Is it a bird? Is it a plane?...No, it's super Alice!

I think Alice needs to get some electrolysis done - check out that beard... 

This blog entry is dedicated to Alice and her move into the unknown world of endless snow and silly coats. She now leaps through the snow like a deer in the New Forest, weaving her way from one patch of yellow snow to the next. I can now track her endless desire to smell other dogs wee as I can spot all the tasty areas of staining against the pure white. Oh Alice, life is so simple and easy....well, it was until I made you wear that coat....

Unfortunately that day, every time Alice did a wee, instead of going through the cut out hole, it went down the inside of the trouser legs and so became a fleece nappy which I'm sure was not pleasant for her in any way! May have to cut a bigger hole in the material. You can see at the end of the next video that she does a wee but there is no yellow patch left on the snow....oh dear, coat malfunction...

She is pretty bouncy in her suit and even attempted a few spins of pure snowy delight. Amazingly, the snow doesn't seem to annoy her. She hates water but solid water seems to be okay and she loves running through the banks of powder - I must admit to being amazed at this...we all know how precious she can be.

So, as you can see, Alice is enjoying her new environment and throwing herself into the snow with gusto. The weather is still pretty mild at -8 so I'm not sure she has really experienced the crazy temperatures yet. It is -17 on Thursday so we'll see how she copes. When we were away in England the temperature got down to -25 and Alice could only cope with 10 minutes outside before extreme shaking occurred...but, this was before the coat of many many colours....

I leave you with an image of a lady that sat opposite me on the Metro.....I think you'll agree that her overall look was quite an accomplishment. I was going to ask her if she wouldn't mind sitting on my Christmas tree....well, if you don't ask, you don't get...

A day in the life of Arthur at Nursery....

It was Arthur's Russian nursery Christmas party yesterday. Really it was just a normal day at nursery except we were allowed in to take some videos, oh and they played a few Christmas songs on the piano! Poor little chap was full of cold and I had administered some Nurofen before hand so I think he was a little subdued but he tried to join in the singing and dancing! Here are some videos and pictures of the event:

As you can see, it was complete chaos, plus I found it hard to video and join in with Arthur!

A worn out and rather ill Elf!

Arthur wasn't interested in the hankie dance...

There was quite a dramatic music medley going on...even I couldn't keep up!

Arthur didn't quite get the game of stop moving when the music stops...

As you can see...Arthur was slightly bemused by the Russian Christmas songs! Poor thing was really too full of cold to join in too much! But at least he was there!

It was then time for a snack and Arthur muttered his favourite word -

If there is a banana within 100 yards, Arthur becomes rather obsessed with obtaining it -

Death stares to boy with banana...

Arthur still working out a way to get boy's banana...

Puzzle time - with obligatory small metal car.... 

Arthur with his teacher Masha - 

Anyway, that was a little snapshot of what Arthur gets up to 6 hours a week! I have a cold, sore throat and cough and Arthur has the same so unfortunately we are feeling rather down in the dumps at chez Ogilvie! I think Arthur would have preferred to have sat and played puzzles or eaten some bananas rather than sing and dance but I didn't want him to miss it! Let's hope that by the weekend we are all feeling a little better and we have Mr. Ogilvie back on home turf....

Damned clot, be gone!

Well, you could say it's been a trying week if nothing else.....

After a rather busy week in England, shopping and seeing friends and family, we should have known that things were going to go down hill when it started snowing in London - everything comes to a standstill and nothing is simple. I had saved the buying of all my food and bits and pieces till the last day and of course by then the shelves in the supermarkets were bare as everyone in Britain decided to panic buy just in case it snowed for the next 200 days and everyone starved and the world as we know it came to an end.... indeed. So sadly I ended up with half the amount of food I wished for and just hoped and prayed that we would be able to fly from Heathrow. We called BA and were told that our flight was still on time and to come to the airport as normal. Why do we always believe them? So anyway, we rock up to the airport and there is a massive queue to drop your bags off as they have diverted all their staff into booking people onto other planes, the departures board has about 2 planes that are not cancelled, the rest is awash with red cancellation signs. So we go through security where I have Arthur's yoghurt and the cream for his bottom removed and taken away with the customs man muttering under his breath ' Even with all the signs they still try to bring things through..' to which I shouted back - ' that cream is solid, there is nothing liquidy about it, granted the yoghurt is liquid but that was just an over sight- I've brought that cream through before with no problems' - Again, why shout at a customs man - you are definitely not going to win the argument and they can do more things to you than you can do to them so eventually I slinked off with my tail between my legs - but seriously - it wasn't a liquid, it was solid! So we get through and then the delays start. Eventually they let us on the plane around 2pm (we arrived in airport at 10am) and then have the absolute joy of sitting on the runway in a queue for the de- icer machine for 3 hours. It amazed me that with so few planes flying, there was still such a wait for this bloody machine - what the hell would the wait time have been if there was a full schedule of planes? 7 hours? I actually felt sorry for the BA staff as they were trying their best to placate everyone and it certainly wasn't their fault - the airport had ground to a standstill and there was the smallest scattering of snow I have ever seen! In fact it was hard to find any snow without a microscope. So at 5pm we eventually took off, the air stewardess found us a row with 3 seats so that Arthur could have his own chair - 

