Park, Park, Park & Park

Here's her entire group from the Gardens, after their cap and gown walk and their dance show.

C brought this home from school last week.  Its a list of good and bad foods, all spelled phonetically.

For those without 4 year old girls in their house, it's Hello Kitty. Made by dad.

We opened gifts this morning, first thing.  She's now graduated to a big girl, full size, pink princess duvet set. More pictures- from her Nursery Graduation yesterday, her official birthday today, and her upcoming party- later this weekend. For the time being, here we are on a train in Germany back in April. Somewhere between Munster and Dusseldorf, and love and adoration.

Lovely Aunt Nettie has now supplied us with some better pictures of the Family Reunion . Here's a good one of the Wigan/Parks. Bella, D, Tilly, C, Adrian, Me, Corrina

A slightly cloudy day, but still a good opportunity for a BBQ and picnic at our local church. Here are our two plus Gwynnie (fresh back from a holiday in America!).

Last weekend, some of Bella's relatives- Jackie and Casper Jaarsma- were in London for a wedding.  They're Dutch, but live in Southern France now.  We took the opportunity to gather some of the family together for a bit of a reunion.  We ended up with 14 people crammed around a table made for 6! I won't get into the full tree here- That's on Geni. Here are the pictures though- Jackie Jaarsma and her son Casper. Corinna (Adrian's girlfriend), a monkey and Tilly Nettie VanMaurik and a monkey Louisa (VanMaurik) Davies and ??

Trying it out at St Georges Park with the support of her big brother.

The last 24 hours of the Queens Jubilee proved as remarkable as the first 72. Monday evening, we let the kids stay up past their bedtime to watch part of the concert on TV.  C’s line during the singing- “I hope the Queen is alive when I am a grown-up.” Why? “Because I will write a great song.  That’s what I do when I build Lego.”  Which is true- he likes to sing while building. The Guards at Buckingham Palace. Tuesday, we all got dressed up in our best and went to The Royal Automobile Club on Pall Mall for the festivities.  It was a special treat- usually kids under 13 aren’t allowed inside.  They made a special exception for the Jubilee Weekend, so we watched the carriage procession down The Mall on a Big Screen TV!  Actually the RAC is only 100 meters off The Mall, but the crowds and weather wouldn’t have been much fun. And since the RAC is so close to The Mall, the flyover went right over our heads out in the garden. Spectacular! Being within the crowd in the Club Ro

In the UK, we are in the midst of a 4 day long Bank Holiday in honour of the Queens' 60th year in reign.  The whole country, and all of the Commonwealth countries, are full of parties to celebrate. Odd are that the kids won't ever have this opportunity again, so we've taken full advantage. It started with the adults warming up on Friday evening.  Bella and I had what is referred to as the Queens favourite cocktail: A Zaza .  It's a few parts gin, a few more parts Dubonet (like a sweet vermouth), some ice and a bit of lemon peel. C had a high fever for Saturday, but threw it off by the evening, ready for festivities. Sunday was the big day.  We had a potluck street party for lunch.  Then off to see the Queens Flotilla on the Thames ( BBC Video ).   Our view was fantastic. That's the Queens Barge in red. On the way back to Pirbright, we got water logged in a proper London rain.  That didn't slow any of us down. We pitched right up to Julian and Anna&#

I just joined Bella and D for C's end of term school assembly.  His class did adaptions of fairy tales. C is in the middle, red shirt, with paper pig ears. Everyone had a speaking part and they all did well. Ah, the age before embarassment holds us all back.