A Trip to the Beach

Posted on May 7, 2013 by Dragons and Fairy Dust

The first weekend in May is always a bank holiday weekend in the UK and it finally looks like Summer might be here. Having a very long late Winter this year this weekend was filled with sunshine. There is something about sunshine that makes everything seem brighter and the world a much better place. The air is filled with bird song, the flowers are finally blooming and there was a haze in the air. The paths that have been muddy all winter are now baking in the sun and there is a smell of warmth all around. It is weather where you want to get outside and do things.

We decided to pack a picnic and take the dog to the beach. The dog has never been to the beach before and we were not sure what he would make of it. He does not like car journeys and sat whining as we travelled there. I think this is because he associates car journeys with being left, the only time he really goes in the car is when we are going away and leaving him with friends. We have taken him to Hamsterley Forest previously which he loved but I think he had forgotten.

We parked in the car park and climbed up steep dunes to reach the beach. The skies were really blue and the beach was not that crowded considering the weather.

The dog was absolutely amazed. We let him off his lead and he raced round in circles absolutely taken aback at the beach.

He wasn’t brave enough to go into the sea, he put a paw in but the waves moved and he darted back quickly. It was much more fun to race round in big circles.

We ate our picnic and watch him race around happily. When we got home we had a very content dog who slept most of the rest of the day. Hopefully the sun will stay for a while so we can do more trips out with him.

Dark Skies Over the Forest

Posted on May 6, 2013 by Dragons and Fairy Dust

Recently I have been lucky enough to have two holidays in Dumfries and Galloway. At Easter we visited Westerkirk Mains which was a great base for exploring the area. The previous summer we were lucky enough to stay in Knockbrex Castle. Whilst we were in the area I learnt that Galloway Forest is actually a designated Dark Sky Park.

You might be wondering what a dark sky park is. Have you ever gone out to look at the sky at night? If you live in a city it is often very hard to see the stars as there is lots of interference from the street lights. This is a problem in much of the country, even rural areas, as light from the city can be visible for around 50 miles. A dark sky park is an area that is free from light pollution allowing you get to get an uninterrupted look at the sky. Galloway Forest was the first dark sky park in the UK.

When we were on holiday we noticed how much darker the skies were at night, the stars looked so much larger and clearer. I was able to talk to my son about the different constellations and we were able to find them in the sky. He was really interested in learning more about the stars and has since picked up several books about astronomy.

I was interested to learn that Kielder Water and Forest Park in Northumberland is bidding to become a Dark Skies Park. They also have an observatory with a number of different events taking place throughout the year. Kielder Water is much nearer to me so I hope to take my son along to some of these events.

There are a number of different things you can do with children to encourage them to learn about the night sky. You do not need a dark sky park to do these, just a reasonably dark area and a set of binoculars or a telescope.

Get a close up look at the Moon. With a pair of binoculars you can see the craters on it and children love to look for the man in the moon.
Get a star chart. You can get types that you rotate to a certain date and it will show you the stars in the sky at that time. There are a number of easily recognised constellations and children love to look for these.
Find the North Star and talk about how sailors used to use it to navigate by the stars at night.

I also noticed a number of forest parks offer activities at night time. You can go on a bat walk at twilight and spot the bats taking off into the night sky. I would love to do this and will be seeing if there is one near me. In some parks you can even go on a walk in the morning and listen to the dawn chorus, the birds singing to greet the dawn. This must be a magical experience. Why not have a look at the Forestry Commission Website and find out what is going on near you?

Bank Holiday Moneysavers

Posted on May 2, 2013 by Dragons and Fairy Dust

Are you looking forward to the bank holiday on Monday? I know I am. I am hoping for sun so I can get out and about for the day, there are so many interesting places I want to visit. The problem with getting out with the family is it can be very expensive. With the cost of everyday living going up people are doing their best to save money. Moneysupermarket seem to be doing their best to help. After asking bloggers to come up with 30 ways to save £1 in a bid to collect over 1000 money saving tips, they have now created an infographic showing deals for bank holiday days out.

