Aberdeenward bound

After a busy week in Cambridge, Bluet, Ilona and I boarded a train to Aberdeen on Friday morning*. While in Aberdeen we went to Castle Fraser, which was really fun, once the kids were given a checklist of things to spot and tick off. A busy weekend ensued

At Mill House there was a swing to play on

A car Andrew and Nick are building to play in

A tree house Andrew just built to not fall out of

Muffins to eat

And a railway to watch in full steam (NB we must get one of these at our house)

Oh, and bees to visit

*We changed at Peterborough onto a busy train, but as we had reserved seats it was fine. In fact the kids behaved perfectly - probably because I let them play games on phones. At Newcastle we changed again and this time the carriage was so full the passengers did not want to let us on even though we had reserved seats, but we eventually got on and everything was fine; all this because of the Edinburgh festival, the train was empty and peaceful from Waverly onwards. As we then arrived 30 minutes late, 50% of our ticket price was refunded, so it all worked out great. 

Trip to Scotland: Bluet's Birthday

Today we returned from our trip to Scotland (incorporating Aberdeen and the Outer Hebrides). So, more details to come, but let us start with Bluet's Birthday 2017, which she got to celebrate with (in no particular order): Andrew, Maria, Wayne, Nana, Steve, Dorthea, Caroline, Madeleine, Uncle Nick and Gina at our lovely Hebridean rental home. Uncle Nick kindly made her a cake and decorated while we were out, whilst Andrew and Maria provided pizza (Bluet's choice of birthday meal, narrowly beating out spaghetti). Before the birthday meal we went into Stornoway and visited the museum inside Lews Castle. You can tell it was Bluet's birthday because she is wearing a birthday crown in most of the pictures