"It's better to be a lion for a day than a sheep all your life."

I love it when a toy inspires the boys to do something creative, which is what happened this week. The postman played his lovely tune on our letter box and me and Opeie rushed to the door excited. It was a package we have become quite accustomed to over the last 12 months and each package as exciting as the next, but this one a little more exciting as it was the final stage of this years Play patrol applicants. Opeie did what he does best and destroyed the outer packaging to get inside, 'Bigjigs' he shouted, he knows that packaging and logo better than anything.

Inside was the Wooden Safari Animal Building Blocks And Opeie's initial response put a huge smile on my face "ooooh... a Gilaffe". Opeie pronounces all his words so clearly but I can't bring myself to correct him with giraffe as it's so cute, I'm still gutted he no longer pronounces dinosaur 'Di Si Yur'.

So the 'Gilaffe' came out with all his friends and we built some lovely creations. The quality as always is exactly what you would expect from Bigjigstoys, the fact that they are made of soft wood means they are perfect for a long life with enthusiastic children. The colours and design are timeless and classic and one of the great things with them being wooden is that if you child moves on to the Bigjigs rail products you can have a zoo built along side the track, the toy can grow with your child's development.

As I said at the start of the post the Wooden Safari Animal Building Blocks Inspired Opeie to get his craft box out as he said he wanted to look like the lion. So our afternoon was than taken up by making Bigjigs inspired masks which was great as the toys had Also helped Opeie to be creative and use his imagination.

Good luck to all the other bloggers x

" speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues"

Slight panic this week, half an hour before heading out for Opeie's dance class, the theme was 'trees and flowers' and we hadn't had our usual craft session in preparation. So quickly I raided the craft draw looking for inspiration. Luckily the mention of the word 'trees' meant Opeie shouted out 'I am the Lorax I speak for the trees', it was all the inspiration I needed.

Not my finest of craft activities but with half an hour to complete, it didn't turn out to bad and most importantly it put a smile on Opeie's face.

"Oh i do like to be beside the seaside..."

Health wise its been a pretty bleak Easter holiday for us at Gifts from the Pirates, Seth kick started the holiday off with Tonsilitis, Both Myself and Mrs M had Bronchitis and then Opeie joined the Lurgy club with a bout of Chickenpox (or Chicken spots as he liked to call it). We managed to get out and do some things but there was a fair bit of time at home relaxing and trying to get back to health.

Today was the last day of the Easter holiday and that's really quite a depressing thought. We love having Seth off and now that Opeie is at Nursery too the holidays are even more important. yesterday we had planned to go to Legoland but the Metoffice informed us that there was going to be heavy rain in Windsor so we decided against the 3 hour drive just in case it was right. The boys had been talking all week about going to the beach so we checked the weather for Barmouth and surprisingly it said sunny and dry so we packed the car and headed out for some sun,sea and sand. 

about an hour in to the journey the sky turned grey and everything started to look a little grim, had we made a bad decision? Mrs M checked the Metoffice again, 30% chance of rain, She then decided to check Windsor again, dry and sunshine! yep that about sums us up. we ventured forth though adamant that there was fun to be had at the beach.

We stopped off at the supermarket just before hitting the beach because we were ill equipped for a picnic, changing our plans when we woke up threw a spanner in the works so by the time we arrived we were all hungry, it was cold and windy outside so we had a very cramped car picnic, needless to say the car is now in dire need of cleaning out. The boys couldn't wait to get their coats on and grab their nets, buckets and spades. Despite the cold and gloomy weather fishing in the rockpools and hunting for shells was loads of fun. The boys were really excitable which was great and they ran around on the sand with big smiles.

Mrs M donned her shades and wooley hat and although she doesnt like the cold at all she was relishing her time with us. The sunshine desperately tried to stay out and when it did show its face it warmed up nicely but the whole time we were playing on the beach we could see the rain heading our way. After splashing in rock pools, digging a trench and looking for crabs we headed back to the car to venture to the other end of the island. Opeie decided that this was a perfect opportunity to have a sleep and as Mrs M was feeling shattered too so she stayed in the car for a bit while me and Seth went searching for adventure.

The weather was taking a turn for the worse and we knew we wouldnt have long before the rain came thrashing down. Seth decided he wanted to do the thing he loves doing most at the beach and that was dig a nice deep hole...

...and of course, climb inside it!

As expected though the sky turned grey and the light showers turned into a heavy downpour so we headed back to the car, with Seth though there is no such thing as heading straight for your destination so on the way back we had to climb up some pretty high sand dunes and then throw ourselves down them.

 It was a pretty amazing afternoon at the beach and although id have loved a visit to Legoland I'm glad we ended up where we did. Its so nice to have us all back to (almost) full health, its just a shame that it happened towards the end of the holiday.  Time to count down to half term now.

"Cunning... is but the low mimic of wisdom."

This week i heard the postman walking up the path and the sound of a Graze box hitting the floor, We have a few delivered throughout the month as the boys love them and they are something a little more interesting for them to munch on. This weeks box though did more than fill a void between meals. I opened the box and instantly, all the inspiration i needed for our next Fox hunting blog post.

As with all the other Foxy posts weve been collecting pictures of the foxes we find for the last month or so and they seem to pop up all over the place.

At a recent trip to our friend Chris', the word 'Fox' was even used in a game of Scrabble...

Charity shops have been a great resource on this fox hunt with Fox related books and cuddly toys popping up regulary. We brought a great book from a charity shop a few weeks back and inside was a fox on a skateboard, very fitting i thought.

On another trip to our friend Chris' house we popped into a cute little fabric shop, Mrs M being the textile enthusiast did a little shopping for ric rak and other fun bits and i investigated with the boys and we found this lovely fox fabric.

And as we rounded the corner after leaving we spotted a window display with Fox hooks and fox book ends. I wonder what our house would look like if i brought all these fox items we find.

On the day that me and Opeie went out adventuring and wrote our Gruffalo post, Opeie spotted these foxes in the gardening section and shouted 'Fox' really loud when he saw them.

Ive walked past this building loads of times but it wasn't till a week or so ago that i realised that our local services company had a fox for their logo, there's no escaping our sly friend.

While making a bee line for the Lego at the toy shop, Seth spotted Mr Todd staring back at us and shouted 'Fox'. Every time i hear the shout it makes me chuckle that our family fox hunt has become such a big thing, but i love that we have these little personal games that keep us entertained.

Mrs M is a stationary geek so while we were in Paperchase buying some fun bits for Mrs M's mothers day gifts i again heard that load shout from up on my shoulders 'Fox', I'm sure people think were mad but i love it, maybe we are a touch crazy.

And last but not least a wheelie bin, It was actually the first fox we found after our last fox post but as its so glamorous i thought i would leave it till last for you all to enjoy.

Well that was the last until we just had a busy foxy two weeks, so here's the update:

Our recent trip to London secured us four fox sightings at the Museum of childhood...

...and a very cute fox card off Mrs M.

I hate being stuck in traffic but last week it worked out to our advantage when a Fox pulled up along side us. Its these chance sightings that really make this game fun.

I imagine Opeie to end up like that little boy from You've got mail "can you spell cat?" "F..O..X!". While Seth was at one of his medical appointments a couple of weeks back, me and Opeie went adventuring and found our biggest Fox to date...

Fox on a beer bottle a second helping from those fox lovers at graze box and that definitely brings us to the end of what i think is our 5th fox hunt, were getting quite good at this. Until next time you sly lot.