On Friday Nairn, Erica, Greer and I took a trip to Edinburgh to visit some of our great friends (Findlay had a better offer – he spent the night with his Granny and Grampa instead!) First stop, we dropped in to visit our lovely friend Kate and her family. A few weeks ago, Kate came to visit us and left with two hens so we returned the visit and took two kittens! Kate’s colleague has taken the little black kitten (who has been renamed Murphy) and Kate’s family kept one of the ginger kittens. The kids all played spectacularly together although we only stayed a couple of hours as we had made arrangements to see another friend, although I nearly ended up dead of fright when we left Kate’s and Erica ran straight out onto the road.
Do you ever have those moments of absolute fright when you just can’t act quickly enough? I was standing in Kate’s path with the cat carrier in one hand and in the other I had Greer in her carseat but my brain couldn’t work out which I should put down in order to leap forward and grab her, plus Kate was standing behind me and I was blocking the path so she couldn’t get past me. Absolutely horrible experience and it really shook me up – Erica was EXTREMELY lucky that there was no traffic passing at the time.
Anyway. I had a rough idea where Kate stayed, but when I checked on the map I realised that she was only a mile away from our second visit of the day – my sewing hero Amanda. Even more bizarre is that their kids are all going to be attending the same school with the youngest of each family in the same class at school. It really rammed home how small a place the internet is! So anyway, we got round to Amanda’s and decided to go to the Botanics for a walk about only to get completely soaked to the skin. Of course, the rain decided to show itself right after Nairn peeked around a bush proudly announcing that he’d pooed. In his pants. Which I then had to try and sort out on a hill in the Botanics in the rain with Greer in a sling. Remind me again why I had four kids?!
My camera battery died so I only got a few photos but Amanda took some crackers and a video clip which you can see here.
As always, click for bigger pictures.
You can’t see terribly clearly here but the kids were actually hammering that thing (which is a metal recycling point) and thoroughly enjoying their percussion session whilst loudly announcing their glee. Typical kids at play, until one of the Botanics staff walked past and I joked, “They’re not always this noisy!” and got the most withering “you’re a shit parent” look I’ve ever had. Ahem…
Have you seen The Ring
Hugging WITH ENERGY!
Nairn decided to hug Jamie at speed, Jamie fell on Erica who fell on Maia…
Then they all rolled down the hill.
About two seconds after this photo was taken, Erica used Jamie as a springboard to somersault over/onto him. Poor Jamie took it like a pro by laughing it off, so she did it again. And again. He’s a very patient lad that one…
So I brought three very tired but very cheery children back to East Kilbride and dropped Nairn & Erica with Bob’s parents for the weekend. It’s the first weekend we’ve had just with Greer since she was born and I found that I really had no idea what to do with myself! I’ve been on the go constantly and suddenly there wasn’t that go-go-go. Any other parents feel like that when their kids aren’t around?
I’ll leave you with a picture of what’s going on in my house right now. I thought it was only kids who liked playing in empty boxes?!
Posted under me, with the kids
This post was written by Vonnie on July 5, 2009
Looks like they had a great time, so glad Erica wasn’t hurt, thank god there was no traffic!
I have seen The Ring, the resemblance is striking lol!
Nice box Bob! (does that sound rude?)
Laughing my head off at The Ring comment! Oh, and you should have told me how unflattering my attire was… now I know! Lovely post, and we loved having you. Jamie and Maia keep going on about when we’re going to see you again, and seeing that we have kidnapped Erica Fifi and Nairn’s big rock, maybe soon?!
god i know that slow-motion terrifying moment all too well it’s like your walking through treacle but the rest of the world has sped up, so glad erica was ok.
looks like you all had a great time.
We had a scary moment like that today. M pulled the tv over with him underneath. Luckily DP was able to catch it before it hurt him but if it had been a week day I dread to think what would have happened cos I was stuck on the sofa nursing the baby
Aw, that looks like a lovely day – heartstopping moment aside. I think we’ve all had one like that..
I know the “oh no, no kids” feeling too – all too rare, alas, but the pressure of Making The Most Of It tends to galvanise me into complete inaction! Enjoy, whatever you do – or don’t do
Aargh, that bloody road I live on! It’s getting worse and worse, too. Should have kept Erica back myself.
Other than that, it was lovely to see you! And the ridiculously-named Felix Bat is almost unbearably cute. (Also, you missed out the bit where you rushed out to the garden to find me bellowing and throwing chickens over the fence.)
It will take you a while to recover from the ‘what ifs’! Sounds like a great day out (except for the pants-poo!)
@Kate
Vonnie probably missed that out because she’s used to me doing something similar with the chickens in our back garden.