Birthdays and snow

It was my Dad's 60th birthday a few days after Christmas, and my family managed to meet up at my sister's to celebrate.  It is very unusual for us all to gather in one place these days, so it was nice for the cousins to have the opportunity to play together.
My sister and her husband put on a lovely spread for my Dad, which included a massive 60 profiterole cake.  My Dad does so much for his family, so I hope he enjoyed having us all there!

 Happy 60th Dad!  Thank you for always 

being there for us

Unfortunately, I didn't take many photos since I'm still paranoid about actually using my camera, but I did take a couple of photos from our visit.

My youngest nephew, Alex, is 7 months old already and he is such a good baby!  You can see him absorbing (and gumming!) everything around him. 

Baby Alex - how sweet is this face!

It was lovely watching the cousins play, and Lily was so good with Rowan, and held his hand when we went for a walk through the snow.  Rowan was a little unsure about the snow at first, but enjoyed stomping through it by the end - he started copying Lily and tried throwing some snowballs. Rowan was quite taken with Lily, and gave her a goodbye cuddle when we were leaving.

A snowy walk with cousin Lily

 Stomp! Stomp!

 

Rowan also enjoyed rough-housing with Tom.  I'm not sure how much Tom enjoyed that, but he took it all in good nature.

I'm hoping that we see our family more in 2015.  It isn't until you see how much the children have changed between visits that you realise how much time has passed.  I am lucky to have a brilliant, loving family, and it would be good to catch up more.

My sister

My Mum

Snow day!

Being the sheltered pleb that I am, I don't watch the news (local or national) so I was quite surprised to wake up and find a couple of inches of snow outside (I'd have been more surprised had it been inside).  Having lived in Aberdeen for 6 years, the snow wasn't exactly an impressive fall, but for England it was a decent smattering worthy of a blog post.  I was particularly excited since it was Rowan's first snow day, not that he'll remember it.  Gareth and I wrapped him up in copious amounts of blankets and a wooly hat knitted by my Mum, and took him into the garden for a quick photo shoot.

 Gareth was worried that Rowan would

be in the cold too long, hence the

worried expression.

A brief pose before heading back indoors.

 I enjoyed the snow today as I didn't have to go out in it.  I have Reynauld's disease, so whilst I appreciate the aesthetics of a nice snowfall, spending any amount of time outside in it inevitably ends in my fingers and toes becoming very painful.  However, as Gareth didn't have to go in for his morning shift, I did brave the weather and take the dogs out for a brief run whilst he looked after Rowan - we decided he was probably a little too young to take out in the snow, so I enjoyed a quiet walk with the dogs alone.

Willow enjoying baby-free time.

The problem with having a mostly white dog in snow.

Rowan does have the kit for snow, and we do take him out in cold weather, but we decided today was a tad too cold. 

Rowan's snowsuit.  He'll grow into it.