Camperbus tours of Wales and Jujitsu.

We start the week with Blokey working flat out on the bus. The children are desperate to go away, even though the weather is getting colder. I hold the fort whilst Blokey does his stuff.

We have to go to the camping shop for supplies.

Owen isn't happy about going out but cheers up when we take him to the American diner down the road.

It's seems appropriate as we prepare for our road trip.

Blokey works flat out on the van..I try and contain the childrens excitement, which is spilling over into frequent squabbles. I feel like I am repeating the same phrases over and over. Answering the same questions over and over. I remind myself this is their anxiety and excitement ..even good things can spell behavioural issues with ASD/PDA. Sam's ADHD is barely contained at these times too.

Blokey hits some problems in the bus and we decide that we will have to do without the shower for now, I can boil hot water on the stove for washing. The night heater also is refusing to channel warm air through to the cab, we look up the fault code and it seems that the pump is faulty. We decide to cut our losses and go as we are. Blokey and I load the van up and we set off for Wales around 3.30. The light is fading but we are on our way, with two very excited boys. The adults have some trepidation about the cold nights and places to stop but, it's an adventure, so we go with it.

There is a beautiful moon as we travel down the A55, the bus has to corner slowly due to its size, and the miles seem to creep along. At 7pm we find a pub for our evening meal. We strike lucky with the Druid Inn, it's in a village just off the A55. We enjoy a fab meal and the staff make us very welcome...even finding us a campsite and printing off details.

On reaching the campsite , we find its closed for the season, so check out the Wildcamping website. We find a night stop by a river, near the beach and set up for the night. The weather is closing in and it's a pretty wild night, high winds and we find later that parts of Wales has suffered severe damage. We have managed to stay dry but Owen was cold in the night, due to him managing to break the zip on his sleeping bag whilst thrashing around ( like he does) . 

The next morning we drive the short distance to the beach and walk the dogs. Just as I am making breakfast , the wind and rain starts to lash down and we happily eat our bacon butties in the warm bus, looking out to sea. The local dog walkers give us some funny looks.

After consulting the children, we decide to drive to Conwy Castle . Fortunately the weather brightens up whilst we look round the castle , but the wind is stil, bitterly cold, so we wrap up warm.

Walking the walls.

Admiring the views across Wales.

Owen/Allan!

Inside the castle walls

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Climbing the towers 

Owens hands are just visible on the higher rail. He kept popping up and down.

The highest point ....hold on to your hat Blokey!

The views were just amazing.

Wind blown 

Back at the car park..we decide to find a supermarket and have a picnic in the bus for lunch.

French bread, chicken, cheese, drinks and nibbles whilst we look at the rainbows coming and going across the skyline. The weather is very changeable and as we eat , there is a hail storm.

We know that it will be dark at around 4 pm so decide to ring round for a place to camp. It proves difficult as most places are shut for the winter. However, we do find a place, it's a micro brewery/pub with a campsite and it's in Snowdonia National Park. When we get there it's dark but the site is well lit and we are made welcome. I have to add that we have the whole site to ourselves, as no one is daft enough to camp at this time of year but us...we rather like this and wander round walking the dogs in peace.

We play board games by lantern in the bus before heading over to the pub for a hot meal.

 Waiting for food, the staff are lovely and whilst all the locals are in the bar, we have the lounge room to ourselves. We carry on playing board games, enjoying the warmth and chatting to the bar staff.

That evening the weather is even wilder and we are woken several times by wind and hail. Thankfully we are all warm and dry. I have snuggled Owen in with extra blankets and insisted he wear his PJ's . He mutters in his sleep and is up and down most of the night but he is warm.

In the morning we all use the very lovely hot showers on the site and I make us breakfast. Sadly, at this point,  our onboard charger develops a fault and refuses to work, so we can't use some of our equiptment without running the engine.

Undeterred, the children want to travel to Bangor and visit the pier. It stretches almost to Anglesey.

We really enjoy running up and down despite the wind whipping up a frenzy.

Although it's grey, we enjoy the views, birdwatching and the rolling skies.

We talk to the boys about heading home that night. More bad weather is forecast and we will be struggling to find a site open. 

They agree to head back later and we set off to see Caenarfon Castle. Once again we are really jammy with the weather and it dries up, we even have a little sunshine at times.

We are doubly fortunate to have arrived when there is a remeberance exhibition on. Entry is free today and we love the spectacular floppy installation.

Cannons!

