More holiday news

Well the snow has now gone from the ground. It is very odd to see the grass in the backyard and in the streets. It's now become more like a normal English winter, that is damp, dark, foggy, and cold (not very cold though). I'm glad we got to see some snow and for the kids to have a chance to play in it. I suspect it will be something that Mitch, at least, remembers for a long time. For the little boys there are always the photos. I hope it doesn't snow again otherwise I suspect we will be stuck here judging by the inability of the English airports to handle a bit of snow.

Yesterday I got to do something that I had never done and that was meet an iStock friend in real life. For those of you who don't know, I sell photos through a site called iStock, and there is a thriving community of photographers from around the world who get together virtually and share tips and encouragement and general life stuff all the while competing against each other for sales. It is surprising how well we all get along! Anyway, yesterday I got to meet Jo, his fiancee Angelina, his mum Dee and Jo and Angelina's little boy Stephan who is a month younger than Sam and Lucas (also Jo's mum Dee was there). I've known Jo through iStock for a few years and we have quite a bit in common given the age of our boys so it was fun to actually meet him in person. I and the boys (Meeks was off in London having tea at the Ritz - more on that later) traveled down to East Sussex which was about an hour and a half long drive through some of the worst fog I had ever seen. We took some photos of the boys playing together (we are photographers after all!) in Jo's nursery "set" and then went back to his place for lunch. There are a few shots on Flickr, but I haven't had time to process the best ones. Many thanks to Jo and his family for their hospitality.

Yesterday Meeks, Krissy and Lorraine went into London yesterday for a girly shopping trip and tea at the Ritz. Apparently they all bought new boots and ate cakes, pastries and cucumber sandwiches :)

In other news, it feels like Sam and Lucas's talking has come along a lot while we have been over here. They are both trying lots of new words and becoming more confident with the words they have. They love their little cousin Hannah and are always saying "Hi!" and running up to touch her when they see her.

To has been a bit of a rest day and tomorrow we're off to see Uncle Jamie and Auntie Phaik in London. We're going to visit the Natural History Museum which has dinosaurs!

There's only a week to go which I'm sure will happen so quickly!

Christmas

Okay so it's a few days late, but finally some Christmas images. Many thanks to everyone who cooked ... which I think was everyone, but mostly Glenn and Krissy.

More snow fun

While there was still snow on the ground we thought it good to get out and play in it. Near Krissy and Glenn's place is a park with some fun equipment to play on ... in between having a snowball fight.

More sledding pics

I'm running a bit behind in the posts. Before Christmas, Poppy and I took the boys sledding again, this time in a park near Nana and Poppy's house. Here are some pics from the day:

Sledding in the backyard

Yesterday we had lunch in a real English Pub. Getting there was a bit of an ordeal, first we had to clear 2 inches of snow off the car then we had to get the kids rugged up (I thought it was hard getting the kids ready to go out at home, but when you add 17 layers of puffy clothes plus beenies and gloves it takes forever. Driving on snowy roads is quite tense. Most of them were clear, but our street wasn't clear and even when the roads are clear you drive around at half the normal speed.

The pub had flagstone floors and very low ceilings and the food was very nice. The little boys had sausages and mashed potato followed by ice cream. Lucas was a little champion. He ate one and a half of the big sausages and a big helping of mashed potato and did it all using a spoon all by himself. He then moved on to the vanilla ice cream and ate most of that and when he'd had enough started feeding me and Mitch.

When we came home Mitch, Poppy and I did some sledding in the backyard. A selection of the shots are below, but there are heaps more on Flickr here.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

Well here we are in the very cold and snowy UK. We're staying in a little village called Lightwater which is in Surrey (which is South West of London). If you're wondering what it looks like, imagine the village from any English comedy or drama from the 70s and 80s (e.g. Some Mother's do have 'Em) and you wont be far wrong. I'll post some photos of the village a bit later, it's very cute especially in the snow.

Let's take a couple of steps back though. We left on Wednesday afternoon Sydney time and the trip was 24+ hours of hell. Mitch was great, but the little boys hardly slept (It didn't help when the airline left the lights on on the plane all the way to Singapore where we arrived at the equivalent of 12:30am Sydney time) and when they weren't sleeping they were whining and crying and writhing and ... well Lucas vomited on me on the descent into Singapore. We arrived in London very early (5am) on Thursday morning. There were issues with the gantry which meant it took ages to get off the plane and we got off last because it would have been impossible to get all our bags and things with people queuing up behind us ... which unfortunately meant we were last in the queue for Customs. We were incredibly fortunate that a Customs lady took pity on us and we were jumped almost to the front of the queue, then it took ages for our bags to come out during which time the kids were crying again. Eventually we made it out of the airport only to find we had to take a bus to the car rental place then our type of car wasn't there so we had to get a different one and then spent ages figuring out how to fit the car seats then finally drove to the exit gate only to find we had picked up the wrong car (there were three cars of the same model sitting next to each other with number plates that only differed by one letter) so we drove back in, moved all the luggage and refitted the car seats and eventually got on the road to Lightwater.

Okay enough about the trip here. I don't want to think about it again ... ever ... or we might not be able to get on the plane to come home!

So back to the snow. It snowed a bit yesterday evening and had a big dump this morning which is when we got the shots below. Mitch had a ball playing in it and the little boys were adorable in their little all in one outfits.Sam was in the blue and Lucas was in the red.

 Mitch cops a snowball

It's great to be here and we're looking forward to our time here very much. A huge thanks to Krissy and Glenn for putting up with us all!

I should add there are a bunch more photos on our Flickr page. The link is on the right of this page or follow this link to a slideshow

Pre-Christmas Christmas Dinner

We had our family pre-Christmas Christmas dinner today. Ganny and Grandad and Mike, Amanda, Lilly and Will joined us. All the rest of our family is in London and we're looking forward to seeing them soon. It was a beautiful hot sunny day (a bit different to what it will be like in London!) so it was perfect for playing in the back garden (once it had been mowed - all the rain we have had recently means the grass is reaching "has this house been abandoned" length in between mows) and having a good long swim. Mitch has come so far with his swimming even in the last month. At the start of summer he was nervous even to step off the steps in the pool and swim to me when I was 2m away. Today has was able to swim a whole lap of the pool. Added to that today was the first time he was able to tread water with his head above the water (a very valuable skill to have I'm sure we all agree!) and float unaided on his back. His confidence is through the roof and he is so pleased with himself. Obviously though he knows never to go swimming without an adult.

Anyway, here are some photos of the day.


After all the swimming and playing we had a delicious Christmas dinner that Meeks had cooked for us. Ham and turkey and roast vegetables and Christmas pudding with ice cream and custard. There is plenty left which I'm looking forward to eating over the next few days.

Preschool Christmas Concert

Mitch had his preschool Christmas concert tonight. He and the other kids sang Christmas Carols and then Santa came on a fire truck. It was all very exciting.

Mitch was very cute

 On Santa's firetruck

 Sam and Lucas had loads of fun playing in the playground