centre – Mediocre Mum

Boat for Hire

My hubby’s been itching to get Madame on the water. He definitely has a love of the sea; he used to do a lot of scuba diving, sailing and windsurfing. Unfortunately, a lot has changed in the last 20 years in relation to health and safety. So, it’s no longer a matter of popping down to a local sailing club and renting a dingy. You now have to have formal qualifications, level 2, which requires a couple of weekends and a few hundred pounds.

So, as a cheap and quick alternative we opted to go to the Lee Valley Boat Centre and hire an electric boat.

It was brilliant and the weather was perfect. I’d highly recommend it but do avoid the pub across the canal afterwards, which was responsible for probably one of the worst roast lunches I’ve ever had. The sign on the door should have been a dead give-away ‘shirts must be warn at all times’ and no word of a lie, the grannies had tattooes!

I always thought Broxbourne was in Herts and not Essex??? ;-)

Sledging in April at the Snow Centre, Hemel

It appears that my 3.5 year old daughter has absolutely no concept of fear. People often comment how great it is but I’m not convinced. It’s a bloody miracle that we haven’t been to A & E yet! She runs up to random dogs, has been skiing, quad biking with her dad in Canada, tubing behind a speed boat and has held a rather large snake. The only thing I’ve ever seen her balk at is spiders, but I think she gets this from her father.

In the video, you’ll see her hurling herself down the Cresta Run at the Snow Centre in Hemel on a Ringo. As she was not quite four, I had to give special permission for her to go. I did a quick mum health and safety check, which usually involves me asking myself ‘will she be killed or seriously maimed’ and the answer to that was a resounding ‘no’ as it was perfectly safe.

I only had to go down with her once and then she insisted on doing it by herself as she was a ‘big girl’. If they would’ve let her, I’m sure she would’ve went down on a Zipfy (5+) or a Airboard (16+) and too be honest I probably would’ve let her.

I don’t want a clingy nervous child but somewhere in the middle would be great.

Thanks to everyone at the Snow Centre, Chris Bennett from F!nn Communications Ltd and Fabiola Franco from Arena Quantum for a great day out!

What is Truck Art?

It’s no secret that I’m a huge fan of the Stockwood Discovery Centre in Luton. As I’ve said in previous posts each time I go I find something new. We were invited to the opening of the Truck Art Exhibit a few weeks back and now that I’ve seen the finished product, I really wish I could have gone to see a group of young people transform a Bedford truck into this!

Truly beautiful!

Truck Design Inspiration From Pakistan, Luton Museums on Flickr

The Truck is on display until the 29^th of May. It’s really worth a visit.

Ophidiophobia – Fear of Snakes

I’m absolutely terrified of snakes, well any reptiles really. So much so, that I won’t go into pet stores unless someone goes in first to check, when I was in primary school boys used to throw national geographic on my desk with pictures of snakes and once I took my 8 year old niece walking in the woods, we came across a snake, I ran away leaving her behind.

Subsequently, when I took Madame to a Creepy Crawly exhibit yesterday at the Stockwood Science Discovery Centre in Luton I was horrified to learn, just as we were about to enter that it wasn’t just a spider exhibit but in fact reptiles. I nearly bolted and a mate offered to take Madame in for me. I don’t want her to develop irrational fears like this so I took a deep breath and went in with her. My heart was racing and I scanned the room for the nearest escape route. The folks at the exhibit were brilliant and as you can tell by the pictures Madame didn’t pick up on my fear! However, you will notice that I’m not in the photos as I was quivering in the corner!

Photos Courtesy of @zooarchaeologis

Performing Stories

Went to Story Tent put on by the Local Performing Arts Centre with my daughter yesterday morning. It’s absolutely brilliant. I’m assuming the lady who tells the story is an actor, as she orated it magnificently, not a book to be found. Then the children get the glue, scissors and paper out and create props for the story. They finish by acting the story out together. This week the story was Little Cock Feather Frock, one I’d never heard before. I did try to google it but it wasn’t one of my better ideas!

I really hope they aren’t affected by the governmental cut backs. It would be sad to see these type of things disappear.