All Together Again

A slight hiatus in a hectic weekend gives me chance for a quick post with pretty poor photos. They do explain why I'm not around much at the moment though. My eldest son and his family are home from South Africa for 5 weeks and my younger son and his family are up from Suffolk to see them and my daughter also came over in the afternoon. This is the first time the whole family has been together in a long time.
There was constant motion so I just snapped a few photos when I could. This is the only one showing everyone who was at the park in the morning. Steve's wife wasn't here at this point as she is doing a two week residential course at the start of a Masters Degree. She joined us after lunch. The photo shows Cesca holding George, Neil, Steve with Lucy and Gabriel and Kaitlyn who got on like a house on fire.


Brothers - talking about football as they always have since they were about 8 and 6 years old!


Kaitlyn and Lucy having fun in the water.



Together we can do it! Gabriel and Kaitlyn discovering that one alone can't make it happen but two working together can:)



In the afternoon we played in the garden and Juliette and Hannah had both joined the party.



Lucy exploring, she is my youngest grandchild at 18 months. Their ages are easy to remember - Kaitlyn is 4 years old, Gabriel is 3, George is 2 and Lucy is 1.


Neil, Juliette and Stephen as always in photographs of the three of them you'd think they'd hardly met before. We had to tell them to put their arms round each other!



On Sunday we took a picnic up to Longshaw and met up with Rob and Rosie and their two children. Rob, Rosie,Stephen and Neil were all at primary school together so they go back a long way. No Juliette this time as she was taking part in the Great Yorkshire run.



Four on a log and finally an appearance by George who always seemed to be out of the shot or behind someone in most of the photos.Lucy is there hidden behind Hannah.



This is the view we usually got of George, he's always off to investigate something or other. Life is going to be pretty hectic for the next couple of weeks but hopefuly normal service will be resumed after that and the next London post will finally arrive.

One Hundred Years Ago

Today would have been my mum's 100th birthday, she was born on 27th August 1910. I have no photos of her as a little girl and very few of her as a young woman. This was taken when she was in her early 40s.



This is my favourite photo of my mum and I'm using it here even though it is damaged - I wonder if you can guess who tore it? :) The little girl is me of course.
My mum was just as nice as she looks in these photographs, she gave me a wonderful childhood and I miss her still. Happy Birthday Mum!

A Flying Visit

We had a flying visit from my younger son and his family last night when they stayed with us on their way to a holiday in Wales. This morning we took the boys to Millhouses Park so that they had chance to run around and play before continuing their journey. DH took all the photos on this post by the way.
Gabriel is obviously enjoying being on the climbing frame.


George with my beautiful DIL Francesca.


All together now! If you jump hard enough on this it makes a fountain of water fly up into the air.



Gabriel loves the slide.


George's favourite is the swing



A climbing wall! With a bit of help from dad I can make it.....



......to the top!



Wow! It's a long way down!



Over we go! Dad's there to lend a hand again. Then it was time to go back to granny's house for some lunch before heading off to the seaside. Let's hope the sun shines for them.

A Suffolk Birthday

It was my birthday earlier this month and I spent it in Suffolk with my younger son and his family. I decided to travel by train for once and discovered that most of the journey is through lovely countryside, the route goes down through Lincolnshire and then into the Fen country. I had my little Canon Powershot in my bag and I suddenly wondered whether it would be possible to take photographs through the window of a moving train and discovered that it is. You only get one chance and the quality isn't that great but I was quite pleased with some of them. Above is the marina at Ely and if you enlarge it you will see Ely cathedral in the background - one of these days I intend to go there. It was built by William the Conqueror and is a really beautiful building.


As we thundered through March I saw a low flying plane, then I realised there were three of them and that the big one was a Lancaster bomber and the two little ones were Spitfires - it was the Battle of Britain flight coming in to land at an airfield near March! It was the weekend of the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of WW2 and there must have been a display of some sort. I just had time to snap this photo. Edited to say that the two small planes are actually a Spitfire at the top and a Hurricane at the bottom. Thanks Roy:)



On the Sunday it was a nice day and we decided to take Gabriel and George to Jimmy's Farm which is pretty close to where my son lives. Jimmy Doherty rears rare breed pigs and there have been several documentary series' about the farm on Britsh TV. It's a really good place for children, plenty for them to see and do including these Red Poll cows.



We spent quite a lot of our time on the woodland Nature Trail, it's an ideal place for small boys to run about and bears like it too:)



Francesca plans to have an autumn nature table for them at home and we collected some specimens for it - acorns, sweet chestnuts, hazel nuts and a pretty bird's feather.



Once Gabriel discovered the little tractor we had a hard time parting him from it!



George enjoyed the woodland nature trail too, he's collecting sticks for the nature table:)



Gabriel and George both loved this living willow house and spent ages playing in it. We shall go back to Jimmy's Farm again as it's that kind of place, always different things to see and do through each of the seasons. On the photos it looks as though we have the place to ourselves but actually there were many family groups and also several coach loads of Brownies and Rainbows having a wonderful day out - they were very well behaved too.



My actual birthday was on Monday and in the morning we went to a small market town called Needham Market, it's an attractive place with quite a few small interesting shops and a great antique centre - the sort where there is masses of interesting, affordable everyday stuff to look at rather than an upmarket antique shop. I bought two 1950s copies of The Countryman magazine which I still haven't read because I managed to leave them behind when I came home! The one building in Needham Market that is truly ugly and uninspiring on the outside is the church of St John the Baptist. It looks neither old nor interesting and I wouldn't even have bothered going inside if it hadn't been for Francesca's mum. Once through the door though, you realise that it is much older than it appears. It was built as a chapel of ease in the late 15th century for pilgrims travelling to visit St Edmund's shrine at Bury St Edmunds and only became a parish church in 1901. It gives a real feeling of what medieval churches must originally have been like when there were no seats or pews and everyone stood through the services. There would be just one or two benches against the walls for elderly or infirm people and this is the origin of the saying that 'the weakest go to the wall'.



