom Brownies last week.

Brandon's 12th Birthday (under Lockdown)

Today Brandon joined the Lockdown birthday club and I really feel for our little man. He seems happy enough and seems to have enjoyed his special day, but it just doesn't seem like a birthday. Thankfully he had plenty of "socially distanced" visitors with his Nanny, Auntie Nicky, Lea and Min plus Lisa and David all visiting him.

Normally we would have gone out for dinner to celebrate, but obviously under Lockdown this was a non starter. So we gave him the choice of any takeaway or click and collect and he chose a Nandos which was actually pretty good. Then for desert we enjoyed a really nice Harry Potter chocolate cake.

It is always difficult for Brandon to decide what he wants for his birthday as it is so close to Xmas. This year was by far the worst though and he really had no ideas what he wanted. So in the end he mostly wanted gaming PC upgrades which included fancy speakers, new keyboard, mouse, streaming microphone etc. He also got a Harry Potter Quill and phone cover plus one more secret present which is yet to arrive.

No party or go-karting for Brandon this year either. So instead we have told him that once the Lockdown is lifted then we will pay for him to have one of those Brands Hatch driving experiences that Joshua did recently.

Doesn't look like much of a present hail for Brandon, but there's a lot of money there.

Opening his presents in his dressing gown before another day of home schooling.

A very expensive gaming keyboard!

The green light up speakers and base box are pretty special and sound great.

A cheeky Nando's "click and collect" for Brandon's birthday dinner.

Brandon with hos Harry Potter birthday cake (and a smile).

I don't usually like these sort of cakes, but this tasted pretty good.

I managed to drag him out of his bedroom to briefly play his Fantastic Beasts game and for half an hour in the hot tub.

As with his Xmas Harry Potter game I am the current undefeated champ at this one.

And this is Brandon's home schooling office and gaming PC station with all his new upgrades.

Teenage Years - Oh The Joys!

So Joshua entered his teenage years late last year and Brandon isn't that far behind with his 12th birthday looming in under a week. For all intensive purposes we already have two teenage boys in the house as their habits and behaviours really aren't that different. With this comes lots of new challenges and traits for us to deal with as parents, such as:

1. They pretty much live in their bedrooms 24/7 and only surface for food, drink or money.
2. Stairs are for stomping down and making as much noise as you can to let everyone know you are coming for food, drink or money. Elephants have nothing on teenage boys.
3. They will quite happily sleep in until gone midday on weekends wasting half of their day and only getting about 4 hours daylight in winter!
4. If you want them to do anything you have to ask at least 3 or 4 times and be sure to only ask one thing at a time as their memories cannot hold two tasks at once.
5. Getting them to clean their teeth twice daily is a major challenge.
6. Asking them to have a shower is like asking them to stick a hot poker in their eyeballs.
7. Dirty washing just gets left on the bedroom floor or stuffed back in their draws.
8. Clean clothes often end up back in the washing basket as it is easier to put them in there than to put them away!
9. The bedroom becomes a sanctuary for used plates and cups and when they do surface for food and drink, never give it a thought that they could bring their dirty crockery down.
10. Why rinse a glass out or use one from the draining board when there are more in the cupboard?
11. Changing underwear daily is a major achievement, especially as they often sleep in their clothes!
12. Their bathroom in the loft is just disgusting and the worst room in the house to clean. I swear Coronovirus originated from their bathroom. I have yet to find a way of getting them to lift the toilet seat when peeing and their aim clearly isn't great.
13. Teenagers must have all the lights on even in broad daylight. It appears that lights cannot be turned off by a teenager for some reason (wait till they start paying electric bills).

Given we are in lockdown and live with each other 24/7, all of the above are driving me absolutely nuts!

Holly's Lockdown Bird House

Another weekend in lockdown and whilst me and Holly were chilling in the hot tub Saturday morning she had an idea to make a bird house for our garden this weekend. So using some scraps of old wood I cut up a house shape and nailed it all together. Holly used the drill to make the hole for the pole for the birds to perch on and then she sanded it all down to get the rough edges off.

Once it was built I dug  load of old paints out of the shed and left Holly to paint it. I think she has done an amazing job and the colours look so good. To finish it off today I cut a piece of astro turf for the desk and then fixed it to the garage wall out in the front garden. Now we just need to get some bird food.

Before making the bird house we sent for a walk around Langdon Hills and Holly found an innovative way to clean her wheels using a puddle.

Holly hard at work sanding down the bird house.

Not only did Holly sand the house but she drilled the perch rod hole as well.

With the build finished and chimney added I then left Holly to get painting.

Holly picked the colour scheme and I think it looks pretty good.

Purple roof and pink house nearly done.

Then for a yellow fence / edging.

And the finished painted bird house. Great job Holly.

Finishing touches today to add some fake grass and then fix to the garage wall.

Holly Starts Brownies Under Lockdown 3.0

Still not much excitement to write about on the blog as we endure lockdown 3.0. The only major development in the last two weeks is that Holly has moved up from Rainbows to Brownies. It is a shame it was under lockdown as she didn't get the normal Rainbows sending off, instead she had a virtual send off.

So far she has had two virtual Brownies sessions over zoom calls and seems to be really enjoying it and knows a few of the other girls there. The last two weeks have been very "craft" based which Holly loves. Last week they made a window mural and then this week she weaved a patterned fish. 

