Rob's birthday

This week we celebrated Rob's last birthday with a 4 at the front.  He took Friday off work so he could lie in and eat doughnuts in bed, after opening his pile of pressies. After I had done the school run, we went to see Skyfall at the cinema. Daniel Craig's breasts deserved a credit of their own, being so large I wondered why he wasn't bothering with a bra. In the evening we went to the local Pizza Express for a birthday tea with Maria, Lol, Jack and Ethan, with cake number 1, then raced home to watch BBC Children in Need. Marvellous. 

But the birthday revels didn't end there, on Saturday we made up guest beds, moved tables and chairs, and I rushed about buying last minute bits for Rob's second birthday dinner. This one was prepared by our lovely friend Laline, who offered to cook an amazing south Indian fish curry with prawns. While she was below stairs in a pinny, finessing her food, preparing condiments and general being fab, I was upstairs relieving Champers bottles of their corks and pouring drinks for our guests, who all made the journey to Hastings from London - Helen and George, Ruth and Pete, Lorraine and Sprout and Deborah.

Laline's meal was amazing, lots of wine was drunk, cake number 2 was eaten, and we then played a 5 round pub quiz I had devised. I sensibly slipped away to bed at about 1am, while Rob, Helen, George, Ruth and Pete stayed up chatting until 3.30. Silly, silly, silly.  This morning after everyone had gone, Deborah popped in for a last farewell, fresh from her night in a pleasing local B&B. She thrilled the girls doing her infamous tongue on nose trick.

Finally a few shots from a very lazy Sunday. Lorraine (still looking in her 20s) and Sprout, also a fine looking man, on Hastings seafront. Plus a few shots of a typical Duthie Sunday afternoon - papers, fire, telly, snoozing, reading, games. Perfection.

Surrey all out

On Friday night after school we drove straight up to Surrey for dinner with Helen and George. As ever, Scarlett and Flo vanished into the bowels of the house to play with their cousins, not to be seen again until dinner time. And what a dinner it was, Helen serving an amazing pork dish that was shredded at the table and put me in mind of Peking Duck. Wine and conversation flowed, the children all stayed up far too late, but then slept in late on Saturday.    

After farewells, we drove the short distance to Ashstead, to Neil and Lorna's, to meet up with Moira and Fraser, who had flown down to surprise Lorna for her 40th birthday.They very kindly interrupted proceedings to have us for lunch - amazing homemade mushroom soup and homemade scones with piles of cheese, bread and ham. Zips set to groaning, we had a lovely long walk on the common, with Neil, as ever, in charge of children's entertainment, chasing the kids for hours through the woods, while the real grown ups walked and talked, something we never seem to tire of.

This morning we very emotionally honoured the 2 minutes silence at 11am for Remembrance Sunday and tonight Scarlett, and the rest of her school choir are perfomring at the White Rock Theatre in the Remembrance concert. V proud.

Suffolk

Another totally brilliant weekend in Suffolk, staying with Rick and Justin. With the half term weather proving to be total pants in the south east, there were only so many movies we could watch at home and in the cinema (loved Madagascar 3 and Hotel Transyvania), and only so many games of Who Am I? and Rat-A-Tat Cat we could play. So the girls and I headed off on Friday morning, leaving Rob to catch the train up on Saturday morning. It was an easy, traffic-free drive up and the weather on arrival was crisp, cold and sunny. We drove straight to Ickworth, the National Trust house and park, close to the boys' cottage in Hargrave. Being half term, the brilliant minds at the National Trust had set up a 20-challenge kids trail through the woods, which took us a couple of hours to complete and included loud singing, star jumps, spotting snails, solving maths problems and anagrams. By the time we finished, the sun was yawning in anticipation of popping into bed, so we hit the cafe for the world's largest slice of Victoria Sponge, a scone, clotted cream and jam and a pot of tea (yum yum).  When we left it was pitch black and we half walked, half ran shrieking back to the car, standing almost alone in the car park. Onwards then to Smart Fox cottage, where a huge fire was blazing, fresh pasta sauce was being created in the kitchen and all was well in the world.

On Saturday, we went up to Easter Wood for lunch and to get a few sacks of firewood to bring back to Hastings.  Justin let the girls take the controls of the tractor, which  they loved. The tractor also proved useful when Rick reversed the car, already stuck in mud, into a ditch. Once the car was retrived, and Rob was collected from the station in Newmarket, we settled into the hut in the wood (wood burning stove pumping out the heat) for homemade pumpkin and tomato soup with bread, cheese, giant pork pie and home made piccalilli. Fantastic.

Justin then changed into his action trousers, special boots and hard hat and became king of the wood with his chainsaw, making light work of a pile of logs for us.

Back at the cottage, we debated whether any of us could be bothered to make the short journey to nearby Barrow, for the fireworks, it being close to November 5. At the very last minute, Justin, Rob, the girls and I jumped in the car and arrived at just as the fireworks started. Health and Safety rules meant we were kept at  a precautionary 30 miles from the fire (yawn) but the fireworks were brilliant, and lasting only 10 minutes, we were soon back in front of the fire at Smart Fox Cottage in time for Strictly Come Dancing. A feast of a dinner - French bean and pork cassoulet awaited us - and once the kids were in bed, the grown ups enjoyed hilarious after hilarious rounds of Pit.
On Sunday, after heading to Frank and Debbie's house for an amazing roast pork lunch, it was time for us to start our drive home. Only moments after joining the M11, we ground to a halt and stayed that way for the next 90 minutes. Luckily our tummies were full, the girls had their DVD players, I had the papers and Rob watched Revolutionary Road on the iPad, so everyone was happy. The tailback was caused by a 12-car pile up, that we eventually passed some time later. We finally got home at 9pm, instead of the sat nav's predicted time of 6.30pm.   No matter, a wonderful and as always restful and fun weekend.