Modern Art?

Whilst enjoying a meal on Thursday at the Jamaica Inn with Mrs A and the boys, Matthew had finished his meal quickly and was somewhat bored - so in order to keep him occupied we played draw your Daddy.

After about 10 minutes of peace and quiet (giving us time to eat the meal) Matthew - aged 10 produced this masterpiece of of his Daddy!

Is it a true likeness?

HMA

Bob Seger- We've Got Tonight live

A good novel - wind and rain lashing against the window, a little light music on in the back ground, Mrs A and the boy's fast asleep - well, I would choose this classic to help ease the night away.

HMA

Pilot Ulster Scots Residential Summer School - 2011 - B

Loughries Ulster Scots summer school has been going for 5 years, yes 5 years - it is hard to believe that we have been going so long. We only consider children from p1 to p7 as the summer school is held at Castle Gardens Primary School.

I will be doing a separate post on the summer school in the coming day's.

This year the Ulster Scots Agency decided to pilot a residential Ulster Scots summer school, aimed at the next age group 11 to 14. Loughries applied to pilot the residential - we were successful and plans were made.

Greenhill YMCA Donard Park Newcastle was the venue for what turned out to be a fantastic adventure. On the trip were 18 very excited children and 3 equally excited leaders, Heather Hutchinson, Carolyn Saunderson and me!

Not to go into too much detail, however I hope you can see by the photo's attached that we had a wonderful trip. Activities included zip line, climbing wall, bouldering, campfire cookery, Scottish and Highland country dance workshop, language and history workshop, music and singing around the campfire and some of the children played.....yes, lets stay up all night!!

It was a great trip and one we may plan for in 2012, I have to say that the children were fantastically well behaved and really had a great time - as coordinator of the trip, I must pay tribute to Heather and Carolyn for making the trip so very special for everyone!

Enjoy the snaps - Thanks to H and C for the snaps.

HMA

Nice Weather For It

Well, on a cold, wet and windy Friday in August - what would be more fun than crab fishing, off Bangor Pier!!

Yes, we all ventured down to the pier and during some awful rain showers and gusty conditions, we had a great afternoon's fun with a 3 crab lines and a few bits of bacon.

In all we caught 21 crabs - and a few feet of seaweed in 2 hours.

Hope you enjoy the pics!

HMA

Slieve Donard - My Personal Challenge

I have a few 'secret' things I would like to do/achieve - most are just pipe dreams, however I hope to realise one of these pipe dreams later this month.

Well, I plan to hike/climb Slieve Donard! Yes, later this month Matthew Warwick and I have arranged to meet up and climb the highest Mountain in Northern Ireland.

Now those who know me will be aware that my job is like scaling Slieve Donard daily, that aside it has always been an ambition of mine - really just to say 'I did it'.

I started training yesterday 6 miles walked and 6 miles walked this morning, I plan to walk Scrabo on Saturday and continue to exercise by walking up to 8 miles per day in order to build up some level of fitness before I attempt this walk.

I am an asthmatic and I hope that this will not affect my walk - I will have to wait and see how it goes - wish me luck!!

Pictures to prove I did do it will be posted later!

HMA

More Reading - Summer 2011

Well folks, not too much bloggin lately as I have been rather busy organising and overseeing 2 x summer schools - which I will blog about soon, also I needed a break from paperwork / laptop - as I need rest!

In order to keep me sane, I have 2 new books to read - one I bought with a book voucher given to me as a gift from one of my schools, the other was a gift from my assistant Minister.

1/ A History of Ulster - Jonathan Bardon - history my worst subject at school, I was a Geography and Maths chap at school. History in my old High school was 1066, Henry VIII and all that - why would we want to teach our own children their own history, tut, tut!

2/ Rock Solid - 12 gospel truths to live by - several contributors - Our assistant Minister, John Mullan, at Greenwell Street Presbyterian Church, gave this to me to read as a follow up to my Christianity Explored Course.

HMA

Pilot Ulster Scots Residential Summer School - 2011

I have been quite busy recently with our normal summer school - last week, now I focus my attention to our new venture, Pilot Residential Summer School at Greenhill YMCA, Newcastle, Co. Down.

Tuesday morning until Wednesday evening, 18 children and 3 leaders will have 2 fun packed day's, enjoying - archery, climbing wall, bouldering, zip wire, dance, music, cookery, language and history project.

Plenty to do and get involved with - report later.

HMA