"Sometimes by losing a battle you find a new way to win the war."

I wont lie, we love a good scrap! we're proper boys and that's what boys do, roll about wrestling, make up crazy martial arts and diving off things we are probably not supposed to (says mom). I tend to double up as Stay at home Dad/Climbing frame and i'm expected to crawl around with those two special items of cargo comfortably on my back, in between the usual play beating that i get which usually ends when one of them stomps on a spot they shouldn't ouch.

Obviously i'm not complaining though, the boys are the greatest thing to happen to me, along with Mrs M they are my best friends. I love the fact that there is no need for me to grow up and i can live my days reliving my youth. A few months back we reviewed the Boomco twisted spinner and had lots of fun playing with our friends so when we were asked if we would be interested in trying out the new product, i couldn't wait to get in to battle mode with the boys.

On the day the package arrived i answered the door and thought 'what on earth is that, it's huge', i soon realised that inside that box was the game changer in our play battles. The Boomco rapid madness is an insane play thing and i was hooked from the second i fired the first round, a 20 shot clip that fires like a machine gun. Today i was selfish and fired the first round myself and Seth's eyes lit up when he saw what it was capable of. He then responded with 'i need to fire that while i'm sitting in a tree'... awwwww, our adorable little sniper.

The power in the blaster made it quite clear that we needed to be outdoors with plenty of space for action, It was time for battle and some of us take this sort of thing very seriously, oops!! The Rapid Madness really ups your game on the battle field as it is air powered and can blast out all 20 darts in the clip in literally seconds. If you are in to running about having a play battle with the kids then this bit of kit is really morish once you have fired once.

After running about for a while and spending some time looking for missing darts (because the range on the shots is up to 50 feet and Seth was firing shots all over) Seth finally got his chance to fire from the tree's when our battle came to a stand off. Thankfully our battle came to an end with the shaking of hands and a big hug, If only wars were ended the same way.

The Boomco rapid madness is a serious addition to your play armoury and i can see we are going to have a lot of fun playing with it over the coming weeks. Since playing with the Boomco blasters all the ones we owned from another well known company have been given away, i think that pretty much sums up the awesomeness of this product

Need more reassurance before you purchase? check this fun video out...

Boomco Rapid Madness Epic Battle

There is also the Zoom 'n' Boom event still going in Glasgow until the end of August, stay tuned for future events.

$£%&@!**$%@&.....Brains!!! @£$!%&*£@$&!£@%$&*.......BRAAAAAAAAAIIIIIINNNNNNNNSSSSSSSS!!

We lost a lot of good men today, they may have turned in to flesh eating zombies but they served our team well.

Today was D-day! The morning that Seth had been going on about all week. Excalibur martial arts (seth's Tae Kwon Do class) had organised a Nerf war to celebrate their sons birthday and it seems to be an annual event with these guys. To prepare ourselves for the big day I had brought myself and Seth new weapons as Seth found reloading our other guns difficult due to his muscle condition. I got the guns that could hold the most bullets thinking that would mean less reloading but when they arrived and Seth realised he couldn't load them on his own we had a week of stress and anxiety. Concerned that he would be open to attack it was obviously playing on his mind a lot especially at bedtime (when is he going to understand that best friends stick together and I'll always be his wing man).

They had a nice easy lesson today so that students could conserve their energy for Saturdays main event and as the older children and adults classes follow his we had a couple of hours to kill. Seth has been asking for weeks if he could go on the Bridgnorth cliff railway and our extra time loitering round Bridgnorth made it the perfect filler. We had Seth's friends from school William and Matthew and their dad Steve with us for company which made it more fun. Before going on the cliff railway though we walked along the city walls and admired the one remaining wall of the castle. Seth spotted a cobweb on the railings and with a very serious face asked if it was a medieval spiderweb? Genius!

After our mini adventure and cliff rail ride we headed back to base to prepare for battle. The leisure centre hall had been transformed into a battle zone with cardboard box barricades everywhere you looked and a camouflage netting covered maze in the centre, a role playing delight for all the kids (and us eager big kids). Mrs M had kindly filled my bag with face paint so quickly got the boys ready for their imminent scrap.