Cars always save the day...broom broom!

So off we went, walking Arthur up and down the aisles, he even had a chat with Sophie Ellis-Bextor in First class - and then chats with all the air stewardesses. He did amazingly well for being on a plane for 7 hours, my iphone came in handy as I had downloaded lots of animal flash cards - it made me laugh every time he pressed one of the buttons and there was a loud 'quack quack' and you could see people looking around thinking they were maybe going slightly mad or maybe there was a horse, duck, chicken and goat on the flight....well, BA need all the passengers they can get these days, you can't be choosy in an economic crisis. We did eventually arrive back home in Moscow to a balmy -21. The taxi driver had blue hands having waited for 3 hours and then struggled to get all our luggage in to the car - the buggy ended up in the passenger seat with the handles sticking into the poor man's head, I think it was impossible for him to get to the hand break but then, who needs a hand break?

The next day, Graeme trotted off to work as normal but complaining of a sore leg. When he returned in the evening, he had developed two lumps on his thigh and was expressing that it was getting quite painful. We did the usual thing of questioning whether it was worth going to the clinic to check it out or maybe to wait until morning. In the end, after doing some internet research and talking to my mother we decided that he should walk to the clinic as it is only 10 minutes away. It was about 10pm so I stayed at home to look after Arthur. At about 11pm I receive a phone call from Graeme explaining that he is in an ambulance being taken to a main hospital on the other side of Moscow and that he has DVT (Deep Vein Thrombosis) and that the Doctors have him on a drip and that it is all very serious as he has two large blood clots at the top of his thigh. OH MY GOD! There is nothing so worrying as being stuck in a flat, in a foreign country, not knowing what the hell is going on and thinking the worst. Graeme said that they were going to scan his whole body to make sure there were no clots travelling to his heart, brain or lungs. I had no phone number for the place he was going to so I had to just sit in the flat and wait to hear from him. At about 1am he called to say that they were pumping him full of drugs, injections in his stomach and shoulder every hour and that they were going to scan him continually to make sure the clots didn't move - it was a waiting game basically. If this doesn't make you wear those stupid plane socks then I don't know what will! The doctors told him that if he had waited to come into the clinic the next morning then he probably wouldn't be here to tell the tale....not a thought I like to dwell on too long.

So, the next morning I had arranged for the nanny to come and look after Arthur all weekend and I set off to find the hospital. The hospital wasn't on any of my maps as it was too far from the centre so I googled it at home, wrote down a few street names and memorised the map...or at least I though i'd memorised the map. I came out of the Metro station and immediately turned the wrong way and so I was following my memorised map back to front. At this point it was about 9am - I had sent a text message to Graeme saying I was on my way...

