camp out

i got a £100 tent for £30 so when we next go camping we are well equipped

not realising how huge it is!

we decided to try it out by camping in the garden and it has been so much cooler than sleeping indoors...

ellie decided to put her tent on the trampoline (no where else to put it and it saved a mattress!)

disney caramel apples

lottie saw these made in disneyland on a youtube video and wanted to make her own

take 3 granny smith apples and push a stick into each, melt a bag of dairy toffees and coat each apple with the melted yumminess, leave to set (which in this weather is in the fridge), just before they have set, put a marshmallow on each side near the stick (these are for mickey's ears)...if you put the marshmallows on straight after you have coated the apples in toffee, they will just slide right to the bottom! once set, melt milk chocolate and coat the apples, leave to set. once set melt white chocolate and add red food colour, coat only the bottom third of the apples and sprinkle red edible glitter onto this chocolate (this makes mickey's shorts), put 2 little white sugar balls for his buttons and there you have "Mickey Mouse Caramel Apples"

poppyville

we saw this riot of red from our house so i said to ellie "let's go explore that before they all fade"

we were already halfway there after work, so whilst still in uniforms, we plodded up the hill

finally we reached the top

the view just kept getting better

then we found the field we wanted to frolic in

presenting South Heighton's beautiful display of nature

my favourite photo

my not-so-favourite photo

ellie having a moment 

i even caught a bee mid-flight!

slip'n'slide

get a giant plastic sheet (b&q £7.48), add water, bubble bath, children and a beautiful sunny day

and you get slip'n'slide!

kept them happy

cleaned them

such fun!

summer birthday

lottie has decided to revert to the method of celebrating her birthday in the summer as she is fed up with her birthday the week before xmas....we used to do this when she was little as she never played with anything and we worked out it was because she got everything in a one week period (sensory overload!)

so we made her a devils food cake bottom layer, fudge brownie top layer, chocolate ganache icing, home-made sugarpaste roses and sliced strawberries

just the one candle so as not to spoil the beauty of the cake

make a wish!

july 4th

we had fat burgers with plastic cheese slices, skinny fries and corn on the cob, washed down with full-fat coke then to follow 'mom's apple pie' with squirty cream

have some pie with your cream ellie

(i had to stab her with my spoon to stop her from squirting even more into her bowl)

australia

got this in a charity shop for £1

aside from 3 missing pieces, it made this

there were these to add

into these spaces

so we used an atlas to find where these place names went

we also found this little fact in lottie's raspberry bear yo-yo