Tommy Cooper (and a few pix)

There's going to be a talent show at the local middle school and Jack really wants to enter. Auditions take place at his elementary school in the next couple of weeks and he's asked me and Craig to help. He wants to be a magician. Seeing as he's never shown the slightest interest in magic I nearly said "why don't you dance?" but thankfully clamped my mouth shut because I know that in the vital moment he would not do it. I've been to too many group kid things where the teacher has said "let's dance!" and he's sat down on my knee and grabbed hold of my neck with the grip of death. So magician then. I'm thinking we could make it funny (if Jack will let me). What about a bit of Tommy Cooper? I used to love Tommy Cooper and because of this blog post I just sat for 30 minutes and watched his videos on You Tube again and laughed as hard as I did 20 years ago. If I sat and watched this at the audition I'd laugh my arse off but then I'm 43 and Jack's 5 and may not appreciate my humour huh?

I also want to post a few pictures of our weekend for F&F in England, as usual....

Took the kids to Franklin Park Conservatory to see the plants and butterflies. Lesson learned: do not take kids again until both of them are at least 8. I felt hard-done-to as well as I would have loved to have enjoyed the plants. Little monkeys.

A trip to the vets on Friday confirmed that Cody's cancer is not getting any worse so that's good news, hey. The vet wants us to do a biopsy of the tumour to determine what kind of cancer it is though. We are worried about all the costs involved but having a major guilt trip about not doing everything we can to help him. It is NOT a good situation to be in but we have a week or so to decide since he's doing so well. Any advice peeps?

We also talked to the vet about Ben who is a darling boy but frantic when we leave. He's manic in his crate, hurting himself and trying to gnaw his way out (I have to wash his bed each time as his crate is swimming in slobber and hair). He also barks the entire time we are gone. I can't leave him out as he chews everything and even ate my lovely Nautica couch throw while we were still in the house - Jack was sat next to him! SO, the vet put him on Prozac. I have a dog on Prozac for Gods sake.

Saturday 7.00 am: We had friends over for breakfast to watch the EFC v LFC game. Sadly, EFC lost but we had a great time and I had bought English breakfast food from Fados Irish bar so we had: black pudding, Irish bacon, bangers, mushrooms, Heinz beans, toast and scrambled eggs. Champion! At 11 am we had Jack's first soccer game and it rained throughout!

Same day at 1 pm: 4th birthday party for the little fella on the left. His mum is English, from Oxford, and in need of some friends right now so hopefully we can help out a bit.

Later at 6pm we had dinner with friends. By the time I got home on Saturday I felt very contented (we have such good friends here) but absolutely knackered!

Sunday, in the garden. Danny loves his bobble hat.

Jack loves his knight's castle.

In what is becoming a weekly (and much loved) tradition, we took the dogs to the local creek and the boys had a great time mucking about in the water. They saw snakes and filled their wellies with water and threw rocks. Usual boy stuff.