After walking for what seemed like an age, I just couldn't find any of the roads I'd written down. I might add that I had to translate all the cyrillic and then see if they matched any of the stuff i'd written, but nothing was making sense. It had snowed during the night so walking through fresh snow is quite hard and I was getting tired, the temperature was about -15 and I couldn't put my gloves on because I needed to use my phone to try and use google maps - again, I thought I was somewhere else so the maps didn't make sense. I tried to stop a few Russians and ask directions but none of them seemed to know where the road was that I had written down - that should have given me a clue really. I stopped one man and struggled with my poor Russian for about a minute to which he then replied ' Oh sorry, I'm not from around here, I'm just staying at the hotel over there' in a broad American accent - why couldn't he have stopped me trying to speak Russian after a few seconds instead of watching me make a fool of myself for a minute?! I was now at a point of desperation and stopped two young Russian girls and asked for directions again, to which they laughed and ran off! At this point I started to cry and stamp my feet in the snow and was about to pick up some snow and hurl it their direction whilst screaming something extremely insulting but realised I was in the back streets of Moscow and probably would not win a fight even if it would make me feel better. Graeme called me on my mobile asking where the hell I was as it was now 11am to which I replied ' I don't fucking know!' in a rather pathetic, whining voice. My mobile then ran out of battery - I know, you couldn't write a better script....but I eventually stumbled upon the American hospital and ran in as if I'd been lost in Siberia for 2 weeks, muttering to myself 'Where is the European Medical centre? Please help me!' The lady printed me out a map with the comment ' Oh, you have a very long way to walk' - listen lady, don't say things like that, I'll end up throwing myself into a snow drift and be done with it! So back I walked, through the snow, still worrying that Graeme might be on death's door and I'm lost in the middle of God knows where. In these situations you realise how difficult things are when you don't speak the language, how alone you are in a big foreign city. 

With the help of my map, I walked back past the Metro that I had exited two hours previously and found the European medical centre about 10 minutes away in the opposite direction...I know, what an idiot.

The EMC....at last.

I had to put on some rather attractive blue plastic covers for my shoes - 

You can't all be as fashion forward as me you know....

So finally, I make it in to see the wounded soldier - 

The leg in question....

I found his spirits to be high and after the initial chat I was then asked, 'did you bring my phone charger?' er, no, 'did you bring me some clean clothes?' er, no ' Did you bring me a tooth brush?' er, no....'Have you brought anything of use at all?' Er...no. So after taking 2 hours plus to get there and staying for 20 minutes to chat I then had to return home to collect said items that I had forgotten.....oh joy oh joy of joy. At least I knew where the bloody place was now though! On my return with all of the above, I even passed a macdonalds and bought two huge bags which I then felt the need to sneak into the hospital as was worried i'd be kicked out for bringing such filth inside such a clean establishment! This did bring a smile to Graeme's face so it was worth sticking the burgers down my trousers ; ).

Tea with the invalid...

Having now been travelling to the hospital for a few days, I am starting to get to know the area and on my travels - usually in desperation to find some lunch other than bloody macdonalds I have taken a few pictures - 

On the way to the hospital...strange building..

Rather pretty church...

Walked through a market...

Sadly didn't fancy any of this for lunch...

I then walked round a corner and was faced with this - 

I think this bus is lost...?

On the side of the double decker it said 'Fish and Chips sold here'  - well, what a very weird English experience you can have in the middle of no where! Oh and you see the pile of snow? Well, as it falls, the usual task force run out and clean it up into piles like so...Britain, watch and learn.

When I was on the Metro, I noticed that an animal had fallen from the ceiling and landed on this man's shoulder...I was going to point this out to the poor fellow but realised my Russian didn't stretch that far...

Russian fashion at it's best..

Having had a rather depressing few days, I realised that I had to go and get Alice a winter jacket as the dog walker had shouted in the usual frightening Russian way that my dog was shivering and couldn't cope with -20 and that she could only be walked in such weather for 10 minutes! I was told abruptly that I must go and get her a coat that goes all the way to her feet! So, in between hospital visits I rushed to a pet shop and found a rather fetching number in red, with pink fleece on the inside! Perfect for little southern softy Alice! Trying to get the bloody thing on her was a trial in itself, as I got one paw in, one came out and so this went on until I realized that you can tighten the legs with a draw string so that they can't get them off!

Come on Alice, see the funny side...

I must admit to laughing for at least half an hour whilst Alice looked at me with pure venom...honestly, it was her that started the shivering nonsense and got me told off so she only has herself to blame...this over dramatic behaviour has consequences you know.

Still working on how the hood works....

She'll learn to love it...trust me!

I took her out in it this evening to collect Arthur from nursery and I must admit at least 5 people in the street laughed at her...heh - she has feelings too you know! She even went for a pee and it went straight through the hole designed for such a purpose - I was amazed! I expected it to all wind up in one of the trouser legs and then to stream onto the hall floor when I unzipped her! Genius, I love it! She was nice and toasty when I unzipped her at home so it is worth the laughter!

