Alex clearly hasn’t seen the sunshine for a while as he was quite confused by the shorts I dug out for him on the first day of the current mini heatwave in London – “Mummy, I think my trousers are a bit small….”

What a glorious few days.  The weather looks like it’s turning now, but we’ve all thoroughly enjoyed spending loads of time outside soaking up the rays.  It’s so much easier getting out of the house when there aren’t coats, jumpers and shoes to contend with.  Keeping everything crossed this cooler spell passes quickly and we can properly get on with Summer!

So what have we been doing to make the most of the sun…?  Matt had a fun few hours with the children on Saturday morning while I was off doing my first performance with my new chamber choir, Chantage (finally, getting some hobbies back post children!).  Feeling brave, he took them up to the Southbank for a play in the fountains at City Hall and a walk along the river to Rotherhithe.

Clearly, the children got promptly drenched, but had a brilliant time!

When he finally dragged them away from the water, Sophie and Alex explored the space, loving the chance to climb all over the architecture and run wild!

Even Sophie’s bunny, Macy, got to see the sights – until she was abandoned in favour of some complicated steps to navigate (don’t worry Tracy, we brought Macy home!)

After a picnic by the river, and a swift half in a Rotherhithe pub, Matt handed the children over to me for the afternoon!  We promptly headed to Dulwich Village for a big ice cream and then into East Dulwich for a spot of summer sandal shopping.  Alex was desparate to by a brilliant pair of bright orange sparkly shoes, but sadly they were only in larger sizes (phew!) so he settled for some navy with an orange trim!  He has style!

Sunday was so sunny, we decided on a more ambitious (and probably foolish) day trip – heading off to London Zoo.  I was a bit worried that most of London would decide to do the same thing, so we left early and enjoyed a super quiet stroll along the canal in Camden. Alex was fascinated by the locks, but I’m not sure he quite understood my description of how they work.  Taking him to Falkirk Wheel in Scotland next week is going to blow his mind!

At the zoo, we headed to see Alex’s favourite area – Penguin Beach.  Sophie – who seems to adore animals – was so excited about seeing so many penguins swimming past her and Alex did lots of penguin waddling impressions!

The zoo wasn’t as busy as I’d feared and we managed to see a lot, including the butterflies, tiger, gorillas, komodo dragons, flamingoes and loads more.  Both the children adored seeing the monkeys – and Sophie in particular loved the assault course proving she really can climb like a monkey (how lovely is her outfit?!)!

She found it exhausting, and in the middle of the komodo dragon house lay on the floor and started looking very sleepy indeed!  I just love her little chubby fingers!

So we packed up and headed back home for the rest of the day!

A nice long nap gave Sophie her energy back, so we decided to make the most of the last heat of the day and unpacked the paddling pool!

A fun, if very wet for all of us, end to a brilliant weekend!  Alex and Sophie are really starting to play well together – it’s such a pleasure to see their relationship developing.

We’ve got a busy week coming up with a trip to Scotland and lots of family visits planned – expect lots more photographs next week!

I shall leave you with some lovely snaps of my duo last week – I love the pair of them in the swing together.

And perhaps my proudest photo of the week – having shown no interest in drawing/writing, Alex is suddenly developing much better pen skills and for the first time in his life drew a family portrait.  Here is Family Agar by Alex at 3 years old (I’m the one on the right!)