family

this was my cunning way of preventing blindness

but it’s also a neat way of checking receding hair lines

here’s my mum talking to brother edd sitting in his hire car (stationary in a motel car park)

esther made a sign.

jane made the mixture

and then we got down to the business

i create chaos by taking photos in continuous mode with my external flash on, causing blindness to anyone in the same room

jane’s dad was particularly surprised by my approach and use it as an excuse to do a particularly elaborate setup

his throw was a great visual success.  the picture below is the catch part of the manoeuvre.  the throw bit is the picture at the top of this post

jane’s mum threw a smaller pancake.  can you spot it ?

having got her eye in she then went for some more complicated shaped ones

we did actually eat them (but not me due to egg allergyness)

even esther had a go

and of course jane did too.

one thing worth noting is the difference in our kitchen since we’ve had our extension.  above is this year (now with extra space to the right).  below is last year (viewed from the other way round)

esther loves her coat hood being up

jane and i went out for a wedding anniversary meal yesterday and it was jolly good.  it was a bit presumptuous as it’s not our wedding anniversary for a few days, but i recon we can make it !

kezia had her birthday party yesterday.  quite loud at times, but generally excellent because some lady came in and did a couple of hours of activities.  jane did the food and i just got in the way.  like a proper dad should.

we met up with my mum yesterday and had a lovely time at Waddesdon Manor.  here she is in and out of focus

and here she is in 3d (nearly)

writing thank you letters and visiting friends (who have a wii)

on the day after boxing day our family got the horrible winter vomitting bug.  whilst jane and esther lay in their death beds upstairs our hosts let kezia and me wander around their house.

we’d had to abandon the sky part of this jigsaw the night before as we’d run out of time, but the extra half day meant kezia and i could spend a few hours putting a few hundred identical blue pieces together

meanwhile kevin and thomas played some proper games

and sarah (who popped in the last piece on jigsaw above) played with her Dora head.  she said “it’s brilliant because i love and dora and i love heads”. surely a winning combo.

thomas loved taking pictures

everyone loved posing for a group photo

here’s kevin’s parents

here are thomas and kezia dangling

and here’s kevin trying to make jane and esther sick (oh the irony)

and when the kids still weren’t worn out we put them on this training wheel where they could run round in circles without going anywhere (thus preparing them for later life)

esther and kezia sweeped up the leaves at church last week

thomas had an idea to surprise his dad with this picture of him and cousin kezia on our thames path walk last week.  he really wanted the picture to appear on the blog.  so here it is.

hello thomas (and his dad) if you’re reading this !