17 February 2006

I will survive

Actually, the half term holiday hasn't been too bad - only a few fights and spats. This has been accomplished by a combination of keeping them quite busy and major incentivisation and threats - Sarah had a friend over last night for a sleepover (as always, the wisdom of using the term "sleep" is debatable) so that was a big incentive to behave well early in the week.

Tuesday we went to the Tropical Forest at Syon Park (used to be called Aquatic Experience), which has animals - mostly reptiles, amphibians & fish but also birds and some mammals in tanks and display cages - that part is interesting, but not terribly exciting, but they do a really good encounter session which lasts about an hour and you get to see lots of different animals - the kids really enjoyed that. There are some photos from that in my album. We had won a free family ticket to that attraction at the school fair and we took a picnic, so it was a nice day out for very little money, which is always the problem with the February half term - it's usually too cold to do much outside, which means it can get really expensive to go places.

Wednesday Alex went to Carousel (his nursery) all day and I took the girls up to the museums (Natural History Museum this time). We skipped the dinosaurs, since Dinosaur Boy wasn't with us and looked at the mammals (including the blue whale model, which was suitably impressive, even for my easily bored 8-year old) and the creepy crawlies. We then had some lunch (they have a picnic area in the basement - more museums should do this) and looked at the earth galleries, including the one with all the cystals and gemstones in it, which they loved, and the room that simulates an earthquake. We then caught a bus to Oxford Street, visited the Food Hall in Selfridges and got some deli stuff for dinner, caught another bus to Daddy's office (their favourite part, I think) and all came home together - a good, but tiring, day.

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