Trampoline Moving

Many many years ago when my kids were little they decided they wanted a trampoline. Being the doting father I am I bought them one, and then built it. A few years later it was getting a bit small and knackered but they still played on it all the time so we bought a bigger one.

I didn’t have a photo of the original so this is a screen grab from a video showing the OG trampoline in the background and the new one in the foreground.

After a few years the “new” one started showing signs of wear and tear and then a storm came in.

I got Uncle Chris to do a bit of welding and did some work to bring it all to a working state but I’d be constantly repairing it and was getting pretty annoyed with the whole situation.

Eventually I decided it was a bit of an embarrassment and decided it had to go. Getting fed up with buying new trampolines, building them and disassembling the old one I decided the next trampoline was gonna be a keeper. Plus I was earning good money at the time thanks to Sky so I basically bought the best outdoor trampoline on the market

This trampoline was then secured to the ground with ground anchors and ratchet straps and survived many many storms without incident.

Fast forward to 2025 and the underneath of the trampoline was looking a proper mess since I couldn’t fit the ride-on mower beneath to keep the ground looking good. Every now and then I’d get the strimmer and fly-mo out but it was a PITA to do that and eventually it all just got overgrown.

I assembled the Droylesden Avengers, stocked up on beer and wine and invited them along for a trampoline moving party. Which involved 10 minutes of trampoline moving and 5 hours of drinking beer and wine.

A side-quest to this whole adventure was to get rid of the random beers left over from Oliver’s after party party.

As we can see Deej turned out to be a superstar and take a Fosters for the team. Charlie and James likewise helped to get rid of some bottles of Madri. Then we got stuck into far too much wine. We drank the whole recent delivery from Naked Wines, drank my two bottles of wine that I’d brought back from the winery in Greece and generally just emptied the wine fridge. Still, it was worth it.

Mission accomplished. I suspect the next trampoline moving day will be August 2026.

Chilli update

After returning from Greece I was super excited [ I wish I could say “we” but it’s really just me ] to find that my chilli fruits were going red.

This is partly due to Charlie and Ellie doing a super job of keeping them watered in our absence. Many thanks!

A while later they started to be properly ready and I harvested a few and put them into my home made bowl that I created on a wood turning course.

We’ve now started putting them in dishes and I’m absolutely loving the results.

It would be easier to just buy them from the shop but as my wise-beyond-his-years-son pointed out “It’s not about the destination – it’s about the journey”

May Manchester

My plans to visit Manchester every month and London every three months are coming along quite nicely. I think I missed January in Manchester [ but January in Manchester is miserable ] and I didn’t actually make it to London until May. But all in all doing pretty good.

Not sure at what point in the day this was – flares may or may not have been purchased by this point. But I definitely left Manchester with a pair.

Manc Chester

Emma and I nipped into town to see Charlie and Ellie. Food was consumed and then it got messy. As is usual with Emma and I once we have a few drinks all caution is thrown to the wind and we just went mental. Fun day out though

Proud Uncle

It was with a heavy heart that I had to contact my friends in London and tell them I wouldn’t be able to make it down for a visit. An even heavier heart [ if that were possible ] became apparent when I had to tell my Cambridge friends that I wouldn’t be able to attend the Aussie Pink Floyd gig at the Royal Albert Hall [ The ROYAL ALBERT HALL god damnit ] and all because BIM decided to have the graduation ceremony on the same random Tuesday in November.

Nothing. Ever. Happens. On. Tuesdays. Ever!

Anyway – it was all worth it to watch my beloved nephew spend about ten seconds walking across a stage to collect a graduation tie pin. Seriously. A tie pin.

After the graduation we went for some wonderful Tapas down a back street of Manchester near some bins and then drank the night away at Afflecks and Brown. The next day Emma and I had a mooch around Manchester. I bought my traditional sausage selection from the Xmas market along with a bag of Macaroons and it was with much shame that I bought two pairs of gloves from Primark for £3. Seriously – how can they make two pairs of gloves for £3.

Charlie’s new band

About half of the Kelly family made a trip into Manchester to see Charlie’s new band [ Cromwell Range ] perform at the Lion’s Den in Manchester.

Playing the drums these days – is there anything the boy can’t do?

Beers were drunk. Laughs were had. Eardrums were destroyed.

Tetris off 2023

Charlie and I generally have a bit of competitive Tetris when he comes over. This year we decided to make it a formal Xmas thing. The only problem being that we were pretty drunk when we decided to formalise things. We definitely decided to do the competition over 5 games but we can’t remember if it was the best of 5 [ i.e. first to 3 ] or purely based on who got the highest score.

So now we reckon it was a draw since he won 3 out of 5 but I got the highest score.

Next year we’ll write down the rules