Spike Theatre

Went to see the Spike Theatre production of "Backwater" at the Harlequin Theatre in Northwich last night. Another fantastic show and sadly not many people there to see it. We'd seen previous shows by them so knew we wouldn't be disappointed. Only four actors but they are masters of the quick change so seems like more and they all play instruments. We love that physical theatre style and the sets and costumes are simple but very flexible so the hut by the fiord (its all set in Norway) changes into the school, the boat office and the home of Nora, the main character who finds her dead father's camera and begins to photograph the strange characters of her village and begins a journey of discovery.

Today we took Archie and James for their third skiing lesson at the artificial slopes at Runcorn. I was expecting a dreary industrial scene but the bit of Runcorn we went to was very green and leafy. The ski slopes are set in a big park and there is even a small steam narrow gauge railway nearby that I assume chuffs round the park perimeter.
It was quite busy with 30 or so children in Archie's group but luckily they got split into two groups and had two ski instructors to each group. They progressed onto the medium size slope this week doing some easy straight runs and then going backwards for some reason best known to themselves. I suppose it all helps to give confidence and get used to situations where you find yourself going backwards down the Alps! Archie fell over a couple of times but mostly seemd to be doing really well. He's keen to go back anyway which is the main thing. It's amazing to see toddlers flying down the bigger slope around the poles and made it look so effortless. I'm sure Archie and James will be doing that before too long.