Seths taekwondo teacher had come up with an elaborate storyline and from just looking at his get up you could tell that he was really in to it. As he bellowed out commands us grown ups chuckled at he rear, the problem was us old timers at the back with our intermittent hearing had no idea what he was saying, so oblivious to any role playing that had been set we took the unclear directions and translated them in to something us dads could understand 'if its under 5 feet tall shoot at it'. The kids were darting about at crazy speed and for the first time I was really feeling my age. It seems that (although I had never seen them before) a couple of the kids had taken an instant disliking to me and were hell bent on unloading ALL of their ammo on me. (On the drive home Seth informed me that its because I have a villainous beard).

Everyone was having a whale of a time and I was most impressed by the 6 year old sniper that managed to shoot me in the jugular, quite the marksman. Seth and William were joined at the hip and whenever Seth managed to sneak up on me he managed to get me on the face which was closely followed by a second bullet from William. I seemed to spend most of my time picking up darts and reloading until a young lady called Emily started bringing me handfuls of ammo she had found, what a little angel. (sadly i didn't get a photo of her).

The final battle was understood by the grown ups clearly, as the children built one large barricade to hide behind us big kids were a pack of zombies coming to storm the trench. The children shot at us to try and fend us off and i lost both arms in the process but managed to get to the wall. As the zombies were tearing at the walls the children (especially the ones that had run out of ammo) were screaming excitably, it was a lot of fun.

It was two hours of mayhem and not eating since early that morning was taking its toll and i was getting very tired. So as everyone flattened the boxes for recycling we made a hasty get away (sorry guys). We definitely look forward to doing that again next time.

Thanks Excalibur and Happy Nerfday Reilly

Super baby Vs the deactivated rockets

As much as I love cleaning the house and doing the washing, after dropping the boss off at work and Seth off at school I had a good think about what me and mini me could do for an hour or two to keep us out of the house (and out of trouble). I wanted to do something inexpensive as we're saving at the moment so after weighing up our options I asked Opeie if he fancied having a look at some planes, he excitedly said 'yes'.

Cosford RAF museum isn't far from where we live and all you have to pay is parking. I've been before and although it really isn't my cup of tea I thought it might be something a little different and something Opeie might enjoy. To start with though Opeie had other ideas and on the drive there he decided to get some shut eye. It worked out well though because by the time we arrived it wasn't open for another 40 minutes.

He woke up soon after opening and we headed in, I wasn't sure how he would react to seeing the big planes but he seemed excited at the thought and as soon as we walked through the doors he was hooked. The first thing he spotted was a cardboard cut out that he said was "silly". Just past there were the doors to the outside, He loved the large planes that were out there.

After looking at the planes out side we headed to the cold war exhibition and nothing could have prepared me for the level of excitement that was brewing. Opeie at the moment loves rockets, if its a similar shape to a rocket, then its a rocket, if hes running fast hes a rocket, when hes shouting out 'super baby' with his arms out, he's a rocket. I really cant remember why it all started but rockets are definitely flavour of the month. So when we walked in to a room full of missiles Opeie was in his element and wasn't afraid to make it vocal.

This little rocket is apparently called 'baby rocket'

We walked around for quite some time and the little rocket enthusiast was really taking it all in. Opeie was in one of his clingy moods but selfishly from a smitten dads point of view i like days like this. Lots of kisses and hugs for me (I'm so greedy) and a boy that doesn't want to let go of me, whats not to like?

Opeie was really having a great day and it was putting a huge smile on my face.

After going round this exhibit twice (i think Opeie was worried he may have missed something), we headed over to the next hangar. When we stepped outside the weather was beautiful and made the afternoon so much nicer. I'm really glad the weather is finally starting to perk up it makes me want to get out more and be doing things.

There was plenty more planes to look at in this hangar but Opeie had clearly got a taste for rockets and wanted to turn around and head back to look at them. I love that he has got to that age where he is in to everything. It makes days out so much more fun and its great how now he can really get involved with me and Seth when were playing, this though is probably making Mrs M's craving for a little girl harder as her little baby is becoming one of the lads.

Coming somewhere like this when i was younger wouldn't have been my idea of fun and as i said at the start of the post it isn't usually my cup of tea but having my excitable little boy with me made all the difference. We were only there for 2 hours but i had a great time and its left Opeie with an even stronger need for rockets