We're going on a shark hunt...

We're going to see some big ones
We not scared
They're swimming in the tanks!

Today Stephanie and I went to the aquarium. Stephanie is loving sharks at the moment, so a quick bit of research found that local to us London Aquarium has the highest variety of sharks for us to see.

It wasn't our most frugal day but savings were made along the way. Children travel for £1 on trains at the moment so our train fares cost less than £26. There is also an offer on south eastern trains where you can get 2 for 1 vouchers for many London attractions. Sea-life is one of these. You can either pick up a leaflet in the station or print your own from their online site here. I decided to print my own as in previous summers the train station has run out of leaflets.

We queued for ages to get in to the aquarium but we had a fabulous time in there. We were there for around 3 hours. My phone battery died so I only got a few pictures. Stephanie used my phone camera to take some videos. We did take Stephanie's camera with us but her memory card filled up very quickly! LOL

I plan on helping Stephanie to collect all the shark facts she learns over the holidays and see if we can make a little book to make use of all of the pictures. Stephanie is really enjoying using the computer at the moment so I am thinking a digital book may be the way to go.

How do you support your children's interests so that they extend their knowledge?

London again!

Yesterday was Dylan's 15th birthday- where did that time go? We had a meal out with family to celebrate in the evening. Stephanie helped me to make his birthday cake;

Regular readers may have noticed we LOVE London. We decided to have a day out today in London. We started by going to the Canal Museum it was smaller than expected from the leaflet. It was more about ice cream/ ice collecting than canals. Due mostly to the person who owned the building when it was used as an ice house bringing the ice in on the barges. It was advertised that you could see a model lock, which I assumed to mean it would be a small version of a lock, in reality there was not even any water in it.

There was one canal boat there you could get on which was good to see but there was no information on  the boat how they are used/built etc which I found very disappointing. The museum wasn't expensive to get in (Thank fully!) it cost £8.00 for the three of us. From here we went to sit along the canal and eat our pack up before we went to the M and M shop. we had a look around Paddington station, Stephanie is mad on Paddington and she was impressed with the Paddington bear shop there, but she had expected some sort of Paddington statue I think.

 

Outside the M and m shop there is a water feature- yes you guessed it Stephanie couldn't resist touching it

She also tested out the water in the canal earlier in the day.

 

Next we went to the Museum of London where we had a good look around the roman section as Stephanie is studying this in school at the moment.

testing out the kitchen equipment in the roman house

 testing out  a roman bed

 

Not roman but fascinating all the same!

We have had a good day despite some things not being as we expected, it was nice to have a day out together.

Half term fun

We have had a busy week, to make up for last weekends laziness. We have been swimming twice, to the cinema and to London twice. Here are some pictures;

We watched the changing of the guards at Buckingham palace

Had a trip on the London Eye

We looked at countless building, I am really struck by the intricate carvings on the buildings. I want to try and include something into my decorating I have planned. Not sure what or how yet.

And in slightly less exciting news- spring appears to be on it's way. I dried 1 load of washing on the line the other day.

Christmas day out in London

We started the Christmas holidays with a bang today! We went up to London we went to Hyde park for Winter Wonderland, we went to Zippos Christmas Circus, to Hamleys, and to Trafalgar Square to see the big Christmas tree before a treat in Pizza hut and heading home. It has been a fantastic start to Christmas for us, here are some pics of our day to give you a little glimpse into the fun we have had.

The lego Christmas tree at St Pancras International- absolutely fantastic

Dylan pretending he didn't really want to go on this ride

Baby went on every ride with Stephanie

Frosty

This smile was mirrored on all of our faces all day

Stunning!

Wow what a start to Christmas, tomorrow we are off on another surprise the children haven't a clue where we are going. I'll let you in on the secret tomorrow, don't want them getting any clues until we get there.

a catch up post

The past few days have been rather busy.
I have taken Dylan to London for the day, we saw the Thames Barriers, St Paul's Cathedral, we went to the Bank of England museum (but it was shut), we shopped on Oxford Street and High Street Kensington, then we had a Pizza hut before coming home. We had a fab day, Dylan chose everything we did on Saturday, it was a fab day and lovely to spend the time with just Dylan.

as we walked along one part of London we saw this little fellow, he was so friendly and came so close.

On the train I spent the journey sewing hexagons together for the quilt. The ticket inspector was very impressed and asked me loads of questions about how the quilt is made, before deciding I was a little bit mad as she would just buy a quilt rather than doing all the work I have been doing.

I sew for the children as I love the feeling that I am making these things myself. This is how far I have got so far;

Obviously I didn't sew all this on the train, I have been sewing almost every evening on this I am so determined to finish it before Stephanie's birthday. I have got lots of other projects I want to get started on, but am trying to hold off until this one is finished.

The last thing I have been doing is tracking down poetry books. I have been looking at poetry in uni; it is an area of teaching I am lacking in confidence in. I am not comfortable teaching it, as I don't feel I know enough about it. I have ordered from ebay some books I have seen in lectures. I am hoping by reading these books I will gain further understanding and confidence in poetry.