"Celebrate the happiness that friends are always giving, make every day a holiday and celebrate just living!"

We had been looking forward to the August bank holiday for quite sometime, we didn't have anything huge planned but the fact that Mrs M was off for a three day weekend was reason enough to be excited. Sadly Friday came and due to unforeseen circumstances Mrs M ended up quite ill and basically sofa bound. Obviously she was well looked after with no shortage of foot rubs, i made sure her nails were painted and eyebrows were plucked as i know this is the best way to get her relaxed. (I know how to treat my girl like the princess she is).

We had arranged to see our friend Chris (gingerjamphoto.com) on bank holiday Monday and Seth had picked somewhere fun for us all to go, but Mrs M still wasn't feeling great and the thought of a long car journey really wasn't appealing, so we decided to venture somewhere a little more local. Unfortunately after driving most of the way there we had to turn round and find a different route due to a serious road accident.

Some bad navigating from the back seat and a couple of bad turns and our journey ended up a two hour stretch, not what Mrs M had hoped for being wedged between two car seats. Chris kept us occupied though with a barrage of terrible jokes that I can only describe as awful 'dad humour' (god help any children he may have in the future).

After our epic journey we finally arrived at our destination, desperate to get out and stretch our legs. The temperature had risen substantially since the morning so I was a sweaty mess. Seth was desperate to show Chris the dry sledging and Chris proved to us once more that he's as big a kid as all of us. The new gym mat/sledge has certainly been getting some use since being given to us by our friend Gareth (he's yet to come and join In the fun though). We all had a great time apart from a few near misses with the gravel at the bottom of the hill.

After a good few rides of the valley we headed back to the car to get the boys wellies on and go splashing. I don't know what it is about splashing in streams but Seth loves it.

Spending time with Chris is always a lot of fun and the boys love him to bits. Being a photographer he comes with the added bonus of taking great photos of the four of us together. Although we're always out together visiting nice places, one of us is always behind the camera so we actually don't have that many of us all together.

It was soon moving towards tea time and I think tummies were beginning to rumble so we decided to head home. It was a great afternoon, topped off with some yummy food, cups of tea and a few games of countdown on the boys blackboard courtesy of Seth Vorderman. All in all a great bank holiday Monday was had by all. Thanks Chris, for the photographs, TERRIBLE jokes and of course the great company.

"Knox in box. Fox in socks. Knox on fox in socks in box"

Do you remember the time when things were this simple?

Being able to chose whatever vehicle you wished to travel in and jetting off to whatever secluded and glamorous location you liked, not even been confined to this planet. Long distance travel wasn't an issue because you could go in to hyper speed or even teleport if you wanted to. There was no need to moan about the price of fuel going up because your transport ran off Orange squash, or Lego and as you can see from the photo above accessorising your outfit to go with your ride was a breeze (its like a cardboard fast and the furious).

Its amazing how much entertainment the boys can get out of cardboard. We've been attempting to de-clutter again so have been listing our unwanted items on eBay and filling up our local charity shops. Mrs M kindly brought home some boxes for packaging up but as i expected most of them didn't make it that far because big boxes in our house are like gold dust and on sight the boys are all over them.

The boys spent most of the afternoon playing in their new cardboard creations, one minute they were in rockets, then a motorbike with a side car. With the help of a coat hanger being attached to the front Seth's became a racing car and right before we left to pick Mrs M up from work they were on a boat that had hit an iceberg and they were desperately trying to rescue all of their toys from the dangerous currents of a violent sea. I couldn't help but think 'i wish we had a boat big enough for me.'

As the boxes had become flavour of the day and the sun was out we asked the boys if they wanted to take their new custom vehicles outdoor racing down some hills, I'm quite sure you can guess what their response was...

It was a lovely evening so we took a slow drive down to somewhere hilly to make the most of the cardboard super cars. On the way Seth reminded us of a snowman hedge that he had spotted the last time we had passed through so Mrs M jumped out to take a picture.

Sadly on arrival the boxes barely even got a look in as Mrs M's PT Gareth donated a very slippy Gym mat to the cause and it soon became the favoured hill sliding companion. As soon as the boys got on it the boxes were a thing of the past. It was early evening when we headed out so it was quiet and we made the most of our dry slope sledging activity. Even Mrs M got in on the action.

 

We left our sledging escapades in high spirits and were all having a great chuckle on the way home so just before getting back to ours i drove to somewhere that had made me laugh the day before. A house we had driven past a few times had given their already tacky lions at the end of their path a touch up. Orange and Red? really? i honestly don't know what possessed them but Mrs M found it equally as funny.

It was another great mini adventure for me and the troops and ive really enjoyed the making the most of our time after Mrs M being at work. Its been a great de-stresser for her too. I feel so lucky to have a great family and with next week being the last full week that Seth has off for the holiday we have a lot of cramming of fun stuff to do.

“May you have warmth in your igloo, oil in your lamp, and peace in your heart”.

Today was day three of the Shropshire snow, we checked online to see if Seth's school was open but then decided it wasn't safe enough for him to go in so we kept him off. Obviously Seth was over the moon at that. We wanted to make sure that we made the most of the snow and i asked Seth what he wanted to do. Seth decided that he wanted to build an Igloo, one that he can sit inside. I asked him what shape he wanted it and he decided on an Igloo shaped like Jokers head (Oh dear).

When i told Mrs M what i was going to try and attempt she looked at me like i was losing my mind. in hindsight i guess it was a bit much for an activity that should be finished in a couple of hours. It was a very cold afternoon after all. I decided to give it a try anyway.

First we got our sledges and filled them with snow from the front garden and pulled them round the back as we knew we were going to need loads of it. We made a really huge pile of snow and started to shape it. It did take us some time but Mrs M being the thoughtful thing that she is she broke up the cold afternoon with an outdoor tray of hot chocolate and cookies for us.

I think at that point Seth could see that a Joker shaped igloo was going to take a long time to make. Which i guess is the reason Seth said "it looks a bit like a Lego mans head, could we make a mini figure shaped one to go with the snowman we made?" It was like music to my ears, that was definitely doable so we shaped the pile into a Lego head shape.

Seth wanted the mouth to be the door so after patting the pile until it was solid and adding the Lego bump on the top we started to carve the door and insides out.

Opeie came out to join us for a bit after his nap too which was nice. He didn't really know what to make of the igloo and he definitely wouldn't go inside. Mrs M was pretty impressed with what me and Seth had been doing with our morning.

The whole thing took a few hours to make but we had lots of fun and i really enjoyed our 'boy time'. The end result didn't come out quite how i wanted it but Seth loved it and was pleased that he could sit inside it. It was starting to get really cold so after tidying up our creation we headed in to get changed and have some warm drinks.

As we were heading in i found some carrots in my pocket from feeding the rabbits and Seth decided he wanted to give our Lego head igloo a classic snowman nose...

"Then come the wild weather, come sleet or come snow, we will stand by each other, however it blow."

It seems that everyone in the UK has gone 'snow mad', Every time it snows in this country people act like it has never snowed before. Mrs M has been hilarious this week, checking the Met Office every hour and updating me on when the snow is coming and how long its staying for. I love the snow but I'm patient and much prefer the surprise of it coming round. Ive avoided the social networking sites as much as i can as it seems that each one has turned into weather.com and there's only so many 'it's snowing' updates i can take.

Well the snow is actually here now so i thought i would write a post about what we've been up to (snow related of course). We didn't have any last year so this is the first bit of snow that Opeie has experienced so he has been excitedly sitting at the window desperate to get outside.

There wasn't much on the ground when we woke up this morning so i got Seth ready for school as usual but as we walked through the gates it was clear that he wouldn't be in school very long. After the slightly dangerous drive home, brakes locking and skidding all over we sat patiently waiting for a text from the school which came at 11am saying we could get Seth. It took me three times as long to get to the school but i was happy to have Seth out so that we could concentrate on having some fun. 

After what seemed like an hour and a half getting the boys dressed we were ready to head out. I know the boys need to be warm but Mrs M seems to want them both looking like the Stay Puft Marshmallow man in all their layers. They each got in a sledge and we pulled them down the road, although Opeie soon lost interest in that and wanted to be carried. We headed up to  a local school where there were some hills for us to make the most of the sledges.

We all had a great time but Opeie started to really get cold it was very cold and we all had bright red cheeks. Silly daddy should have put Opeie in a balaclava (I'll know for tomorrow though).

Mrs M decide to take Opeie home, i think they had both had enough of the snow. Me and Seth stayed for some more sledging and a 'snow battle' as Seth called it. We went down the hills on the sledges backwards, on our tummies and i even used mine as a snowboard which made Seth laugh.

We had a snowball fight but sadly the inevitable happened and i hit Seth in the nose with one (Oops), he was Ok though and soon got over it after giving me a big snow beard to get me back...

Soon after we both started to get really cold so Seth got back in his sledge and i pulled him home so that we could have a nice cup of tea and a cuddle under a blanket. It was a great couple of hours and we will definitely be making the most of snow over the next few days. Tomorrow we'll be making a snowman i think so be sure to keep reading.