The real hidden secret of this church though is the double hammerbeam roof which is mentioned in Nicholas Pevsner's 'Buildings of England'and he described it as 'the climax of English roof building'. Apparently it's the finest double hammerbeam roof in the country. The leaflet in the church suggests that you lie on the floor and look up and then you get the impression of looking at a ship's hull - and it's quite true. I did and you do! It's thought that it may have been crafted by shipwrights brought in from the nearby coast.



As always in Suffolk many of the houses in Needham Market are painted in pretty colours especially the Suffolk pink which was originally made by mixing animal blood with lime. I loved this tiny cottage which must originally have been a 'one up and one down' and looks as though it was tacked on to the end of this row as an afterthought.



This hare is my birthday present from my husband bought in one of the lovely little shops in Needham Market. I absolutely love it.



My birthday cake baked for me by my lovely daughter-in-law Francesca, she gave a little party for me and I had more cards and presents than I've had for years. Gabriel and George had been practising singing 'Happy Birthday' and the cake was delicious. It was a really lovely birthday weekend.

My Anglo Saxon Warrior!

I spent last weekend in Suffolk and on Saturday we went to the Anglo-Saxon village at West Stowe. It is built on the site of an original Anglo Saxon village which was occupied between 420 and 650AD by people who migrated to this country from the area that is now part of Northern Germany. Around 650AD the village moved to a site about a mile away which is where it remains today but the reason for the move isn't known.
The original site was gradually covered by sand dunes until it was discovered quite by chance during trial quarrying for sand and gravel.

It was decided to do an archaeological excavation of the whole site and this took place between 1965 and 1972. When the excavation finished the decision was taken to reconstruct the village using the tools and materials available to the Anglo Saxons. There are no written records for this period of English history so the venture was experimental archaeology as they tried to discover how the Anglo Saxons built their houses and lived their day to day lives. Huge numbers of artefacts were found so there was plenty of material to build on. Some weekends during the year it really comes to life when an Anglo Saxon living history group lives there and carries out all the activities of daily life including storytelling round the fire which was one of the great sources of entertainment for the Anglo Saxons, children and adults alike. This way the history and legends of the family and tribe were passed from one generation to the next. I'm hoping to manage a visit to Suffolk when one of these events is on.



Before you go into the actual village there is a room with a short video telling you about West Stowe and also a display of various artefacts. Above on the right of the display case is the Brandon Hoard which is on loan to West Stowe but was discovered near by. It dates to the lst century AD and consists of an iron bound bronze cauldron, a wine strainer, a skillet and a bronze bound wooden vessel. It probably belonged to a wealthy chieften and was hidden during the Roman invasion of Britain. The owner may well have lost his life when taking part in Boudicca's rebellion around AD60 - she was the legendary female warrior chieftain of the Iceni tribe who led a revolt against the Roman invaders and East Anglia was her territory.



Permanent residents of the village - at least until the autumn when they will probably be providing a selection of hams, bacon and pork sausages! Gabriel liked these a lot.


The interior of one of the buildings showing a central hearth in a wooden frame. Several of the houses had these so it must be a recognized style of hearth. I have a feeling that oak doesn't burn very easily so it may be safer than it looks. Any experts who could comment on this? Against the wall are warp weighted looms with the clay loom weights hanging from them.



George was having a good time and he thinks he'd like to be an Anglo Saxon.



Gabriel sees himself as the tribal chieftain and is trying out the chair for size:)



One or two of the Romano British re-enactors who were in the village when we were there, not a full scale presence but giving a little authentic atmosphere.


One of the houses had a built in box bed not unlike the stone box beds found at Skara Brae in the Orkney Islands. Neil prodded the straw filled mattress and announced that he didn't think it would be very comfortable!


There is an excellent small museum at West Stowe and on the way in this splendid gentleman flew up onto the fence and cried 'cockadoodledoo!' very loudly several times much to Gabriel's delight. I managed to catch it in full flow.

It was a serious museum but also had things for children to touch and feel including this replica of the helmet found in the burial at Sutton Hoo which is not far away and is scheduled for a visit sometime this summer. He was thrilled at having it on and wanted to see himself in the mirror. It's a poor photo because of all the lights.

Then mummy discovered a dressing up box and he became a small Anglo Saxon. At this point daddy got in on the act as you can see at the start of this post. Gabriel thought it was hilarious seeing daddy dressed up like this. I think he rather looks the part!



I had to leave after lunch on Sunday but in the morning we went to Shotley Gate which is on the estuary where two rivers, the Stour and the Orwell, meet to flow into the sea. Shotley Gate is on a little peninsula in the middle and on one side is the port of Felixstowe and the other is the port of Harwich. The cranes are in Felixstowe which is the largest container port in the UK.


Shotley Gate itself has a nice marina and the estuary is full of boats both cruisers and sailing craft.



There are little sandy beaches and it's possible to walk for 10 miles along a path that goes by the river and through lovely countryside so Neil tells me.



The beaches are thick with seashells, crab skeletons, beautiful coloured pebbles, seaweed and the occasional stranded starfish. Neil and Gabriel are looking for shells so that Francesca can make a shell necklace.


Time to go and get some lunch at the local pub but on the way there we were able to see the lock opening for a boat to move out of the Marina and onto the estuary.
This will be my last post for a while as early in the morning I am off to Sussex and Dorset for a week. A week in the pouring rain by the looks of it too! The forecast is dire for tomorriow and I'm not much looking forward to the drive but hey ho - maybe I'll be lucky and the sun will shine: