Aaron's Blog

Last Friday at Beavers, Aaron spent the time our in the local woods poo hunting. The weather was wet and horrible so he went in his waterproofs, but he had a great time. He said that they found Badger and Fox poo and because of this, he got his Poo Detective badge! He was very proud! He also has Bobby The Beaver (the mascot) for the week whereby he has to take him places and take photos so he can put in a booklet. He was very happy he got Bobby as well! 😉

Poo Detective

Aaron has now joined Beavers! 

He has had a couple of free taster sessions and has loved every minute of them! We have just paid for the membership and almost bought him his uniform so he is now almost a fully fledged Beaver! 😉

He has already been involved in cooking sausages on a BBQ, building things and this week they will be going out into the woods to build camps and other outdoor things, so he can’t wait! He will also have activities taking place over weekends where they go off to the local Scout Leaders Hut and in the woods nearby and do circus skills, make bug hotels and make camps, etc. It sounds really good and Coby has already said he wants to go as well when he is older! haha

Several of his best friends go as well, so he knows enough people there to make him feel comfortable with going and it takes place just up the road at the Woolwell Scout Hut for an hour and a half, so is nice and close, even though it means we can’t relax on a Friday evening again until he gets home. Hopefully Aaron will keep it up though as it seems really good!

Over the August Bank Holiday weekend, we camped at Diggerland in Devon for the 3 nights. We couldn’t have picked a better weekend weather-wise either, as it was roasting throughout though not quite as hot as when we camped at Monkey Tree. We all had a great time and enjoyed every minute.

When we first arrived on the Friday evening, the electricity wasn’t working for some reason, so we were worried that all our food was going to go off. Luckily though, it seemed to turn itself on after about half an hour of the cable being plugged in, so we were quite relieved.  We got the tent up quite easily between us whilst the boys were already making friends with some of the other children who were camping or caravaning as well. It was great really, as we could keep an eye on them but not worry about them as they were happy playing. Whilst we were putting the tent up, the Red Arrows flew over as well, so that was an unexpected treat!

On the Saturday, we had tickets to go into Diggerland for the day. It was another hot day and we were sweating! Diggerland was good fun and it was actually quite quiet, so we didn’t really have to queue for very long on any of the rides. We all had lots of goes on various diggers – Kelly, Ben and Aaron even had a go at driving a full size digger around a dirt track – and had great fun. We had bought dinner from the cafe there (burger and chips) which was nice enough and stayed until closing time. Unfortunately, as the day went on, Coby got more and more teasy as he had a late night the night before and it was so hot, so he was shouting and crying a lot. Just before we left, we went in the shop as Gramps had given the boys some money to spend, so they all bought something each, so were happy with that. We had all had a nice time and were quite surprised that we spent the entire day there as it wasn’t really a very big place but, as there were no queues, we were happy to go on the rides multiple times.

We then walked back over to the campsite (which was just beside the main car park) and cooked up some food to eat. The rest of the evening was spent relaxing at the tent whilst the boys played with the other children again.

On Sunday, we didn’t really have anything planned, but it turned out to the hottest day of the weekend, so we decided to go for a ride to see if we could get a small, cheap paddling pool for the boys. We weren’t able to find one anywhere, but we did end up in Taunton at the Grand Western Canal and had a lovely walk along it.  We didn’t know this was there but will definitely visit it again properly. Whilst walking along, a barge came along that was being pulled by a big Shire Horse as apparently this is the only canal where horses still pull the boats along. It was very interesting and the boys loved seeing the massive horse! We also had an ice cream by the canal and it was just beautiful really.

We eventually made our way back to camp and relaxed for the afternoon. A lot of the people on site had left for the day so it was very quiet for us, which was great! I had a game of football with the boys and they played with some water guns that they had bought earlier that day, so the day ended up passing quite quickly. We had some nice food again for tea, cooked on our gas BBQ, and relaxed for the evening. The boys were again playing with their new friends by this time and stayed up playing until nearly 9:30pm (the same as he last two nights!). It was the best evening of the weekend to see the stars but it was much colder as it was a clear sky.

On the Monday, we had to pack up and leave the site by 12pm, so we got up and had some food and then started putting away our camping gear and tent into the car. It was absolutely roasting again so Kelly and I were both sweating buckets doing it! We managed to get it all packed again a little after 12pm, but we didn’t really rush it (due to the heat!). A lot of the other visitors on the site had left by now apart from a family that the boys had made good friends with, so they were happy playing with them until it was time to go.

We had all had a lovely weekend and had some good fun.  Again, we were very lucky with the weather, although it was too hot really in the sun! The facilities were quite limited and basic but it was only a cheap camp site and perfectly fine for what we needed, so we will probably go back again at some point next year. 😉

During the holidays, we went up to Paignton on a Saturday as there was a Sci-Fi show on the green by the sea. It was brilliant but very busy! The traffic to get into Paignton was ridiculous and we were very lucky to get into the car park. By the time we had parked and walked down to the road, there was a massive queue trying to get in! The show was heaving with people as well, and there was also a fair and circus there. We all had great fun looking around the few tents full of Sci-Fi stuff (even Kelly enjoyed it!), looking at the cars such as various Batmobiles, Lightning McQueen, Transformer Barricade, Tow Mater and the DeLorean from Back to the Future, but the best part was getting pictures with various people dressed up as characters from various movies and shows. We managed to get lots of pictures of us with characters such as The Predator, Captain America, Spider-Man, Deadpool, Boba Fett, Storm Troopers, Captain Jack Sparrow, etc. The boys (and myself) were very excited with it all! heehee. We had a great time and will definitely be attending again next year!

A couple of weeks ago, just before School started again, Kelly took all of the boys to a Plymouth Argyle open training session, along with some of their friends and parents.  They got to see the players training and they all wore their football kits. The information said that the children would be allowed to take part in penalty shoot outs and other games but, for some reason, this didn’t happen, which was a shame. But they did enjoy the couple of hours that they were there.