From The Mouths Of Babes.

I spent a wonderful afternoon with my son.

When I arrived at my son's home, he was in the middle of building some small lego www.lego.com/ vehicles. After he finished this activity, he showed me the book that he is currently reading: 'Dragon' by Hilary McKay. I was impressed.

True to form, and at my son's request, we started our afternoon together by going to McDonald's. We then chose to take the buses to 'The Cartoon Museum' www.cartooncentre.com/ Our attendance at 'The Cartoon Museum', today allowed us to enjoy the Beano and Dandy 70th Birthday Bash, which is on until 2nd November 2008. As well as this treat, we were also able to view the wider museum. My son was very interested in quite a number, of the early cartoons, and spent time reading many of them, out loud and laughing.

We then made our way to 'The Cabinet War Rooms and Churchill Museum' www.cwr.iwm.org.uk/ As we approached the museum, my son mentioned that Barack Obama www.barackobama.com/ may become the President. My son's comment surprised me. Maybe this is a playground topic in his Steiner school, or perhaps his generation is going to break the habit of previous generations, and actually take an interest and most importantly -vote!

This was the second time that we had visited 'The Cabinet War Rooms and Churchill Museum'. My son could not remember his first visit, which was when he was five years old, and prior to how it is arranged today. This means that he may not remember visiting 'Chartwell' www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-chartwell on several occasions with me, when he was slightly younger.

My son made was facinated and paid particular attention to the footages of Sir Winston Churchill's funeral. At the end of the tour, he asked if he could leave a comment for the museum. I said that he could, so in true Steiner style, he drew his comments.

On the way home on the bus, my son asked me to read to him. The book that he selected was the comic book 'The Bash Street Kids in Space'. To be able to participate in the activity of reading to my son, was a pleasure for me. I had been reading to him several times each day, every day, since before his birth. I had taken out a library membership for him, very early in his life and bought countless books for him. It reminded me that, the last time that I had read a comic to my son, was when he was six and a half years old. This was during our weekly, hour and a half, supervised access, when I would take him to the nearest local shop, to the Social Services building, so that he could choose, amongst other things, several comics of his choice, which I would buy and read to him during our access time.