Just like Summer

What a super day it has been, it had been just like summer should be with the sun shining down and the temperatures reaching into the mid twenties, and it stayed that way until the showers of the evening. All in all  it has been glorious and what a better way to spend part of it at than at the Rock By Rail Museum near Ashwell in Rutland.

It is a lovely little museum and there is lots to see. The people there work very hard to restore the engines and the rolling stock and you can walk around the workshops and see the work going on. At the moment they are redeveloping the museum but that doesn't make it less interesting and they are hopping to complete the work by September when they will have the some of the trains in steam again.

The museum opening times at the moment are Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday from 11.00am to 4pm and admission is free, although they do ask for voluntary donations of £4 per adult to assist in their work. You can spend a good coupe of hours at the museum, even though it is being redeveloped, and there is a cafe on site so you can have a drink and a bite to eat.

Sun and Trains

I'm not sure how many ways you can say it is another fine day. I think I might have used up all the common ones. So lets just assume you know the weather is still lovely and move on to a day in sunny Rutland.

As is common during the school holidays, now the girls are getting older the mornings are always lazy with the girls getting up in their own time. This morning was different in that their was only one girl to get up, Emily. Catherine had a sleep over at Charlie's so when I got up there was nothing to do except drink my coffee and reflect on life's events. 

The morning was just spent around the house, everyone waiting for Catherine to return to start the day. The preparations for the sleep over were so hasty that we all forgot to ask what time she was coming back. It was just before we were leaving for Oakham in the car to get some lunch that we spotted her and Charlie's brother George heading towards home. She went home and we continued her journey to get some food knowing she needed lunch too.

When we got to Oakham we popped into Leeson Family Butchers. They do their own home cooked range of pies, pasties and sausage rolls. They have even won awards for them and I can recommend their range of pies. It is a great place to pick up a quick lunch and there is even a good sandwich shop next door, although nowhere as good as the one in Uppingham.

With lunch brought we headed home to eat before going out for the afternoon. The idea being that today we would managed to do what we missed out on on Tuesday. Going to the the Rutland Railway museum with Emily and Catherine. They had both seen the pictures from when Lucy went there but they had never been their themselves.

It is not far to the museum from the village. Just a short drive through Ashwell and back into the countryside on the way to Cottesmore. In fact it use to be on the flight path into the runway of the RAF base there before the idiots that run the country decided to close the base and make a mess of sacking the pilots. 

Once we arrived my first impression was of how much the place had changed since I last took Lucy there. It was like someone had given the place a makeover as well as a new name. It is now called "The Living Ironstone Museum" and has a new website to replace the old Rutland Railway Museum" site. It all looks rather impressive and I hope that the new image gets the hard work of the people their recognized. They put a lot of hard work into the place and they deserve some success. 

When we got there we started to look around. I took Catherine down the nature trail and Emily decided to stay looking round the main part of the museum. It was lovely down the nature trail that follows the track to the end of the museum site. Catherine and myself walked to the end. It was lovely to just chat to her as we walked. We don't get much time to chat when the house is full of people and she is much more complex person than she appears on the outside and has more insight than you would imagine for a ten year old. The countryside was beautiful and in contrast with the industrial nature of the museum it just highlighted how lovely it was.

When we walked back to the main museum site they were moving some of the trucks around with a diesel engine. It took as a bit by surprise. When where there once countryside suddenly there was trucks. It made us both double take until we looked down the line and saw the engine going back down the track. One thing I know nobody expected was that Emily old boyfriend from when she was in year six would be there. Catherine spotted him as we walked back. I remembered he wanted to be an engineer when he finishes school and there he was working as a volunteer at the museum. 

When we got back to we found Emily sitting on a bench. She had walked to see the engines the have been restored or are waiting restoration and it was where Catharine and myself headed off to next after telling Emily we had seen her ex-boyfriend. I was a bit surprised that it was Catherine that was taking such an interest in the museum I thought it would be Emily given her tomboy tendencies of the past. Clearly those are being replaced as she approaches womanhood. Catherine loved the engines and was asking all sorts of questions some of which I didn't know the answers to and the information displayed with each engine didn't explain. So they had to go unanswered as we moved onto the quarry area to see the diggers. 

It was just before closing time that we left. It is a wonderful place to just stroll around and the work the people put into the place for nothing is commendable. To think all this has been created with such a small amount of money is amazing. It really is a credit to the people that have worked on the project over the years. While we were there the temperature peaked at around twenty six degrees and I think we were all glad to be in the shade when we got home and drank the drinks that Emily go from the wine merchants in the village. 

