Two wonderful days with my adorable granddaughter Catrin

As regular readers of this blog will know, I try to see my granddaughter Catrin – now three and a quarter – once a week and usually I collect her from nursery on Thursday and babysit her that evening while her parents are busy. This week has been different though because her nursery was closed for two days as a result of staff training, so I had extra duties.

Catrin and I had two wonderful days together but it was so tiring. After 10 hours looking after her on Monday and another 9 hours on Tuesday, I was so exhausted that I slept over 11 hours the following night! How do stay-at-home mums (and dads) manage?!?

For Monday, I decided to take her to see friends of mine in Cambridge. Catrin and I have never been on a train together and she found it all so exciting. We were met at Cambridge station by my friend Anne who has two youngsters of her own who were actually in school and nursery that day. Anne loaned us a child seat for the day and drove us to a child-friendly place called “The Box Cafe”.

At the cafe, Anne and I were joined by our mutual friend Ellie who brought along her two year old daughter Hope. Ellie became a first time mother at 47 and has written a fantastic blog about her amazing experiences called “Mush Brained Ramblings”. Catrin and Hope were soon delighting in each other’s company and playing in the cafe’s Wendy house.


Cuddling Catrin and Hope at “The Box Cafe”
Anne – who recently left the Tinder Foundation (on whose Board I sit) – had to go back to work, but Ellie drove the other three of us to a great location for our day out. About eight miles south west of Cambridge is the National Trust property of Wimpole Estate where we spent most of our time at the Home Farm. This has a collection of rare breed sheep, goats, cattle, pigs and horses. At least as exciting to Catrin and Hope were the large number of child-size farm vehicles, so they were busy driving brightly coloured tractors when not on the see-saw or slide. A full-size tractor took us back to the entrance when we had to leave.


Catrin drives her tractor

Catrin and Hope on a real tractor
Tuesday was a challenging day because there was a tube strike in London. So it took me almost two hours to travel from home, it cost £22 to take a taxi to the museums (we struggled back on the tube), and Catrin’s little friend James (and mother Jen) were not able to join us because of the travel difficulties.

But again Catrin and I had a really fun time and she was so well-behaved. We did four things – two not a great success and two a brilliant success. We started at the “Sensational Butterflies” tent in the grounds of the Natural History Museum where Catrin was much more interested in stamping a card with different stages of the life of a butterfly than actually observing the butterflies themselves. We finished by going to see “Under The Sea”, an IMAX film in 3D at the Science Museum, but Catrin preferred not to use the 3D glassess (actually the 3D was sensational) and eventually insisted “This is boring” so we left early.

Much more successful was our time in the rest of the Science Museum. Catrin had a fabulous time in the section for 3-6 year olds called The Garden. We have been here several times before and she loves it, but usually it is very popular and therefore very crowded. Since it was a tube strike that day, hardly anyone was there and Catrin was able to spend as long as she wanted on whatever she wanted. Then we visited a section for older children called Launchpad. I have never taken Catrin here before because I thought she was too young but she really loved it. Both The Garden and Launchpad have so many interactive features to engage the kids.


Catrin studying hydraulics at The Garden

Catrin exploring magnetism at Launchpad
On both days, Catrin was so good that I recommended to her daddy that she have a Peppa Pig sticker on her ‘Good Behaviour’ chart on the kitchen door. She is now only one short of completing the chart – but I have no idea what her reward will be.

Thanks, Catrin, for making an old man very happy.

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 1st, 2014 at 8:28 am and is filed under My life & thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

2 Comments

  • Nadine Wiseman
    May 3rd, 2014 at 11:17 pm

    If you keep this up, by 15 she’ll be expecting a quick weekend trip with Grandpa to Paris!

    How is Catrin at entertaining herself – with craft or imaginary play? I think this is how working Mums and Dads manage – they get on with their chores and littlie plays alongside. One day Grandpa might need a rest day!

    Kind regards

    Nadine

  • Roger Darlington
    May 4th, 2014 at 8:52 am

    I think a trip to Paris will definitely be on the cards one day. I did that with my son (her daddy) when he was a teenager.

    Actually Catrin is very good at imaginary play and I enjoy listening in to the conversations she manufactures.

 




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