Deck Tales

There's no real tale to this blog post - but it just struck me the other day how much goes on out on our deck. It's completely enclosed and not at all overlooked, and feels a bit like another room of the house.

And you can see how comfortable my children feel out there - I think the naked bike riding came about because the boys have new bikes (Will for his birthday, and James because his £50 bike from Costco four years ago had reached the end of its natural life) and wanted to ride them whilst simultaneously being told to get ready to get in the bath.... I'm not sure, but I think Nick was in Scotland, so normal parenting rules didn't apply - I was so harried they could have got away with anything. Actually, I've just noticed that Will is, in fact, riding his old bike, and James is riding Will's new bike, so maybe new bikes had nothing to do with it and they just felt like getting naked!

The next classic is Laundry Basket Racing - the rules are (1) take one laundry basket, (2) insert sister of your choosing, (3) draw finishing line with chalk on the deck, (4) decide on number of laps, (5) hoon around the deck, drift on the corners and try to complete the race without dumping your sister out of the basket. Ella and Phoebe LOVE this game - I'm still waiting for the first big smash, after which we may need a permanent black flagging...

And finally, Phoebe, hat-fetishist extraordinaire - desperate to put a hat on her head, but still slightly lacking in the skills to do so! Though it's admirable that she could balance it there at all. Actually, it's also impressive that this is even a hat - in the last few days, she has attempted to put a sock, a pencil case and a pair of pyjama pants on her head. Future career as a milliner, perhaps?