Skywatch Friday - the view from here is lovely

As it has pretty much rained here constantly for two weeks the opportunity to take sky like photos has been minimal so I'm cheating and using photos that have been given to me by a neighbour this week from his hot air balloon trip over our houses. (Thanks Steve) I guess I'm stretching the rules by looking down rather than up too.

To see photos of real sky taken by lots of people themselves - click on the button below. (Will try to do better next time!)

Water water every where

I am sat here struggling to think of anything to write - all I can remember about the last two weeks is how much it's rained!

We've had Aunty Bags visiting us one weekend and managed to run through the rain to the pub, followed by an almost complete large family meal the next day (Uncle Simon was watching the football). It was ages since we saw "Beeba" - and even though Euan was a bit poorly they definitely bonded.

The lovely Beeba

The next weekend we had Daddy's-friend-dave (or daddy as Euan called him for short) visit. I left Tim and Dave talking their normal rubbish and escaped to go wine tasting. Worked my way to number 10 and got stuck on that (if anyone would like to get me a Christmas present I number 10, it was 'Campo le Calle' Soave Doc, Latium Moroni, not sure what it all means but it was very lovely!). We ended the night dancing and generally being one of those 'older women' who I would have pitied 20 years ago!

Oh look it's raining!

Just to prove that clubbing is for the younger generation we had a birthday party to go to at Chicago Rock on the Sunday - Patrick got to the dance-off for musical statues, an earlier round can be seen in the photo, hence the serious expressions and funny stances. The party ended to coincided with the turning on of the Christmas lights and fireworks. The fireworks were very close and extremely loud - Patrick decided that they were "sprinkling on" him (pretty sure it was the rain!) and demanded to go home.

Euan and I managed to go for a very quick walk between showers on Monday - the river levels are really high - but we saw this fab rainbow on the way to school, so may be someone is trying to say something?

Highlight of the fortnight - Euan managed to get a hit on the potty! When inspecting the poo he pointed out "look mummy, slug".

Quote of the fortnight - I was singing along to Wham! Wake me up before you go go (pop trivia - it happened to be the first song at our wedding) when Euan shouted "NO, MY GOGO!".

Thought of the week - “The work will wait while you show the child the rainbow but the rainbow won't wait while you do the work.” ~ Patricia Clafford

Skywatch Friday - a slice of my heaven

There are so many photos of the amazing skies that I brought home from Pembrokeshire. I hope these will be enough to keep me going until I get my next fix (also a fun game of Where's Wally can be played with the kids!).

To get a look at hundreds of other peoples slices of heaven from all around the world, you MUST visit Skywatch Friday .

A whizz bang weekend

My children are party monsters. They spent Friday night at a bonfire party in a friend's barn (or play barn as Bucks called it) - this was a 'high-end' party - nicely arranged straw bales for seating (and later playing/nesting/shredding/sticking down clothes), a well stocked barby, mulled wine, a potato baker, posh soup, a table piled high with three kinds of homemade cake (my personal favourite was toffee apple cake) and most importantly lots and lots of impressively loud fireworks.

Euan wasn't impressed with the bangs and spent the whole display whispering to me "let's go, mummy's car". The other two spent it screaming with their friends "MORE, LOUDER, MORE!". I had to drag three very tired but very happy children home.

The following night we hosted the annual Killens firework party (we go into the garden and watch the fireworks held at the local stately home - last year we got a bit over excited on the mulled wine and missed the show!). The house looked lovely after 2 days worth of cleaning and decluttering - it lasted for about 2 minutes once the many children and bottles of RED wine arrived!

This was the first year we felt brave enough to get sparklers in (glowsticks are far less dangerous with boys around!) - they were very successful with no visits to A&E.

The night ended with the compulsory drunken Wii hula-hooping competition. We (including Anya) got to bed at 2am, needless to say Sunday was pretty much a non-event.

Quote of the week - Patrick (when looking at picture of a snake with its eggs) - "what else has eggs?". Me - "birds, snakes and fish". Patrick - "and elephants". Me - "No, not elephants". Patrick - "but I've seen small elephants".

Thought of the week - "People who make no noise are dangerous" ~ Jean de La Fontaine

A tin hot tub

Half term, Hallowe'en and our 10th wedding anniversary have all come and gone by very quickly with lots of excitement from the whole family.

School ended with a disco (Patrick was very excited about going even though he wasn't sure what a disco was - he spent the whole 2 hours next to the sweet stall, eating and playing go-gos with his friends, so I'm not sure he knows what a disco is still) - unfortunately the school decided that it wasn't a good example for there to be a bar, so the plastic cup of wine that normally makes the whole experience bearable wasn't available - enough said!

We treated ourselves to a luxury week away in Pembrokeshire, we had a lovely cottage with a hot tub (over looking rolling countryside), a swimming pool and eggs to collect each morning and animals to feed. I wasn't sure about the hot tub but since getting back we've been googling them and working out where it could go!

We met Granny and Grandad for the day near Swansea, once we dried out a bit we had a lovely day. The pots of 2p coins went down very well, Anya caught my addiction to 2p shove machines, Euan just held onto the coins in his hands, Patrick tried sticking them in every machine (mainly the rides that I'm too stingy to let him on!) and was a bit disappointed when nothing happened.

The amazing beaches were made all the better by good weather - the children wasted no time in stripping off and going into the sea at every opportunity.

Our annual trip to Folly Farm was a good as ever, although the children have graduated from the tame rides to the fast and furious ones. After the animal feeding at the cottages Patch wasn't too impressed with giving a goat a bottle of milk.

We ended our week with a visit to some dinosaur filled caves and meeting up with my friend Cath (and meeting the very beautiful Owain - once again had to remind myself that I have plenty of children and need NO more!).


So other than a pile of washing, hundreds of photos to sort and even more emails waiting for me at work tomorrow that's the end of another holiday. Good job we've got our next holiday to Spain to plan for next year.