Daisy Suzanne Allen
Born Sunday 6th March 2011
8 to 8½ years old
Her life: 4 to 4¼ years ♥ 4¼ to 4½ years ♥ 4½ to 4¾ years ♥ 4¾ to 5 years ♥ 5th birthday ♥ 5 to 5½ years ♥ 5½ to 6 years ♥ 6th birthday ♥ 6 to 6½ years ♥ 6½ to 7 years ♥ 7th birthday ♥ 7 to 7½ years ♥ 7½ to 8 years ♥ 8th birthday ♥ 8 to 8½ years ♥ 8½ to 9 years ♥ 9th birthday
In summary: Index ♥ From birth to four years old ♥ Four years old to nine years old ♥ Nine years old onwards
Special features: Golden Bear (reprise) ♥ More cookery
We start this page with an homage to Harry Potter via World Book Day with a pretty decent effort by Daisy, who is presumably using the wand to turn Gregory (who seems to be dressed as Mr Happy) into a frog, or something.
It's a Monday morning and I am heading to London for work once I have dropped the kids off. Daisy is opening some random last presents for her 8th birthday, and the time is 7.10am. I am no longer familiar with these times (as I write this in early 2024).
A common sight in Year 3, with Daisy tackling 100 times table questions (with the title omitting the fact that there are also x12 questions. She got 100/100 (that's my girl! Or Lynne's girl!), with a reference to 11.50 at the bottom. I am not sure if she did it in just under 12 minutes or something else. Later, I think in year 4, they have to do them all in 3 minutes so it's probably not that (but then again it might be that she finished with just under 12 seconds to spare).
This is how we work on the farm (in the garden), chewing on a chive and carrying the standard issue broom on our shoulder.
It's the middle of March (St Patrick's Day in fact, although that has no relevance to any of the following photos) and so it is time to plant some seeds, in the hope of growing some flowers.
Daisy and her interfering hair advertise another bag of seeds.
We fill the trays with compost, sow the seeds in rows with a further layer of compost on top, and then, as demonstrated by Daisy in the picture on the right, we lightly water the compost. And then wait. For a long time.
It wasn't long before Daisy was getting a Superstar Award for Super Netball, which I presume is just playing it really well rather than some sort of game played using special powers ("hey no flying!"). Miss Young could just not find a black felt tip pen.
Based on the photo numbering, I think Lynne took this one, which makes me think that it might have been for something (Rainbows perhaps?).
Down to the local park for some rather passive looking football action. The way Daisy stands with the football suggests that she is in control and Gregory is rather in two minds about whether to engage or not.
This looks suspiciously like a trip to Miller & Carter on the A6 near us. Daisy has gone for a (what looks like a strawberry-flavoured) mocktail.
I love these kind of notes being left for me.
This photo is also included in Gregory's page but I have put it here too because I like it (and of course they are both featured and so I have to be fair). The silhouetted shapes are on Heaton Moor Road on the bridge over the railway line.
It's the end of March and a bit early for Easter, so I don't think this is an Easter bunny, so I presume that it is something that Daisy got for her birthday. We'll come back to this.
In the meantime, it's time to do some cooking. First, pour in sugar, and lots of it.
Then add some softened butter.
Some whisked eggs are also required. There is a particular level of concentration here.
Then mix it altogether and look a little deranged! (An intermediate step will have been, I presume, to add some cocoa powder.)
While waiting for the chocolate cakes (spoiler alert) to cooko, Daisy gets really intricate in decorating the bunny. "Chocolate!" and "Happiness" are the key messages, which are likely interconnected.
The chocolate sponge cakes have turned out alright.
In the same bowl, we seem to have made another chocolate mixture (efficient washing up system from me), which Daisy gets busy spreading over the first layer of chocolate sponge. She adds the second layer and then gets on with the fun bit of decoration, with sprinkles and mini eggs.
She certainly seems happy with her concoction (as Gregory cheekily pops into shot). What a great effort that is.
The next day is Mother's Day, and here is what the kids have put together (potentially doing two cards each, one at school and one at home), as well as the classic champagne, chocolates and flowers triumvirate. The chocolate cake may well have been for today as well, but I can't recall for certain.
Total rock star in the house. (Daisy is, my records suggest, actually off ill on this day, as was Gregory. Given this photo was taken at 11am, I am presumably working from home. She seems to be recovering.)
This is what she normally looks like.
They must be bored: they are playing Junior Monopoly. Daisy seems to be doing better than Gregory in terms of how they are feeling as it's noon but The Boy is still in his pyjamas.
This is more like sick day behaviour: playing on the Wii.
