Mummy & Bean's Weekend in London Town

Bean and I never get to spend time alone, so I decided to take him away to London for the weekend, just him and me, to go on adventures and see stuff.

Building his kre-o transformer.

He packed some toys in a little backpack and adding the new things I had brought; a Kre-o transformer blind pack (fantastic value at just £2 for an interchangeable figurine - a firm favourite with my boys), a new matchbox car, a little notebook, a pack of coloured dot stickers and a teenage mutant ninja turtles colouring-in book. I'd also packed a load of felt pens. He managed to entertain himself for the whole two hour train journey, though the stickers only ended up on me and he was slightly foxed because he didn't have a seat belt.

My leg :/

Watching the world whizz by.

Waiting for our very first tube train.

We got a tube to old street and a big black taxi cab (in which he happily found a seat belt, bless him) to Wellington Row because our first stop had to be the Felt Corner Shop near Bethnal Green, where I shook Miss Lucy Sparrow's hand and told her she was a genius.

She has painstakingly created all the items one would find in a corner shop, just using felt and a fair amount of wadding. It's lots of fun and I had to see it for myself, having come across it online a few weeks ago and actually squealed in delight.

Corner Shop selfie.

We then tried to get a tube into Town but the central line was closed so we had to find a bus.

My incredibly logical husband made himself useful even when we where so far apart. I rang him while Bean had a rest on a park bench to moan about how I couldn't find the right bus stop and he simply suggested going on Google maps as it would show me the bus route and everything. Love him!

While we were there I also took a moment to give Bean his pedometer (I'd forgotten, Daddy had given us a challenge to find out how much walking he did over the weekend) which led to this hilarious video;

Love his dancing!

He was trying to make as many steps as he could. Funny boy!

The pedometer didn't go to plan though. He kept taking it off his trousers to check it so it didn't count even half his steps. It also went mental on the train, so we've no idea how much walking he did. Next time, I might set my iPhone up to track us. It would use up loads of battery power but now I've got this pocket re-charger thingy, I'm not so worried.

Let me just take a moment to tell you about this awesome gadget I bought recently

The incessant map checking, photo taking and the like of a day trip wipes out my iPhone really quickly but this thing means I can recharge it on the go without too much hassle and it seems to be able to do that several times when it's fully charged.   It takes eight hours to fully load and has little lights which go out as the charge is used up, so you always know how much it has left.    I bought it on here eBay after a weekend away when I really struggled to keep my phone alive and I reckon it was really great value. Just so you all know, I'm not paid for anything (like, ever). I've borrowed this image from the eBay seller I bought it from. I'm only sharing this because I personally have tried and tested it and think it's super.

On the way to the bus stop we passed the Museum of Childhood. I've walked past a few times (usually on the way to Spa London) but never gone in. It wasn't on our itinerary because I never thought a five year old would enjoy looking at toys through glass any where near as much as he did. I loved looking at the old school transformers and star wars toys, and was enthralled by the massive train set. 

Twenty pence in the slot activated the trains and he loved watching them go through the tunnels and around the track. 

We were there so long I gave up trying to get to the aquarium, but we still got a big red double-decker bus to St Paul's as previously planned.

Top deck baby! (distracted by unwrapping a sweetie).

We had taken a bus to Bethnal Green tube station from the Corner Shop, but much to Bean's disappointment we couldn't go upstairs because we were only going a few stops to save him walking it. He was super pleased to find the front seats free and the windows are huge on these new buses! It was like a green house up there, but the view was fantastic. 

Water thingy (no idea lol)

Mary Poppins book bench.

 On the way to London, I had told him about the book bench trail I had planned. This one wasn't on our trail but Bean liked it. He especially liked sliding off it repeatedly.

"I'm the King!"

Bean was more interested in the architecture than I gave him credit for. He was always looking around, forming opinions on things. He found this windowsill (I won't tell him if you don't) which he decided was in fact a very grand throne. He loved that it even had a place to put his backpack. 

That's not my...bench.

On St. Peter's Hill there is a small play installation. Bean watched for a while before joining in with the other kids. He looked so morose as he sat there but I knew he was just working stuff out in his head.

Watching the other kids and waiting for his turn on the roundabout.

Selfie on the millennium bridge.

 As we reached the end of the bridge, there was a bigger boy sliding down one of the support beams, so Bean just had to have a go too. I was a tad terrified because it doesn't just slope downwards, but sideways too, so if he went too high he would've slid off the top. He was happy to listen to my worries and thankfully never left my arms reach. He invented a game where he had to slide down a land on a 'darlek eye' (a bolt to you and I). He couldn't come off until he'd got the high score, apparently.

