Oh! It really, really is here.

Thomas was off, as soon as we left the car park, up the fifty degree incline that was covered in a carpet of last year's pine needles and leafmold. He had reached the top of the hill, and was out of sight in the trees before I could shout out 'Thomas, wait for ...'. Tutting, and muttering some profanities under my breath, I grabbed Matthew firmly by the wrist, and James equally firmly by the hand, and set off up the steep face of this little mountain. It was slow going, but my razor sharp hearing told me that Thomas was alright even though I couldn't see him. I pushed a delighted Matthew up the hill ahead of me, and dragged a whimpering James up behind me. Both of them tripped and stumbled many times, miraculously never managing to take me down with them. Having three children teaches a person good balance I think! As we climbed the never-ending hillock I tried my absolute hardest to imagine that we were on a journey, an adventure, a quest, but it was tricky to stay focused whilst trying to maintain a good grip on the two small people climbing with me. It was slow going, but eventually, with our shoes full of pine needles and our seats a little muddy (alright, they brought me down once!), we made it to the summit with barely a scratch. Triumphant and breathless, we looked around for our leader. Thomas was now halfway up a rather large, and beautifully proportioned climbing tree, whose distribution of branches was so perfect for climbing that it seemed as if it must have been man made.

We explored many of the secret places in this way today, Thomas always a little way ahead, Matthew forever pulling me along, desperate to be as fast as his biggest brother. Poor James was not in the mood today, too tired and four-years-old to put in much effort. But he valiantly tried to keep up, and barely complained at all, just content to rest by my side every so often.

James and Matthew were just finishing off their ice-lollies when Thomas came hurtling over to us, from the direction of the memorial, face alight, and excitement bristling in every fibre.

'You've got to come and see this ... it's amazing!' he screeched.

'What is it? What is it?' We were all on our feet in a heartbeat, eager to follow our fearless leader into the deepest depths of any dangerous place his imagination could conjure up for us.

'I've found the place I've been looking for, for my secret hideout!' he said, leaping up into the air, then bouncing from one foot to the other, itching to show us his latest discovery.

We followed eagerly, knowing that it must be something very cool, as Thomas didn't do ordinary. We watched him disappear into the trees to the left of the memorial, looked at each other for the briefest of seconds, and then darted in after him. What we saw took my breath for a moment, and left me a little staggered

'Oh Thomas ...' I breathed, 'you've found Narnia!'

He whirled round to look at me, confusion in his eyes for a moment. And then he grinned, realising that I was right. He had led us to the ruins of Cair Paravel. We wouldn't have found it in any old trees; it had to be these trees, with the sunlight breaking through and making a mottled pattern on the pine needle carpet, and the monstrous white stones of the monument rising up through the canopy. It was perfect.

We started to look for Aslan.

Oh, what a blessed relief!

Oh, I'm so pleased - I've been released from the horrible spell of Twilight :) I'm very happy to be myself again. For the past week I've been reading in every spare minute I could find, because I was being compelled to do so by the story that had gripped me. But I'm reading the fourth book of the series now, Breaking Dawn, and it's nowhere near as good as the first three. It's okay, I'm obviously going to finish it - and I do hope that the second half is better than the first half. But I'm not really bothered now. It's been spoiled by the silly plot twist. The reason I loved the first three books was because they were, in a strange way, believable. Alongside the purely fantastical, there was a strong thread of realism, that tied the story to our world, and made it somehow relatable. I know, it's about vampires, weird! That thread has completely disappeared in the fourth book, which is a real shame. I really think Stephenie Meyer went off in the wrong direction with this one - she could have done anything with the story, but she chose to take it off in a very silly direction that I've just found annoying. I've lost sympathy for all of the characters, bar one. Even my beloved Edward is irritating me. He was deliciously frightening, though we loved him, in the first three books - but that's all gone in the fourth book. He's a very pale reflection (ha ha! Yeah, yeah, course he is, 'cause he's a vampire!!) of his former self - but not in the way that Meyer intended him to be, as far as I can see. I think we're supposed to feel sorry for him, but I just want to slap him and tell him to snap out of it. And as for our heroine, Bella - I just cannot stand her in this book. I don't like selfish characters, and she's the very selfishest I've ever read! She's proper doin' me 'ead in! It's usually fine to dislike self-serving characters, but I don't think we're meant to dislike this one - we're still meant to love her. But I wouldn't really be mind, at this point in the story, if she were killed off.

*Sighs deeply, in contentment* I'm so happy to be back in the real world - I was getting worried that I wouldn't find my way out of my daydreams! But I was like this when I read Harry Potter too, and I came out the other side of that just fine - the only difference was that HP held my attention for the full seven books. I hope Meyer doesn't write any more in this series - I'd have to read them if she did, because it's probably one of my little obsessive compulsions; but I would read them reluctantly.

I'm looking forward to tomorrow. We're hopefully spending the day at Willison's Park (Williamson's Park actually, but the boys have all called it Willison's as they've been learning to talk). Thomas and I are hoping to get up there in the morning while the others are at playschool, and we want to hide some treasures up there. Then we'll pick up the littlies after lunch and go back to the park and let James and Matthew try to find the treasures. I don't know what the treasures will be, or whether they'll stay hidden long enough for us to pick up the other two boys and get back, but it'll be nice to be out in the fresh air all day anyway. We wasted this morning's sunshine, by staying in our pyjamas and flobbing about the house. Sometimes flobbing is exactly what's required, but probably not when it's sunshiney outside.

Ahhhhhh, joy and bliss. And life returns to normal - excellent :D