I've posted up quite a few photos of my new daughter, Gaia, over the last couple of weeks. There are plenty more to come, of course, but today I'm celebrating my other mini-monster, Dante, with a few pics from a trip we made to the funfair shortly before his sister's birth.

The fair in question was Fundamania - http://fundamania.ie/ - a travelling funfair. There were lots of stomach-flipping rides, most of which were for older children, but a nice few for the smaller kids too. We went on a teeny roller coaster (a bit tame even for Dante) and Dante came on the dodgems with me for the first time ever -- I would have taken him on long before this, but Mrs Shan was concerned about him getting whiplash! Anyway, he loved them, so I suspect we'll be on them lots more in the years to come. (I lived for dodgems -- or "bumper cars" as we used to call them - back when I was a child. They were usually the highlight of any travelling funfair, or a visit to local beach resort Ballybunion in the summertime, which used to have a small indoors dodgems rink.)

He also loved fishing for rubber ducks, and picked out an owl when he won. I normally don't let him play on the shies, as I know the odds against winning are astronomical, and he goes wild if he doesn't win. But this one guaranteed a prize, so I knew we wouldn't be facing a meltdown!