Instead of visiting each family member or friend individually on my visit's to England, my mum has started a tradition of organizing a little get-together or open house where all of my friends and family members can gather in one place and spend time with us, it is perfect since it would take a long time to visit everybody separately. Mum even creates little invitations for the event.
This year, she, along with my Auntie Carol and Uncle David, arranged a little afternoon gathering at the Esporta Fitness Club in Cookridge. It was a wonderful venue, our room had a conservatory attached to it, and since the weather was perfect too you could sit inside or out.
Mum, Auntie Carol and David provided a fantastic buffet (thank you so much) and there was a bar in the room where people could buy drinks. Of course, the most exciting part was seeing familiar faces of those who had gathered together to see us. It was wonderful, the only difficult part was spending enough time with each and every person who came. I was especially grateful that my dad was able to come.
So, who is who? Let me introduce everybody to you...
Above, Amelia inspects "Uncle Phil's" hair (actually he is my cousin but I call him Uncle Phil). Below, we pose for a photo with my Auntie Beverly, cousin Gemma and her little boy.
Can you see the monkey hanging from the tree? Oh wait a minute, that's not a monkey, it's my nephew Conner.
Here I am with the girl who babysat for me, Samantha. As you can see, she now has two beautiful children of her own, Megan and Tyler. It was a real treat to see her, I always thought of her as the older sister that I never had, she is an amazing woman and I can hardly believe that so many years have passed since she used to pay me 50 pence (equal to about $1) to turn off the clock radio alarm clock in the mornings.
My brother, Andrew, looking cool in his shades.
Here is my friend, Sula, and her man, Alan, well, her name isn't actually Sula, it's Sue, but I always called her Sula, not quite sure why. Anyway, she and I worked together at Donaldsons, it was so good to see her again and catch up.
My friend Carli's family has grown a little since I last saw her, I only remembered two children, but here she is with four, what a cute bunch. Carli is my friend from church and we used to get together and hang out in the evening once a week.
My Uncle John and I pose for a photo. Whilst I was home, he also compiled a CD for me with photo's of this day as well as some from when I was a little girl, what a nice surprise.
Below, Amelia and I pose with Pat and Sarah Knight, my former "in-laws", I was so glad that they came, they even brought a little bag of sweets for Amelia too. It's good to know that even though we don't talk or write all the time, we still have a special bond.
It was a long day and as curious as Amelia is, she hadn't really taken a nap, so I was happy to see that she finally "conked out". Vicky gave her a little cuddle as she slept.
After the afternoon "open house", we headed back to Auntie Carol and Uncle David's house. Now, I need to make a special shout out for this next photo. Here is my cousin "Uncle Phil" with his wife Sarah "Mad Bridey" (another nickname of course) and their sweet daughter Hannah, oh, and there's Amelia too. Anyway, Sarah has been waiting patiently to be on my blog ever since I went home, she is very special to me, just like a sister, and even though I didn't meet her until after I moved to the United States of America, we had an instant connection. I know that if I lived back in England, we would spend a lot of time together.
Here we are together again (I miss you)...
Amelia had a photo with three of her cousins, looks like she's having a good time.
There's a little story that goes with this last photo. Of course I am a first time mum, and quite cautious about certain things, one of which is feeding Amelia, I always feared that she would choke on "normal food" and gave her, what my family called "bird-size pieces". Whilst in England, I got a lot of stick about it and to make matters worse, Amelia was really kicking up a fuss whenever I tried to feed her the usual baby food, so, finally on this evening, after a few words of encouragement from Sarah, I decided to give Amelia a whole quarter of a crustless, ham sandwich. Of course she loved it (as you can see below), it seems that all she wanted at mealtimes was to be independent. I'm happy to report that I am much more relaxed now and Amelia is feeding herself really well and eating "normal foods". Looks like everybody was right!
So, there you have it, just a few of the special people that I saw during my visit. Spending time with them made me remember how much I really miss them. I cannot wait to see them again!
During the second week of our visit to England, we traveled to Scotland for a couple of days, above you can see Amelia helping Nana and Grandad to find the right route. It was just a few hours drive away. We stayed at The CraigMoss Guest House, it was perfectly located in the heart of Edinburgh's City Centre, comfortable and the owners were really nice.
When we arrived, Amelia immediately tested the daybed by bouncing gently on the mattress.
After a good night's sleep and a hearty Scottish breakfast, we headed out to the Edinburgh Castle, as you can see it was a very wet day. Mum and I decided to buy souvenir rain poncho's, the absolute height of fashion, we even put one over Amelia too.
Since it was so wet, I didn't take too many photo's, instead I bought a DVD Postcard to look at.
Matthew and Amelia stood in the guard box and posed for a photo.
The Canon shown in these photo's is fired once at 1 o'clock in the afternoon, every day, by the same guard. The photo below is blurry because I took it as the canon fired and it made me jump out of my skin, even though I was expecting it, I like how it came out though because I caught it at the exact moment it was fired.
On our last day, we toured the Royal Yacht Brittania, which has now been decommissioned. It was a great tour, unfortunately Amelia wasn't very interested and Matthew ended up taking her off of the boat a couple of times.
"Ring the bell, sir"
My mum, Amelia and I have a little rest after walking around the yacht.
They were working on the yacht, so you might be able to see the scaffolding.
After having fun on the yacht, we went to the mall to eat, while we were there, we saw a "Build-A-Bear Workshop", my mum decided to make a bear for Amelia, here she is recording a message that was put in the bear's hand.
Next, the bear was stuffed.
Nana picked out a special heart for Amelia that was placed in the bear.
Since we were in Scotland, Nana dressed the bear in a scottish pinafore dress.
The bear was named Heather, a true scottish name, what a wonderful gift, Nana gave it to Amelia as an early first birthday present.
Later, we drove back through Edinburgh's town centre and down the Royal Mile, years ago, this is where the royal processions would have taken place.
We saw Holyrood House from a distance, it was opposite the Scottish Parliament building.
The street lamps were pretty fun, can you see the crown on top?
Finally, it was time to go home, we all agreed that we could have used a couple more days there, maybe next time.
On the way home, I fell asleep and was awoken when we reached to border between Scotland and England, there was a huge rock, one side said Scotland and the other England, depending on what side you were standing on you were either in England or Scotland.
Of course we had to pose for photo's, it was so cold and windy, Amelia's nose got a little pink. Mum said that sometimes there is a man playing bagpipes who stands at this location, he wasn't anywhere to be seen on this day, it was probably too cold.
So, back to England we went.
I can't wait to go back to Scotland again, there's so much more to see.
