R.I.P Mittens

The other day, Mittens (aka Bramble) went missing. I wasn't that surprised, he was very brave and adventurous. I didn't have the time to teach him how to behave around roads... The following day, I was told that he had been hit by a car on the bypass. I was devastated. I had been with him, raising him and feeding him since the day he was chucked outside. I raised him to be a warrior cat. He was as strong, agile and brave as his role model, Bramblestar. The only thing he lacked was sense...
I had trained him and urged him on until he could take on one of the most senior cats in the neighbourhood. I was so proud of him... He was just beginning to teach his sister how to run the clan he had created.

Until his smaller, more timid sister has the strength and experience to run a clan, I will be the leader. Fire and his small band of ruthless cats are our most worrying enemies... I'm not sure if River will ever be able to face up to him in the same way her brother did, but all I can do is raise her for as long as I can.

"Mittens" really doesn't fit him. He will always be known as BRAMBLE

Play Dates and Boston Pool Party!

 Yesterday, two new home educated kids came for a play date. Amelia and Madeline. We played on the xbox and went to the park! It was really fun!

Last year, I learned about the Boston Tea Party, but today I went to a Boston Pool Party! It was about an hour away, but it was worth it! The house that we went to was on a farm so there were quite a few animals like cats and horses. In one of the buildings there was a giant indoor swimming pool! The pool wasn't cold but it wasn't warm either! After awhile, there were loads of home educated kids in the pool! Once I'd been in for a while, I got out of the pool to have a small lunch with Amelia and Madeline. Once we'd had lunch, we got back in the pool and decided to try to create motorbikes! I made a really cool one that I kept falling off!

The place we went to also had lots of animals! The first animal I saw was a little beautiful tabby cat. It wasn't that friendly, but I still got to pet it! After I saw the cat, I decided to go and see the horses! The horses didn't actually belong to the home-educated family, but they said I could see them anyway. There were 2  horses and 1 pony and they were absolutely beautiful! The first horse I got to stroke was a giant black stallion. It was kind of scary, because it kept trying to escape from the fenced of field by biting the fence! The second horse I got to stroke was a really skinny brown mare. I was a bit concerned about it because it had a lot of cuts and it was very skinny. I fed the two horses a lot of juicy grass because all of the grass in their pen had been nibbled down!
The last animal I saw was a beautiful Malamute cross Akita. It was so soft because its fur was like wool! It was quite afraid of people, but I still wanted it!

My amazing waterbike!

It doesn't always work...

Busy busy busy!

I've been really busy lately! First, I had a really action-packed play date! George came around along with Liv-astrid and her brothers. We played on racing games and I got second place! After we played the racing games, we decided to go to the park! It seemed like a good idea at first but it started to rain! It wasn't just normal rain though, it was cold and wet rain that makes your feet squelch.

On Sunday I went to the cinema with dad to see Tomorrowland! It was really cool and complicated! I think I got the story though. It's about a former boy inventor (Frank) and a teenage girl (Cacey) who travel to a different dimension of futuristic inventions. The plot was actually much more difficult than it looks from the trailer. Even though it wasn't in 3D, I really enjoyed it!


Today, I went to the Burghley Gameshow with mom and dad! It was so much fun! I probably enjoyed it even more because it was actually quite warm! There was hundreds of dogs there! Everything from tiny Chihauhaus to massive Great Danes!
One of the first things we saw was the ferret race. There were four ferrets that had to race through tubes. Most of them had no idea what to do and ended up going backwards! There was one ferret that obviously had trained becuase it bolted to the end of the race! After the race had ended I got to stroke one of the ferrets! Its fur was quite wirery, but it was still soft.

How cute is he?

I couldn't hold him properly in case he bites, but I wanted to!

 We also saw two people who were working as blacksmiths. One of them was putting a metal pole in burning coals and then bashing it with a hammer. It looked like a lot of hard work.



It looked like a lot of hard work just to make a coat-hook!

There were also quite a few show hamsters there! Most of them were asleep but there was a Campbell that was being bought. It was so adorable!
 There was even a gigantic pack of beagles in a field that you could go and stroke. They smelt so much like dog, but they were still really cute! I got to run along with the pack of beagles just like in a hunt, but there wasn't a fox!

I love the dog's face in the front!

There were also gorgeous fluffy Alpacas!

I love their smiley faces

Anyway, I've been really busy! I wonder what I'll be doing next..

London!

