Easter holidays in Wales 2012

We spent Easter with Andrew's parents, which is always a lovely treat. Eggs were hunted in the garden, chocolate was consumed, a birthday party tea was held in Sophie's honour and many expeditions set out hunting for dragons in caves.

The second part of our Easter holidays was spent staying in a converted chapel in North Wales, near Bangor and Angelsea. Friends stayed with us and the kids all had a ball together. Sophie also got to spent more time with her Godmother Rachel.


One day we caught a steam train from Beddgelert to Porthmadog. It was fun having lunch on the train together.


Then we had a really lovely walk back to Beddgelert along side a river - the kids lead the way!



Some video footage of Sophie laughing and running.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=L2UzrqUh31c

PS For my non-Welsh family, see this link for the legend of Gelert (which every time I hear or read, I end up crying).
http://www.beddgelerttourism.com/gelert/

PPS Beddgelert is pronounced Beth-gelert. Love the Welsh alphabet!

Sophie "reading" a book

Watch out!

Occasionally we worry that Sophie is too gender stereotyped when she spends hours and hours putting her dolls (she calls them babies) to sleep, cuddling them, feeding them, patting their backs etc. But we are reassured that she also likes other pursuits when she goes to the dress up drawer, insists on this outfit (note also sword, belt and shield) and has a sword fight with William.

The four Marshalls: January 2012

Penarth Aug 2011

At the end of our August holiday, we spent a couple of days staying at Aunty Jenny's house in Penarth, just outside Cardiff. It is a great apartment, with the added bonuses of being near the beach, having Milly the cat to meet and get to know, and Nana and Grandad stayed too, so we got to see lots of them. We spent a lovely afternoon at Barry Island beach, playing on the rocks and making sandcastles with Nana.




So, an update on the kids as of August 2011:
William played about 15 games of Ludo this week and 25 games of Snakes and Ladders. Despite the fact that these are either totally or mostly games of chance, he seems to win about 85% of the games he plays. Shall we take him to Vegas....? Although these are his first board games involving a dice, he now recognises the numbers on the dice instantly, not needing to count the spots. He has been giving Sophie a good morning hug and kiss each day and it is super sweet to see!

Sophie is learning the meaning of new words and can point to her ear, nose and throat when asked to. She points at lots of things/people that we then have to name for her. She is also becoming more vocal, and can say 'No' and 'more' (very useful words for a toddler). Sophie now understands a lot of the things we say to her and we are beginning to get a feeling that she is a very determined little character. Two upper canines came through this holiday. One thing she likes is doing buffas (aka raspberries) on Mummy's tummy, but William is still the family buffa master!

St David's in August

Five days in St. Davids, Pembrokeshire, Wales, to play on the beaches, walk the cliff paths and see a lot of Nana and Grandad. My highlights were that I actually read a newspaper, and went to bed early most nights. I also especially enjoyed finding a place called Druidstone (Thanks to Stephen who introduced it to us), that had great, simple, home-cooked, hearty food (just right after a windy clifftop walk), lots of art for sale on the walls and a very relaxed atmosphere. I reckon it'd be a great location for my 40th birthday celebrations. I just wonder who might want to travel that far to celebrate with me?






We took a boat ride with Aunty Jenny around Ramsey Island, where we saw seal pups. It was all very enjoyable, except for the fact that Sophie screamed almost the whole time.....until she final fell asleep and the boat had some peace.

The Just So festival

In August we spent a weekend at the Just So festival. It is a family camping festival that was full of so many fun things for us to all do together. As a treat, we stayed in a canvas bell tent, which had air mattress and loads of room inside. It was erected and waiting for us on our arrival - now that is easy camping! Easy for me to get used to, for sure.



We did a pirate workshop, spent a lot of time playing in the giant sand pit, made Green Men out of clay (Andrew's are shown below, but William made one that he said was a representation of Sophie), built dens, made claves and a woodland badge (William used a band saw and power drill with help and supervision), made leafy crowns, had a wild rumpus, listened to story telling and a performance of Peter and the Wolf, played with hoola hoops, balloons, bubbles, ate pizza and even relaxed! It was all super fun and we plan to go back and do it again next year.



My personal highlights were special because they were completely unexpected - not that we really new what to expect at this festival. The first was one evening at a cabaret performance (the kids were really engrossed in the acts) when we watched a dance off between the Gruffalo and Elmo (the patchwork elephant). Imagine 7 ft tall characters from books trying to dance in their costume suits. The other was while we were listening to story telling and the author bounced out a 4 ft diameter bogie that we bounced above our heads, around the audience. I wasn't expecting that to happen.....