So, back to the hospitalised one...every part of his body has been scanned, he has been injected with metal and then put in an MRI machine - he said it was like being cooked in a microwave oven...his whole body started to heat up to an uncomfortable level. He has been injected in the stomach every hour and has downed 2000 pills. Today the cardiologist said that the clots are getting smaller and are dispersing - hurrah! He has been told that he cannot fly for 2 months and that he will be on blood thinning drugs for 6 months but the cardiologist commented that his recovery is excellent! Thank goodness for that. So, for those that think DVT will not happen to them, get out your flight socks, drink a glass of water every half an hour and do your in flight exercises as next time it could be you!

Arthur wrote a piece on the piano for his father - it's a modern piece, titled ' Daddy, when ya comin home cause Mama's ears hurt...'

He has also learnt the ' let's throw everything out of the cupboards' game but sadly mother is too tired to pick it up....hopefully Alice will do it.

I leave you with a parting shot of the hero of this story - a man that is proud of the amount of bandages he has on his body - so proud that he is taking photographs of himself in his hospital bathroom....we live and learn...

The white dress doesn't really do much for his legs...

Confusion with the Russian psyche...

Our Metro stop 'Hunter's Row' - pronounced 'Okhotny Ryad'

I admit to some confusion when it comes to understanding the Russian mind set. Having explored the wonders of the Tsars, then experienced a Stalinist park in celebration of communism and then watching a banned communist rally from my window, I feel unable to narrow these people down. They have lived through many types of government and yet it would seem that at this moment in time they are teetering on the edge of a world of lost identity. Where do the people of Russia today belong? If you get rid of your history, banish it to a corner then you must be careful of what will take its place (Putin..?!). I find it weird that people here would hold up a picture of Stalin in adoration and yet for some people, those times were the most certain that they had experienced for a long time and they felt looked after by the communist state so they are willing to forget an atrocity or two. Heh, it's not that simple and the Russian is a complex beast so I judge not - but because I'm English, I like to put things in neat boxes and label people as our history and government is fairly straight forward with few extremes....well, I just want to know more about your typical Ruskie....my curiosity is on high alert. I have asked many long term expats and also a few Russians to try and explain the Russian psyche but no one is able - it is a mystical beast that you can only guess at and most have told me that by the time I leave I will still not have a grasp of this elusive thing. I shall keep searching though....

Good old Communist Rally!

On the subject of our good old mucker Stalin, there is a building being renovated next to Red Square - it is from a design that was signed off by Stalin when he was still leader and has a very funny story (funny now, not so funny then...) attached to it. The architects gave Stalin two designs for him to choose but he didn't realise and so signed off on both of them. The architects and designers were too frightened to tell Stalin that he had made a mistake and so they built the building with one design used on one half and the other design on the other half! I hope that you can see the different halves in my picture - 

Left and right sides different designs....

Most of the main streets have Stalinist buildings where the older buildings were demolished. There are still some beautiful older buildings down the side streets which I much prefer -

I have started my Russian Lessons with Olga - I did spend the first hour and a half thinking of ways to throw myself from the window as it dawned on me how similar Russian is to Latin. I remember in my first Latin lesson at Uni, the teacher said that Latin was like a mathematical crossword puzzle and thinking  - 'oh well, that's me done for then' - anything being similar to Maths is just not going to get past the guards in my head. I felt like I was back in class at the age of 13, reading out bad Cyrillic and getting flustered by letters and words that the day before I knew fine but now in a test situation my mind had gone blank. I do understand the way the language is constructed though because of Latin and so she commented that I was already very knowledgeable and this seemed to excite her but made me tremble in horror as the grammar is so complex that I think I will spend every lesson trying to remember what has to agree with the subject, the object and what ending the adverb has - holy cow. Graeme and I are having separate lessons and Olga is teaching us completely differently. As I have studied many languages before, I have a need to start with grammar and then to build on top of this - unfortunately, learning this way does hinder the amount you are able to speak in every day conversations. Graeme on the other hand is being taught useful sentences to memorise and has been told that they will try and avoid complex grammatical situations! I think that Graeme will probably be babbling away much sooner than I as I'm such a stickler for detail in Grammar which will no doubt be my undoing! I'll be trying to conjugate verbs at the shop and the shop keeper would have served 40 people by the time I remember the right ending. Anyway, at least we are trying and I did enjoy my lesson and using my rather cobweb filled brain! Graeme was sitting in bed trying to learn his homework last night and so I called him a teachers pet to which he replied ' If you are going to do something then you must try and be the best you can at it'  - oh blah blah blah, turn the light off GEEK! I get the feeling Olga is going to prefer the 'Committed Graeme ' to the ' Lazy Chloe'.