On Friday me and mom had to get up really early to catch the train to London! It was quite a tedious journey because the train kept stopping all the way there. 
When we got there we met up with Cat, Tilly and Lavinia. First, we went to a cool park. There was a massive zipwire and I loved it! But then the school kids came... they were like wild animals, stampeding towards the park! They took the zipwire, so me, Tilly and Lavinia decided to try the slide. When we got to it, we realised that it  had been overrun by school kids as well! It was quite cold, so our parents decided to go somewhere else.

Then we got the Tube! It was really exciting! Tilly and Lavinia stood up at the end and they nearly fell over when the Tube stopped! When we got off the Tube, we were only a few minutes away from our destination, the London Museum! It was actually quite interesting and it was very busy. Me and Tilly were sketching the Greek artefacts on display. I sketched some tiny animal statues that were very, very old ornaments. 450 BC!! There were lots on naked statues but I didn't sketch them!

 Next we went to the Dungeons. On our way to the Dungeons, I got a great look at the London Eye! It was gigantic! There were about 37 individual carts on it and there were long queues to get on it.

Finally, we got to the Dungeons. There was about a 20 minute wait, but it was worth it! The first ride was a nice boat ride down a dark tunnel with spooky figures and lights! It was okay until the end of the ride. It was pitch black and then a giant light flashed in front of us showing a massive gate! It looked like the gate was going down so I thought I was going up! It was just an optical illusion, but it was weird! Then the boat jerked backwards and air was blasted into me and Tilly's face! Then the boat seemed to speed back where it came from and it was really scary! Mother was terrified!

 After the boat ride, you just walked through some creepy scenes. There was also some amazing actors on the way that told the story of what was happening. Everyone was a guilty of a crime! There was even a court where 3 people were asked what their names were, where they were from and what they were accused for. Me and two random people were picked. As soon as I said I was from Newcastle, the judge instantly said "GUILTY"! He obviously had something against people from Newcastle!
 There was also an actress who owned a bakery. She kept making really cheesy jokes and kept hinting that her pies were made out of people! In the middle of her jokes, a cupboard behind her opened and a body fell out! It looked really realistic, it was spooky!
Later in the story, a murderer is loose! He calls himself Jack the Ripper and the explanation of what he does is really graphic and gory! He cuts his victms' throats and then slices their stomach! After the woman tells you about Jack the Ripper, lightning strikes and all the lights go out! When they come back on, Jack appears in the middle of the room, throwing himself towards you! I screamed and Tilly and Lavinia gripped on to my arms! That was really scary!
At the very end, there was a rollercoaster. Of course, me, my mom and Lavinia didn't go on it and decided to go to the gift shop instead! When I was in the gift shop I just happend to glance over my shoulder and it was like love at first sight! There was a little rubber, stretchy rat that was only £4! I've called him Lucifer, and I love him so much!

After that, we got back on the Tube and headed to Seaworld! Seaworld was really cool! It's like a giant aquarium that you can walk through! There were rays, sharks, turtles and loads of other fish! I also got to stroke a starfish! It was really rough, like rocks! One of its legs was softer and more squidgy than the others. The staff said that it was because it can take in water and push out water. That leg obviously didn't have much water in!

I loved the Starfish

Beautiful Jell-Fish

There was also a tunnel you could walk through that had a glass roof. Rays were always swimming over it but there was also some turtles in the tank that were really beautiful. In the side of the tunnel, there were little holes you could climb through that had a magnified glass window at the end of them! It was amazing to look through them because the turtles would swim right up to them!

Turtles

Near the end of the Seaworld experience, Tilly demanded to see the penguins so me and mom took her to see them! There was one penguin that was always swimming about for us. It jumped up on to the ice and waddled right up to me and Tilly and pecked the glass right in our face! It was so adorable! It's like the penguin knew that Tilly loved penguins!

Of course, I needed some sort of souvenir from the gift shop! This time I got a squishy penguin toy! Tilly loved them as well, so I decided to get one for Tilly and one for Lavinia as well! I got a black and white one, Tilly got an orange and white one and Lavinia had a green and white one!

After that we went to an Indian restaurant called Masala Zone! It was okay... I ordered a fish finger sandwich because I thought it would be simple but it ended up being full of weird sauces and salad! I mainly just had chips and some of mother's nan bread. The desert was disapointing as well! It was a sorbet, but it just tasted and looked like a Master Chef disaster! Another disaster happened, Lavinia's penguin died! Me and Tilly think it has a hole in it, because it seemed to lose most of the air inside it. Cat set up me and Tilly's pudgy, happy penguins beside Lavinia's deflated one and Lavinia's going to write an email to Seaworld about it!