Daisy is busy making some Mii's on the Wii.
We flip over into the weekend and it's time to prepare some party bags for Gregory's birthday party the next day. Daisy watches on.
Never mind that - let's get back outside to plant some more seeds.
Daisy was awarded a "bring your own friend" voucher for Gregory's birthday party at Run of the Mill (a classic destination at that time), so she chose Rosanna.
Once again Daisy watches on as Gregory opens his party presents (still a few days before the actual day).
The day is still going so it's time for some back garden football.
A couple of hours later and it's time for a big hug. I'm guessing the football didn't lead to a big fallout (or maybe it did and this is the reconnection).
Your guess is as good as mine. (It's still the same day!)
Gregory's birthday generally always falls in the Easter holidays and so gives us an opportunity to make the most of the day (I always take the day off work). We headed over to Dunham Massey on a sunny day and, because it was the Easter holidays, there was the possibility of "winning" a "free" Easter egg (if you paid to get in, etc). This was in the little garden bit. There was presumably some form of treasure hunt.
A smiling Daisy sitting on a tree trunk. (I'm just saying it as it is.)
We'll ignore the grammatical slip at the start and instead smile warmly over a lovely, personal bit of artwork especially for Gregory's birthday.
It's the day after Gregory's birthday during the Easter holidays and they have sought out a slightly suspicious looking Easter bunny.
At the following weekend, Daisy attempts to ride her bike without stabilisers. She had ridden it with stabilisers for quite some time, which made the transition to her own balance quite tricky. I recall spending quite a lot of (back-breaking) time holding her up whilst she cycled around the lawn and got used to balancing on her own. There wasn't lots of room but I decided that it was better than going up and down on the patio. She would ride by herself for an increasing number of seconds, improving slowly but surely. And eventually she got there (but it might not have been at this moment).
A classic plan was to head to the local park then head for snackage and drinkage (including a tasty pint for me).
It's now Good Friday - surely the best Friday, especially when it's sunny as it so obviously is here. It must be pretty warm to as, firstly, the lawn mats are out and, secondly, the kids are having Calippos.
Just to track back to the Mother's Day photo (out of sync chronologically but this is when I took the photos of them), here are some close-ups of Daisy's efforts. She was clearly into arts & crafts at the time.
The inside is even better, featuring as it does some poetry ("Ode to you"). She had obviously started to get into descriptive writing at school.
Speaking of school, this is presumably the one that she made there. She has gone for the old 'flower on a cup' classic.
And that will do for now.
This looks like a good way to spend Good Friday: sat outside having lunch in the sunshine. Looks like cheese and crackers for Daisy, with some crisps and cucumber (I don't think I deliberately made lunch by alliteration; Gregory, meanwhile, has sandwiches).
Well now, what do we have here? A brand new bike for Daisy? I think so. She looks pretty happy to have it. We can even see the old bike dumped unceremoniously on the ground. Having mastered riding that older bike, it was time to upgrade.
She was particularly grateful for the new bike, it seemed.
But never mind going for a ride on the new bike: it's time to chill in the sunshine.
No, wait, scratch that. Time to get to the park! Here it is in all its glory.
The next day, it was very much more of the same, and why not? Although this time, I can see the paddling pool in the background, so there might be some water action in the offing.
And in another moment of déja vu, we were back at the park for my cycling action. This, however, looks like a bit of a fall. Well, as the saying goes, the best thing to do is to get straight back on. I'm sure she did (not least because we needed to get home).
In preparation for Easter Sunday, there was a surprise waiting for Daisy the next morning (all courtesy of Lynne).
So grateful was Daisy that she was happy to clean the car in Easter Sunday morning. Good payback. It also coincided with Nana Sue's birthday, and we went round to Aunty Katie's for a BBQ. Actually, I need to locate the photos for that - they should feature here!
In what was an action-packed Easter weekend, on Easter Monday we headed to Stanford Park in Hale to meet up with some of Lynne's friends. Daisy soon found herself in the adventure playground section.
Not exactly sure what's going on here: insert your captions time!
I don't know exactly why the kids are showcasing Easter eggs on the Friday evening after the Easter weekend, but they are. Lynne was heading out to watch Dirty Dancing in town.
A couple of examples of their writing. First, an advertisement for Gregory's and Daisy's shop, which got a great review from a local customer. Second, a slightly minimalist birthday card for Uncle Matt.
Let's advance to early May, the bank holiday weekend in fact, and another trip to the local park. The swings were always a favourite, especially when they were both on teh same one. Daisy looks a bit braver than Gregory here, which was usually the case.
