Christmas dinner this last year was again at daughter Sara’s, with son John and family joining in the fun.  Sara put on her usual lavish and most welcome spread after a long and enjoyable morning watching each other, and especially the grandkids, opening prezzies.

Pics below show Christmas dinner in progress, and myself, Madge, Grandson Sam, and Grandkids Tom and Amy opening their prezzies. Happy family times !

 I’m no keen fan of today’s politically correct, over-permissive society, but a glance at these notices taken from a nineteenth century London workhouse shows just how strict and unforgiving society was in those days to the poor and disadvantaged:-

 And how about tucking in to this menu from Nelly’s Cafe in 19th century Liverpool :-

  Had a lovely day out on the East Coast at son John’s house on the occasion of his 42nd. birthday. Daughter Sara and family went along with us, and John’s in-laws, who live nearby, came too.

The weather stayed fine, and we all had great fun being entertained by the Grandkids on the back lawn, playing Tigs, playing on the climbing frame and doing various party tricks, after which we enjoyed a delicious al fresco meal cooked up by John’s wife Amanda.

Pic below shows John’s younger daughter Amy posing on the lawn; videos show Amy and the rest playing Tigs, and Sara’s eldest son Sam doing three of his party tricks without his pants falling down. A good time was had by all !

As school holidays arrived once again this August, Madge and I found ourselves host to five of our seven grandkids for a fortnight, when Jake and twins Dan and Lauren came up from the South Coast to join Sam and Tom and cousins Lucas and Jackson. 

We managed to rotate the sleeping arrangements with Daughter Sara so that everyone had regular changes of scene, and managed to cope nicely with regular visits to local parks, fun around the tree house in the garden, barbecues and trips to outdoor pools and seaside beaches on warm, sunny days.

Hard work for Madge, with bathing and bedding arrangements and mass catering with home-made cottage pies and hotbox stews to complement the inevitable kids’ favourites of chicken nuggets, beefburgers, sausages and chips. My speciality was breakfasts, with pancakes, fry-ups and waffles on offer.

Pics below show kids enjoying chasing around the garden at one of Sara’s barbecues, Lauren busy in Sam’s garden workshop making prezzies for her friends back home, Amy, Katie, Tom and Jackson feeding the ducks in the local park, Dan sliding down from the Treehouse in our garden, and Lolly and Katie on the beach on our day trip to the East Coast as guests of son John and wife Amanda.

Life is all about contrasts, and it’s nice now to just chill out and  cater for ourselves in true Wrinkly fashion. In fact it’s essential !

Just got back from an extra-curricular vacation at a caravan site in L’Estartit on the Costa Brava. (We do not normally go abroad on holiday during the English summer ). This was courtesy of  close relations who kindly invited us to join them for a fortnight,  using one of their two caravans which they keep down there for the use of themselves and close family.

We were made to feel at home and very welcome, with everything set out for us ready to use and enjoy for the fortnight.

Over twenty years ago, we  towed our caravan down to that same site quite a few times, so it was interesting to see how the area had changed over the years. Although much had changed, the whole area is still very pretty, and we had a really good time under the Catalanian sun.

Two pics below show our gang on the site, and a view of the camp outdoor pool

The two videos below show the caravan in place on the site, and the beach area which is only a short walk from the site through the old town of  L’Estartit.

The beach is a perfect sandy beach with a crystal clear sea which remains a safe depth for children (and wrinklies) up to over twenty yards from the shore.

Son John and family booked in May to our regular hotel, the Hyatt Regency at Taba Heights on the Red Sea, and so although we were there by ourselves in March, I thought, “You only live once !” so off we went with them for another fortnight in the sun.

The sun was a lot hotter than back in March, but there was a nice breeze most of the time which helped to make it tolerable, and of course we spent more time in the pools and enjoyed lots of reading under the sunshades.