Arthur is well, growing taller by the second and causing chaos around the house - he's decided that going to sleep at 7pm is too late and so he usually goes to bed at 6.30pm and then sleeps until 7am! Children go to bed quite late here, in fact you still find children in the parks at 10pm and so I think people think we are a bit strange for Arthur's early bedtime but I can't keep him awake any longer! He has a good hour and a half sleep at lunchtime so I think he has taken after his mother in his love for bed. Good lad! His art and music classes at nursery are going well - the head teacher was impressed that he can concentrate on a puzzle for up to 20 minutes by himself - unlike his mother who has the attention span of a gnat. He is still just babbling words - we realised the other day that he was saying a Russian word but because we didn't know it we thought he was just talking jibberish. I think his brain is slowly trying to distinguish the two languages and I am awfully jealous of the fact that he will speak Russian like a native and will not have moments wondering what endings go where. I declared out loud to Graeme yesterday that I thought Arthur would grow up and then get recruited as a spy because of his fluency in Russian and then he would never be able to tell us and then he would get shot and we would never know all the brave and wonderful things he had done in the name of Great Britain! Yes, my friends, I have the ability to go from 0 to 100 when my brain gets going! I'm watching two spy related programmes at the moment and reading a spy thriller - hence my spiral into crazy land. I always wanted to be a spy - yeah, yeah to all the people that know me and are now laughing hysterically at the thought of big mouth Guthrie actually managing to keep something secret. You don't know, I might have always been a spy and this is a double bluff...errrr, no I don't think so. As soon as anyone threatened torture i'd be  - ' So, those secrets I said I knew nothing about...well, if you pass me a computer i'll give you the codes of how to blow up Britain with one button. Now, where can I get a nice cup of tea.'

I'll finish with a few videos and pictures of Arefei (supposedly the Russian equivalent of Arthur ) and wish you all well and good day....

Art Class with Daddy again...

He has found a new place to sit and contemplate the complex differences of Russian and English...

We've decided that tucking the jumper into the tights is the way forward....

Bath time always fun...

Especially fun when we balance pots on our head....

Animals are all well - think we may have to buy Alice a jacket soon. Temperature is to drop to -21 on Monday so we must get miss Alice some boots!

Doing what we do best...sleeping!

Alice, it's called sharing.....

Sleeping chuckle brothers....

And to finish, a picture of a little snow in Red Square....

Like icing on a cake!

National Unity day holiday and an overdose of culture.....

Inside the Kremlin walls - Kremlin Palace ahead.

Well what a busy weekend we have had! Thursday was national unity day and so everyone has Thursday and Friday off so that they can go away for a long weekend. The Friday isn't actually a holiday and so everyone has to work next Saturday to make the work back...go figure. So we planned a very busy few days and boy, we haven't stopped. On Thursday we attempted to see Lenin for the 80th time but yet again our plans were scuppered by Religious parades in Red Square for Unity day and so we just had a walk around and then ended up in TGI Fridays having hamburgers and beer...how did that happen?! We have tried to see Lenin so many times but every time something happens - I don't think the old crusty wants us there. Anyway, we had a good walk around the back streets and came across this fabulous door - 

Door we found in a back street

This was actually a door to a restaurant but what it was in the past, I have no idea.  Rather special though. It was raining which was a bit grotty although Arthur enjoyed the puddles - 

As you can see, Arthur will follow anyone for a balloon...

On the Friday Graeme and I ventured to the Armoury in the Kremlin. You can buy tickets for all the different parts that you want to see but we were just interested in this area although it meant we couldn't walk around the whole of the inside of the Kremlin. Whilst we were in the queue for the Armoury, Putin drove past in a massive cascade of cars with the prime ministers flag on the front of his car. It's amazing because cars drive ahead and stop all the traffic along the roads he needs to drive down so that he can drive through the Moscow traffic as if it wasn't there....lucky Putin - not even the Queen gets that treatment. Anyway, we can now say that we have been within 5 metres of Putin - well, it's a little bit exciting...okay, not exciting at all. 

