Wined, dined and definitely cosseted

We've finally returned to base camp after a wonderful visiting tour with our delightful family, oh how lovely it is to have lots of children and grandchildren to share the festivities with.

As you may remember we landed in Bristol on a disappointingly rainy day, which managed to get worse on the second day. We arrived at our friend Carrol's house like 2 drowned rats on her doorstop and the walk was only 10 minutes from the caravan site.

Still we had a wonderful visit with warming winter soup, wine of course, and chocolate cheesecake for pudding :-) we had lots to catch up on and before we knew it, it was nearly dark again and time to brave the return journey. By this time the rain had turned to horizontal hail stones and we were twice as wet as the morning walk......my boots were even slushy inside.....yuk! No sightseeing this trip.

The wind was gusting, this being the night if the big storms and our poor little van was doing her best to stay upright, but we made it through to the morning. The iron gate had been ripped of its hinges so my gallant DH had to help remove it before we could get out and on our way to Cardiff.

Thank goodness we arrived in sunshine  and were able to go for a lovely walk. Our little grandson was on great form the whole visit, especially on Christmas day.

is it a tree or a cocktail??

it's OK dad I don't need to share your laptop any more ....

And then it was dad's turn to remember what it was like to be a baby taking his very first steps.....

After all that activity it was time to take a break in the park.

look mum no hands!

told you this'd be fun dad.... 

think you should let me have the hat though.......

Think it must be time for dinner now, all that walking has made us all hungry.

And what a lovely spread it was too, we were wined and dined to perfection, thank you so much for a lovely Christmas day.

Of course someone had to sleep off all the food didn't they......

And the crowning glory was a very special gift for our lovely summerhouse.

Don't you just love the hand worked cross stitch tablecloth, a gift from our daughter Nikki.

All too soon it was time to head back to the wilds of the South East and leave Wales behind.

......a nice day for the bridge crossing for a change....

We made very good time to our family group get together at our daughter Hannah's house, sadly we were all so pleased to see each other and had so much to talk about that all thoughts of photos went out of the window.

All except for the ritual breaking up of the gingerbread house....

After which presents were exchanged and what thoughtful ones they were too.

magic..... for someone with poor circulation, thank you Hannah and family

And this gorgeous scarf from Nikki and family, thank you..

It was so lovely to all get together for just a few hours, thanks to Hannah for hosting again this year.

And so onto Nikki and her family for our last Christmas dinner, yesterday. We had a beautiful roast lamb with all the trimmings, expertly carved by husband Adam.....

hurry up dad we're really hungry....

oh well might as well pull a cracker while we're waiting!

After all that eating us girls went for a lovely walk to the local antique barn, it's enormous and we had such a great look round, getting lots of ideas. 

And as if you could top that Nikki's husband Adam cooked us a five star full English breakfast this morning, thank you all for making this such a special stay.

We'd like to say a great big thank you to all of you for making our Christmas such a wonderful one this year.