The rest of the afternoon was just spent just cooling off and as Emily would say chilling. Emily wanted me to play a computer game with her over the internet but we couldn't find the other disk. It is in the house somewhere but the where bit is the problem. Catharine disappeared into her bedroom and was chatting to her friends and after the unsuccessful disk hunt Emily went into Lucy's room to use the computer there. The lower half of the house fell quite and their was nothing to do other than relax until dinner.

After dinner the relaxing theme continued for everyone. The house was till hot from having the sun on it all day and the windows were open in hope of catching some cool air and the ones upstairs remained open for most of the night. Eventually bedtime came and Emily and Catherine retired for the night and they went off to bed. I hope to dream of happy times.

It's been a smashing day. You couldn't ask much more of it. The weather has been lovely and I hope the promise of the sunset means we have a great day tomorrow. Hopefully it is just that little bit cooler and we can do all I have planned when we have Lucy with us. It's been so long since Emily and Catherine have seen her that I can't wait to see all their reactions. 

Trains and Planes

When I had planned to day over the weekend the weather forecast was a lot different than it turned out to be in reality, for the promised sun was gone and the day started dull and wet, however that wasn't going to stop me and I was all prepared as long as it didn't rain. Lucy was off to see the trains and I had already asked her mummy for her wellington boots.

One nice thing about this Tuesday was I managed to have a little bit of a lay in. Without Emily being here there was no need to drive into Oakham to take her to school, she was having a sleep over at her friends house. Catherine is very easy to get ready for school compared to Emily, she just does it and never needs reminding of the time, Emily on the other hand needs hurrying along if she is tired and doesn't want to get up. I'm sure she is a practicing to be a teenager in years and bits time. 

With Catherine gone to school there was time for a wash and brush up and a nice quiet cup of coffee before it was out to get Lucy from her mummies. Today when I picked her up she was extra colourful in a new striped cardigan and Peppa Pig trousers. She looked lovely and she was so proud of herself. It is just a shame I forgot to take picture to share on the blog, maybe next time she  is wearing them and I pick her up. As we walked to the car chatted about the things she had been doing and soon we were headed for the shops.

The goal at the shops was to get Lucy a toilet training seat as the night before I got a email saying she was using one at her mummies now. We had been working on using he potty for a while but we couldn't interest her in using it for more than a morning or a afternoon before she slipped back to using her pull-up. Hopefully this will work and we can get her out of pull-up's for good. When we were at the shop I let Lucy decide on the seat she wanted and what colour it was hoping that it would make her feel it was hers and she had ownership of it. We also got some sweets for everyone, which looking back on should have used Lucy's as an incentive for using her seat. It is something I going to use in future, just a bag of lollipops will do.

Once we got home she wanted to try out the seat, and when I asked if she need to use the toilet she was soon on it and then straight off it. She thought she was going to fall down the toilet. I remember that Catherine thought the same when she was first toilet training and I had a devil of job getting her to use the toilet rather than the potty. I tried to reassure her that she was going to fall, but although I got her back on the seat she was too unsure to stay there for long enough to use it. All day I kept asking her if she need the toilet and the only time she said yes was when we were in the car and miles from home. I'm sure if we all keep at this weekend we will make some ground, it is just going to take time to make her confident. I know she so wants to be like her sisters and wear pants.

Most of Lucy's morning to lunch time was spent around the house playing games and watching a bit of Peppa Pig on the computer for a few minutes at a time. All the time she just chatted and chatted. Her use of language is really coming on and she is starting construct more complex sentences now. I'm so proud of all she achieves and she is coming on leaps and bounds in every area.

For lunch we had a bacon, eggs, beens and potato wedges for a change, from the usual food we have for lunch. I must say that everyone seemed to enjoy it and Lucy loved her eggs as always. When we finished that, we did some bread making so we had fresh bread for dinner. Lucy helped again with putting in the ingredients, other than the flour and then took delight in watching the machine do it's magic before we went out for the afternoon.

Todays outing was to the Rutland Railway Museum which is on the road from Ashwell to Cottesmore. It is an open air museum and given the weather we have been having the reason why I ask Lucy's mummy for the wellington boots, I knew there would be plenty of mud about and I didn't want to ruin Lucy's Peppa Pig shoes. The museum is dedicated the now extinct iron ore industry of the the East Midlands and is themed accordingly with most of the exhibits being old engines used in the quarry's around the region. It is set out to recreate the essential elements of a quarry during hay day's of the industry back in the 1950's and as a living museum allows people to experience working practices at the time. It has wonderful plans for the future and it is entirely funded by donations for visitors and various grants. Of course all of this was lost on Lucy all she was interested in was the trains. 

