In and out, cool skid and peppercorns.

1. Love to catch sight of our children running in and out of the soft play frame.

2. He falls to his knees in a slide across the floor to express his displeasure at the wrong kind of sweet. Once his mum has calmed  him down, I tell him he did a cool footballer skid, and he smiles slyly.

3. Peppercorns fall and bounce as I fill the grinder. I think there must be a better sort of mill that is easier to fill, but then I remember this one was a wedding present, and that from his highchair Alec used to call it Bub and imagine it on adventures with a jar of Maldon crystals, named Salt.

Not disappointing, night park and that winter flowering thing.

1. Apparently, the disappointing biscuits are not disappointing to the menfolk. 

2. The shadows of children in the night park. A late run-out that might make bed and sleep more enticing.

3. The cold air of the whole dark street is perfumed by that winter flowering thing a few doors down from us.

Still cake, plate and corrective powers.

1. There is still some homemade cake in the tin.

2. He is very tall, with a voice that sometimes makes me think a visitor has come to the house, but he is still quite pleased to be given a cold collation plate.

3. During the course of our game, I zap a neo-nazi with my emotion control power to make him feel embarrassed. He starts crying, gives us plenty of information, and then walks off to start a new life with better choices.

Still early, snowdrops and Outnumbered.

1. I've already been in a taxi and had an MRI, and it is still so early that no-one is up at home, so I stop in the park cafe to drink coffee, eat a shortbread and read an Edith Wharton ghost story.

2. Nick wonders about the little white flowers outside the back door. They're snowdrops, and they mean spring will soon be here. Earlier I saw a planting of giant snowdrops, cyclamen and hellebores at the gates of Dunorlan -- all good friends when the rest of the park looks like it has been left outside all winter and then sat on.

3. Bettany has been asking about Outnumbered, which originally broadcast before she was born. We watch an episode (me through my fingers because well observed sitcoms about family life are just a bit too close to home; and her round her phone, occasionally laughing or asking a question).

Beyond the barriers, going home and half term.

1. At the station, a friendly face waiting beyond the ticket barriers.

2. I walk on to the platform in time to see the destination on the front of the train just arriving: it's on its way to Tunbridge Wells.

3. Our lovely child -- just a little bad tempered -- is home for half term.

Fruit bowl, plans and resonate.

1. I come down to a fruit bowl full of bright new oranges and apples -- veg box arrived while I was sleeping.

2. She asks for a hug so she can lie next to me and tell me all about her plans for own clothes day.

3. The Folk Show is particularly good this evening. Most of the tracks seem to speak right to us, and for an hour then show holds our attention so that we listen, rather than seeking other things to do while it plays.

Jam, an hour later and gothic.

1. My mother brings us two jars of blackcurrant jam -- perfect timing, because it's hot cross bun season.

2. When I look up, it's an hour later and I'm 1,000 words in.

3. To marvel at the set before the production starts. This is Dracula -- so of course there are ruins and high windows and disconcerting stairways.