Tag: out

Butterfly World

If you haven’t been to Butterfly World, near St. Albans, in awhile you may be surprised at some of the improvements.  When it first opened it was a bit of a disaster; very overpriced, including the café and it was pretty much a building site.

It was nice to see all the improvements yesterday, they’ve obviously listened.  The gardens are in full bloom and are absolutely stunning.  Madame and her pals had a whale of a time climbing on, over and through all of the sculptures.  If you go, do seek out the playground, it’s a bit tucked away behind the café.  My photos don’t do it justice.

To save a few pennies you could take a picnic as there is a dedicated picnic area.  I wasn’t organised enough so purchased lunch for us and it wasn’t too expensive (£7).

Do bear in mind though that it is still a work in progress and the large dome isn’t finished yet.

I’d love to know what you think.

If you’re struggling for ideas of what to do with your kids this summer these posts may also be of interest.

Kite Flying Dunstable Downs

Free things to do with kids near St Albans

Havilland Mosquito Museum

 

 

 

Win tickets to a Kid’s Festival in August!

Thanks to the lovely people at Lollibop I have a family ticket (4 people) to give away on the blog (value £80) for the Festival on the 5th, 6th and 7th of August in Regents Park.  We’re gutted we can’t go as we will be at a family reunion in Canada but it looks like a great day out.  We had a sneak preview last month.   It’s a mini Glastonbury for kids!

If that doesn’t tempt you, here is a video.

 

As always I like to make my competitions as simple as possible.

1.) To enter all you need to do is reply in the comments section of this post describing your child/children in one word.  For example my daughter is ‘insane’.

2.) The competition will close, Sunday the 10th of July at 6 pm.

3.) This is a UK based competition.

4.) The winner will be chosen randomly.

5.)    Please leave me some way of identifying you whether it’s your Twitter Username or use a valid email when commenting.

If you don’t manage to win, there is a discount code in the side bar of this blog.

Good luck and thank you for entering!

Congratulations to Joe who has won the family ticket.  Please do get in touch so that I can arrange the tickets for you.

I used Random.org to choose the winner.  As you will see it came up with 35, so I then counted and recounted, to double check, that in fact it was the 35th comment on the post.  Thanks everyone for taking part!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dinosaur Days!

We accidently had a Dinosaur themed weekend.  Someone recently suggested ‘theme-ing’ your week with your kids (e.g under the water, at the Zoo, etc.).  However, to be honest I thought it sounded a bit wanky and far too organised for me.  Nonetheless, in this case it worked out well.

Last week a friend recommended Knebworth House and said it had a fantastic Dinosaur Trail.  So, Saturday morning I decided that’s what we would do.  I sat Madame on my lap and showed her all the pictures of the dinosaurs and the adventure playground.  She was very excited, until I flipped to the opening times and realised it closed in September.  Doh!

Quick change of plans, with a bit of gentle persuasion I convinced hubby, who is a London Commuter, to go to the Natural History Museum in London.  It was brilliant!  As it was a Saturday we drove in, no congestion charge on weekends, we have a diesel, parking was only a tenner and the museum is free!  Madame’s highlight was the robotic T-Rex.  She also liked these guys.  They reminded me of @chickenruby and me.

She was fascinated by the blood around their mouths and reckoned they needed some baby wipes!

Then, today, thanks to @zooarcheologis, we went to the local museum where they had a Dinosaur Day. Madame made a miniature dinosaur and giant wellie boot dinosaur foot prints.  I wasn’t there, so I’m hoping Claire jumps in and tells us how they’re made.  I think they look fab, even though they do look a bit phallic (rotate footprint 90 degrees clockwise)????

All in all a great weekend!

No Running Please!

Whoops!

We went to Bekonscot Model Railway Village this morning in Beaconsfield, Bucks.  It’s a bit expensive as we could only stay for half a day (£8.50 per adult and £5 for children over 2).  But if you went for a whole day and took a picnic it would be worth it.  However, you can get a voucher from Lets Go with the Children that will get one child in for free for every paying adult.  I had troubles printing the voucher but just printed the website and it was fine.  As you can see by the slideshow below Madame really enjoyed it and so did her dad!

A Great Day Out! RAF Museum Hendon

I’m always looking for inexpensive family days out (in Herts or North London Area), not that we can’t afford it but I object to paying and arm and a leg to spend quality time with my daughter. @annieqpr one of my twitter mates recommended the RAF Museum in Hendon.

Earlier this week my daughter asked to go to an airport and I duped her by taking her to the local outlet centre which looks like an airport.  I think you’ll agree from the photo.  She had a great time running around but I don’t think the ride-on airplane fooled her. So I thought it was only fair to make more of an effort!

We had a great morning at the museum and it was all free, including the parking!  I’m not a plane enthusiast but my husband is a real anorak.  His father serviced planes during the war, which I attribute to this fascination. I’ve also been told that it’s a bloke thing.  I learned the date they painted black and white stripes on the bottom of planes, the equivalents to German planes and the process of recovery planes from lakes in Europe.

I really didn’t mind though because Madame absolutely loved it.  She just ran around shouting plane, plane, plane!  There’s also an interactive section for kids…she’s a bit young to get a lot out of it, but she did get to press buttons and things happened.  Plus, her daddy got to make a fool of himself on a glider and sat in a tiny helicopter (Roberts R22).

We ate in the Wings restaurant, which I wouldn’t recommend, but you could take your own food as there is an area for those who do.

All in all, a great day out!

[slideshow id=3458764513862262355&w=426&h=320]