Bros

"My Mummy's made a festival!" said the Boy Wonder, running over to give us hugs as we walked into the playroom. "I know!" I said. "We're going to go there later, to have lunch with Mummy and then go to the cinema." "I went to the cinema yesterday," he said. "I saw The Land Before Time."

It then turned out that he hadn't been briefed about us being booked to take him to the Cardiff Animation Festival screenings of The Wrong Trousers and Vengeance Most Fowl - which was probably wise of his parents, because there'd been a non-negligible chance that something might happen to prevent us turning up today. When he found out, his first reaction was puzzlement: "But I've seen those already - they're on my telly!" I stated firmly that seeing films in the cinema was better than watching them on the telly, and after the event I'm pretty sure that he'd agree with this assertion. Whether the other patrons would also agree, after being treated to B's alternating stream of questions and running commentary throughout the films, I really couldn't say, but it's a very family-friendly festival, and no-one actively objected.

I took this photo during a hiatus between lunch and the cinema, when R and I took the Boy to the local park to work off some energy, and met up with his Daddy and the Baby Brother. B minor is desperate to be able to copy all the things B major can do, and was a bit disgruntled not to be able to climb up and sit on the fence beside him. As long as everything is going to his master plan he's a wonderfully sunny baby, but when thwarted he's inclined to respond with extreme prejudice, and rapid adult intervention was needed at this point to divert him. Luckily there were ducks (which he loves) to shout at, and then a family friend who was also at the park with her own children offered all the kids ice cream lollies - a new experience for B minor, and one he took to with relish.

R and I both had a brilliant day, and the icing on the cake was that we also got to spend some time over lunch with H and S, who were in Cardiff because L had inveigled her brother into doing the music for the Sketch Showdown yesterday evening. Neither H nor the artists had any forewarning of the cartoon characters they were going to be asked to sketch, and he had to produce either the correct theme tunes, or failing that some kind of appropriate music, as they worked against the clock. This sounds incredibly stressful to me, but H said he'd enjoyed it, and S, who was in the audience, said that the whole event was a lot of fun.