We decided to go camping at the weekend as my two were on holiday in Spain and Sarah’s eldest had been taken “up norf” for a week by my Dad. This left us with just the two youngest and we thought that they shouldn’t miss out. Besides the tent had only been up once in the last two years and we needed to check it was ok before we go on holiday in August.

We didn’t go far – 16 miles to be exact to the Isle of Sheppey. Sarah was told about the site by Ben’s childminder who has a caravan there. We were supposed to arrive there at about 8pm but we couldn’t find it. Eventually we were directed by the childminder and found it down the only road we hadn’t been down!!

We (I) started putting up the tent but the ground was rock solid and we didn’t have a mallet so Sarah went off to borrow one and when she returned she said "Mud are playing tonight" and sure enough they were. The sounds of Tiger Feet were by then emanating from the clubhouse. We finished off the tent and headed over for a drink.

They were billed as "New Mud" claimed to have two original members in the band. As far as I can work out the drummer used to be in the band after the heyday but they do have someone called Rob Davis on guitar. The original band had a guitarist called Rob Davis but whether or not this was him I don’t know. The Rob Davis from Mud became a record producer who produced hits for the likes of Kylie so would he be playing on a campsite in Sheerness?

Unfortunately I only caught the second half of the set which included Lonely this Christmas, Dynamite, Secrets that you keep, Oh Boy etc but they seemed quite good. First time I've heard those songs live since the Theatre Royal in Newcastle in 1975.Ben kind of liked them too – he was shaking his legs about to the music. It was a bit loud inside for him so we went and sat outside the backdoor (behind the band) and listened from there.

The weather over the weekend has been really nice and parts of me have turned a nice shade of brown. Friday night it was still nice and warm at midnight and it was pleasant to sleep in the cool tent after weeks of trying to sleep in a hot stuffy house. We went swimming and looked around the town on the Saturday and went to the “beach” at Leysdown.

Ben was a bit confused at first but he seems to have taken to camping. He enjoyed the swimming and got all independent about it and holding onto the edge of the pool he walked all the way round and all the way back. At one point he slipped and disappeared under the water to be rescued by his dad. He was a bit shocked at first but was soon laughing again.

On the Sunday morning I was sitting having breakfast with Ben and he was gurgling away. Suddenly I realised that it wasn’t just random gurgles – he was singing “twinkle twinkle little star”. Sarah came back and I told her – she listened and agreed that was indeed what he was doing – oooh he’s soooo clever!!