Bewildered in the spring sunshine!

Spring sunshine, an ancient Norfolk wood, den building, scary slides and climbing in tree houses, fairies, witches, Boggles, Twiggles, a Wiggle and a Crocklebogg have formed a large part of my lovely family day and I have to say it is by far the best time we have spent together in ages, in a time of our lives bogged down by high workload and other day-to-day stresses, it was lovely. A surprise day out to 'Bewilderwood' was just what the family Hammond needed. After a hearty picnic we explored the woods and whizzed down the slides. Lucy overcame many a fear and Anna was fearless as ever, hurtling everywhere without a care in the world. Even Mrs Hammond went down the death slide! The most impressive part of the day was that the collectively impractical family that we are managed to build a den that stayed up! Good work team....

A right stinker!

The title of this blog is not linked in any way to the excessive levels of wind that occur in my house. I am afraid it is a reference to the stinking cold that poor Anna has. She really does have a howler and is clearly feeling under the weather. We have the running nose, the over reaction to everything, not sleeping and general levels of grumpiness. This evening we had the conversation about how many boys she had kissed that caused her to get her cold, I just got a wry smile and very little reply. It's been a while since I had man flu, so I look forward to the generous gift of her cold that Anna is likely to bestow upon me.

On another note, Amy is in fine fettle and recuperating nicely in the land of trashy day time TV. A perfect world if you are my wife...

Chaos, groovy tunes and ice cream galore...

Amy is slowly on the mend (despite her dissatisfaction with the quality of care she has received based on the fact that I have not made her enough cups of tea) and I think that I have done a pretty good job of holding the family Hammond together while its matriarch recuperates. Well not really! I have disrupted the girls' routines, fed them at the wrong time, given them way too much ice cream, introduced them to rock music such as Elbow, the Pogues and Coldplay, encouraged behaviour such as hill rolling and skipping bath time to watch telly. Actually it's been quite a good week with not too many rows and I even got Lucy to do her reading. I will hand the parenting back to Amy mid next week, having learnt an extra trick or two and how to heat up a spaghetti bolognaise. At least they have not starved, had some fun with their old Dad and did not pull the wool over my eyes with the constant use of the phrase 'Well Mummy lets us....'

Mummy goes under knife!

Amy is in hospital today parting ways with her irritating gall bladder and I am at home with the girls in charge! Operation 'get rid of unwanted wind' went well at the hospital, as did operation 'explain a new set of circumstances' to the girls. They have both been confused and worried about what is happening to Amy, so I came across a stroke of genius and out came the pretend doctors kit. The girls performed an operation on me on the living room floor. I have to say I have more faith in the skilled surgeons who have helped Amy today and considerably less in the amateur butchers that I have been exposed to this evening. The NHS is really going down hill in this country! I have had an operation on my brain, leg, nose and belly button and I don't feel at all better.

It has been a day of real worry and waiting and I am glad it is over. Get well soon Mrs Hammond, the girls cannot wait to see you. We love you very much. Coming home soon for a week or two of pampering Hammond style...