NEC Youth Dance ~ "Soldiers" (Out of Eden)

Minnie back left in green 3/4 lengths & bunches :D, Bugs far front right behind piano (barely visible) in purple t-shirt

Ballet Open Day

Today was the once a year event where we Mums & Dad's get to watch our children dance during their normal lesson (so we cna see all they are learning). I love this event. FOr us today though it was a marathon as Paul was not here, having driven my Mum back down to Portsmouth yestaerday with all her stuff (she is moving back home now she has retired). This meant that we all had to get there on the bus. It's easy enough with all but one walking now and easy access buses mean no collapsing of the buggy anyway, but the bus-stop is a 20 minute walk away + 5 minutes the other end to ballet, so we had to be out in good time - especially as the buses only go one an hour!! Then we have a total time of 1hr 45 minutes of ballet to watch - taking us right up to lunchtime, so I arranged to have lunch with R&R (A's best friend and her Mum - who is my good friend), but by the time P was dancing Paul had arrived (he did it in 3 hours straight!!) and so he joined us and we all went for lunch together - and I didn't have to catch the bus home :D The only thing that bugged me a little (but not enough to make me not go home with everyone else in the car) was that I had been looking forward to the opportunity to have a mosey around town - I haven't been into town at all since we moved :( We just about had time to order a book for JIH and measure JAH's feet (up 2 sizes in 6 months!!) and by him a pair of shoes, whizz into Home Bargain and buy some vinyl-y beanbags for the creche at church (and one for us) + the fastest look round ever because the car-park time was running out and Paul had taken the kids back to the car already. That was it - shopping time over :(

Back home to upload the million and one photos I took - and see that I won 8th Place in the IheartFaces competition this week (YEAH!!!!) - and get the kids some tea. Paul was pretty exhausted after his 400 mile round trip in two days (plus helping Mum pack, load the van and unload into her house : apparently the van & top-box was choka-blok, so much so that Paul only had just enough rear view vision - how much can one person keep in one room??) , but he need to go and get some food for a few days too - poor man!

I'm not going to post the photos tonight because I'm running them through noiseware - a nasty consequence of only having a bridge camera instead of a proper DSLR - it doesn't cope too well indoors without my bumping up the ISO higher than it confortably takes good pictures without them all being grainy/spotty/noisy. Anyway, when I've done that I'm going to bed, as it is gone 1am already and I have to be up reasonably early (and us all out the house by 9.15 tomorrow), so I best get some sleep tonight!! Check back tomorrow for photos - or take a look at my 365 to see the best ones :D

Crazy Family Fun Day

Today was the annual Nantwich Family Fun Day and our church were involved in the event this year in a bigger way than ever before. Usually we have a promo' stand with balloons and face-painting, but this year we had a group of our young people performing a puppet show and dancing in the main arena - twice!! This was obviously a great opportunity, but also major hard work in terms of prep' and practice. Paul was down at the park about 7.30 this morning setting up and returned home about 6.30pm tonight - with Chish and Fips in hand (only our third plate of chips today then!!) - NOTE TO SELF - remember to make up packed lunches next year to avoid exorbitant over-pricing on burger stands & seriously unhealthy eating for the whole day!! The weather held off its rain, with only a few light showers here and there and generally warm - kind of sticky warm iykwim. (It's tipping it down outside now!!).

In the middle of all that my girls all had ballet and as P has an exam coming up VERY soon it was important not to miss her lesson. Then back to the park for the second set in the arena!

The puppets and the dancing were all brilliant - imHo!! In one of the songs JAH was operating two puppets (one on each hand) doing different parts of the backing track to "Walking on Sunshine" offset to each other - really no easy task (just ask J&J), but he was amazing! :D

Just a few snapshots to give a taster of the day. Click the little 'from NFFD' at the bottom if you want to see the pictures in an album, or the whole collage if you just want to see it bigger :D

From NFFD

Tomorrow is Sunday School Prize Giving day - so another early start and busy morning - now that I am, in part, Sunday School administrator!