The house without Christmas Day

Lots of different things are happening in our house this year. One by-product is that we are delaying Christmas Day for a couple of weeks until 2018. 

In the future, the pub quiz question will be "What was the year with no Christmas day in our house?" 10 points if you say 2017.

Once our wondering child returns from her self-imposed exile in Canada, we shall see if Santa comes, check under the tree for presents, look for crackers, and have a Christmas day.

So in the meantime, we didn't have christmas yesterday. 

 We has a raclette - with no turkey.

 I managed to find some bargain mince pies.

And on boxing day, went for a walk to restart the normal routine. So I have to work 2 days this week, and will have 3 days off next week, including New Year and Christmas. 

Misty december morning

Stirling Castle and the missing Wallace monument

A wee trip to Embra in the cold

Baltic
Icy
Freezing

But we do like a wee trip to the capital.

Pulling the focus

I've been using my 1plus2 phone for the last 18 months, and have never ever taken a photo without using the "auto" function.

Today, however.....

We just need better looking models!

Feeding the student - taking the night off

This weekend we found ourselves spread around the world in 3 countries, across 2 continents.  So those who were in Scotland met up for a little pizza, followed by a trip down the coast back to Anstruther (again)

 This is the end of the pier show!

 

 I love my 1plus2 phone. Quite dependable in all weathers 

 

 Here's the original picture - difficult to avoid the floodlights.

Then, back to St Andrews for a short stop in Morrisons for some essentials (if you are a student) then finally off to Janetta's for a cheeky wee 2 scoop tub.

We had a great evening!

Tis nearly the season...

Not wanting to start Christmas early sometime means that we run out of time and post cards after the last posting date, so this year, we have definitely started early.

It is still November, and we have been to visit the Christmas market in Edinburgh.

 At this point - when I had my big idea, perhaps I should have kept quiet.

 

But, I didn't, so 5 minutes later we were shooting the breeze 60 metres up in the sky!

 

I didn't drop my phone or rucksack, and surprisingly we didn't pass out with altitude sickness

 

We gave these a wide berth - far too dangerous! - Galloping Unicorns!

Just keep rolling along

Car news (2)

The trusty kia (the white tank) has reached 66666 miles (or 107288.53 km)

Everything is working, and apart from Kia replacing all the wheels (rust spots) the last 4 1/2 years have been trouble free.  We have 2 1/2 years of warranty (or 33334 miles) left.  Here's hoping is goes well for us.

Another day trip to Anstruther

Sometimes we are good at parenting, and other times, we muddle through.

This is a child of ours who looks happy because we have picked her up from University, fed her, and taken her out of St Andrews for the afternoon. 

 

 

 We call her "Eskimo Nell"


We were in Anstruther.  

Last post at the Menin Gate

We were not sure what to expect from our trip to Ypres but we were surprised by the spiders.

 And the cats...

And we found the ceremony very moving. They meet every night to remember. The gate has thousands of names carved on the walls. Everywhere we went we saw thousands of names. All unique.

 

Private W F C Athur - Royal Irish Fusiliers

SPending some time visiting some of the battlefields of the Somme and Vimy ridge, we moved on to find a special gravestone.

We then managed to track down the farm where he was killed, which looked so much like any farm in Scotland. 

One name - amongst the thousands that we read on the other memorials.  

Tin tin was a belgian from Belgium

October holidays - yippee!

After last year's satnav failure we took the same route to Hull, and hopped on the usual ferry.  Not the last car to board this time. Not rushing all the way from the border to the boat.

Instead we travelled like adults, sharing the driving, stopping to buy a gourmet picnic (Tesco - Carlisle), and heading to a town to the west of Brussels... 

Off to Herge town, to hunt down the front-door of the Tintin museum.  Road works not withstanding, and a distinct similarity to cumbernauld, meant the we parked some way away and walked the last bit.

We we treated to many many (many) facts about Herge and his creation, and it was facinating.

Here is Thompson and Thomson in the 2cv.  I think we have this model at home.

We had a great time.

O Canada

The world is getting smaller. No 2 child is off on her studies across the world.

We have a dual time zone in the conservatory, and world time apps on the phones to help keep track of when she might be awake and on the move.

Then we just have to worry about the walking, climbing, hockey, snow-shoeing, travelling, sight-seeing, etc etc.

Back in time - yorkshire style

 Looking a little like something from an episode of Dr Who, we found ourselved in a 1940's weekend once we had finished at the crime writers convention.

We had been on the hunt for a wee craft shop, so this was much better.

Keep dancing!

Leyburn had come alive with about half of the public dressed in 1940's style, with cars, lorries, and stalls all keeping to the theme.

And then back to the caravan to try to set fire to the garlic bread...

Room for a few Moore at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park

Love these guys.

 And these guys! 

But only one of this pair...

Cabbage white or something else?

Tourism in Yorkshire seems to be a bit over-rated sometimes.  We failed to find the sunday market in one town (because it wasn't on - not because we couldn't find it) and this daytrip was to find a medieval village. 

Hmmm!

The village was a few wooden planks laid out in a grassy field in the shape of the outside of some buildings. Nothing higher than 10 cm

But on the way there we had been accosted by a rambler asking if we had seen a butterfly....

 No - but we saw some cows!

 

Rocking the day away - yorkshire style

After our time in Hull, and the billion free museums, our next stop was to more familiar territory - York.

Home of a great University, and one-time out-of-town furniture superstore.

We were pitching up in York for a week, at an "Adults only" caravan site. This is not what you might think it is. It just means that there are no children and noise.  No bikes, and flooded toilets. 

Not caravan club, so not pages of rules and regulations.  We were shown to our pitch. "I hope you can reverse" she said.

"Born to reverse" - that's me!

So from our new base we could go into York, or see the rest of the world.

 We saw the rest of the world!

We started with a trip to the forest to see some stones.  

Bonus of the day was getting free parking!  England is expensive.

So we went back on a second trip the following day - it was too warm for York.

The Anvil

 This one was national trust, so we had another cheap day out.  The stones are very dramatic.  We were on the edge of Wensleydale - but saw no sign of Gromit.