“The true secret of happiness lies in the taking a genuine interest in all the details of daily life.”

Day 80:

I have absolutely loved cruising around Telford with Opeie on the Raleigh choppers over the last few days. It''s not only been us with the smiles on our faces either. We've had people honking at us, giving us thumbs up and a few people stopping for a (distanced) chat about how they owned one when they were younger. It turns out that these little beauties are happiness on wheels. 

'A project keeps the wheels of creativity spinning'

Day 72:

After talking about going out on bike adventures it was clear we needed to get everyone on board with our plans, so today we went and picked up a bike for the female member of our posse. Both Opeie and myself ended up a touch jealous of said bike (especially after I had sold my custom pink one when Opeie entered the world). Im sensing our future bike adventures may have just taken a more retro path, watch this space, I feel a project coming.

"True love is selfless. It is prepared to sacrifice."

A few days back I was looking through one of our external hard drives and I found a folder of photos I hadn't seen for quite some time. As I scrolled through the pictures i started to feel a little sad when I came across pictures of the custom Raleigh choppers that me and Mrs M had before Opeie arrived on the scene. As Mrs M was so ill during the pregnancy I left uni and my job to take care of her and Seth, it was the start of my 'stay at home dad adventure' that I've been on since. 

There wasn't really much chance of us getting out on them and we knew the extra cash would really help so we sold them. I'm kicking myself now as they would have been great to give the boys when they are older. Sacrifices need to be made though when you make that decision to become a parent.

That sad feeling soon passed though when I continued to scroll through the pictures and came to this little cutie. We do make sacrifices for our children but the return you get from their adorable faces, addictive smiles and 'daddy I love you' comments means far more in comparison.

With that in mind though, he's no longer this size so I am thinking of two new custom bikes, a Raleigh chopper and it's little vintage counterpart the tomahawk, Watch this space.

All celebrate the zombie resurrection..... with excessive amounts of chocolate!!

It seems the older I get the more cynical I get with it. I'm pretty laid back most of the time but certain times during the year this side of me really comes out and this weekend is one of them. I guess you could say I'm a bit of an Easter Scrooge, I love the long weekend, the chance to catch up with friends and relax but as I checked my Facebook account yesterday i was greeted with an array of images of children with excessive amounts of chocolate. The yearly Facebook Easter competition had begun and it was absolutely ridiculous. 'Look how many Easter eggs my child has got' each status was screaming out. Surprisingly I didn't check it again yesterday as the first viewing had enraged me. Probably a little over the top I know but I just think that much chocolate despite being unhealthy is also unnecessary. And I just couldn't let it go, I could have easily gone on a commenting rampage but it was probably a good job I didn't.

Despite my eggstremely over the top Easter rage (haha), We did celebrate zombie resurrection Sunday today instead but without making a huge deal about chocolate and junk. Seth has been going on about a Lego kit for quite sometime, no longer available to buy in the shops so I searched eBay for it in the hope I could find it at a reasonable price. I did track it down for roughly the price it was sold for minus the box and instructions and when it arrived I was debating how to wrap it up for the boys.

We have an abundance of empty plastic eggs from Opeies 'surprise eggs' obsession in the house so as there was no box for the kit I split the Lego pieces into some of the eggs so that we could have a Lego themed egg hunt. It was a bit depressing to see £40 of Lego kit distributed in to 9  half filled small plastic eggs but I knew the boys would love the sentiment and of course the treats inside.

And to go with each egg a rhyming clue leading to the next. Seth being Seth guessed what kit it was by egg 3 but that just made the hunt more exciting because i had left the minifigures until last and he knew exactly who it was he was looking for.

At the end of the hunt there was another surprise, while many children were stuffing their faces yesterday me and Opeie were busy building our next large Lego build as part of the Easter fun. I didn't manage to complete it due to Opeie coming down with chickenpox and needing cuddles so i will write a post about it when it is complete but there maybe a slight clue in the picture below. The Lego Easter egg hunt spurred on a morning of Lego building which was great as Mrs M and Opeie were feeling a little fragile. Not the greatest of Easter weekends over all but as always i surrounded myself with some of the people i care about the most. 

Happy Easter everyone.