Tim Atkinson's Blog, page 112

Wordless Wednesday... Vendéen sky

Welcome home!

Yes, we had a lovely time thank-you: the sun shone; the wine flowed; the pool rippled and the food was delicious. I'll tell you all about it later. But first, this:





Yes, a little 'Welcome Home' from our brave officers of law enforcement, less than twenty-four hours after arriving home. Yes, I know the sign says 'Maximum Stay Two Hours' and, yes, we might have overstayed our welcome (outside our own house, I should point out) but...



Is it really the best use of scarce police resources when ...

Remember this?

The photo Sarah took of Charlie and I on the beach at Anderby Creek?







Well, it's been made into this...



A wonderful canvas print by canvas dezign, whose banner you might have noticed on the side-bar. Furthermore, readers of Bringing up Charlie can get a 5% discount by clicking the link and quoting this code: AGEYPGHKCFE. 



So if you've a favourite holiday snap that you want to turn into a canvas print for the wall this could be your big chance. I can recommend it; in fact, I just did.



Thi...

Time Flies

Another post-from-the-past today, and appropriately it's about the passage of time and the elasticity (when not at work) of the clock. One of the most remarkable aspects of giving up work after twenty years as a teacher was the fact that my life was no longer organised into fifty minute chunks punctuated by what sounded like a fire alarm. The great irony reading this now in the middle of the summer holiday is both that the days are now wonderfully free of all restrictions (I don't even have t...

The Graco Nautilus

...so much more than just a car-seat:  ... you can fly an aeroplane,

Inspect the bin-lorry... 

watch the telly...

   have a drink...

 (whilst making sure it doesn't spill)

 You can read quietly...

 ...or read noisily.

And lastly, you can tell your dad non-verbally when you're fed up of him taking photos...

Oh and, of course, should you wish to you can use it in the car as well...

One small step...

Another video today. And isn't this why video cameras were invented? And why we blog for that matter (some of us at any rate)? Today's archive post is from January 14th 2009, and records the Neil Armstrong moment when Charlie took his first small steps.



To see him whizzing around the place today you'd hardly know it's only a year-and-a-half since he became fully bipedal. And when he runs he takes some catching. But the most charming thing is the way he tiptoes around the place, almost dancin...

My first vlog!

Ok, for today's trip down memory lane I'm going to have to send you back to the page itself. You see, it's a vlog (video-blog) - my first, in fact. Last week's archived post was all about losing my blogging virginity, and today's is about the time I, well, 'lost it' in the company of a video camera. It's only thirty-seconds long. You see, you get better as you get older and I'm now much more confident, practised and established than I used to be. Anyway, you don't want to hear about it, do yo...

Old friends...

It's the summer hols, we're all off school at last (cue Alice Cooper) and as I'm not always here to post I thought I'd schedule a few 'old friends', i.e. posts from the archives to keep you entertained. And where better to start than at the very beginning. It's a very good place to start...



So here's the first-ever post on Bringing up Charlie, back in the days when I still worked full-time in a job I was increasingly unhappy doing, dreaming of a way out and tentatively dipping my big toe...

Something for the weekend?

One of the great things about being a parent, I find, is the slightly surreal nature of the conversations you end up having. This week, for example, we've had enquiries into the nature and purpose of the sky and the proper names of our wheelie bins. Then yesterday afternoon, at the end of a long and tiring stint of motorway driving, I was commanded by a voice from the back seat to observe rather than merely listen as Charlie addressed some new and exciting line of philosophical enquiry. The t...

Make me smile...

What makes you smarter than a chimp? What makes you you? That's the question the Science Museum is asking as part of its 'Who Am I?' exhibition and they'd like your answer to the question 'What makes me smile?' In my case, it's simple. In fact, I can answer all the Science Museum's questions in one go: what makes me smile, what makes me who I am (and far luckier than a chimpanzee) is the pleasure and privilege of sharing my tiny corner of the universe with such a wonderful family...







How ab...