We cancelled our planned family trips to London and Cornwall and decided to take multiple day trips. Much of the time it was the Littlie's and I - the Hubby's ruptured achilles required elevation above his heart for the majority of the day due to excessive swelling, but we jumbled along through our days in a largely content manner.
The first few days of the holiday were perhaps the most challenging - primarily managing multiple hospital appointments and understanding Hubby's new injury was difficult - plus the children took a couple of days to adjust to being together again 24 / 7!! This happily settled down after the first 2 or 3 days and the children spent the remainder of the holidays being each others play pal. This is always one of my favourite things to observe - they are usually each others best advocate and supporter and it does fill me with pride to hear the conversations they have and the games they create.
My camera malfunctioned during the holidays (much to my horror). I only have a point and shoot camera but in my experience they just don't seem to last much beyond the warranty period. I'm on my third model now and have loved my current one with it's WiFi connectivity (especially useful to transfer pictures for this blog) but am now researching new options. I don't have a smart phone so that instant camera facility isn't available to me elsewhere!!! Enough about this but I write this partly to justify the 'quality' of images!! Memories captured none the less. I also found myself being much more in the moment this holiday period; either part of the play with the children and trying to record the scenes to my physical memory rather than watching through a lens - which can sometimes be tempting. I kept a handwritten journal throughout the holidays and whilst we stayed at home we did get out to a whole range of parks across the county (always with a picnic) and the weather was stunning for much of it!
We also had lots of water play. Either in the paddling pool, Marine Lake, the sea or Water Parks.
The children had chore charts for the first time too - with daily jobs to complete in return for a little pocket money or a specific treat day (like Puxton Park). This helped us balance the extra mess that happens in a family home and reduced the need for nagging!!
My Mum - 'Granny', came and stayed on a couple of occasions for a few days at a time which was a great help. It meant adult company on days out for me and a doting player of board games for the kids. I loved spending these relaxed times with her and the children - especially Little Lady are so appreciative of her time it is an equally rewarding relationship.
In short, August 2014 was a wonderful month. It was challenging in many ways - yet these times do help you to appreciate the good - and gladly there were plenty of good moments. We could have easily done with another couple of weeks of restorative rest and child filled fun this summer. The children were still able to fill their days and not once complain of boredom. Other than the first couple days of readjusting there were no kiddie cross words and the sunny days of summer were just that. For once our English summer was full of sunshine; our days in Somerset were long and warm full of outdoor opportunity...and our little family was happy and content.
This post has been drafted awaiting photos for over a month and he is now about 12 weeks into recovery - hence the down turn of my own health during September is not reflected in this previously drafted post. I liked the post as it read when I came back to it today as I was clearly still on the high of good times with the kids... reading it helped me to reconnect with those times and so with only this adjustment and the addition of photos it has stayed the same and I've hit publish. What a difference a month can make! Problems with my own camera has meant that sorting the photos for this post has been tricky - hence it now being October before my record of the summer is complete!! Better late than never!
J9 x
