Chelsea Physic Garden, Body Worlds and Mr Gum and the dancing bear.

We visited Chelsea Physic Garden, a short walk from Sloane Square tube station. You enter by an assuming entrance - 4 acres surrounded by high brick walls. It is a remarkable garden originally created in 1673 by the Apothecaries in which to grow medicinal plants. It’s a living, breathing museum, complete with labels and educational messaging next to every ‘exhibit’. If you want to know where aspirin comes from, you can actually see and touch the plant right here. We just enjoyed wondering round. P did the children's trial which she liked!

 We then went for a wonder round Battersea Park...

 ...and a snack in the park.

 We the took the tube to Piccadilly where we went to Body Worlds, a new permanent museum taking the place of Ripley’s Believe it or Not. Body Worlds is a museum made up of real, plastinated people and is unlike any museum or exhibit you’ll have ever seen. preserved human bodies used in 200 exhibits across 6 galleries giving a thought provoking, educational insight into our reproductive, respiratory, cardiovascular and metabolic systems. All exhibits are fascinating and strangely beautiful! It is worth noting there is a cloakroom before you enter the museum as you are only allowed a small bag for your journey round. There is also lift access and stair access on each floor as well. You get an audio guide which tells you about the different exhibits. 

We then walked over the river to the National Theatre.

 We went to see Mr Gum and the Dancing Bear in which Andy Stanton has adapted his own crazy but kind children's book about the unlikely friendship between feisty nine-year-old Polly and the giant bear she rescues from a miserable life of humiliation, and peppers it with bouncy songs by Jim Fortune. From what I remember it seems quite faithful to the book with shouts of, "The truth is a lemon meringue." It is suitably bonkers and we loved it! 

cambridge literary festival

Today P and I went to hear both Robin Stevens (author of the Murder Most Unladylike series) and Anna James (author of Pages and co). Both talks were highly enjoyable - Robin Stevens talked about her life and then got the audience to help create a story. Anna James talked about her book and the stories she liked.

  I love the Literary festival and P and I had a lovely afternoon!

Literary Festival

On Saturday, P and I went to Cambridge Literary Festival (I was going to take E but she had a gym competition and the older 2 were (supposedly) revising). We heard the amazing Jacqueline Wilson talking about how she got in to writing and how the Jackie magazine (for those of us of a certain age) was named after her!

 We also heard Mark Lowery - who was very very funny but maybe slightly old for P.

Wild Flowers and Croquet (Alice in Wonderland)

Today we went to Ickworth to view their wild flower meadow.

We found a beautiful damselfly.

We went for a walk to the fairy pond.

We also found some baby spiders.

Then we went for a game of croquet.

and found another spider

Jam Tarts (Alice in Wonderland)

We are reading Alice in Wonderland at the moment



 
so today we made Jam Tarts.

Ingredients

• 12 teaspoons jam (of your choice of flavour)
• 28g sugar
• 255g plain flour
• 140g cold butter
• 6 tbsp cold water

  Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180oC
2. Sieve the flour into a mixing bowl, add the sugar and rub in the butter until it resembles fine breadcrumbs
3. Add the water tablespoon by table spoon until it is a moist dough
4. Grease a cupcake tray and cut the pastry.
5. Put the jam into the pastry and bake for 12-15 mins
   

December 22nd - Theatre trip

Today my mum and I, G and E went to watch The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe at the Birmingham Rep. 

The play was well done with a small but talented cast!  The transformation from English country house wardrobe to the winter landscape of Narnia is simply quite magical. There were amazing fantastical animal costumes and a most impressive Dwarf puppet and a three-man sized puppet version of the Lion, Aslan, very reminiscent of the War Horse creation. The songs were also very catchy!  All in all a great show!

Day 26 - bedtime stories outside

Today we read bedtime stories outside (just before it rained!).

Mad Hatters Tea Party

Today we went to the Central Library for an hour and half of free fun based on Alice in Wonderland.   We used props for photos, did some craft and played some games.  The highlight for the girls was of course the tea!  It was aimed at over 8s - but I think it was probably perfect for those aged 4-10.

Cambridge literature festival

This weekend we went to the Cambridge literature festival held at the Cambridge Union chamber. There were a number of events for adults and for children. We  heard tales about animals and then met them, heard Clementine Beauvaistalk talk about her detective books set in Cambridge as well as how to write a detective book, heard Michael Foreman talk about his books and had a lesson about drawing Claude from Alex T Smith. The girls enjoyed it and the festival was very popular with some children's events selling out! Tickets were reasonably priced and authors available after events for signing books.

Alice in the rain

This evening we went to Wimpole Hall to watch an outdoor production of Alice - An Extraordinary Adventure - it combined both her adventures in wonderland and through the looking glass and was performed by "Heartbreak Productions" a touring outdoor theatre company.   We got there about an hour before the start (you have to get there early to be able to get a good place to put your rug), during which the 4 actors in character as Alice and her family entertained the children in the audience, playing tennis and telling jokes etc. 
I loved the play! The actors delivered their lines with enthusiasm, there was humour aimed at both children and adults and the story was well delivered. The White Rabbit, the Mad Hatter, the Red Queen, Humpty Dumpty, Tweedledum and Tweedledee and a baby that turns into a Peppa pig were all intertwined fabulously!  It rained for the second half and the cast were drenched but kept going with vigour and even got some rain-fueled jokes in!   

Well worth trying to catch if they are touring near to you! 

December 3rd

 Today the girls wrote letters to Father Christmas. On the lists were a beautiful dress, nail vanish, craft things, make up and music!

We also read this fab book. I love the grumpy take on Father Christmas. E hadn't come across a comic style book before and so it was good to discuss features of it.

Roald Dahl themed 8th birthday party

Today was G's party. We hired a room and I planned activities for weeks.

To invite the children I bought chocolate bars and re-wraped them with a gold ticket in the inside containing the party details.

Then today when they arrived they had a selection of different activities to do.

(1) They made chocolate lollipops and decorated them with sprinkles.

(2) They tested different chocolate.

(3) They made Formula 86 Delayed Action Mouse-Maker sweets (using sugar dough)

(4) They caught dreams like the BFG (they painted jam jars with glow in the dark paints)

(5) They made Mr Twit's beard by sticking on felt and cornflakes to fake beards I bought from Amazon. They also put red and yellow paint.

(6) They made enormous crocodile bookmarks from green foam.

Then we played some games:
(1) Pass the parcel
(2) The chocolate eating game where if you throw a 6 you don scarf, hat and gloves and then using a knife and fork eat as much chocolate as you can.
(3) Helped the Fantastic Foxes escape Boggis, Bunce and Bean by passing balloons under and over each other.
(4) Had a quiz on the books.
(5) Played musical statues (as the foxes escaping the farmers)

And then we fed the kids lots of sweets and cake :).

 All in all it was a success! Although some of the stuff was hard to transport home as it didn't really have time to dry/set! Never mind!!!