Next stop if to get her Brownies uniform in hope that one day they actually meet up in person and not on a computer screen all the time.

Holly on her Brownies zoom call.

Getting some help from Tina to weave her fish.

And the finished piece, very clever.

This was last weeks window mural which now sits in our man cave extension.

2000th Blog Post

Amazingly I started this blog about 14 years ago and today achieve a pretty incredible milestone of 2000 blog posts. I haven't blogged much in 2021 yet because I was conscious that the 2000th milestone was coming and wanted it to be something special. However with the Lockdown 3.0 due to new strain of Covid-19 (which is spreading faster than last years strain) has meant we have barely left the house since Xmas. Further more the schools are once again completely shut (unless you are a key worker) and therefore we have all 3 kids at home for home schooling.

The home schooling is hard for us and for the kids and is something that we will never truly understand as it is not something we ever went through. Tina tries to cover Holly's home schooling and I try and oversee the two boys whilst also doing by day job. This can be a real challenge as working from home means I probably spend 75% of the time on Teams / WEBEX calls meaning I am not always available for them. I really worry about the impact last year and this year is going to have on all of their development and education. I know the kids will hate me for saying this, but I kind of wish the government would simply insist they all have to stay on another year to catch up for lost education.

The world around us has changed so much in the 14 years that I have been writing this blog and to be honest if I was part of a young couple starting out now, I would seriously think twice about bringing a child in to this world. That being said I have absolutely no regrets about having 3 children and cannot imagine life without them. So despite how grim the world currently is, I thought it would be good to look back at where is all started for Joshua, Brandon and Holly and where they are now.

So here we are from day 1 of Joshua, Brandon and Holly to current day. What a ride it has been.

All 3 of them have changed so much and as they change it brings more and more challenges to us as parents. The two boys have definitely entered the "teenage" years and long gone are the 6am morning and crying out for a lay-in of a weekend. These days you re lucky if you see the two boys before lunchtime and then even when they do get up, they will only come downstairs for food and keep themselves locked away in their bedrooms most of the time.

Joshua is still as reckless as ever and doesn't always think things through, but despite that he is very mature and grown up for his age and is by far the most independent out of the 3 kids. Not to mention the fact that he has only just turned a teenager and is almost as tall as me (by year end I reckon I will be looking up at him). Still very unclear where he sees himself going for a career but it is early days, I think the latest was possibly a policeman.

Brandon has turned in to a very handsome young man but just lacks confidence in his own abilities. If ever there was a kid who has unlimited potential and could do what ever he wants in life, it is Brandon. He just needs to believe in himself and his abilities. I really have high hopes for Brandon if we can just steer him on the right track.

Then there is Holly, what can I say about my little Princess. She is growing so fast and it is shocking to see her turning in to a lady at such a young age. I might be biased, but she is such a pretty little girl who has a real sassiness about her. On one hand I feel sorry for any future boyfriends as they have their hands full with her, on the other hand I hope that day never comes when I have to deal with her having a boyfriend. Holly is by far the most creative of the 3 kids with her arts and crafts and arguably the most musical as well.

13 years old and almost as tall as me already!!! Josh is going to be a big lad.

Happy New Year 2021

Well 2020 is finally over. For the first time ever I think everyone was celebrating the end of what can only be deemed as a disastrous year more than they were celebrating the New Year. Obviously the Covid pandemic completely obliterated all plans for 2020 including our planned holiday to Bulgaria. We were in and out of lock downs with the kids being home schooled for the majority of the year and as if that wasn't bad enough I was made redundant in June from a job I had held for 32 years!!! Quite an experience for me having never been out of work since leaving school and lots of emotions and feelings to deal with which were all very new to me. But that which does not kill us only makes us stronger and I believe we will come out of 2020 stronger and better.

There is light at the end of the the tunnel now with two approved vaccines for Covid-19. So for us 5 King's we definitely stayed up until midnight to wave goodbye to 2020 and welcome 2021 which can only get better. Fingers crossed we will have our vaccinations somewhere around spring to summer and hopefully we can get back to some sort of normality in 2021 (what ever that new normal might be). For me personally I have one main objective for 2021 and that is to try and turn my current Ford contract job in to a permanent position. Whilst I am extremely grateful to have got the contract job, I do feel very vulnerable and would like to secure a permanent position for added security.

Anyway we all stayed up on New Years Eve including Holly. We enjoyed a nice dinner using the last of my Jamie Oliver turkey and leek pie followed by some of Tina's really nice, boozy, Christmas pudding cheesecake. We then spent the evening playing some family games including "Beat the Parents" and Brandon's new Harry Potter game he got for Xmas (which is really good - because I won twice!). We cooked up some late night snacks and settled down for a movie before switching over to the London light show and a bit of Alicia Keys to welcome in the new ear.

Earlier on New Years Eve, Holly completed her Unicorn jigsaw puzzle we got her for Xmas.

New Years Eve saw us finish off the last of this years Jamie Oliver turkey and leek pie (rather aptly decorated).

Tina's delicious boozy Christmas Pudding cheesecake.

We had a lovely sort of second Xmas dinner with crackers and wine.

Family game time on New Years Eve playing Brandon's new Harry Potter / Fantastic Beasts game.

It's rare to have all 5 of us down stairs in this day and age, let alone playing a board game!

And then all stayed up to wave good bye to the disastrous year that was 2020.