Holly's Brownie Weekend Camp

Tonight we parted ways with Holly for the weekend as she has gone away with her Brownies Club. I think this is the first time she has really stayed away from home without us and when she got in from school she was definitely nervous and apprehensive about going.

The Camp is at the Southend Scout Camp and once we drove Holly there she soon overcome all her fears and was pretty excited when she saw where she was staying, the bunk beds and some of the activities planned. Before long she was running around with some of her friends leaving us to wave goodbye and send her off until Sunday.

I hope she has an absolute blast of a weekend and I can't wait to hear about it on Sunday.

A nervous Holly arrives at the Scout Camp for her weekend away.

She soon settled in to her dorm and seemed happy with her bunk bed.

The girls seemed to enjoy climbing all over the bunk bed ladders, god help the team leaders tonight with 6 of them in one room!

Holly exploring the Scout Camp grounds with her accommodation for the weekend in the background.

Hashtag United First Team Mascot

Today Brandon's U13 football team has the pleasure of being the Mascots for the Hashtag United Seniors team who were playing over at Bowers and Pitsea. The lads got to have 30 mins on the pitch ahead of the game and then got to walk out with the first team and fist bump them all before the match started.

The match itself was very high quality football and despite Hashtag taking a 2-0 lead, the game ended if a 3-3 draw. During the match there was some guy on the sidelines who was reeling off football chant after football chant at the top of his lungs right in front of where our team were sitting. They all found this fun and joined in singing various football chants for the entire match!! They all seemed to have so much fun.

At half time they ran a on pitch challenge to see if anyone could hit the cross bar from outside. They had put a pair of gaming headphones on the cross bar and if you hit the headphones you won them. Well most of our team got very close but none of them actually hit the headphones or the cross bar, except Brandon. Brandon didn't even take his coat off and hit a screamer that bounced of the top cross bar resulting in him winning the headphones.

Our captain Joshua leading the first team seniors out on to the pitch.

Brandon nearly as tall as the first team players now!

Good luck fist bumps all round before kick-off.

Only 12 of the 16 could make it today, but they all had fun. Such a great group of lads.

In the stadium and making lots of noise with football chants.

So nice to see the boys spending quality time together and having fun.

Joshua's Options Done - Now The Waiting Game

With the March 18th deadline looming we finally got Joshua's Year 10 options submitted today. Now it is the waiting game until around June to find out of he gets his main two options. He had to chose between History and Geography in which he chose History and then he had no choice but to take Spanish for his language. Then the two options he has selected are:

    1. ICT, and

    2. Construction

The ICT will suit him really well as he is very good and confident on computers, plus this subject is 75% coursework which again favours him. The construction course looks really interesting and will teach him lots of practical skills as well as learning how to set-up a business and potentially open up the door for an apprenticeship when he leaves school.

As his two back-up subjects he has chose Sports Science (which I really like the sound of) and then Travel and Tourism. The Sports Science would be handy as he could help me out every time I get injured and teach me about hypertrophy and all my overtraining habits!!!

Brownies Bronze Award and World Book Day 2022

Holly had a nice surprise at Brownies this week as she was awarded her bronze award. So Tina now has another 5 badges to sew on her Brownies top plus she has a Bronze award broach.

Also today was World Book Day at school and Holly wanted to go dressed as Hermione Granger from Harry Potter. She had new school shoes to accompany her costume and Tina done an amazing job on her hair.

Holly's certificate and awards for her Brownie's bronze award.

My little Brownie now has her Bronze award.

Hermione Potter all ready for World Book Day 2022.

Amazing job on Holly's hair by Tina.

Pancake Day

Yesterday was pancake day and the kids all enjoyed both a pancake breakfast and desert. Brandon has the traditional lemon and sugar for breakfast, but then a sickly Nutella and banana for desert. For the 2 boys pancake day is simply about eating pancakes and they have no other interest. Luckily Holly was still interested in messing around and having a skills contest to see who could do the most elaborate pancake flip (I think I win with my under the leg flip). Holly wins the Darwin Award for flipping one straight in her own face!

Holly getting ready to practice her pancake flipping.

Up, up and away.

Half Term Bowling and Crafty Katie's

The first half term of 2022 has been and gone. Both me and Tina were working all week so we didn't really have any days out with the kids, but then that was probably a good thing given that we had 3 storms blast through over the course of the week.

The two boys went to the cinema one day last week and watched the new film called "Uncharted" which they seemed to really enjoy. Then they both went go karting over the indoor track in Basildon as well, once again Brandon being the quicker of the two. Given the stormy weather I was actually quite pleased we had booked the indoor karting and not outdoors.

Holly had a few events planned during half term. She spent one whole day at her Carousel Gymnastics clubs doing a gymnastics holiday club. Then she had a day at her Crafty Katie's club which she often does in half terms. The unlike the boys she had an inset day on Monday whilst they both went back to school, so to keep Holly out of my way whilst I was working, Tina took Holly bowling and around to see her Nan.

Holly enjoying some inset day bowling by beating her Mum.

Holly enjoying some arts and crafts at Crafty Katie's.

Disney Suit Case

We are reliably informed by Michael that we are now within 6 months of our big holiday to Florida this year. So preparations are underway with replacing outdated passports etc. We have also decided this year to replace our rather tired and very dated suitcases with some new hard shell cases. Joshua already has a new plain black one which he needs for his ski trip in America next month. Holly however is really getting in to the Disney spirit with her Minnie Mouse case which she picked out.

She ma be all smiles now, but once filled I bet it is me pulling it around the airport!!!

Brentwood Tubing Birthday Party

It is not often these days that Joshua and Brandon get invited to birthday party's purely because of the age they are at. However this weekend Brandon was invited to a tubing party over Brentwood ski slopes by Joshua who is the skipper of his Hashtag football team. As Tina was sleeping from working nights I had to take Holly with me and fortunately managed to sneak her in. She really enjoyed the tubing and spent most of her time with Joshua's little sister Isabelle.

Hashtag under 13's at Joshua's tubing party.

Action shot of Brandon.

Going down backwards.

Holly and Isabelle linking up to go down joined.

Brandon sending it down backwards again.

The hill doesn't look that big but the tubes certainly get some speed up.

Holly and Isabelle again.

These two barely left each others side and left the footballers to get on with it.

Holly getting tired out coming back up the hill.

Harry Potter Studio Tour Part 2

Second blog update from our recent Harry Potter Studio Tour with some extra pictures taken by Auntie Nicky. Again a lot of them I have left blank as I really have no idea what I am talking about!

Floating candle cafe.

Holly with her choccie ice-cream.

Birthday boy with his milk shake.

Holly doing some magic and making a broom float.

The mirror of dreams - or something like that????

Hagrid's house, at a guess???

Me enjoying my first ever Butterbeer.

Holly wanted me to get a Butterbeer moustache.

Learning how to make Howlers.

Some movie secrets showing how to make letters float out of a letterbox.

Me and B exploring Harry Potter Studio's (yes he is nearly as tall as me).

Holly and the trolley.

Me and the kiddies in the HP bank.

Goblin type characters.

My pretty little girl obviously has a liking for gold bars.

The best bit of the studio tour for me was the dragon scene in the bank.

Amazing special effects as the dragon burns down the bank.