Spy Kit

Sometimes the simple things in life are the best. After watching a James Bond film recently, Sam took the urge to create his own spy's briefcase.

We duly headed off next day to Hunstanton car boot sale, and bought a briefcase for £2. Sam's played with his spy kit ever since.

He's called Double Oh Three And A Half.

Liverpool

After the kuk sool won championships we visited Albert Dock in Liverpool. Yes, this is the Mersey, and across it, that's a ferry.

Albert Dock is rather more commercial than I'd expected, but the Merseyside Maritime Museum was good fun.

Fortunately this foghorn is de-commissioned.

We took a ride on the Liverpool Wheel, a smaller-scale version of the London Eye.

The view from the top was fabulous though. It's quite expensive but worth the money.

Sam was awestruck.

After the very long drive home Sam was a very tired, very happy young man. And he wore his medal to bed.

Remembrance Day In Swaffham

This year Sam and Dad attended the Remembrance parade in Swaffham.


It was the day after we watched the Lord Mayor's Show in London, and the two parades could not have been more different. In Swaffham the town band led servicemen, veterans, cadets and emergency services to the war memorial on the market place.


The two minutes silence was observed respectfully, and Sam stood at attention throughout.



In a reference to Dad's Army, and in particular to Jonesey's saluting lesson for the platoon, Sam's only comment afterwards was "She gave it a little wiggle."

Walking At Sandringham

At the start of autumn we went orienteering in the woods at Sandringham. We have the O map thanks to a friend in the Uniformed Services faculty at college, so I picked eight points for us to find and off we went.

We did enjoy the map-reading, but for me the afternoon turned into a nature walk, marvelling at the fabulous forestry.

Sam believed that this tree was probably a teleporter to another world. It didn't whisk him away though, thankfully.

Sandringham's a beautiful place. Mind you, the Queen's garden isn't going to have an old washing machine and a dismantled motorbike in it, is it?

If you follow in our footsteps we recommend the muffins in the cafe. Delicious!

Kuk Sool Won UK Championship 2010

Sam is the UK's silver medallist for his belt and age group!

We journeyed up to Liverpool on Friday night, ready for the competition on Saturday. Sam was putting on a brave face but actually was terrified. But when we got to the venue, he seemed utterly unconcerned!

Sam was due in Ring Two at ten o'clock. We waited ringside from ten to ten. The judges didn't appear for another hour, during which Sam was incredibly patient, polite, well-behaved and utterly cool. The picture above is an unusual view of my fantastic, handsome son.

Here you can see Sam in the terror zone, just before the contest. He looks scared. He was scared. When they were called forward the assembled parents all had last words with their children. "Remember, low stances!" "Thumbs up when you do number five!" "Loud kee-yups!"

As Sam dipped into the arena I told him "Have fun, do your best!"

We'd already talked about the whole tournament experience. Sam was a little worried about having to do routines in front of people he didn't know. We had agreed that it was Most Excellent to be taking part in a UK Championship in a sport at the age of seven, which Dad didn't achieve until he was twenty (UK cross country championship if you're curious). We'd high-fived over the fact that Most people will Never take part in any UK Championship, and we both had (or were about to).

Here you can see Sam telling the judges who he was, and what he would be doing. To my utter amazement, in the Techniques class, Sam decided On The Mat which three techniques out of fifteen he would be demonstrating. I was gobsmacked when I found out. It obviously worked as he won a silver.

This picture shows Sam just about to start his Techniques. Jesus H, he's got his "game face" on hasn't he! He was a determined little bundle of energy in Liverpool and reaped a just reward.

Sam is the second best seven-year-old in Britain.

School Cross Country

A soaking wet morning in The Walks saw Sam taking part in his school intger-house cross country. Despite the teachers' efforts to make sports day sanitised and uncompetitive, they can't stop the cross country race being a....well...a race.

And they were OFF!

Sam finished in a rather good seventh place, considering that his race included the year above his own as well. That result meant that Sam was picked to represent the school at the King's Lynn championship, to be run at Lynnsport. Well done young man!

Lord Mayor's Show III

The new Lord Mayor - Mayor Bear(!) - trundled by in a golden carriage. Nice wheels!

