Out and about... Framlington Castle...

So after my post about "What do babies want to DO..." I took my own advice and signed husband and I up as English Heritage members. It was a great deal £82 for the two of us for a year but as we signed up to pay for it via Direct Debit (although we paid for it in one lump via Direct Debit not in monthly instalments which I found odd) we got an extra 3 months free. Plus with that we can take in up to six children (under 19) each... although that sounds like a special kind of HELL it's still nice to know we could take our nieces and nephews should the occasion arise.

And for our first outing.... Framlington Castle! About an hour drive from home and looked pretty awesome in the pictures on the website. Unbeknownst to us being a bank holiday they were also holding an event where they were reenacting some siege of something... I forget who and what now (if I am going to go to these historical places it's probably going to be a good tip to spend less time hunched over my camera buttons and more time learning the history). Essentially it meant on top of the castle walls, bizarre house in the middle and surrounding grounds they also had tents demonstrating typical crafts, cooking methods and assorts for the 12th century. It also meant (cringe cringe cringe) there were lots of role players about... which I assume kids would LOVE to get involved with but personally I found it a bit embarrassing to having grown men talk to me in "ye olde" lingo and pretend they don't know why I am in "foreigners clothes" etc (squirm).

So here's an top view of the castle and goings on of the event...

We walked around the top of the castle walls, took some pictures and got a real lung full of fresh air which was a welcome break after what has now been nearly 3 weeks of on-off rain. There were food stalls selling drinks, sandwiches, burgers and (surprisingly) pizzas. Toilet and changing facilities were all fine. Husband even reported the portable loos they got in to take the extra visitors (due to the event) were surprisingly pleasant. It was lovely! Well worth what would have been £13 for two adults (works out we will have to do a minimum of 7 days out like this over 15 months to get our money back... not bad at all in my opinion!) My only criticism would is that the best views of the castle and the surrounding scenery, moat etc were from the castle walls which was definitely NOT a buggy a friendly route and potentially not safe enough to carry baby around either (personally). BUT we're still very excited by the novelty of our Bjorn baby carrier so need little excuse to get this out the car boot...

All in all great bank hols! Highly recommended! Go join the English Hertiage and have some historical family time! :D  

What do babies want to DO...

Rain, rain and more rain reads every UK weather forecaster at the moment. My visions of endless Spring walks and reading in parks are, for the moment, scuppered. So on top of that being reasonably annoying for me, it seems Euna is not one to be kept indoors. We stayed in nearly all weekend which revealed two things... 1. if she doesn't go out in the car or pram she doesn't nap and 2. if she doesn't nap she gets overtired and finds it hard to go down at night. Excellent.

So what do you DO with a baby? Please note I can not afford anymore days at Bluewater or any other shopping centre.

We have all the usual indoor baby entertainment items. We are the proud owners of one Bright Starts vibrating bounce chair...

 A Disney's Baby Einstein Ocean Adventure Gym...

A Tiny Love Super Play Mat...

And of course you know we've been rocking tummy time but what else can you do? Well... I had the misfortune of accompanying my niece and nephews to a local soft play area on Monday and discovered their leaflet tables are a great source of finding things to do. So here's my two favourite rainy day friendly day out ideas that I picked up...

Birch Gallery and Tea Room - I could definitely while away an hour or two here. A pot of tea and a squint at some local artists' works.

Layer Marney Tower - Whilst this would be more fun on a sunny day so you can enjoy the gardens and I am kicking myself for missing feeding the lambs with my sister's kids you could still enjoy a couple of hours seeing the inside of the tower.

A little squint at these on the web brought me to looking on the English Heritage site and there are tons of ideas on their Days Out page and second to that what fantastic value their membership is! It would be £82 for a whole year for hubby and I and Euna would go free... for a years worth of days out and that got to be £82 you'll feel great about given where it's going... Brill!

We will also be looking at swimming as soon as we've got our health check and jabs done on Thursday (tears are imminent). Damn and blast to rumours I heard that we will not be able to take a camera!

Any other ideas? What are you doing to while away these rainy days with your babies?

Lessons learnt - English weather can suck and far too much of what is available locally relies on it NOT raining... humph!