So, The Armoury - AMAZING! Sadly you are not allowed to take photos - although I sneaked one - 

Horse in Armour in Background

It was extremely interesting and I don't think I have ever seen so many jewels - the first section is a display of Religious artefacts and then the largest collection of Silver in the world - there were plates and tea sets used by Catherine the Great, a dinner service given to the Tsars from Napoleon depicting scenes from Olympus, Armour used by the Tsars, presents given to the Tsars from ambassadors around the world - I particularly liked the presents from the British (not biased) which included a set of silver snow leopards which the audio guide said were unrivalled for their beauty. Seeing as we're all struggling a little in Britain, maybe we should ask for them back and melt them down to pay off the deficit...can you take back such presents? Maybe I'll ask next time i'm in. There was also a large selection of guns and swords laden with diamonds and rubies. Even the blankets for the horses were made out of golden thread with ivory saddles. There was a collection of thrones, the throne of Ivan the Terrible was made out of Ivory and there was a throne there given to a Tsar from the Armenians that had 900 diamonds on alone and that doesn't include the sapphires and emeralds. There was a room full of carriages which were magnificent - one was a wooden sleigh that carried one of the Tsars daughters from St. Petersburg to Moscow in three days in the middle of winter - it had something like 30 horses pulling it - incredible! There was a fabulous collection of clothing from different centuries. There were also coronation gowns and crowns - there was one crown that was only used for the coronations and was supposed to represent the seat of all Russian power - it was about 600 years old and was edged in fur with beautiful jewels around the rim and on the top. There were also some dresses of Catherine the Great - one was her coronation gown and boy, the lady was obviously a bit of a heffer cause all her dresses were huge...Peter the Great's boots were massive too - he must have been a bloody giant. Anyway, it was a feast of aristocratic indulgence and was extremely interesting. Graeme and I both commented on the fact that it's no surprise that the Russian working man revolted if the aristocracy were prancing around in all these jewels in golden carriages on Ivory thrones... although I'm a right wing royalist so really I'm in the corner of the Tsars and not the collective.

Today we visited the opposite of Royalty, The all Russia Exhibition centre (VDNKh) created by Stalin in 1937 to display Communism's achievements in Science, agriculture, industry and technology. There was an All-Union agricultural exhibition held here in 1939 that was supposed to have been in 1937 but Stalin had killed most of the participants and so it was two years late....I don't think he really thought that one through.

The main entrance

The Triumphal Soviet Arch

It was such a weird place as it was there to celebrate communism and there were these beautiful buildings and pavilions which when you entered were just crammed full of cheap and nasty shops and stalls - selling anything from cameras to shoelaces - I think Stalin must be turning in his grave - which is not such a bad thing!

House of The Peoples of Russia

Another statue of Lenin...

I took some photos of the inside of the building to show how tacky it is. Supposedly it used to have an illuminated map of the USSR and dioramas of Lenin's home town but now just cheap mobiles...

You can just see the original walls

Cheap stalls under beautiful architecture

It seems so sad that a beautiful building like this has been completely destroyed with tat. All a very odd mixture and experience. 

Fountain of the Friendship of Peoples

There are sixteen golden statues of maidens dressed in the national costumes of the Soviet republics. The state funding stopped for the VDNKh in 1990 and so this is why it is so run down. 

Former Coal Industry Pavilion

Pavilion dedicated to Culture

Yes that is me with my red bobble hat in front of the Stone Flower Fountain

I took a video to show how weird it was to walk around a place where the original message had been lost to the power of capitalism - maybe it is the ultimate retaliation against Stalin and all that he did to his people - 

Ukrainian Pavilion

A Vostok Rocket outside the Space Pavilion

People walking on the wing of a passenger liner...er no thanks.

After we strolled around the park we went back to The Memorial Museum of Cosmonautics which sits opposite the entrance to the park.

Space Obelisk

This monument consists of a rocket blasting 100m in the air with a tail of energy made of titanium. 

The museum was brilliant and filled with fantastic things from real moon buggies to a replica of the MIR space station. In the whole museum Arthur found a radiator on the wall the most exciting part....in fact he screamed when we tried to remove him from it - even real life rockets couldn't compare with a normal boring everyday radiator...marvellous. 

I've signed Alice up for the next moon landing.....

Check out that pure rocket....

Another rocket....

I have decided that retro soviet space gear is the way forward - 

Nice tracksuit...

I want one...

Not a good career option for someone with claustrophobia ....

They had a replica of the MIR space station or part of it - 

The toilet..beware of yellow hose....

Food storage

Steering wheel area.....?

So my lovely friends, I have been to many places this weekend from Royal crowns to Communist monuments to the moon and back.....and now i'm laying on the sofa with a glass of wine listening to my husband snore....exhaustion has hit the Ogilvies.....