Adventures on the high street

In these parts it was the last day of school for most children! You know the excitement of the last day, and as we walked up to the high street I could see uniformed children skipping and laughing on their way to school. Of course I understand that, its just a bit odd because of all the places I have lived the last day of school has been in May or maybe June, but the end of July? The British have a great year-round system where kids go to school for 6 weeks and then have 1 week off, have 2 weeks off for Christmas holidays and Easter holidays, which by the way are called Easter holidays. Now they are off for the summer holidays and will return in September.
Anyway, what I wanted to blog about was my curious cat children and all that they did on the high street today. Ethan has not been allowed to ride his scooter through the town centers since an incident involving a metal sign where he, looking the other way ran full speed into the sign, knocking it over. So today, he walked and Tim walked for most of the way, though rode in the umbrella stroller for a bit of it. This isn't the wonderful stroller my sister gave me, which some how has broken, but another one that we bought second hand. Its much nicer for going into stores with very narrow aisles and grumpy elderly people who don't want you to be in the stores. First stop was FARA charity shop for furniture, and we asked about bunk beds...the chap said he'd sell one to me for a reasonable price and I decide to call Todd about it (of course forgot my mobile phone) and then you can imagine what two small children would do in a shop crammed with second hand furniture. We go to the card shop for a look, the kids see some balloons...and well, there's another shop to leave. Stop at the ATM and Ethan enjoys pressing a couple of the buttons. Cross the street to the butcher where I get my yummy free range eggs the same price as Tesco's eggs and some (ugh!) liver! But liver is good for me with all the iron, so I've taken to making it, though I can't stand it and only persuade my family to eat it by making a dessert on the same night. Next stop a browse in the pet store and a longing eye at the gerbils and hamsters and rabbits...Ethan plays with the rabbit cages that are on display. Come now, come now, COME NOW. Next stop post office and the kids want to touch the dividing strap, and they make the pens hang down, and off we mail grammies birthday card to the US. Lots of love in there Grammie, no peaking till your birthday. The boys put the cards and other mail in the red pillar post box, and dilly dally, hanging from the box. There is a man waiting behind us. "Do you think anyone else would like to use the post box today?" I ask, and we move on. A look in the charity shop for shirts and books for the kids, the kids obviously find things, but I don't , so its "not today, come now." A stop in an actual furniture store, produces a good bit of longing in me for a new bunk bed, but of course thats not very reasonable. The kids climb on the bed and on the way out Ethan punches every roll of carpet and climbs on a carpet on a trolley. "One more instance and you will have to hang on to the buggy" Then we are crossing the "Zebra Crossing" and Ethan is playing a hop scotch, jumping from stripe to stripe. The cars behind patiently waiting. And now I have a boy holding onto the buggy. We go to the News Agent to top up my Oyster Card for the coming week and Ethan watches the lottery advert and the Indian man who runs the story tries to talk to him and he says, "You're clever" and I think "right, clever!" He's staring at the simple video with his mouth open! Anyway, they manage to say bye, and he says "Bye darlings!" (all kids are called darlings, and sweetie and poppet here!) Finally we arrive home. Such were our adventures on the high street. And as far as I could tell, not one grumpy look from any elderly people, unless they did it as we passed, which may well be.

Picnic on the Green

Many times since we have moved here to the UK, we have enjoyed walking about 10 paces off the pavement (sidewalk for you yanks) and sitting down on the extremely short grass to enjoy a bite to eat and bit of relaxation in an open green. Today was even better because we were joined by several families and couples at our churches' picnic. We unfold our picnic blanket (which happens to have a foil side underneath, so as to warm the people sitting on top!) and spread out the plates and the packed lunch and enjoy conversing with the other families. The kids soon eat up their food and are up and about, playing football (which would be soccer, but of course we call it football), frisbee or just running around with swords and sticks. A game of cricket starts up, and I watch for a while trying to understand the gist of it. All I can gather is that its not baseball! The bat is flat with a sort of a bump in the middle, the person throwing the ball is attempting to get 3 wickets down behind the person with the bat. The person with the bat is trying to keep the person with the ball from knocking over the wickets. Sometimes people run, but I didn't understand why. My friend tells me she doesn't understand the game either (but everything I know is what she told me!) and she says this game can literally go on for days and days. Seems like a big commitment to me!

Someone comes round to offer me a chocolate candy, and I say, "No, no, I'm good." and she says, "That's an American expression. When someone says they are good, we would say you are referring to your behaviour" (I tried to spell it the British way, probably wrong though)

Then I say, "Well, no thanks, I am okay." She laughs. So I say, "How should I respond then?" She says, "No thank you, I have had enough or I am full." How very straight forward. Never really thought about that before.

So there was something nice about our gathering today. On any given day pleasant day, the green is filled with small groupings of individuals, but to have several gathering together was really wonderful. The weather cooperated and though the morning was cloudy and cool, the sun came out for a simply lovely afternoon! Other than a little sun burn our children survived with no injuries (though Tim almost chased a ball into the street--I am paranoid about kids running into the street since I a 4 yo chased a ball and was killed in our neighborhood in Annapolis), the fun flying disc Grammie sent last month had one of its fasteners pop off and though Todd and a friend and 2 boys searched and searched we couldn't find it. We only had tantrums at the end of the time when 2 tired boys decided they were still hungry and very thirsty and we had to take the bus home. Never enough energy for the journey back! After arriving home, Ethan asked for a fried egg as a snack.

By the way, these pictures are not from today, though from a sunday a few weeks ago. Since, then Ethan has had a haircut!