We started out at the engine shed and had a look at the trains that are currently being restored. These included a break van, a diesel engine and a steam train. Of course Lucy was more interested in the steam train and was soon pointing at bits and asking what they were called and I was so explaining what they did as well. All that playing with trains and reading about trains as kid was paying off and I was able to answer her questions. From the engine shop we moved out into the main museum and had a look at the army engine they have there. Lucy noticed the engine pit under the train and I explained what it was for and that she had to be careful where she went and to stick with me. 

Next we head off to look at the rolling stock. They have a large collection of iorn ore trucks from various periods but what Lucy wanted to see more than anything was the large crane she had spotted. What I love about the place was the decay of some of the rolling stock awaiting restoration and how it blended into the nature that surrounded them. It was like nature was eating them and returning them to the earth as the weather and natural forces wore them away. When you look at the state that some of the rolling stock is in and you compare it to the renovated rolling stock you can see what a great job they are doing there. Lucy was keen to see all she could and was happy to match down the line side walk until we ran out of things to see.

Returning to the main museum we head off to look at all the engines they have there. Like the rolling stock they are in various states of repair. Some are in working order and look like they did when they were working in the quarries, while others are not more than rusting hunks of metal and are far from there former glory. All the staff there seems so dedicated that although there are years if not decades of work to be done, it will get done. Lucy loved the engines and was soon asking questions again about what bits are called and I was explaining again complete with the noises the trains make. 

The last area of the museum we went to was the platform which Lucy wanted to go and stand on. It was while we were standing on the platform that we got a free air display from the Harriers at RAF Cottesmore. I'm not sure what was going on at the base but while we were there we had seen a couple of Harriers coming into land very low. Now that isn't that unusual but what followed was. It wasn't just two coming back to the base but what appeared to be a whole squadron of twelve or more aircraft all with long range tanks. The most impressive sight of all was four coming into land in formation. It is a sight I had never seen before, two yes but never four. Lucy seemed impressed too, but I did have to cover her ears as much as possible as she found it far too noisy with her young sensitive ears. As we left one of the people at the museum told me where to watch them coming in, but later I couldn't find place. I will have to look on google maps and work it out.

Before heading home we set off for the supermarket. The idea for dinner was a simple pasta and tomato based sauce combined with warm homemade bread to clean the bowls. All we had to get was what we need to make dinner, the sauce and the pasta. It didn't take long, in fact Lucy probably spent more time on the rides outside the shop.

We got back home about five minutes after Langham School had finished for the day although it didn't matter as Catherine had already said she wanted to go out on her new bike after school for half an hour so we weren't expecting her home straight away. When Catherine did get home she got a royal Lucy welcome, a massive hug and a kiss and then Lucy started following Catherine everywhere as they played around the house. 

Soon the beep beep of the bread maker told us the bread was ready and off we went to see the results. It looked lovely and the bread turned out to be the best we have made yet and here is the recipe I used to make a 1kg loaf:

• 600g Strong white flour (Hovis)
• 28-30g Butter
• 7g Fast acting dried yeast (Tesco's)
• 330ml Semi skimmed milk
• 1 Tablespoon of salt
• 1 1/2 Tablespoons of sugar

On our bread maker we just used program 2 which makes standard white or brown loaf. As a guide it takes about 3 hours 20 minutes to make with a light crust. 

At about five Emily came home from her sleep over full of stories of what she had been doing. Lucy was so pleased to see her and went through same procedure of hugs and kisses before following up to her room while she got change back into her home clothes. 

Soon it was time for dinner and I cooked the pasta in a tomato sauce and served it with fresh bread. It something the girls haven't had in ages. For some reason I just hadn't thought of doing it as a meal. Lucy of course loved it and probably has it at her mummies, she use to cook it for lunch sometimes. With dinner out of the way there was just over an hour for the girls to play all together before Lucy went home. Of corse they made the most of it but it was soon time to take Lucy back to her mummies after a kiss and a cuddle from Emily and Catherine.

With Lucy back in Oakham the house fell quite as Emily got on with her homework in the bedroom and Catherine went into the family room to watch some television and the played on the computer. She really wanted to go out on her bike but it was just too dark. The nights are really drawing in now and at the end of next month there will be hardly any time to play out after the clocks change. All too soon it was bedtime for Emily and Catherine off they went to the land of nod as I settled down to relax.

It has been a lovely day and I was glad that little Lucy said she wanted to go to the museum again. It just gives something else we can do and given it is free other than what you can afford it is ideal. Personally I wonder how you get involved. If I had the time then doing something for them would be a worth while thing to do. It is like someone needs to take care of the museum and add extra enthusiasm and energy to the place and I could do that!