Image courtesy of MoneySupermarket Travel Insurance

What are your plans for this bank holiday? I would love to know

The Maker Faire 2013

Posted on April 29, 2013 by Dragons and Fairy Dust

This weekend I took my son along to The Maker Faire which was taking place at the Centre For Life in Newcastle Upon Tyne. The Maker Faire is an event where engineers, scientists, crafters and artists get together and demonstrate the projects they have been working on. It is a great chance to show children that science and engineering can be exciting and to encourage them to go and try and make their own inventions. Science often is portrayed as boring but events like this set the record straight and act to spark the imagination, showing how interesting science can actually be.

There was a buzz in the air as we approached the Centre For Life and even before we entered there was plenty to look at. I had to take a couple of photographs of El Grando, a giant mechanical dragon at the entrance.

You could control him by pressing different buttons placed round the side of the barrier and he would move his wings, head and other parts.

He was very impressive and I being a great dragon lover I would have loved to take him home. The door in was guarded by a friendly Dalek who greeted us with “Hello Human”.

At least he did not try and exterminate us. Inside we found out how to make our voice sound like a dalek.

Walking around the ground floor we found a number of demonstrations of pulleys and other types of mechanical engineering. My son was fascinated by these spinning turntables that you could create sand patterns on.

This creation is a man with a moustache apparently. The two turntables span at different speeds and we had fun creating different shapes.

The next stand we visited encouraged us to hack our schools website. My son was very eager to try this and a lovely lady helped him to modify the website adding pictures of himself and our dog over the schools photographs.

He was very intent on this and was given a url to take home with him so he could continues his hard work. It was actually a demonstration of some of Mozilla’s tools, in this case Hackasaurus which is a great way to learn about html. My son actually continued playing with this when he got home and he was really interested in how it all worked.

Going round the corner into the main exhibition it got very busy. There was plenty to see and we were not really sure what to look at first so we just wandered about. We found a stand where you could buy a little electronics kit and have a go at making it yourself, including soldering it.

We chose a bagpipes kit which has a little speaker and some resistors allowing you to play a tune when you drag a wire across the resistors. My son took ages making this and was very intent on the work as you can see. He had never used a soldering iron before but managed brilliantly with a little help from me ( I had to be a bit careful of my fingers).
This is the finished result:
It has inspired me to dig out my old books on electronics for kids and my soldering iron and find some electronic bits and build some more kits with him.

My son’s favourite exhibit was apparently the pole dancing robots.

They were actually moving to the music and raised a definite smile. We also found the robots from Robot Wars. You could even have a go at driving them.
I was fascinated by the replica of the Mars Rover.
I find it amazing that this robot is actually driving around on Mars sending us back information. The rover was actually moving around and it is incredibly graceful for something that looks quite box like and chunky. My son was pleased to get a couple of posters telling him all about the Mars Rover and the solar system.

In the conference room was a section dedicated to computers and programming. From the BBC demonstrating their TV application layer software which you can write once and run on any device, to 3D printing to amazing applications that use the Raspberry Pi.
We even found a stand with old computers like an Acorn and a ZX81 that were working. My son was not very impressed by these and found it hard to believe that these computers were around when I was little. It made me remember why I became fascinated with software in the first place, do you remember those days of programming in basic?

Moving upstairs you could see how busy the Maker Faire was and we had got there just after it opened.

Upstairs was dedicated to crafting with opportunities to make all sorts of things from jewellery to Japanese bags. I was quite impressed by the knitting robot.
She seemed to be doing a great job. The circular arrangement of the knitting needles reminded me of a knitting nancy, a peg toy for knitting that I had when I was little. I was also impressed by the patchwork quilts, I wish I could make something like that.

The whole day was absolutely fascinating and I am really glad we went. We have come away inspired and I am now planning all sorts of projects to try with my son. He really enjoyed the day and has already asked me to find my soldering iron. As a way to inspire you to make things it really worked. A lot of hard work must have gone into making the exhibition so fascinating and it was a great way to spend a day.

Disclosure: I received tickets to visit The Maker Faire but was not told what to write and my opinions are my own.

