Yes, we are finally home again, although not until we enjoyed almost a full day on the beach yesterday.

we set out at around 11am and were installed on the beach with Costa coffee and picnic by about 12:40. We did not leave that beach until well after 4:30pm so were claiming that as a whole day on the beach – let’s face it, it is as close as we are going to ever get to having a full day on the beach anytime soon :-).

anyway, it was a lovely day with the temperature breaking into the low 20’s and the kids just had a ball. When we arrived there was no sea at all in sight – to the point that the boys enquired as to why there was no sea – don’t think they have ever been to the beach and not seen the sea before :-). Once we explained the tide and that the water was over by America for a little while, they set to building sandcastles, playing with their cars and digging a large hole to play in.

The tide did come in and high tide was around 4pm, although obviously it could be seen for about 2 hours before this as it made its way in. Typically, the sand out beyond the beach area was more like mud, and Olly just loved slipping in it and hence got sticky muddy – so we were going to have to wait for the tide to come in to clean him up either way :-). Mummy decided that she would walk down with them and do the 100yards or so of buddy beach to get to the water as the tide came in – it certainly looked hard going from the comfort of the beach towel 🙂 for the three of them but they made it and danced in the water, slowly coming further up the beach as the tide came in.

As we left the beach it became obvious that the lack of sunscreen may have just burned Olly a tad on his face and neck. What wasn’t so clear at the time was that daddy had burned his neck, his shoulder and his stomach on his left hand side rather badly – he is now a glowing red beacon that has been used to show the boys how angry the sun can be and what it can do to our skin if we don’t protect ourselves properly 🙁

We ended our day by heading out for dinner on the way home – we actually fancied a Chinese meal so set out for the magic wok in Windermere, to find that while it should have been open, they were slow in getting ready and the restaurant was just not ready. So we meandered North and ended up in Waterhead, where west in the gardens of the Waterhead Hotel and enjoyed a fantastic meal. we would definitely go back there again for a meal if we were in need of feeding etc.

Separately, the night before we ended up at the Sun Hotel in Troutbeck Bridge -we enjoyed a fabulous meal there also.

So, the holiday is over and we are home – already looking forward to the next time we can escape normality and head up to the lakes for a short break – the kids seemed to have a wonderful time and I suspect would chomp our hands off if offered a weekend at Grandma’s lodge again anytime soon 🙂

And it was a bit wet and a LOT muddy – clearly a lot of rain water has fallen at the farm over the past few weeks. It was nice to go back there but a little disappointing to see that they had not really made any additions / updates to their existing infrastructure of three years ago 🙁

The kids were blissfully unaware of this and thoroughly enjoyed themselves. They really liked feeding the goats / sheep, although one of the cheeky older goats managed to grab hold of the bag that Elliot had his food in – stole it and it tore – so he ate the bag :-). Elliot was not best pleased with the goat so decided that he was only going to feed those that were not so cheeky 🙂

The indoors section had them both enjoying themselves thoroughly where Elliot found a friend called Matthew who he played with for the better part of an hour and Olly disappeared to a section upstairs entertaining the folks up there with cat mewing and the like. We did think we had lost him for a few short moments until mummy heard the mewing coming from the room. 🙂

We had a LOT of rain overnight last night, although we did not get the hailstorm like the one back in Ossett !!!

While it has rained today. it has mainly been OK, so we nipped out to Kendal and have bought the boys new school shoes – Elly is now a 13G and Olly an 8G (if you understand kids shoe sizes).

We went into the big play centre on the Glebe in Bowness (where they used to (well, still do it seems) sell lots of Bayliner boats) for a couple of hours and then back to the lodge for a couple of hours outside.  The boys are LOVING playing outside of the lodge – they simply do not want to come in to go to bed however.  Oh, AND they are eating like horses right now as well – seems like the Windermere hunger is kicking them like it kicks us adults 🙂

Hoping to get to Ducky’s Park Farm tomorrow – let’s just hope we can get up and ut early enough…