Memory lane

Another early morning!! 6.30am the boys were awake. I contained them until about 7am... But at least everything was more relaxed this morning.

We pottered until ten, and then went for a lovely walk down to and along the river. It's about as far from their house to the river as it is from our house to the sea - and yet they've only really discovered this in the last year, or since mum retired really. This is Ben and Dad walking back towards the village. Bit of app trickery to make it reflect more how we enjoyed the morning :)

Charley did his usual trick of waking up as we approached a cafe, and dad and I had coffees and shared a scone with Charley while Ben had a penguin biscuit amd a HUGE drink of water.

And then on the way home we bumped into another old friend! Was lovely to see you, Sarah!

Charley didn't have a great deal to eat at lunchtime but then we had just been out foraging for alpine strawberries in the garden and he'd eaten quite a few! Ben didn't eat very much either but then he was full of chocolate biscuit... Of course this lack of eating lunch by the boys meant that both of them wanted lots of milk during the afternoon. And Charley for some reason seemed to want more sleep than I'm usually aware of him having, so our playdough playtime was short and, to be honest, fraught. Nobody was around and able to play with Ben and he was not really interested today. I've bagged it up to take home, maybe one day next week we'll get it out again and play with shells and cotton wool and pebbles and bits and pieces.

After a second afternoon booby nap from Charley he was finally a little more awake and chirpy so he went in his bumbo on the counter, well away from the edge, and away from anything he could pick up and bash, while Ben and I made a ginger treacle Herman mix and Mum cooked dinner. It smelled amazing. I'd forgotten how amazing black treacle tasted. Memories of bonfire night at my primary school came flooding back, with the parkin and treacle toffee they always had. I love treacle toffee! Can't eat it any more because my teeth just can't cope but ohhh it was good to lick the treacly spoons :) The cake cooked while we ate, filling the house with treacle smells. Charley enjoyed his tea, so did Ben. When I asked Charley if he would like a strawberry for pudding he got a bit excited - and when I brought one over from the fridge he looked like he might pop with joy!! Funny boy :) The cake was gorgeous. Not the sticky ginger cake I was originally after, but a dark treacly delicious parkin type cake. Mmmmm. Looking forward to some more of that for supper!

Tomorrow is going to be an interesting day. We have to move all our gear over to Steve's parents' house, ready for mum's Australian cousins to arrive and take over the bedroom we've been staying in. Hopefully Charley will cope, and not just break down when we get into the car like he almost did this morning when Mum and I swapped our cars round on the front drive.

Should be an interesting couple of days...

Now all I need to do is get this patch sewn on my jeans. In my haste to pack and get going on Tuesday I forgot to pack a second pair of trousers so I only have my jeans and various tees, or the posh frock for the wedding on Saturday... Just hope I don't get my jeans dirty :-/