A Visit To Traquair House

Posted on April 23, 2013 by Dragons and Fairy Dust

Recently we were on holiday in Dumfries and Galloway in Scotland. While we were there we went on several day trips and one of these was a visit to Traquair House. Traquair House is described as Scotland’s oldest inhabited house and promised plenty to see. As well as the house, there is a maze on the grounds, a cafe and craft workshops. It sounded like an interesting day for all the family.

Traquair House is situated near Peebles, which was a bit of a drive from where we were staying. It took about an hour to get there. The car park is situated next to the 1745 Tearoom and the craft workshops. The first thing we did was go and get some lunch before we explored. .

The menu was full of home cooking and it was difficult to choose what to have. In the end my son and I decided to have a Jacobite Burger, which was a lamb and mint burger flavoured with cheese and served with Traquair Ale Pickle. My husband decided on a steak hot pot. The meals came quickly and they were delicious. There was a relaxed atmosphere in the cafe and we did not feel rushed.

After lunch we made our way down the long driveway towards the house.

There was still a touch of snow on the ground. I saw a squirrel dashing off into the trees quickly as we wandered along. The house was hidden behind trees at first but we soon saw it in all its glory.

There are several sections, on the left is the gift shop and brewery shop as well as the Chapel. On the right is a dining room and the main house is straight ahead. We were not allowed to take photographs inside.

Traquair House was used as a hunting lodge in the 1500′s and was visited by many Royal hunting parties. It seems hard to imagine now but the house used to be in the middle of a forest and people came to hunt wild cat, wolves, deer, wild boar and bears. I can’t imagine running into a bear in the middle of Scotland now.

The inside of the house is absolutely fascinating. There are three floors. On the ground floor you can find the cellars, one of which is set out like a dungeon. The second two floors are accessed by very winding stone stairs. Rooms of particular interest to me were the fabulous library, which took up two rooms. The first one had been filled and the second room needed to be utilised. With floor to ceiling shelves and comfy chairs for reading in, I would love rooms like this in my house.

I also was fascinated by the room with a selection of toys, there were china dolls and a fabulous dolls house which had a small King Charles Spaniel in one the rooms (which my dog would have loved). The bedrooms were interesting as well, one of which was meant to have been used by Mary Queen of Scots and there was a small cradle beside the bed. As you walked round the walls were full of interesting photographs and paintings giving a feel of what it must have been like to live in the house in the old days.

Traquair House has a Catholic tradition. This was evident in the chapel and on the top floor of the house was a small room for the priest. There were hiding places in the house for the priests possessions. The priest’s room had a secret escape tunnel behind a cupboard so he could make a quick getaway. The steps did look very steep so I hope he did not have to rush down them.

You get a good view of the house from the back garden.

You also find the entrance to the maze in the gardens. My son and his cousins were very excited to visit the maze and soon disappeared from sight. We spent a little time reading about it and found out that the maze has four sub-centres that need to be reached before you can find the middle.

The maze is quite large as you can see from this view.

As you enter the maze on the left hand side is a small gate labelled fools exit. This is a short cut to help you to get out. The hedges on either side are quite high and you can’t see round the corners.

We had great fun finding our way around the maze and did eventually find the middle. The kids were perched on the logs in the centre looking very smug as they had got there first. They were also completely covered in mud so I suspect they had been rolling around on the ground.

On the way out we visited the gift shop and the brewery shop. Traquair House has it’s own brewery which was originally set up in the 18th Century and revived in more recent years. You can peep into part of the brewery at the back of the house. The brewery shop makes fascinating visiting, you get a small sample of each of the three different ales that are produced on site and told about the history behind them.

On the way out we walked up the avenue to see the Bear Gates. These were installed as the main entrance into Traquair House in 1738. They were in use for six years but the after Bonnie Prince Charlie visited the Earl of Traquair closed them, vowing never to open them again until a Stuart king was on the throne in London. They have been closed till this day but are well worth a look.

We thoroughly enjoyed our visit to Traquair House, there is plenty to see and it appealed to all the family. You will need plenty of time to visit, we were there for several hours and didn’t visit the craft workshops. You can find more information on their website.