We had the mundane task of taking the car for a service and MOT on Saturday but Paul managed to inject a dose of adventure into proceedings. We dropped the car off before 9am and spent over an hour walking home together from the garage. We looked at various parks, bridges and buildings on the journey and also stopped off for a spot of breakfast. The boys enjoyed the exercise but mostly just enjoyed having the uninterrupted attention of their dad. Theo made the return journey a few hours later with his dad to collect the car. Paul told me that they had a really good chat together. The rest of the day was spent drawing, playing, watching movies and having tickle fights with Paul.
We went out for breakfast again on Sunday although this time it was planned. The boys loved the experience. Theo relaxed after his large breakfast by reading his book and sipping his tea. Tristan just enjoyed playing with his balloon. We spent the afternoon in the park where the boys played with their friends for hours and hours and hours. In fact so many hours were spent engaged in running around having water fights and screaming that Theo exhausted himself to the point of feeling physically sick. He has learnt that when mum says enough is enough she might actually have his best interests at heart.
Bank holiday Monday started with the delight of discovering that Paul was not going to work for the boys. Theo lounged around with his dad until gone 10am which is incredibly unusual in our house.
They played 'Civilization' on the laptop (note the American spelling) which involves starting a civilisation on an unknown continent of a randomly generated world map with just one settler group and managing the available resources to make it a success. Theo loves the strategic nature of the game. You have to drive the advancement of your own nation through technology, religion, economics, militarisation etc. whilst keeping your citizens happy, quelling revolution and fighting off the invasions and espionage of the competing civilisations.
Tristan and I played together and did some creative activities. He drew some planets and we stuck them to some black paper. He arranged letters correctly to spell the word 'sun'. We also made a chain of monkeys which he carried around for a while.
Paul and the boys spent an hour fixing their bikes. In true masculine fashion they got covered in WD40 and brake grease. Theo rode to the park whilst Paul started to teach Tristan how to ride his little red bike. I met them all in the park and we had a picnic. We stayed in the park for over four hours. We played all sorts of games together collecting more and more children as the day went on. We had a fabulous day. Tristan collapsed into bed at 6.30 pm but Theo went back out with his friends until I collected him just before 8pm. He was a sweaty, ruddy, grass stained mess of a boy - all signs of a great day spent outside.
We had planned to carry out a few experiments over the weekend but the weather was so beautiful that we stayed outdoors for most of it. The weather will soon be less clement so there will be plenty of rainy weekend days to engage in scientific exploration with dad to come.
Prudence Clarke
26.08.2013
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