Yesterday on sunday morning we were awoken at 6:30 am. My two children, boys aged 7 and 8 had made us breakfast in bed.

Sheila had a bowl of cereal and I had a slice of toast with marmite. This sounds great but there was a surprise.

The cereal had a spoonful of salt and my marmite on toast was sprinkled with chilli powder !

We had been truly april fooled. We never did manage to get the kids back that day, so they are one up on us.

I have been hunkered down concentrating on finishing a major carved Jewel for weeks now. This is carved from pink morganite which has gold units wrapped wround the stone and set with diamonds. I will be posting images of this piece when it is finished in a few days.

I am so fortunate to live in this area. I walked my dog for 30 mins and looked over woods and fields towards the Pen y Fan, at 2,950 feet, the tallest mountain in the Brecon beacons. A pair of red kites circled above our fields and swooped low over my head a few times. The trees here, mainly oak, ash and hazel are changing color for the fall.

As i walked back up the hill to my studio the half moon rose up behind the Oaks behind our house. When I came back I was truly ready to get back to work.

Took all the family to Margam park, nr Port Talbot, South Wales. This is an impressive country park complete with a Castle, Pine and beech woods, landscaped grounds and a ruined Abbey.

We were there as my two boys wanted to buy fossils from the rock, gem and fossil show. This was held in the Orangy. There was a very good selection and the children had a wonderful time. They had saved their pocket money for the last two months and with some small contributions from us they managed to buy 6 great small fossils.

On thursday my wife and I saw a great dance performance at theatr Brycheniog in Brecon nearby. I have been a fan of modern dance from the moment I saw a televised performance by Merce Cunningham when I was 16.

I love the movement that dancers make, especially the way that the bodies create new and unusual forms and patterens. Desigms inspired by dance have been a theme for me throughout the last 28 years of designing.

This was a very powewerful performance. There were two dances. The first “Etude no. 1″ was a solo dance by Lucie Mongrain. Performed on and around a wooden blue rectangle that echoes the sound of the dancers steel tipped shoes. The movements were geometric and machine like. At times rythmic and undulating at other times dislocated and staccato.

Th esecond work was “Chorale”. A work for ten dancers this was very powerful. With chanting, loud vocals and extremes of voice and movement. The dancing was very sexual and sometimes suggestive of violence.

I was impresssed by the work but I must say that I would not want to watch it again.

Compagnie Marie Chouinard are from Montreal, Canada and this show was part of a short tour of Wales.

Andy Eagle from Theatr Brycheniog has brought over a Canadian dance company every year for the last 4 years and we have been to see every performance.

I went to Hay-on Wye yesterday with my two sons. They are aged 8 and 6 and are crazily into Fossils right now.

We discovered a new shop, open since May of this year that has a good collection of minerals, crystals and fossils. We were shown around by Rebecca Payne who was kind enough to open up the cabinets to show us all of the specimens although she knew that we were only spending a maximum of £4.00 each boy as they were using their pocket money.

We were shown large trilobites, ammonites, amber, dinasour teeth and many other treasures. The gallery also features some nice paintings by Louise Player.

The address is The Hour Glass collection, 2 broad street, Hay-on Wye, Powys, Wales. The phone number is 01497 820 950.