The end of the holidays!

In the UK the school summer holidays have just come to an end and all my grandchildren started back today.  I have received photos of them in their school uniforms and two of them are starting new schools.  The eldest is my grandson who goes to his secondary school and is cycling there on his own; how he has grown up lately and the youngest is joining her sister at a new school.  She too, looked so grown up.  Good luck to them all.

However on Monday I had the two 'Cambridge' grandchildren for the day and when my son and daughter in law dropped them off we had the grand removal of the plaster on 'Es' arm that she fractured whilst in my care at the beginning of the holidays (see my last blog)!!  I had decided to take them down to Rushden Lakes and hire a pedalo from Canoe2, however in the meantime I had a call from my niece and as she was free we met up including her two boys.  This meant war and needless to say a race ensued, after a bit of practice.

 

I think we won.  In these two photos we were practising and taking pictures of each other!!  We had already had a walk round the lake so after this it was back to my house for lunch and a great day was had by all, even if I did have wobbly legs after all the pedalling!!

I am back there on Saturday as the 50+ Adventure club are having a canoeing afternoon on the River Nene.  Hopefully no-one, especially me, will fall in.  I have canoed with the club before - down the River Wye, on the River Nene from Oundle to Fotheringhay and on the River Severn from Bridgnorth.  I regret to say that on the trip down the Severn my partner and I did capsize, but luckily we were on a sandbank and the water only came up to our knees!  We were still a little damp for the return journey on the Severn Valley Railway!!

At the end of August the Mini Mania group showed of their 'makes', but yours truly had cheated like mad.  The topic was " the Seaside" and we could do anything that we wanted to. 

Back in 2010 I went on a Pat Archibald workshop called 'Banks and Braes' and using a photo from the year before I made this

 

'Sandcastle at Holkham'

The photo had been taken on a holiday the year before when we went to Holkham Beach and the tide was out and so my son and grandson built a sandcastle.  I used foils and glue balls with gold sprinkled over and finished with machine embroidery.  I love this piece and thought it was very apt for the subject matter for Mini Mania.  By the way, this is the same grandson going off to his secondary school and his back view on the pedalo!!

September's Mini Mania is 'Circles' and we can do anything we like and I have a few ideas, but putting them into practice maybe a little more difficult.