16 tomorrow

This weekend for our grandaughter’s 16th birthday has been long in the planning. Getting our family together is hard enough, but trying to do it in London, which is where we need to be for a special Alice Day on Saturday, and realising that it is London Marathon Weekend, made it very tricky. But our two girls are very good at organising and between us we came up with a plan. Everything was booked . . . and then came rail strikes!

Not daunted, our two came up with a modified plan which meant moving the family get together to tonight and then relying on cars, buses and taxis for Saturday.

We drove down to Sevenoaks this morning, making very good time. We were booked into Sevenoaks Premier Inn and later caught the train into London.

Somehow everyone eventually arrived, from different directions, at Bob’s Lobster, an American seafood restaurant. We took up half the place with our party of ten, but the staff were excellent. Alice’s mum brought the cake and I liked this picture with Alice, her mum Clair and her Aunt Joanne. It was significant because this was the first time in 16 years that the cake hasn’t been made and decorated by her mum. It was a super rainbow cake, but Alice reminisced about the ones her mum had made her in the past. A bought birthday cake, a sign of growing up.

A fabulous evening, but eventually we all departed in different directions. Some will meet up tomorrow. Remember the extra photo, taken as we walked to the station, it may be important.