Tagged: family

September 10, 2018

Greece 2018

What better way to embrace the autumn than with memories from the summer..the following are a few of the best from our soujourn in Greece where if there’s a theme running through it’s crystal water and the beauty of clouds. And the fact that for a whole month my kids only wore one swimming costume…

Laters, Kate x

August 14, 2017

Greece 2017

Laters, Kate x

June 5, 2017

Camping x

It’s been half term already and we’ve been camping with friends.

Living the simple life in a field, blowing giant bubbles.

Can you tell we enjoyed it??

We weren’t far from the coast.

And next to the site was a high ropes playground..

Including a terrifying giant swing!

Truly the stuff of nightmares!

As was our departure. Not a sight you want to see…..we lost the car keys in the long grass on the first day. But it was OK as we kindly got driven back to London to fetch the spare set. Except we got hit by a super-storm…Damp got in (She’s 19 years old) and short circuited the electrics so the spare key wouldn’t work…and the manual key? Was part of master key that got lost! At least once we got in we were able to drive away, which was more than the car behind us – they’d lost all their keys, including their house keys and had to be towed away from the campsite!

Laters, Kate x

January 5, 2016

Best of 2015..

Laters, Kate x

August 3, 2015

Greece Part 1

We’re back! And straight into the thick of it..amongst the detritus of unpacking, I have the movers arriving tomorrow to clear out our cellar, kitchen and sitting room ready for the builders to move in, hashtag chaos. The perfect time to reminisce over quieter times..these are from our first week in beautiful Greece on the stunning island of Spetses.

Looking back from the end of the pier..you can just make out the terracotta roof of my parent’s house.

The house with the arches at Charlie’s elbow belongs to my sister’s inlaws and is where the kids go swimming in their pool.

My mother, enjoying some sun..a clearer picture of the arched house, the next door house belongs to a lovely lady who will be ninety this year…she was evacuated in the War with my Grandmother.

Charlie in heaven.

And he’s lost his first tooth!

Beware..Tiger Shark..

Looking down on the beach.

swimming till the sun goes down..

And when it does, the new moon appears..along with Venus and Jupiter.

Laters, Kate x

June 2, 2015

7 Questions..

Favourite Colour: Blue..denim, navy, the sea, the sky..it rocks.

Best trait: I value the simple things in life..but truthfully, what I hold truly dear doesn’t a lot, but is ultimately priceless.

Worst trait: I like to think I’m tidy, but I fear I’m not – things just get discarded like the feathers from a plucked chicken so there’s a perpetual circle of chaos around me. I’m also surprisingly crap with technology – I’m not an obsessive checker and regularly lose my phone. I see the internet as something wonderful but inherently dangerous and I suspect losing my phone is a Freudian way of trying to keep a distance from it’s pull.

Oldest item in wardrobe: Hard to say – there’s a fair amount of vintage with unknown heritage, but I do have a cream cape that used to belong to my Grandmother. It’s a treasure.

Newest item: Vintage silk dress bought on Ebay and dyed black, otherwise it’s my Miss Hellfire stripey shoes..certainly different and surprisingly comfortable..

Favourite piece of music: Schubert Lieder sung by Ian Bostridge which shouldn’t work because he’s a light, English tenor, but does..maybe because it’s such intelligent singing.

The last time I laughed: Charlie was asking me about the world’s tallest animal. I said ‘Giraffe’..he looked at me in surprise, and said ‘But what about the Decondra lizard Mummy? It’s at least 2 metres taller, lives in South African and has the ability to make anything you need – if you’re in the Arctic and you need a coat, the Decondra will just make one for you..it can also make plastic..and toys..basically it’s the best pet ever to have..just a big shame it’s so tall’..deep sigh…..

Laters, Kate x

May 26, 2015

In England’s green and pleasant land..

We spent the Bank Holiday weekend with family in the light, clean air of the country, marvelling at the fresh greens and bright colours of early summer, whiling away happy hours reading papers that got read, drinking wine and watching dogs happily snoring in the sun.

Their’s is a garden that represents all that is good about England; It’s a place were time stands still yet life buzzes around.

It’s a joy just to walk around and breathe in.

And the children love the freedom of space..

(Taken just for Lauren..)

They have the most amazing tree..

Like something straight out of Doctor Seuss and The Lorax..

I loved it..made me giggle and sigh.

There was much playing of football with cousins and dogs till the sun went down. Gentle, simple..heavenly.

Laters, Kate x

June 3, 2014

Early Summer Flowers x

One of the hardest things I’ve found as a parent is the relentlessness of it – it’s 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. With young children even on a ‘holiday’, unless you have the luxury of child care, there’s no time off – the scenery may change but the demands don’t..in fact they’re exacerbated if you’re by water and they can’t swim..or applying sun tan lotion to a moving target..or cursing the lack of toys as the rain comes down..or wondering where the nearest pharmacy/doctor is..or suffering a hangover with a child bouncing on your head at five in the morning..no matter how beautiful the place there’s still meals to sort, cleaning to do, shoes to find..teeth to brush.

But now that Charlie is five, we seem to be turning that parenting-at-the-rock-face corner. And this holiday sort of proved it.

We wanted to know if we could find a back to basics, out on your bikes type of nostalgic freedom where we could let the kids roam free without a care in the world.

We based ourselves in a little holiday park where cars were banned, where there was an indoor swimming pool (although they still had to be accompanied to swim) a tennis court and a small playground and told them they could come and go as they wanted, even (this was the big one) out of sight…they wandered, made friends, played football, played tennis….and we sat outside in peace and quiet and read!! Unheard of…I finished a whole book!

The truth is modern day parenting has made the world smaller, more tense, less happy till it’s almost no better than pretending to sleep. Really..we don’t need the blister. Which doesn’t mean it’s easy to let go – we’ve all read or seen the horror stories. I just believe we need to do it and we need to do it more – freedom, boredom, security, love and benign neglect is a potent combination.