Bridging the Gap

I had been thinking, since January when Marley was still in nursery, the end of August would be tricky. Marley would have finished nursery but there would be a couple of weeks before he started his first full day at school. Having months to mull it over was awesome, he would do a day with one set of grandparents another day with another set, a scattering of transitional half days at school, a few days with me and we would also have a few days as a whole family sprinkled in. Perfect!

The first week I had booked off from work, so there was less juggling in terms of work/child care.

I attached the bike trailer to my bike and Marley and I set off on an adventure along the seafront. We cycled from our house, all the way along the seafront cycle path, to Spice Island. Cycling is such a good way to take in the fresh sea air and all the amazing scenery. It's faster and easier on the legs than walking that distance, so we could stop and look at so much stuff along the way. Once we got to Spice Island, we got some chips and a beer/apple juice and sat and watched the boats and ships. We then rode down to the beach in front of the hot walls and had a doughnut 🍩. Marley loved it. He felt so special to have some one on one time with Daddy and I loved it too. We had so many random conversations while riding that we probably wouldn't have had if we were just sat at home. This was only the second time that we had used the bike trailer and it was clear that this was going to be an exciting activity for us to do together regularly.

Marley had an afternoon session at school so I thought that we should do something for the morning. Marley was still buzzing from the bike ride the day before so I reattached the bike trailer and we took a short ride down to Southsea Beach Cafe and grabbed a coffee and a bacon sandwich and ate it on the beach. We had a play in the sea and rode home in time for lunch.

We met Marley's teacher, Miss Younger, at his new school. Kez, Marley and I all went along for the 30 minute session. All of us were excited to see it from the inside. Due to lockdown restrictions, we were unable to see the school other than virtually, so this was the first time. So much outdoor space and plenty of toys to use in it, Marley was over the moon and was eager to start his first day, but he would have to wait another week for that.

We were heading to London that evening, hoping the boys would be asleep when we go there. So we picked Louis up from Nursery and went to the bandstand and ate fish and chips, while watching the ships roll in 🚢.

Wednesday morning we woke up full of excitment. Firstly we were at Grandad & Lucy's house and secondly we were going to visit the Natural History Museum. Marley was super excited to see all the dinosaurs and Louis was just excited to be somewhere new. After breakfast, Marley had a ukelele lesson with Pete and Louis watched from the best seat in the house... his highchair!. Louis absolutley loved watching them play, he was dancing along while eating a bowl of blueberrys and strawberys and the most delicious peaches ever, which Lucy had got in especially🍑.

Once we were all ready we walked down to the bus stop and got on a double decker bus, which is such good fun with the kids. We got a seat right at the front on the top floor, so we could see all the sites and goings on around the busy streets of London. Both Louis and Marley were in their element. Marleys favourite bit was when we drove past the construction site where the HS2 work was going on.

We made it to the Natural History Museum, which was awesome for all of us. Being greeted by the huge skeleton of a blue whale as we walked in was incredible. All of us, kids and adults were in awe and probably the most silence I had experienced since the middle of the night when we were all fast asleep.

There was so much to see and do in there for all ages. I could have gone back on my own, every day for a week and still not had my fix. Marley particularly enjoyed seeing all of the dinosaurs, even though the big tyranosaurus rex at the end was a bit too real for him. And of course we had to get him something in the gift shop 🙄.

Louis loved seeing all the huge birds, and made sure that he went to each one in each case and called it "Duck" 🦆. It was really cool to let Louis just wander arround too. The architecture of the old part of the museum is really cool and spacious. Louis loved just walking about and exploring.