Having done my first ever triathlon earlier on this day, we headed over to Altrincham/Hale to a pub for the 1st birthday of Wilson (son of Lynne's friend Nic). Daisy had got herself a monkey mask which looks like has been artistically added to by young Daisy.
It had been Uncle Matt's 40th birthday during the last week, on the Monday of the bank holiday weekend, we headed over to Uppermill to see him. We started off in the park where he put his Herculean strength to good use by pushing both of them on the swing at the same time, using a classic brace position to get maximum leverage. Full marks for that.
We're soon exploring the area, including a slightly intimidating stepping stone path across the river. I'm sure if you slipped off you wouldn't be swept away. It'll be fine.
We grabbed some lunch at a nice café and I managed to get a couple of people looking and smiling, including the recent birthday boy himself.
Now that Daisy was a fully-fledged cyclist with her new bike, I could go for bike rides with her. Our route of choice was along the Fallowfield loop, a great, traffic-free place to mooch around. My snapping-while-riding skills were honed on the slopes of the Alps, in case you were wondering. Need to sort out my helmet strap, though.
She is soon powering on ahead. We ended up doing about 6 miles, as per Strava, heading north-east on the loop.
The above was the afternoon after we had come back from Uppermill, and the next weekend, in warmer weather, we were back out again.
The basket that came with the bike, while it lasted (it was removed at some point due to not being that cool), was a useful place to store snacks and a drink.
For this ride, we headed west along the "Floop", reaching the bridge just before the Sainsbury's cut-off point (a shame it's not a continuous route to Chorlton, but you can shuffle across the road to get to the western section). Anyway, there is plenty of opportunity here to take in the local artwork.
After the delights of cycling, the next day it's time to clean the car as the sun beat down.
Skip another weekend, and we headed to Yorks Sculpture Park with Charles, Sally, Oli and Lucy. Daisy tries to make sense of the map but is distracted by something.
This looks a bit like chess pieces getting piggybacks.
This is what all floors could look like if polished enough.
Daisy took on the role of chaperoning Lucy.
Daisy has all the poses for this lethal looking unicorn-type creature.
The next day and Daisy is back on the bike - she is really clocking up the miles.
During the week, Daisy was involved in some sort of wear-a-silly-hat-at-Rainbows event, with one of her best friends Maeve looking on.
We'll finish this entry with some certificates. First, Daisy got star of the day. You never know how many of these get given out, but nevertheless it's not to be sniffed at, eh.
Next up, evidence of both English and maths skills. The first gives reference to "all the extra work you do at home", which may be a reference to the fact that she loves writing stories. And there's never a moment that two actuaries won't be proud of their daughter being the Times Table Champion.
That seems like a good time to stop another epic instalment.
Starting again, we have Aunty Katie pushing Daisy along on her scooter in what is an unconventional way of using it. My records don't state what we were up to.... but wait...
...I have found this which, apart from showing everyone in a psychedelic light, looks a bit like it might be the Heaton Tandoori, where I can well imagine we popped for a curry for my birthday (even though it is almost two weeks after).
Daisy understandably likes the letter 'D' so she has made one. With eyes.
She has also made a shield, although it is perhaps not one that looks immediately suitable for the battlefield given the picture of a chick (I presume) on the front. It's quite a large shield as Daisy can only just see over the top - that would also hinder her in the field of battle.
Again showing her creative side, she has made a bag with a long strap and something to go in there.
It's quite hard to see some of these, but here are some of Daisy's rules for life. There was a full book at one point, which I read out for a video. I'm not sure if this is an early prototype of that. But "never give up" and "be yourself" are good mantras, the latter being a golden rule. I also like (in smaller writing): "Whatever the weather, enjoy yourself" and "Don't run on slippy materials". There are everyday rules, rules of wisdom, law of children and rules of happiness. Great stuff.
We're now in mid-June and it's my turn to do the school drop-off, before I head to Newcastle for some Ride the Nation (work charity cycling) action. My organisational skills have been deployed and left them facing in opposite directions. This could be interesting.
The following week I am off to watch England play Afghanistan in the cricket One-Day International World Cup at Old Trafford, but for now it's time for another school run. Gregory is wearing his star of the week jumper.
Daisy in full Roman garb? That can only mean one thing...
...yup, a school assembly.
This is the dream: the children making their own breakfast (and meals more generally). You have to start with the basics, though. Here she is preparing some cream cheese on bagel. Lovely.
Miss Yikes is a cool dudette who is a master of the ... Dab. (I literally had to step away from the laptop in order to remember what this move is called. I'm getting old, you see.)
