Skiing adventure

Was my last blog post really on Christmas Eve?? Help! Time is marching on and I need to start blogging more! Well, a few weeks ago we returned from our annual "Adventure"-every year we pack up the car, set off straight after school on Friday, drive from Yorkshire down to Kent and board the train which takes us through the Eurotunnel to France.Then it's a LOOOONG drive through the night with R and I sharing the driving and little ones asleep in the back, through France, Belgium. Luxembourg, France again, and finally Switzerland. It's always exciting to see the Swiss border with it's white sail-like roof and security guards waiting to sell you the Swiss road tax disc.Finally we arrive at our destination-Lauterbrunnen in the Bernese Oberland at around lunchtime-head off to the ski-hire shop and get fitted for boots, skis, helmets etc, followed by a wonderful Swiss lunch...

Alpen macaroni with apple sauce...

....and delicious burgers for the kids.


And the temperature on that first day? -28 degrees Celsius! And it stayed like that for the next few days!

Chilly, chilly, but oh so beautiful...

 

This part of Switzerland is my very favourite place in the world-one day I would like to retire to this little bit of heaven on earth.

We stayed in this chocolate-box chalet...

...and every morning caught the mountain train to have fun,

lots of fun

in the shadow of the Eiger, Monch and Jungfrau.

Christmas Eve

It's Christmas eve. The shopping's all done. The fridge is full. The last minute knitted gifts are wrapped. The home-made sloe gin is open. We've had our traditional meal with our lovely friends and walked to the Christingle service with them. The children are tracking Santa on Norad. Michael Buble is singing Christmas songs in the kitchen.

Happy Christmas!

December birthday girls

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas around here-the tree's up, the light up snowman and robins have taken up their positions in the garden and the old decorations which we bring out every year have been distributed around the house. The knitting needles are clacking away furiously on the last few knitted presents.
But there are 2 events to celebrate in December before we can start on Christmas. Kirsty and I have our birthdays on consecutive days-13th and 14th December.My baby was 14 this year-a very grown-up sounding age

We celebrated with a family party on the big day

followed by a fun friends party at home..complete with a marmite cake for the marmite-mad birthday girl!

the next day I celebrated..

with a birthday cake made entirely by Cameron

Playing catch-up

Well, I don't know where the last few months have gone, but I've been meaning to catch up on blog posts every week and it just never seems to happen.Over the past few months there has been a lot of yarn-y therapy going on...

this is the flower basket shawl knitted in alpaca sock yarn which I picked up at Woolfest earlier in the year,

My cable-yoke tunic knitted in Rowan coccoon...

and some Christmas presents

Summer 2011

Well, summer is almost over-Charlotte went back to school today and Kirsty and Cammeron start tomorrow.Am feeling a little wistful and sad-summers seem to be slipping away faster and faster as the years go by. Today was a truly horrible windy, rainy day and it made me feel that we'd skipped right past Autumn and straight into the depths of winter. I have been looking over the photos of our holiday and summer and decided to post them on here to cheer up this dark, cold day.

France's own version of the Red arrows on our first evening

Rock-pooling on the pink granite coast

Enjoying Croque Madame in the Harbour Bar

Amazing rock formations

Mer-people...

...and a little yarn-therapy on the beach!

Felty fun

This last week of the summer holidays we got crafty with wool and made a felted picture

We decided on greens and blues, and after having some silly moments with the wool tops...

we decided that a sheep theme would be apt-