A platoon of pikemen followed close behind. In days gone by there would have been up to four thousand of them!

The Household Cavalry Mounted Band and Escort look as splendid in real life as they do on the telly.

Only in England. They make a fine sight.

The parade wound its way past us, along St Paul's Churchyard, and down Ludgate.

There were many teddy bears in the parade, to honour....Mayor Bear.....and Sam snapped this chap atop one of the vehicles in the AA display.

Lord Mayor's Show II

One thing that we can do well in England is to put on a spiffing show of pomp and pageantry. In the picture above(please click on to enlarge, I've cropped a lot of these pics to remove the backs of people's heads, Sam picking his nose, etc) you can see the Band of the Grenadier Guards, formed in 1685, just as they are about to pass (on the opposite kerbside) a pack of Beaver Scouts from King's Lynn, containing many of Sam's friends! That wasn't the 0nly surprising meeting of the day, we also bumped into Sam's Grandma and Grandad outside King's Cross station.


Not to mention Martin Jarvis and Denise Robertson - one a famous actor, the other a national treasure, the againy aunt on This Morning. Sam was initially fascinated, then embarrassed, as his mates in the Cubs kept shouting at him, and not the "celebs"

Closer view of that rowdy lot from King's Lynn.

Toot Toot!

The parade was a really enjoyable mixture of modern elements and the very, very old, with the City of London Militia above being part of the Old, of course.

Brave Sir Robin didn't run away, even when we cheered at him.

Sam was excited to see the Cadet Force band march by, he's quite keen on joining them himself one day.

So, what HAVE the Romans ever done for us?

I loved this old, beautiful Royal Mail lorry. Fantastic!

Lord Mayor's Show I

Sam snapped in the act of snapping St Paul's.


We've watched the Lord Mayor's Show on the telly each November for several years, and last year we decided that this year we'd visit. So we did! We got hold of grandstand tickets to make sure we had a great view, and got up in the middle of the night to take the early train to the capital.

The grandstands are right next to St Paul's cathedral. And I mean right next to it. When we'd arrived via the Tube Sam wanted to pose next to a sweet little garden. Who am I to argue?

This photo shows the proximity of our seats to the cathedral.

A quick self-portrait proves that Dad is indeed the devil. No wonder Sam's looking so smug.

The journey is all part of the fun of course. Sam loves the escalators on the underground.

Jumping ahead a bit, after the parade we ventured across the Millenium Bridge. Sadly it wasn't bouncing around as advertised, but it was very busy. This is from the south bank, obv.

Scalextric Meets Dukes Of Hazzard

See the ramp! See the cars! See how the cars fly from the ramp!



Thanks to James May we know that you don't need a continuous track for your Scalextric cars to work. Don't ask me how, you just don't. Which inevitably led us to experimentation with long straight tracks....and jumping....


Sam set up a pits area at one end of the hallway. We set the track up along the hallway floor. And hoisted the end of the track up to make a jump. A big jump. With a Health & Safety "Cars" duvet as a landing area, natch.

Oh what fun! The cars roared and whined then flew. Then crash landed. All perfectly safely. Great fun.

Did I say "all" safely. I meant "nearly all" safely. Ooops.

Don't worry though, with ten minutes TLC and a Phillips screwdriver, Sam's blue Mini was back in working order once more.

Orienteering In The Park

I'd been looking around for a suitable orienteering race for us to take part in for quite a while - so to hear that there was one happening in The Walks was very cool, if not a little spooky. So off we went.



Sam likes maps, and is becoming quite good at using a road atlas. A sport that combines maps with charging round the great outdoors has got to be a winner. Norfolk Orienteering Club organised a "Try Orienteering" event that sounded just the job.

We chose to do an "orange" course, which is very easy but a decent length, and Sam loved the whole thing. We found 20 of the 21 map references (known as controls), and the 21st had been stolen from its tree, and although worn out by the end, the little star had a great time and has asked when we're going orienteering again.

Sam finished fourth on the Orange course in a time of 33:52.

You can find the full results here: Walks-Result

And Norfolk Orienterring Club live here: Norfolk_Orienteers