The last conker?

Could this be the last conker of autumn? Sonny spotted it yesterday walking back from the shop, and gasped in awe !


'Mummy look a conker!!!!'

He was particularly excited as we had only just been commenting how the conker ( sorry, force of habit) Horse Chestnut tree was completley bare of leaves and conkers , and that we hadn't seen any for weeks .



He wanted to wait until we got home to open it.

And here it is in all its mouldy , conkery, glory.

Halloween

Mwahahaha!I do LOVE dressing up , and what better excuse than your sister in laws halloween party.
We had a BRILLIANT time , the kids love seeing their cousins and its always so nice to catch up with family , especially because we don't live that close .

The night before we went to watch Martin's youngest brother in a Harold Pinter play. He was really good . I was so impressed and shocked at how much he reminded me of his big bro when he was in character. I really enjoyed the play itself too,( i'd heard some Pinter plays can be a bit heavy going , but this was really entertaining and darkly comedic )

The children stayed at Martins mums so it was really nice that they got to spend some time with Granny while we got to do some ' grown up' stuff , not sure they're really into Pinter anyway!

deeeelicious

Vegetables in ale with mustard dumplings.... Ox cheeks with mashed potatoes

Now normally you would have to haul me over hot coals to get me into a motorway service station restaurant..all those fast food , disposable , crappy , additive pumped , rubbish causing american style food chains leave me cold.

But... when we passed a certain newly refurbished roadside cafe, with a menu especially created by a certain well known 'chef' my curiousity got the better of me.

The food didn't disappoint it was lovely ( although without blowing my own trumpet it didn't seem like it would be completely out of my league to attempt to recreate it at home) And much better than the usual roadside microwaved rubbish. It was good value too when you consider what you were getting...but it was still right next to the motorway and it wasn't really that cheap so i shan't be leaving my lunch box at home just yet.

Trees

And yet more obligitory tree pictures. So hard not to go for a walk and take amazing pictures when everything looks so beautiful at this time of year. I do have a serious thing for trees though! The bigger the better. It appears that i may have shared the love with a few certain small people too.

What's in it Mummy ? Nothing at the minute i hope!

This picture doesn't even do this justice, it was a gorgeous sight , absolutely thick with leaves.

And finally another picture of 'fungi i have seen and photographed'

Wordless Wednesday

Felting

Thanks to a course Martin has recently been on, we now own , felting stuff! Nothing as grand as a needle but a mat , some mesh, some wool , and most importantly some felting know how ( and just incase we forget a set of instructions)
Martin experimented with making some bits on his course ( he's an art teacher) , mainly felt balls and sort of dreadlock type things. Everything he has made so far has been cut in half to see what the inside looked like ( so thats were Jamie gets it from) This lovely felt type dreadie was made into a real dreadie when i sewed it into my hair, you can't really tell on the pic but it adds a nice bit of colour. The process seems very similar to dreading, trying to get the fibres to lock together, rolling away.

This was one of the aforementioned balls. It was too beautiful just to be left so i sliced one of the halves again and sewed some hair grips to the back of them.

Matching Mummy and Maya hair slides.

I think Maya manages to pull the look off a bit more successfully!

A bike ride and some building

I can't believe how lovely and warm it is still for the time of year, this is rather helpful when your children have an aversion to coats.

A quick stop to make some notes, ( being detectives apparently!)

and another stop to feed imaginary cows in the empty field..

and then there's no stopping them....

Luckily we all make it back in time for a spot of building( dinosaur houses) and tea ( fish pie)