At the end of June, we went round to the new Brunger-Roe household in Cheadle Hulme for some outdoor action. Here, Daisy is liaising with young Carys, Joe's daughter. Looks like she wants the drink!
We then had some cricket action. Daisy had been in training at Heaton Mersey cricket club and the ODI World Cup was still on (they go on for ages).
Mid-July now, and it's the day before Lynne's (40th!) birthday and we're at All Star Lanes in Manchester. Daisy starts off with the rolling thing but then decides to do away with that and bowl it herself. Good work!
I don't know where we went for lunch but it was somewhere that served whopping great creamy milkshakes (I am assuming that's what it is). Daisy looks on partly with envy and partly saying "are you seriously going to have all this yourself? Good luck with that!".
It's mid-afternoon by now and Daisy is actually ready for this train to come, thank you very much.
England had started their innings and I was following it on my phone. I think Jason Roy got out round about now playing a loose shot outside off stump (strange how you remember some things like that). Meanwhile we are stood on the platform nowhere near a TV. We did ultimately win the World Cup of course ("by the barest of margins"), which triggered (further) enthusiasm in cricket, particularly in Gregory (as he hadn't really played much up to that point) but Daisy too.
Their respective artistic development is evident here, as is the pithiness of comments such as "You're so old now". A banana (called Bob) and strawberry (name unknown) are exchanging comments, with the banana saying "Breaking news! Old woman looks so young even though she is 99." with the strawberry confirming this.
Daisy, aka D-corn, was prone to strong expressions of love, although I don't know how much I would love everything smashed together (like some sort of Big Bang reversal, also known as the Big Crunch).
Not entirely sure what this is - presumably a camera? However, if it is, I'm not sure what the "Cool Dudes Food" is doing on the top. It's "extra yummy", though.
It was a busy week of performances. First up, Daisy's music performance on Monday evening, with the multi-talented Daisy on guitar.
Then on the Wednesday, it's time for her drama play, Pirates of the Curry-bean. She played numerous parts, including a mouse (blink and you miss her!) and, she thinks, a monkey and a person from an island (or something like that). As she was Year 3, she didn't get any of the headline parts (which would generally be given to the Year 6-ers).
She seems to have a good position for this bit (maybe a song?).
This might be her character from an island given the outfit she is wearing.
Well someone's had a brush put through their hair!
Right then, it's the end of the school year and time for the school report. Her English and Maths scrub up well...
...while it's heartening to see comments like "What a pleasure it has been to teach Daisy this year!" and "She is a good, supportive friend to those around her and is a well respected member of the class". There's also a music report where she is mostly achieving but occasionally excelling.
A good chief knows when to make their own headwear and look (rather too) intently at the camera.
With England's first ODI World Cup win fresh in the children's minds (I waiting most of my life for a win such as this and they get it irritatingly early! We nearly won a couple of times when I was young, though), we headed to Old Trafford to watch Lancashire play Durham in a Twenty20 match (the Hundred didn't exist then of course). Daisy poses right in front of the red rose.
Wandering around the ground, we see a very tall gentleman.
Daisy just seems to be happy to be here. The match was a convincing win for Lancashire. Having hit a challenging 189-3, with Aussie Glenn Maxwell smashing 58 off just 33 balls, Lancashire ran through the Durham side, bowling them out for just 117. I remember Maxwell being everywhere in the field - indeed, he managed to get a run-out.
It was all pretty tiring, though. This is during the car journey home. It's not even 6pm.
We skip a few weeks due to the holiday season (I had a weekend in the Lakes then we all went to Redditch, Newquay and Wells in our big summer holiday (almost two weeks!)). There was a fun day at Heaton Norris Park so we headed along to there in the sunshine. They had a big band on, which had the kids watching intently (for a few seconds anyway).
There were a few rides available, including this rotating rocket thing.
There was a large bubble blower here. It had some kids (like Gregory) chasing them around but Daisy seems unmoved.
Absolutely the best thing about baking is licking the bowl / spoon / spatula afterwards...
Here is the finished product, a rather rustic-looking chocolate Rice Krispie cake with sprinkle topping.
It's been a while, but the very beginning of September sees Daisy back on her bike, and once more whizzing along the Fallowfield loop.
A very happy Daisy points out that she won the Mario Kart Wii competition (we were in teams but she got the most points).
Just a few days later and it's time for the first day back at school. She looks relatively happy here as she poses on day one of Year 4.
She is always happy to play the big sister to l'il G, who was of course starting school in Year 1.
And that, as they say, is that (for this historical period anyway). You can always, of course, check out the next phase in Daisy's life.
Back to the Secret Portal.