Masala Zone

On the way back home, my legs were absolutely killing! I shuffled about in the train and in the car all the way home because I just couldn't get comfortable. I still had a great day though, even though it was so tiring!

Christopher Loyd!

Us standing in front of the "What on Earth Happened?" Wall Chart!

Yesterday, I went to Gamlingay to see Christopher Loyd! He's a historian who writes history books for kids but he also home-educates his children! He gave me and all of the other home-educators three talks, though some of the kids left in between the talks.

The first talk was about the Magna Carta.
The Magna Carta was the first ever list of laws to give King John 1st's people more freedom because King John was raising taxes and stealing everyone's money to keep fighting the war in France. He wasn't a very nice King at all!  King John signed the Magna Carta in 1215, 80 years ago! The Magna Carta was written on parchment, which is sheepskin soaked in lime. Parchment was very expensive so  you had to write very small on it. Magna Carta is Latin for Great Charter.

The second talk was about Shakespeare.
To make it easier to understand, and a lot more interesting, he showed us a massive timeline of every Shakespeare play all together, with the year on the bottom. He also let us try acting in Macbeth! Me, Elise and Grace were witches! It was really fun, but really difficult to read the script! If Shakespeare was alive still alive today, he would be 450 years old! I bet you he'd be really proud of himself if he knew people were still talking about his plays today!

The last talk was about the Beginning of the world to the present day!
It was really interesting!Did you know the earth is 4.5 billion year old? He asked us a very difficult question that I actually didn't know the answer to... where did water come from? Some kids said it came from the river but then he asked, where did the river come from? Apparently, massive clumps of ice hit the Earth 4 and a half billion ears ago. The ice melted, forming the  rivers and oceans. But that didn't explain where micro-organisms came from that lived in the oceans? If the micro-organisms came from the ice comets, doesn't that mean that there is life on other planets? Maybe we'll never know...All of life on Earth that we have today, all the plants and animals, insects and birds ALL evolved over billions of years from those very first bacteria!


Double, Double, Toil and Trouble, Fire Burn and Cauldron Bubble!

A good thing about Christopher is he always wears a large black coat with loads of colourful pockets. Inside each of the pockets, there's an item to do with what we're talking about. He always uses simple items, like rubber rats and bottles of water instead of anything really complicated. It's a lot easier to remember what he's talking about if he shows you the items!
Also, in every talk he shows you the book he's written that's about the talk. He also has a massive timeline-type poster that he puts on the wall behind him so that he can show you when a certain thing happened.


Tilly had her hand up for ages, but he never chose her. :-(

After the three talks, I played in the park for a bit with Tilly, Lavinia and Liv-Astrid's brothers. We only got to play for about half an hour, but it was still really fun!

Tomorrow, me, Tilly and Lavinia are going to London! We'll have to get up really early to catch the train but I can't wait!!

LEGOLAND!

Yesterday, I went to LEGOLAND at Windsor! It was only meant to be a 2 and a half hour journey there, but it took 3 and a half hours! It was so worth it, though! There was a whole lot of walking and a whole lot of wet rides! The first ride I went on was with Tilly. It was a spinning cups ride beneath a giant, lego spider! I hated it! I was clinging on to the bars of the spinning cup while Tilly sat there, bored because it wasn't spinning fast enough!

The next ride we went on I enjoyed much more. Sadie joined us for this ride. It was a rapids ride! In a rapids ride, you sit in a large, round box-without-a-lid style container as you get pushed down a wild river! The first time around, we avoided the massive bucket full of water, but the second time it was tipped on our heads and we got absolutely soaked!
The third ride was a log flume ride. In a log flume ride, you and a few other people sit in a log and you go down a river and up a hill and when you reach the top of the hill, you fall down it into a massive splash! I was sitting at the front, so I got drenched! Fun!

The fourth ride wasn't so much of a ride and more of a joke! It was a gentle cruise down a river! Tilly was controlling the pedals while me and Sadie battled for the wheel! It was fun, even though we crashed loads of times!

The next ride was one of my favourites! It was a driving school! Everyone watched an introduction video which explained very important details, like what "Stop" means! So me, Tilly and Sadie didn't really pay attention. When we got in the carts I realised that obviously no one else knew how to drive! People were going the wrong way on roundabouts,  running red lights and everything! I only accidently didn't brake at a red light because for some reason the brake was on the right hand side! I still got my driver's licence though!

After that, me Tilly, Liv-astrid, Lavinia and Sadie went on the log flume again! We went on like 10 times so when we finally got off, I was soaked! I did feel good though, because I had conquered that ride! I didn't scream when we went down!

