Champ's Birthday

Champ's birthday was actually on the day that we flew to Ireland. For his birthday he was getting his much awaited and deserved remote control car. Champ had saved up his pocket money for a year to go towards it. Hubby and I decided that rather than him opening it on the day that we were leaving, looking at it briefly and then putting it away, that he could get his present a little early. He loved it...no LOVES it!!!! Well, once he managed to wrestle the controller out of his Dad's hands anyway :o)

Obviously travelling all day we weren't able to do our usual birthday celebration but we did manage to pick up a chocolate cheesecake for pudding on the drive to the house.

So on the weekend that we arrived back home we celebrated Champ's birthday with a family party. It happened to be Guy Fawkes so we went to watch the local fireworks.

I made pumpkin pie for pudding. We only get tinned pumpkin in October here so we have to make the most of it!

Champ asked if he could have an ant cake so we thought about how to do it. I had seen little packs of halloween creepy crawlies in the shops that contained little ants so I bought 4 packs. The kids had great fun icing it and then creating the colony. I think hubby swallowed an ant though :o)

Everyone joined in with the singing....Happy Birthday to you...

I just love the look of complete joy on his face

So after supper, pumpkin pie and cake we bundled the children up. My Mom has been knitting hats for the Christmas boxes this year and the children were lucky enough to be given one too. At the start of the cold weather this is probably the only time that everyone will have their hats AND their gloves, from now on we spend most of our time hunting for lost items.

The fireworks were late in starting luckily Gran had brought sparklers which had the added bonus of giving us a little space in the crowd as people are wary of children waving hot metal rods around :o)

The firework display was spectacular. The kids all stood there mesmerised with open mouths, barely blinking throughout the half an hour display.

On the way home we took a back route and ended up squelching our way though muddy fields in the dark. What an adventure!

Northern Ireland

Since we were going to Northern Ireland for the wedding we decided to stay a little longer and have a family holiday.
It rained and rained and rained! so most of the time we stayed inside. It was disappointing that we didn't get to explore NI as we would have liked but it was still lovely to spend the week together. We did manage to get outside in the brief few hours when it wasn't raining.
One of Hubby's friends has a holiday home in Portrush and let us stay in it for the week. It was a lovely house but only had three bedrooms. Kiki of course has to have a room of her own, that's because if anyone else is in the room with her she wakes up in the middle of the night and wants to chat.
Googs started off in the same room as the older two but after keeping them up, he was moved to our room.
This is the beach within walking distance of the house.

With all that rain came lots and lots of rainbows.

One of the many castles we saw on our trip. They weren't in the best condition and after a while Kiki was pointing out building sites and shouting "castle!"
You can just make out the above castle on the hill top below.
Giants Causeway. I am so pleased that we managed to get to see this it was amazing (£12 for parking though!) The kids loved scrambling over the rocks, well all except Kiki who was refusing to walk and lucky me she didn't want anyone else but Mommy for the trek back up the hill - well at least I could eat our fish and chip lunch guilt free :o)

And the second from last day the sun came out for a whole hour and a half!

Kiki ran straight for the water, quick run!

Football on the beach to warm up.

Kiki was making pancakes in the sand.

and Googs was drawing pictures of all of us.

The trip home was hard work. We got to the airport okay. We had stopped for lunch at Ikea where Googs spilled his juice all over himself and Boo somehow managed to put tomato sauce in her eyebrows. We then got to the airport where we noticed that kiki's nappy had leaked while we were at the checkout desk so after a quick change we went through security where we all had to take off jackets and shoes and belts - not easy when there are six of you! In the departure lounge Kiki couldn't be dragged from the cash machine with out screaming. Finally it was time to board. Seating wasn't assigned so we had to make sure that we were one of the first in the queue to make sure that we were sitting together. We queued for around half an hour and just before they let us on the plane Kiki did a big poo! Hubby took her off to change her while I kept our place, as soon as he arrived back Googs announced that he needed a poo!!! aaaah After Kiki kicked up a huge fuss in the plane we were pleased to get back to England. On the drive home we got stuck in a traffic jam for 8 miles! it took us an hour and a half longer to get home than it should have. Maybe I shouldn't have written about this - it is stuff I should really forget if I am to brave another trip ;oP

wedding outfits

I really should have taken these pics before the wedding. They are now fresh out of the suitcase and very creased!

I made 12 of these flowers in total, 2 for the boots, 2 for the belts and 2 for the hair clips.

Here is a very creased pic of Kiki's skirt. The girls loved that the skirts flared out when they span round. Boo called it her peacock skirt and Kiki called it her princess dress.

I made the underskirt and attached some tulle. I was going to add a whole lot more tulle than this but once it was on one layer seemed enough.

The boys ties

and cummerbunds. I didn't have a pattern for these so I just made it up. They turned out okay I think.

And finally the waistcoats. I was sewing the buttons on the day before we left. The lining is a lot greener that the pic shows and the centre circles on the girls dress is the same material as the lining.

Googs really didn't want his picture taken. It is so hard getting pics of all four together.

fungi, dragons, pumpkin, grim reaper and marshmallows

This is the time of year to hunt for fungi. As with most trees, plants and flowers, I have not much knowledge of fungi. My only question seems to be "Is it edible?"

I love all the shapes though

Obviously I know that this isn't a fungus :o) but I love the colours.

We went on a walk to Wantley woods with some friends.

We came across a wonderful dragon made out of a stone wall and a carved wooded head and claws. The kids loved it.
The only thing was, it was on top of a hill and Kiki is going through a "carry me" phase - not easy.

Champ also found a little hideout with a friend of his.

The day of the pumpkin carving finally came!

The kids all got stuck in.

Champ and Boo marked out the design and Hubby cut it out. I think that they did a brilliant job!

Last night Champ came to tell me an hour and a half before he had to leave for cubs that it was a Halloween party and he needed to wear fancy dress!!! We don't have any dress up clothes that fit him aaaahhh Because he is home educated and the other boys know each other from school I don't want him to stick out any more. Sooooo we had mad dash round the house trying to find something for him to wear. We managed to find a black tunic in the dressing up box (years ago a local theatre was moving premises and I rescued a few outfits out of the skip - mostly dresses). I then found some black material and quickly made this hooded cape. I think it turned out quite well considering I hadn't really a clue what I was doing. Hubby then made the scythe out of a nappy box, some tinfoil and an old mop handle. I just had to paint his face and he was all done. The whole outfit took 45 minutes to make!

Today was our autumnal fire with marshmallows. Champ nipped into the horses field and picked up a load of sticks, so along with some crumpled pieces of paper and a block of hard wood that they wanted to add, we made fire!

The weather is really starting to change and the kids got cold today and yet they still refused to wear shoes - I am only their mother, what do I know?

Although Kiki insists on having her marshmallow put on her stick she doesn't actually put it into the fire...well she actually did it once and all the ash that she picked up by ramming it to the bottom of the fire pot was enough to put her off :o)

The other guys enjoyed setting their marshmallows alight.