Life, Love & Literature

We’re just back from a week and a half at my Dad’s in N Wales.  When the kids were young I used to be so relieved to get home as the trip would leave me phys­i­cally exhausted and men­tally drained, now the kids are older and able to cope with the strange­ness bet­ter I just feel sad to leave.  Don’t get me wrong I miss Pete of course and it is nice to be in my own house.  But Wales will always be home.

Lee is a lovely place to live (much nicer than the town I grew up in) and I have friends down here I’d miss if we left.  But apart from Pete and the boys the peo­ple I love are all back up in N Wales and I miss them a lot.  It’s over 7 hrs each way so really a once a year trip.  Oh well we’re not in a posi­tion to move up and even if we could I’m not sure we would, the boys are set­tled here.

So hol­i­day was off to a bad start as the first day was my Aunt’s funeral.  Not an easy day. My aunt was a won­der­ful woman who has been ill for 20 years but kept her spirit and her sense of humour through­out and I will miss her hugely.  But she also rep­re­sented a link to my mum as they were extremely close sis­ters and the day was full of lit­tle reminders that my mum is not here and with­out my aunt here my mum feels that bit more distant.

Any­way, cheer­ing up a bit.  After the funeral we col­lected the kids from my friend’s and went for ice cream.  There is a farm near Chester where they make their own ice cream and they have lots of activ­i­ties for kids.  It was very wet so we set­tled for just an ice cream and a run around the ‘pig maze’.

Sat­ur­day was wet again so I took the boys into Chester for a potter.

Sunday,we went round to my old­est friend’s house for lunch and I got to cud­dle a gor­geous baby.  I tried to get a photo by giv­ing the baby to Jack — that didn’t end well!  No per­ma­nent dam­age done though

Mon­day and the sun finally came out so it was off to the beach.

The tide was in when we got there so there was time for a play in the park.

 

 

 

 

As soon as the sand was vis­i­ble it was onto the beach and into the sea.

There were also sand­cas­tles (and a sand fish!)

    

And foot­ball!

   

Tues­day was nip­pier so we went out to lunch

And then to the Ice Cream Farm again for pud­ding.  Since it wasn’t rain­ing we got to see all the areas which they have added since last year.

There were playgrounds

                

And there were quad bikes!

  

Weds was sup­posed to be really hot so back to the beach.  Unfor­tu­nately stiff sea wind was chill­ing so not much sea this time.

Thurs was cold and wet so we went into Mold to have break­fast with my sis­ter and nephew (who is off school hav­ing fin­ished his GCSEs which makes me feel very OLD!) and a very quick pot­ter about the shops.  Then back to Grandad’s where I drew a map of Avan­tia (Beast Quest) for Sam to scrib­ble all over.

Jack read

And they both drew

   

Fri­day was wet but we went up the hills

Then we nipped to the shops to get the 100th Blue Nose Friend!

 

Posted in Family, Holiday, Out and About

Tags: Wales

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