"Your heaviest artillery will be your will to live. Keep that big gun going."

having two young children, me and Mrs M never get to do anything together. We have not been out in almost 5 years which is a little crazy when I think about it. Over the last month or so though the boys have been taken out a few times by Laura's folks and sister and they have had so much fun, making me and Mrs M realise we need to occasionally do things for ourselves. It is important to do things as a couple every now and again. I feel lucky that our relationship is so solid. Had it not have been i can imagine the stresses of not having that 'us time' could become quite a strain.

While we were at auntie Lottie's cottage on boxing day I was asked whether I was interested in going clay pigeon shooting, having never fired a gun I jumped at the chance and Mrs M seemed game too so a few days later Lottie and Opeie hung out while me and Mrs M donned some Harris Tweed and went on a mission up to their friends farm to meet up with Lottie's chap Aaron and our friend Aub.

Mrs M didn't like the look or sound of the gun but eventually intrigue got the better of her and she was soon shooting at the sky. Her face was priceless when she hit one of the disks.

I'm not much of a mans man and was convinced I was going to miss them all and expected everyone to have a chuckle at me but i managed to hit a few and the boys were great in showing us how to use the guns etc. We were only out for an hour or so but it was lots of fun and was really lovely doing something with Mrs M and not having to worry about the boys. Saying that though Seth would have loved to sit and watch from a safe spot, maybe next time.

Me and Mrs M have got a few plans for some things to do together and we are lucky to have some great family and friends to spend time with the boys so we can fully embrace our 'us time'.

Writing from the drivers seat - killing time with a sleepy child in the backseat

It's been a while since writing one of my life from the drivers seat posts, Opeie hasn't done much napping in the car recently and with Seth being off school we couldn't really be sitting around for hours anyhow, it wouldn't be fair on him. Today though after dropping Mrs M off at work, the plan was to pop over to nanny and grandads so they could see the boys. Opeie was exhausted and soon dropped off so when we got there Seth went in to entertain the excited grandparents and auntie Lotty, and me? well I have this quiet half an hour to blog away.

I cant believe that there's only a week or so of the summer holiday left, i don't know where the time has gone. Seth has Informed me that he doesn't feel ready to go back to school yet and also that he would prefer it if he had the weekdays off and the weekends for school. I'm not sure the government and education board would go for that but you never know it may be worth putting in writing. 

The school years go by so much quicker as a parent than I remember them going as a child. I don't remember all that much of infant and junior school, i have really hazy memory around that time apart from dressing up like a tea pot, Morris dancing in the playground, and marrying my girlfriend from age 8-11 in front of the school for our leavers assembly while parents sobbed. (it was a bizarre way to leave school at 11), that pretty much sums up my school life ages 5-11. It's no secret that I hated secondary school, I did the work but I never felt comfortable apart from when I was in my art class, it wasn't a great time for me. That being said I did have some fun friends and time outside of school was always filled with adventure.

It would be amazing being a child again and I always say how i'd love to see things through the boys eyes for just one day. I don't envy them having to go through school though and as a parent that has been through a crappy time at school i do worry that they will have a rough time too. If our situation had been different we would be home schooling the boys but sadly that's not an option.

It will be interesting to see how the boys turn out, they are having a great start and are kind well rounded children with parents that will back them up with anything they decide to do so i think they will be just fine.

"P for pneumonia, pterodactyl and psychosis"

When we became play patrol agents for Bigjigs Toys one of the wooden toys I really hoped we would be lucky enough to review was the Chunky Alphabet Puzzle as we're teaching Opeie his letters. He's been able to say his alphabet for months but he doesn't understand which letter is which so you can imagine our excitement when we opened our recent mission and found the item inside. We took the Alphabet puzzle with us on our travels yesterday and enlisted the help of an outside agent, auntie Lottie.

I knew that Opeie would like it and its already been played with a lot. I'm really hoping that it will help his understanding of letters over the coming weeks. We've been working on Opeies colours too over the last two weeks so I was pleased to see that Bigjigs Toys had colour coded the wooden blocks to go with the spaces in the alphabet board, on the board they had also included the lower case letters in each slot which I thought was a great touch.

As much as we loved the toy there was one or should I say two issues. Not with the toy on the whole but with the letters 'K' and 'Z', both of these letters only fit one way Round which probably seems like an I significant issue but for a two year old learning his letters via a wooden puzzle it can be quite frustrating when he is expecting each piece to fit. Opeie knew that he had the right letters for the slots but they just wouldn't go in which ended up confusing for him.

Apart from this though the Chunky Alphabet Puzzle is a great toy and I wouldn't let that put me off buying something that I know would benefit Opeie's development. This item is going to become very useful as Opeie is learning and anything that keeps him motivated to learn and entertained at the same time will always be a fantastic toy in our eyes. A definite thumbs up from Gifts From the Pirates.

"Well, life on the farm is kinda laid back, Ain't much an old country boy like me can't hack, It's early to rise, early in the sack, Thank God, I'm A Country Boy"

A few weeks back we had a phone call from Auntie Lotty asking if we wanted to come over and see them which was really nice, the weather wasn't great but uncle Aaron (who is a farmer) had asked if Seth wanted to go on a tractor ride? obviously he jumped at the chance so after picking Lotty up we headed over to a friend of Aaron's farm. Seth and Mrs M went off in the tractor and me and Opeie stopped with Lotty in the warm and chatted. I have no idea what happened during that tractor trip or what they go up to and waiting for Mrs M to write the post could mean waiting till in to the next century so i though i would just have a post with picutes that she had taken.

I think you can make your own minds up whether Seth had fun. Thanks uncle Aaron.

Spring is nature's way of saying, 'Let's party!'

I had so much housework to do yesterday as I was a lazy bugger the night before after snuggling on the sofa with Mrs M all evening. Opeie usually doesn't mind playing alone for short amounts of time while I get things done, I try to do the jobs in short bursts broke up by playing with him. Yesterday though Opeie wanted all the batman figures out and kept coming in and saying 'daddy play!'. Needless to say those big brown eyes have some serious power over me and surprise surprise I didn't get much done.

Opeie looked so cute surrounded by batman toys. and we quickly got in to an epic game fighting the villains in Gotham's underworld.

After an hour or so of playing the game came to an end when our friendly neighbourhood Spider-man decided to take over the Batcave.

After lunch we had to drop the boss at work, the sun was out and although it was a little nippy it was to good a day to be stuck I doors. We headed over to see auntie Lotty as we hadn't seen her for a few weeks. After a nice cuppa, a chat and plenty of cuddles for Opeie we headed to the park for a little picnic as Opeie hadn't long been awake and hadn't eaten.

After the picnic and a play on the park Opeie made it clear that he wanted to take part in his new favourite past time, feeding the ducks. Thanks to Mrs M always being prepared there was a loaf of bread already on the back seat of the car so we jumped in and headed over to the lake. Opeie always looks so happy when he's feeding the ducks, I love taking him and so probably do Warburtons. I think all the MD's will be getting a nice Christmas bonus this year because of us.

Once the loaf of bread had gone Opeie instantly lost interest in being at the lake and walking, so he sat on my shoulders until he saw some steps. I don't know what it is about steps/stairs but he loves them. He counted as he was going up, well up to 14 and then started again, cute. On the way down the steps the other side he said sorry on every step??? Strange boy.

We got back to the car and I gave Opeie a list of places to go next and he said 'castle' so I drove to the abbey ruins that are not to far from us for more walking about. I was hoping I could wear him out so that Mrs M might have an easier night with him. The sun was still bright and it had got a lot warmer by this point and as we pulled up a heard of cows came to meet us at the gate which Opeie loved.

And that filled our time up to going to pick Mrs M up from work. It was such a lovely afternoon and I'm hoping the sun is going to stay out for a while now so that we can get out and about more.

The little scientist gets a day out at Thinktank

We've all been having such a great half term and have managed to really make the most of it. Seth has decided recently that he's really in to science so we've been doing experiments at home. Yesterday we decided to take the boys to ThinkTank to fuel Seth's new passion and we were really pleased when auntie Lotty said she was going to come with us. We all love Lotty she's so much fun and yesterday was the first time Opeie said 'Charlotte' which was so cute.

 After picking Lotty up we headed to Birmingham, we were looking forward to having lunch at TGI's to start our adventure, Opeie had other ideas...

Typical Opeie, he's such a cutie though. Lunch as always was lush but in great Opeie style he didn't want to eat his. Lotty decided she was skipping lunch and went straight to dessert (my kind of girl).

After lunch (and colouring) we headed to ThinkTank and as soon as we walked through the entrance we were hooked, there was so much to do everywhere you looked. We really didn't know what to do first so after having a little wander about looking at fossils and a crocodile in the floor we asked Seth what he wanted to do and he decided he wanted to go to the 'Big bang Show'. The show was great with lots of explosions. I was so busy taking in what was going on around me that i didn't take as many pictures as i would have liked.

  My favourite part was the old cars and motorbikes...

After looking out of one of the windows and seeing the outdoor play area the boys were itching to get outside and play so even though it was freezing outside we headed out to explore the activities.

After the play area we headed home, it was getting on a bit and we wanted to miss the rush hour traffic (didn't really work out though). We didn't manage to get round even half of Thinktank as there was so much going on so were going to buy a years pass and go again soon. Only 3 days left of half term i cant believe it's gone so quick. Ill be counting down the days till the Easter holiday.