I love this door and Sam is facinated by the lock.

We visit the museum, where there is a medals exhibition. 

Sam enjoys trying on the hats and asking about the many different medals.

Owen quietly reads about the medals and colours in one of his own.

This hat is very heavy mum!

We climb all the towers and admire the views ( so many steps and there I was worrying I was missing my excercises) .

The boys find it hilarious that we can see the top of the bus from here..if you look closely , you can see the green roof in the bottom left corner.

A view of the rememberance installation from one of the towers.

Owen in the Kings ( Edward) apartments , checking out the Royal view.

On top of the highest tower...more stairs. Owen insisted we climb every tower..it was dizzying!

We also checked out the Eleanor exhibition and the boys remembered her from our castles of the UK programmes. Caenarfon was featured and this is one of the reasons they were keen to see it. There was also a room explaining about the various Kings and the Prince of Wales.

We made a stop at the gift shop and Owen spent his pocket money on some Horrible History books. As we were a bit cold, we decided to find a cafe in the town and have a snack before setting off home.

After deciding on a little quiet cafe, we ordered 4 hot chocolates, with cream, Blokey and Sam also had hot chocolate fudge cake. The cafe owners was a friendly guy and came across to chat to us about the castle and town. You learn so much talking to the local people and Sam and Owen are always keen to chat to adults in these situations.

We head off for home, it's a long journey and we stop for a hot drink as we go. We finally pull up at home around 8 pm. Blokey and I unload the essential items off the bus and get the boys a snack supper. Owen is tired and grumpy but we manage to get them to bed eventually and it's not long before they are spark out.

The next day involves us collecting Owens snail Orel from our friends house, shopping and cleaning out the bus before taking it back to storage. The boys play at the park too and Blokey and I do chores. We then order a takeaway before we all fall into bed exhausted.

We have another busy day planned on Saturday because it's the boys Jujitsu gradings. They are going for green belts this time. Sam is, as usual, very nervous but we know from experience that he will be fine once there.

We drop them off and visit the nearby market and grab a quick lunch in the pub.

Then it's time to see how the boys have faired ..they look tired but have passed!

Sam doesn't enjoy the photo bit where he has to face all the other parents but he manages well and is happy he has his new belt. It's a real achievement and Sensei Reece makes sure they realise that and praises their hard work. They are the youngest in their group to reach this level and the gradings are getting harder as they progress.

As its nearly 2 pm and the children haven't eaten lunch yet, we dash to the chippy, so they can eat as we drive home. They are ravenous beasts and still a bit hyper and stressy. On arriving home, both boys instinctively take themselves off to calm down. Owen with his music, Sam at the park running around and calling on his friend .

I work in the garden and Blokey spends time sorting out the garage...which looks like a bomb has hit it after all the work he's been doing. ...and collapse into bed.

We all sleep in late today. I do my exercises and the children chill out doing their own thing. Blokey installs Windows 10 on Owens PC, he has some issues removing Linux but after a number of hours and copious mutterings he manages to get it all set up.

I do more chores, mix some bread dough and Sam helps clean the house. He likes vacuuming and hums happily as he works. The sensory therapist explained how this type of work really helps him and he certainly seems to enjoy it.

After lunch the boys go to play on their PC's, Blokey does a tip run and I write up my home ed notes. It's been a very busy week ! The trip in the bus has helped us realise what works and what doesn't, but we are happy to see how much the boys enjoy travelling and taking in the sights. Blokey will continue to get everything fully operational and then I can think about making it a bit more homely. There's plenty of time and we will get there.

Microscopes, leaves, writing, sushi and film nights

Sam achieved a new certificate for his maths today.

Owen can't concentrate again today because 'it's only a few more days till Dad is off work for a whole week!'

It didn't help me distracting him by setting up the microscope kits.

He couldn't wait to try it .

First we made a mini magnifier using water drops.

The boys got busy avoiding the set activities and looking at various objects they could find on the table.

The cloth fibres were a particularly exciting thing.

And the light refracting on the water droplets.

We also looked at the set activities and filled in our sheets. But as usual the children found lots of off curriculum learning of their own.

We then moved on to an Autumn craft using leaves we found outside. I had dried and pressed them overnight.

The children chose colours to make ears.

Sam worrying about getting glue on his hands, but soldiering on despite it.

This is Sam's finished fox, he coloured the edges of his leaves with orange. He tells me it is supposed to have a big and little eye, because it's a 'Mum Fox' ..like your eyes Mum. 😂😂😂 . The purple nose is because 'it's one of your favourite colours' .