After that, the park was closing, so we went to the bathrooms to dry our clothes under the blow-dryer!
It took 2 and a half hours to get home, so I fell asleep for a bit. I was so tired and I was wet and my feet were killing, but I still enjoyed it!


Today, a home-educated kid from Bourne (where I live!) came over! He is called George. He was really fun! We played on the Xbox and the DS, but we spent most of the time taking Maisie for a walk and seeing all of the parks in Bourne!

Tomorrow, I'm going to Gamlingay to see Christopher Loyd, He's a children's author and he writes lots of fun history books! I can't wait! I have seen him before and he was awesome!

Swimming and a Disco!

Yesterday, me, Tilly, Lavinia, Liv-astrid and her brothers went swimming! We went to Saxon Pool instead of Oasis and to be honest, I thought that Saxon Pool is really boring! When we played in an empty, shallow part the lifeguard told us to get out so that a group of school  kids could come in to learn how to swim. So we moved to the slightly smaller, shallow pool where 2 toddlers were playing. In the middle of our game, the same lifeguard told us to move again! The whole pool was full of school kids, there was barely any space to play our game!
We still had a good time though, but I was starving at the end! We had to get changed really quickly because we were late for something really exciting! A disco!

We rushed to the Eco Hub in Gamlingay to have a disco! It was really cool and really loud!! We played Musical Statues and Musical Chairs. The kids who played Musical Chairs were like animals! They pushed and shoved and stole chairs from people! it was every  kid for themselves there!

Musical Chairs!

 A few of the adults were also giving out cool, glow in the dark bands that could connect together. I got quite a few of them, so me and Tilly decided to make a chain and link ourselves together with them! It was obviously very popular, because everyone else wanted to make a giant chain together. In the end, we had almost every kid connected to each other with the little bands! I still have my chain necklace on now!

Glo -sticks!

At the end, I was absolutely shattered! But the excitement isn't over yet, as on Monday I'm going to LEGOLAND! Auto-correct automatically corrected that to capitals, it's that exciting! And on Friday, I'm going to London with Tilly and Lavinia!


Also, I've come up with a new, sweet invention! The Zingy Lime and Coconut delight! It's a cupcake that's been drenched in Lime flavoured (and coloured!) icing and then dunked in to a bowl full of crispy coconut grains! Unfortunately, I don't like coconut, so I'm just having the icing and the cupcake itself!

Duxford Air Museum, Play Dates and Dancing!

The other day I went to Duxford Air Museum! As soon as I got their, I went flying! I was playing tag with Livastrid, Tilly and Lavinia when I tripped and fell on the  hard stone! It killed my wrist and there was a hole in my leggings! So for the rest of the day, my wrist ached and my knee stung.

Anyway, we got to see quite a bit more than what we saw last time. We also had a cool talk about World War I and we got to wear some of the clothes and hats! The metal German hat didn't suit me quite as well as my usual ones! We also got to hold some of the guns and grenades and got to try on a gas mask! Did you know that gas didn't kill as many people as some people think? There were quite a few ways to avoid dying from gas, so it never killed that many people. One of the ways people stopped themselves from getting gassed was urinating on a cloth and covering their mouth and nose. That wouldn't stop you from going blind, though.

I got the German hat!

Arrggg! I've been shot!

The next day (or the day after, I'm not sure!), Livastrid and her brothers came around! It was really fun. We watched Tom and Jerry and played on the DS. When their mother came round to pick them up, we went outside for a bit and ended up playing a game with plastic food! Eventually, we just went insane and started playing with everything, including a paper plane!


A few days later, we went to Woolmer Green to celebrate May Day!

The Morris Dancers!

May Day is a celebration that is meant to please the Fruit and Flower Goddess, Flora! People, usually men, do Morris Dancing! A Morris Dance is very lively and is often accompanied by an accordion! Morris Dancers usually wear socks and pants that have bells on them, so it makes them jingle quite a bit!
Another dance that is done on May Day is a Maypole Dance. Maypole Dancing is quite different. Children will hold a ribbon and they will dance around a pole in such a way that it makes beautiful patterns on it. I tried it with Tilly, Lavinia and a few other kids but it didn't turn out quite as beautiful as I expected!

Maypole Dancing

Cracking the sticks!

There is always one person who doesn't participate in all of the activities of May Day, the May Queen. The woman who is crowned the May Queen will sit in a throne like chair that is decorated with flowers and plants.


My wrist doesn't hurt quite so much now, but my knee still stings sometimes. Even so, I still enjoyed it all!