![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
A Night at the Museum
May. 3rd, 2014 09:20 pmI'm doing this now so that I remember everything and then I am going to bed. My apologies if there are any typos, but I am rather tired, despite the early hour.
Overall, the sleepover went really well. No-one got eaten by dinosaurs, because frankly any dinosaur with any sort of intelligence would have given us a wide berth. All the girls turned up on time and only one health form was missing, and that was probably because the parents are divorced so dad picked her up Thursday and mum brought her Friday. We began by being taken to the excavations of the Roman wall of the original garrison of Glevum, with impressive stone work and even one of the timber posts. This is at basement level of the centre of Gloucester and there's a glass panel at pavement level that you can look down through to see a section of the wall, and, on this particular evening, several Brownies waving back up at you.
The wall was rebuilt following the Norman conquest and then served to defend the Parliamentarians in the city against the Royalists during the Civil War. This was also the location of Humpty Dumpty of nursery rhyme fame. HD was a large cannon belonging to the Parliamentarians, which exploded (as they occasionally did). The Royalists thought they could repair it and then use it to attack the walls. Unfortunately, "all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't make Humpty Dumpty better again."
We then returned to the museum, the Brownies got to handle some Roman artefacts, dress up in Roman costume and make a laurel wreath out of card and tissue paper. After which it was hot chocolate and bed. The museum guides said they could sleep anywhere in the museum, which we translated into, you can sleep where the owls tell you, thus keeping quiet friends together and splitting up the ones we anticipated causing trouble. 15 of the 16 started sorting their beds out and getting into their pyjamas. P started crying.
And didn't stop. Brown Owl phoned P's parents, who said they really wanted her to stay. Finally her friend helped her into her pyjamas and she phoned her parents again, who still wanted her to stay. I eventually persuaded her to get into her sleeping bag by agreeing that I would sleep nearby (and therefore in between the two groups of 8 Brownies - oh joy!). She cried herself to sleep.
We all breathed a sigh of relief and got out the cheese and wine. Half of the Brownies then had to get up to use the toilet again. P woke up. We took turns sitting with her and drinking the wine. I managed to spill wine on my pyjamas (Tigger pjs in case you want to know). It had dried out before I got to bed. White wine, so it didn't show, unlike the Brownie who had got hot chocolate down her uniform.
We finally went to bed and slept fitfully. Most of the girls were asleep when we crawled into our sleeping bags and the two who weren't were moved so they could stop giggling at each other. The floor was hard. I had anticipated the Brownies would be up early, but I was the first up at 7.15. Not long afterwards they all got up, dressed and packed their bags. They were much quieter than they had been the night before. Then it was breakfast and collection by parents.
We declined the request from one of the Brownies who asked if we could stay a second night.
Overall, the sleepover went really well. No-one got eaten by dinosaurs, because frankly any dinosaur with any sort of intelligence would have given us a wide berth. All the girls turned up on time and only one health form was missing, and that was probably because the parents are divorced so dad picked her up Thursday and mum brought her Friday. We began by being taken to the excavations of the Roman wall of the original garrison of Glevum, with impressive stone work and even one of the timber posts. This is at basement level of the centre of Gloucester and there's a glass panel at pavement level that you can look down through to see a section of the wall, and, on this particular evening, several Brownies waving back up at you.
The wall was rebuilt following the Norman conquest and then served to defend the Parliamentarians in the city against the Royalists during the Civil War. This was also the location of Humpty Dumpty of nursery rhyme fame. HD was a large cannon belonging to the Parliamentarians, which exploded (as they occasionally did). The Royalists thought they could repair it and then use it to attack the walls. Unfortunately, "all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't make Humpty Dumpty better again."
We then returned to the museum, the Brownies got to handle some Roman artefacts, dress up in Roman costume and make a laurel wreath out of card and tissue paper. After which it was hot chocolate and bed. The museum guides said they could sleep anywhere in the museum, which we translated into, you can sleep where the owls tell you, thus keeping quiet friends together and splitting up the ones we anticipated causing trouble. 15 of the 16 started sorting their beds out and getting into their pyjamas. P started crying.
And didn't stop. Brown Owl phoned P's parents, who said they really wanted her to stay. Finally her friend helped her into her pyjamas and she phoned her parents again, who still wanted her to stay. I eventually persuaded her to get into her sleeping bag by agreeing that I would sleep nearby (and therefore in between the two groups of 8 Brownies - oh joy!). She cried herself to sleep.
We all breathed a sigh of relief and got out the cheese and wine. Half of the Brownies then had to get up to use the toilet again. P woke up. We took turns sitting with her and drinking the wine. I managed to spill wine on my pyjamas (Tigger pjs in case you want to know). It had dried out before I got to bed. White wine, so it didn't show, unlike the Brownie who had got hot chocolate down her uniform.
We finally went to bed and slept fitfully. Most of the girls were asleep when we crawled into our sleeping bags and the two who weren't were moved so they could stop giggling at each other. The floor was hard. I had anticipated the Brownies would be up early, but I was the first up at 7.15. Not long afterwards they all got up, dressed and packed their bags. They were much quieter than they had been the night before. Then it was breakfast and collection by parents.
We declined the request from one of the Brownies who asked if we could stay a second night.
