London (Photo heavy!)

On Sunday Simon and I took the boys up to London to do the touristy bit. Emily had been going to come with us but woke up full of cold and decided to stay at home :o( . We opted to go on the open top buses as that gives you an overall view of London and you can hop on and off as you want. As it was, we stayed on the bus most of the time getting off where we wanted to walk the rest of the way. Richard and Simon on the bus with Trafalgar Square behind them.

They were just about to change the guards over but the bus couldn't stop long enough for us to see it.

The London Eye

Big Ben

Simon taking a photo of Big Ben seen through the London Eye

The London sky line

Top of St Pauls Cathedral

St Pauls

Tower Bridge

Close up of one of the towers

The Tower of London

Henry, Richard and Simon with the Tower of London in the background

Henry standing next to one of the lions in Trafalgar Square

Henry and Richard at one of the fountains in Trafalgar Square with the National Gallery behind them

Walking towards Admiralty Arch at the entrance to The Mall, leading to Buckingham Palace

This statue of Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother is about half way down The Mall

Looking down The Mall towards Buckingham Palace

One of the guards at the entrance to Stable Yard Road

Walking towards The Victoria Memorial in front of Buckingham Palace

Simon and the boys in front of the gates of Buckingham Palace

In front of Buckingham Palace. The Union Flag was flying at the Palace which meant that the Royal Family was not in residence. When the Royal Family are in residence the Royal Standard flies.

From Buckingham Palace we walked back to Victoria Station to catch the train home. Richard took the opportunity to do some drawing on the train, while Henry was happy to listen to his music and watch the passing scenery.

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After our day in London, we arranged to order pizza in for the children while Simon, Jon, Deb and I went out for a meal at the local Thai restaurant. A more relaxing way to end the day :o)

Jon, Deb and Simon

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Second visitors

Our second visitors arrived on Good Friday. Jon's brother, Simon and his two boys, Richard and Henry, were over from Chicago and came to spend the last few days of their holiday with us. Liz and I were pregnant at the same time for part of each pregnancy with our children. Helen is 4.5 months older than Hugh, Richard is 6 months younger than Claire and Henry is 9 weeks older than Emily :). They all get on well when we get together and this time was no exception (though there was more laptop interference this time - in the evenings there were laptops all round the lounge!).

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They arrived early Friday morning and after having some hot cross buns and tea, the boys, Emily and I went to have a walk around town while Simon had a nap. (They'd been up since 4am and Simon had driven down from Yorkshire which had taken about 4 hours). It was really cold on Friday so, after a quick walk round town, we ended up at Caffe Nero

Henry had a hot chocolate and chocolate brownie (though after having hot chocolate at home later that evening he told me Liz and I make better hot chocolate!)

Richard had water, a caramel slice and a croissant

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Jon suggested we head up to The Broadway for lunch so that we could meet up with his other brother, Mike. Their sister, Deb, also came.

Emily, Henry, Richard and Simon

Hugh and Jon

Hugh caused a bit of a stir with Richard who hadn't expected him to look quite like he does ;o).

Family photo

From left : Deb, Simon, Hugh, Mike, Jon, Emily, Henry and Richard

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A good start to the weekend.

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Our first visitors

Over the next couple of months we have a number of visitors coming to stay with us. It's going to be lovely seeing everyone again. We started a couple of weekends ago with Michelle, Matthew and Josh coming to stay with us. Unfortunately they could only stay the one night because Michelle was working the days on either side. She's working a lot of shifts at the moment, on top of planning their wedding, so it was great to get a chance to see them again. Josh loves following his grandpa (Jon) around when he comes to us and this weekend was no exception.

We took Cloud for a walk and she didn't act up when Josh held the lead, so he enjoyed that.

When we got back Michelle and Matthew were having a nap so Josh and I spent some time taking photos ;o) (you've got to start them young lol!). He was using my little point and shoot and I used my DSLR.

It got a bit confusing at times but nothing we couldn't sort out.

Josh and Grandpa

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I promised Josh that if he let me take some good photos I wouldn't post the ones where he was pulling faces! Worked out well ;o). We're looking forward to seeing you all again in May!

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It's been a while

(Because a blog post needs a photo!)

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I know it's been a while since I last posted and I really had hoped to get an update done today but I'm afraid it's not going to happen. I was starting to edit my photos when my computer told me that I had virtually no space left (in that I couldn't even save my first edited photo because there wasn't enough room!). I've spent the afternoon sorting and deleting files to free up some space to be able to edit but haven't got that far yet. I am hoping to have a post tomorrow afternoon at the latest.

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I've had a break from my computer for the last couple of weeks but am looking forward to doing some blog reading during the holidays and seeing what everyone has been up to. Hopefully some of you will still be checking back here and I hope to get into the habit of posting regularly once more :)

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