'We marched up the Roman Road that's known as Watling Street'

Mostly, when I ask Ferdy and Gil what they would like to do on Fridays, we have to find a compromise: go to Narnia becomes go to the woods; meet some dragons becomes make some dragons and I haven't yet found one for fight Storm Troopers.

So when Ferdy informed me that this Friday he'd like to go to Watling Street, where Boudicca's battle purportedly took place, I was pleased to realise that this was something we could actually do.

But first we did some division games:

We commenced with a division grid game (a bit like scrabble but with numbers) and then Ferdy set me a division sum, his task being to subsequently swap around the numbers to make them into a times sum.

Next, Gil had a tummy bug so Ferdy decided to read him all his new Alfie books.

After all this sitting down (Ferdy isn't a fan of sitting down unless it's to read books), Ferdy needed to do some dancing to his new Horrible Histories music.

He has perfected the sword fight with Commander Paulinus.

Watling Street is very long, but it part of it runs near us so we went in search of it and the Roman ruins nearby.

I wasn't sure whether Ferdy would be disappointed in what we saw (was he expecting so see men in sandals and togas, and traders lining the streets?), but he was excited to find a street sign (albeit in front of some very modern looking houses) for Watling Street.

And in the ruins of the town Letocetum, which consisted of a bath house and a mansio (hostel) with a cobbled street leading to Watling Street running inbetween them, an elaborate game ensued involving Emperor Nero, his mother and a plethora of slaves, legionaries and, of course, Queen Boudicca (my role). I should have known that Ferdy can rely so much on the stories in his head, he doesn't really need many props...

Ferdy stands next to the bath house with the mansio over towards the chuch

Over a coffee and a brownie (Ferdy was a little bit shocked to learn that chocolate hadn't been discovered in Roman times and that they mainly had boring fruit for pudding), Ferdy invented a quiz about the Romans. My reward if I got 10/10? A cuddle and a bit of brownie.

1. What did the Romans believe in?
2. Who did not want his Mummy?
3. Who wanted to kill the Romans?
4. Where was the battle?
5. What was the only thing the centurion (in Horrible Histories) didn't like about Julius Caesar?
6. What did the Romans invent?
7. What did the Romans wear instead of hats?
8. Who were the traitors in the battle of Teutoburger Forest?
9. What did the Romans use to wipe their bottoms?
10. Were ladies allowed to be in the Roman army?

I got 8/10. I got a cuddle (because that's a good try, Mummy) but not even a crumb of brownie.

Ferdy has requested that for our next trip we find where Boudicca is buried. Archaeologists believe her burial site may be in Kings Norton, under the McDonalds, so it'll be a dormouse big mac to accompany our history lesson next week then...

(title of blog from The Battle of Watling Street song in Horrible Histories the Movie)