While we made our way a tube station, Bean discovered he could make the lights on the floor go out by covering them up with mud. Then he did a lovely big H for Henry in one of them.

outside the Tate Modern.

We stayed at a good friend's house, you know, the kind who've been in the family for so long, they are actually family now. It's actually my Mum's best friend of twenty five years, they've watched me grow up and now they're watching my babies grow up. 

They have a hot tub in the garden and after all that walking, a few warm bubbles with some familiar faces is exactly what we needed. Bean happily fell straight to sleep in the spare bed with no arguments.

Big Ben selfie.

The next day, as we headed off to the aquarium, we got the tube to Westminster so he could see Big Ben since he'd mentioned it on the train. He was so impressed by how tall it was, his little face dropped as we came up the steps onto Westminster bridge. He's obviously seen it on TV and it is much bigger than he thought. He wasn't happy with just seeing it from the bridge as we crossed the river, and insisted we walk over to the bottom and then see it from all sides-which of course isn't possible what with all that fencing and all. So he climbed along the fencing for a bit until he realised the aquarium was in the opposite direction.

Big Ben.

Big Ben selfie from the other side of the river.

We finally made it to the London Aquarium. Because we hadn't bought our tickets in advance as I had previously planned to (thank goodness we didn't though, as we didn't make it for the time slot I was going to book them for), we had to queue for about forty minutes. Thankfully Bean was ok, he's not normally great at any kind of queue, but I had a little stash of sweeties to keep him going.

It cost the two of us £38 and it took less than two hours to get round (I'd read online it should take three). It was great and Bean will remember it always I'm sure, but I think maybe there are better value aquariums around. I wouldn't bother going again.

The penguins were super fun!

Shark face/photo bomb.

Bean had been given some spending money so he bought himself this cute little shark. Talk about over loved! It is now a tad on the black side after spending the rest of the day travelling around grubby London and will be lovingly hand washed later today.

Behind the London Eye.

Yummy sausage.

We found a real food market behind the Royal Festival Hall to grab some lunch from. One of the fabulous things about Bean is he'll eat almost anything, so when we go out, I know I can always find him something. His brother isn't anywhere near as easy to please. He grabbed a hot dog from one of the first stalls we passed, a lovely sausage from a farmer who was obviously passionate about his pigs. I chose the most delicious gallette from a crepe stand, full of goats cheese, caramelised onion and rocket. This is Bean tucking into his while we waited for mine to be cooked, it was so busy he had to stay by my feet but he happily sat on the floor and chomped away. Ate the whole thing too.

Then we got the tube from Waterloo to North Greenwich so we could go on the Air Emirates Line cable car across the river. We didn't really know where we were going, which made Bean's tired legs even worse. But we worked it out and he was fine.

He might be a bit tired :(

He found a sign he liked and decided to pose for a photo for the only time in the whole trip (aside from the selfies which I only get a second to catch).

We queued forever for the cable car. We had to queue to get a ticket for Bean (I used my oyster card).
Note to all; buy online before you go! 
Then we had to queue again to get on. Thankfully there were loads of benches I could plonk my tired Bean on. And it was totally worth it! Considering how little it costs (£2.30 for a child, I think £3.30 off my oyster), it's short but very very sweet. It goes so high! Definitely doing that again!

A view over the Thames.

Air Emirates selfie.

Bean was very impressed by the O2.

We then got the DLR and tube to Embankment, where we walked over to Trafalgar Square to check out the giant lion statues.

There were loads of people climbing on them, and Bean so wanted to get up there but he misjudged just how big they were and once he'd got up he was freaked out so we checked out the water fountains instead.

"Too high Mummy"

It was time to go find our train, which was messed up by line closures. We had to run from London Euston to St Pancras, then through St Pancras twice trying to find the right platform. Poor Bean's legs! He was so tired! But we made it, with five minutes to spare. And we'd managed to get some dinner (Marks & Sparks sandwiches) on the way.

Our train left at 6:00pm, so obviously he was shattered and that involved a fair amount of messing about. We had to get four different trains to get home, but he was brilliant and it wasn't so bad. When we got off the train, he insisted on hiding the things that we had bought his big brother (a little toy stingray from the aquarium and a Big Ben keyring) behind his back so he could surprise him in the car park where Daddy and Ed were waiting for us.

We had an amazing time. It was so good spending time with my little guy, doing what interested him and going at his (very slow, very observant) pace.

We never did do the book trail or the quiz, but we did other stuff instead, so at least we were never bored or short of choice, though how anyone can be bored in London with a loaded Oyster card is beyond me.

Ed had spent the weekend with Daddy. Apparently they were practising fishing in the living room...I'm not commenting haha.

I'm looking forward to Ed's weekend which is coming up very soon - watch this space.