Pics below show the beach view from our apartment balcony, the interior of the apartment and a view of its beautiful domed ceiling, Madge and I in our favourite occupation, and the family on board the coral reef submarine. Now we have just three weeks before we join other members of the family in Spain for another fortnight in the sun at the end of June. It’s a hard life if you don’t weaken !

Spent the last half of the week down at the South Coast at son Paul’s house. During our stay, Paul’s eldest son Jake had his thirteenth birthday.

His treat was to have an hour’s exclusive use, along with ten of his mates from school, of the Buckmore Park Karting track near Chatham in Kent. This is a state-of-the-art track that was opened by a group of top Grand Prix drivers.  Lewis Hamilton cut his driving teeth on this same track; there is a video on YouTube showing him coming from fourth place right at the end of a Kart race to win the race at the age of  11.

The package included a talk on tactics, a practice lap before racing, a certificate recording lap times, a hat and bag, a meal after the race and a “Champagne” dousing on the podium at the end..

It drizzled throughout the afternoon, but this added to the drama with some spectacular spins before the gang learned to steer into their slides on the bends.

Pics below show the gang before kitting up for the racing, the layout of the course and the pitstop area, and a quick video of Jake taking the grandstand bend.

We had an easy weekend this week, as Grandsons Sam and Tom only came for the day on Saturday, because their cousins Lucas and Jackson who normally stay over with them at ours on Saturday nights were busy rehearsing for the Panto they were appearing in at the local library theatre. This meant no stopover, and a  Sunday morning lie-in and no Sunday breakfast pancake-making for yours truly.

Helped Grandson Sam,  who is now an accomplished drummer, and fellow group member Elliott, to build himself a percussion machine from recycled stuff such as bean tins, old buckets and strips of pine this weekend.

He needed this for his Performing Arts course at school. We had great fun working out how to make a framework which would be sturdy enough but could also be folded up for easy transport.

Pic below shows the result of our labours, which worked out very well, especially with the addition of  Sam’s considerable drumming skills :-

Had our usual Winter break to overcome the post-Christmas blues at Warner’s Adults-only, this time Bodelwyddan Castle in North Wales.

Nice to chill out, on our own, and be waited on for a change. Bodelwyddan is a Victorian folly which houses part of the Museum of Wales: www.bodelwyddan-castle.co.uk/

The spectacular neighbouring Marble Church, thrown up by a Victorian building contractor in four years at a cost of sixty thousand pounds by the wife of the owner of the Castle in memory of her husband:  www.themarblechurch.org.uk/

The churchyard contains the graves of many Canadian soldiers who died in the 1919 ‘flu pandemic which killed more people worldwide than the first world war. It now costs more annually in modern pounds sterling to maintain the church than it did to build it !

Pics below show a view of the door to the castle, myself next to the indoor pool, wife Madge waiting to slaughter me at table tennis, and a view of the games room. There are also outdoor and indoor bowling greens in the castle grounds.

Ah well. back to hosting two grandkids and their two cousins chez Ramsden over the weekend. It’s the contrasts in life that make it so interesting !

Our regular October trip to the Red Sea ran into serious trouble this year; at one point we were beginning to doubt that we would make it, due to the collapse of XL Airways. There simply were no flights to our destination on any airline right up to the week we were due to go. At the last minute, flights became available one week later than we had planned, which was O.K……. Phewww!!!!

As this was our tenth visit to the same venue, we expected the usual warm welcome, but this time we were upgraded to a beachfront bungalow with our own loungers, towels and even tea and coffee making facilities in the apartment, and we were invited to both weekly Manager’s cocktail parties. At the first party, we chatted to a very smart, friendly Egyptian chap and mentioned a favourite dish of ours which was not available in the dining room.

The next day, our waiter informed us that it would be available to us for the duration of the holiday, courtesy of the finance director – our companion the previous evening. Can’t beat a bit of good networking, obviously !

The climate, as always, was beautifully warm and fresh, and we had a lovely relaxing time. Pics below show the view from our balcony along the beach, the inside of the apartment, the view from the window across the saltwater pool to the beach bar, and a view of the front of our beach bungalow apartment.