Owen liked how his fox has nice pointy ears and he loved sticking on his nose. 

Our sycamore tree had dropped most of its leaves this week, so I decided to sweep up as many as I could. Sam decided to help and chuckled as he worked.

We made a huge pile of leaves and he had me film him diving into them .

Sam by the massive pile of leaves we collected. Our composter and garden bin were completely full, so we had to stack up 12 waste bags! There was still a pile of leaves in the corner when we finished !

After we had unpacked the shopping ( when I say we..I actually mean me..Sam just held the door open and shouted random things at me) , we started with maths.

Owen is struggling with division and the explainations on the app are confusing him..so I showed him another way..which would work if he actually listened to it *beam me up* , instead of dramatically throwing his head to the table and yodelling 'I can't do it!'.

I stay calm and we manage to make some head way..eventually...

Sam works happily on his own, he's really getting to grips with the methodology behind the equations.

Whilst he is waiting for me to finish with Owen , Sam practices his writing.

We move on to journaling next. Sam chooses another spelling page . He has to think of 20 words, each needs to have 7 letters...he ponders for a while.

Owen decides to do some drawing in his journal but practically gives up immediately. He's stuck but will not allow me to help him. He's being incredibly frustrating at the moment, we have found that at this time of year his behaviour can become more challenging. We think it's Halloween, bonfire night and the lead up to Christmas . He's already counting down the days, plus we are hoping to take the children camping if the bus is ready enough.

Sam finished his spelling.

Owen scribbled over his Tiger shark *sigh*..which was really good ..but he couldn't see how well he had done. ( to self : don't comment , don't comment)

The boys then chose some items from the house and garden to examine under the microscopes.

We had coconut fibre, hair, sycamore seeds, Rosemary ( with frost on) , some stalks, seed heads and stones.

There were many 'Ohhh's' and 'ahhhh's'. Owen also looked at his giant snail.

So many ziplock bags for fun.

More supplies to look at. Coffee, chocolate, flour, sugar and salt. The boys described what they see and I wrote their notes.

 

We then dissolved the coffee , sugar, etc, with hot water and reexamined it. The boys described the differences. Some things dissolved better than others. Some things looked dissolved, so we added food colouring. This highlighted some crystals we had missed.

As we were doing this our sushi goodies arrived...of course Owen is now desperate for sushi for his lunch.

The boys try their new blue light filter glasses on. Sam's consultant recommended them , so if they use their iPads before bedtime , it shouldn't affect their ability to go to sleep. 

I am not totally convinced yet..but they do look adorable in them. I will let you know how it goes.

Very Joe 90.. 

We made some breadsticks and a loaf because we are getting low and none of us fancies a trip to the shops .

Our sushi making skills are improving too.

We went to the library ...and the boys nearly caused me to have a hernia carrying all the books to the car!

This is a huge bag!

I also had the foresight to photograph the children's lists of non fiction books, they would like to look at....*I know!..Go me eh?'

The children are still enjoying lovely interactions with the staff in the library and there are whoops of delight over new non fiction books that have come into stock. The librarians smile and discuss the boys finds and the cover illustrations with them.

In the non fiction selection, Sam finds language books and a CD, also some reference books on marine biology and some guides to Wales and Scotland...'because I want to choose where we might like  to visit in the camper bus,'

Owen has chosen history books about WW1 & 2 , the Hollocaust ( tried to dissuade him because *I * find it upsetting ) and the universe...( whispers and everything..tips hat to Hitchikers Guide ) .

We have to do a few errands, so we get home around lunchtime and I crack on with some food.

The next day we work through the final activities in our Royal Microscopic Society box.

There is a forensic section, the boys look at the evidence to try to work out who did the crime.

Hmmmmmm says Owen.

They both need some guidance to arrange their work here , this allows them to see who has most evidence against them.

We also check back on our solutions from the other day. Some have re-crystallised and are well worth another look. The boys found it incredibly interesting.

We also studied herbs, sand, seeds, soil and some more crystals.

The forensic kit and separate samples.

It's looking more and more like Winter time and I wake early to their lovely view.

Sam dancing as we collect the camperbus. He's very excited because Blokey has finished work for over a week and he will be working on it, with the intention of us all getting away for few days.

More dancing...with 2 hats and 2 pairs of glasses...

We watch the Book of Life together..we all love this film so much,