Park, Park, Park & Park

While in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, we went to a favourite beach- Little Presque Isle.  The weather was fantastic- the water is usually too cold to even get in, but we swam for hours this time. Just off the shore is an island you can wade out to in waist deep water.  On the back side, we found all the young, cool kids hanging out and jumping off the cliffs into the water. C mustered up the courage, and we jumped together.  It's about 30 feet down to the water!

I'm just back from our US holiday- Bella and the kids are there for another week. Here's a sample of just some of the family and friends we saw... Grandma, C, me, Grand-Dad, D in Hinsdale, Illinois Bella, D, C Barbara and Jack Ryan at their cottage in Michigan Too numerous- The Isotalo side in Northern Michigan C, D and Great Grandma Isotalo in Northlake, Michigan Cary, Ubu (C's Godfather), me, Bella in Downers Grove, Illinois

We're now in the US and staying at a (very generous) friends cottage in Michigan. An aspect of the US is the large portions of food. Even for what the English would call the pudding course. Couple that with the car aspect and we found ourselves at essentially a drive-in ice cream parlour. Oinks in New Buffalo must be famous in the region. It has all kinds of memorabilia covering the inside of the shop. And so many flavours that its tough to choose. C is devouring Superman flavour (?) in a chocolate dipped cone! In the foreground is my scoop in a cookie bowl!

C spent an enjoyable week at cricket camp the last few days. Today he was awarded for Best Fielder. Tomorrow morning its off to the land of baseball though!

Bella has a close friend from her time at Wycombe Abbey- Sari.  Here we are meeting in Wales .  Since both of our sets of kids are now out of school for the summer, we took ourselves off to Sari's parents place- Blacklands Farm in Bedfordshire- for this past weekend and all met up. It's an idyllic rural setting- plenty of grounds for the kids to make mischief in, a muddy pond where they dive in nude, relaxing walks for everyone, and food straight from he garden.  We even did some camping in the garden.  It is really the polar opposite of London. Here are the kids under an apple tree: D, Jack and C  And here we all are just before leaving:

Hearing a great deal of giggling and carrying on after bedtime, I went upstairs to the kids room and read the kids the riot act last night. Maybe due to my stern voice things then calmed down. When Bells and I came up to bed an hour later though, we found this site: both of them sound asleep in our bed.