I love half term and this has been a great week, brimming with sunshine, family and days out.  There’s been, by coincidence rather than deliberate, a military theme to our days out, we visited the Fleet Air Museum in Yeovil where the highlight was an original Concorde which you could go in and imagine yourself as a jet setter of the 70s and 80s and today we’ve been at the Historic Dock Yard in Portsmouth visiting the Mary Rose, HMS Victory, a submarine and so much more.  I hope to write up a post but both are really worth a trip.  In between our days out we also managed a couple of visits to the beach and my first sea swim of the year

I have read a number of Andy Cope books for professional reasons (he writes a series on how to be A Brilliant Teacher/NQT/Middle Leader)  He is an amusing and engaging writer so I was keen to read his latest book on emotional intelligence written with Amy Bradley.  Its a very easy, witty and thoughtful read.  Andy is a brilliant follow on Twitter @beingbrilliant giving a little positivity with a touch of realism.

On Wednesday evening I did not watch the political leaders debate on television but our constituency hustings in a local church hall.   I studied politics at university and still am a bit of a political geek.  Whilst I am disillusioned by our political system at present and the effect of the media in trying to caricature our politicians and polarise opinion, our local election hustings is the highlight of the campaign.  It is always so well attended by a true cross section of our town and allows a respectful, informed discussion of the important issues locally and nationally.  This year we have the conservative, labour, liberal democrats and green parties contesting the seat and all candidates attended the meeting.  For me the candidate who stood out the most was the green party candidate, he was superb, passionate about the NHS, education, housing all such key issues.  The candidates all agreed that there were certain issues that should not be partisan but need a collaborative approach if only that attitude could be repeated at Westminster.

With trips out I’ve been making lots of picnics this week, rolls, salads, dips etc.. I’ve also been making fruity puddings, lots of soft fruits are in season ( and on offer) and our first home grown strawberries are ready.  Our family favourite is Eton Mess and I’ve made it this week with two willing helpers.

Whilst its not my make, we’ve stayed at my mum’s this week and she has made Little Miss a beautiful skirt and me and Little Miss matching shorts!  She’s taking dress making classes and we are reaping the rewards.

Shorts and t-shirts – yeah!

With visits to two military museums, I’ve been hearing and learning a lot about military history this week.  I think the submarine presentation was the most memorable with some really interesting facts and some quite gross toilet stories.  To access the submarine museum you have to make a short boat trip,where the skipper and his mate were so funny with their observations of Portsmouth.

So now we are approaching the maddest half term of them all, school trips, club trips, sports day, special events and family celebrations, organisation is key but this is always my favourite time of the year and I’m looking forward to the madness.

Thank you to Morgana and all her contributors for their #littleloves