St Ives

When I woke up this morning there was a very definite autumnal nip in the air.  Even though it looks like we are forecast some warmer weather still to come it feels like the end of summer today.

Backing up the photos on my phone I found all those I took on our holiday to St Ives, Cornwall at the beginning of August.  It was the first time visiting for the children - the all day drive down has put us off since they came along- and they had a fantastic week.  The weather was a little mixed but we mostly had glorious sunshine and made the most of the beautiful beach.

It is such a pretty little town, although packed with visitors in the high season, and I quite enjoyed walking up and down the streets with the pushchair trying to get Nell to sleep!

Nell had her very first splash in the sea and was very enthusiastic, we had to hold her back from walking right in.

Bea was not so keen on the paddling but had days of sandy fun building sand castles and dams.

St Ives also has some lovely little shops.  I can't remember the name of the shop in which I took these photos but they had lots of pretty things.

Goodbye summer, until next year!

Escape to the Cotswolds

We have just returned from a very relaxing week in the Cotswolds. I haven't been there since I was very small so I had no memory of how lovely the area is.

We stayed near the Cotswolds Water Park and were lucky enough with the weather to be able to enjoy an afternoon on the lakeside beach.

Bea was thrilled to be allowed an ice cream all to herself.

We spent a day at the Cotswolds wildlife park - absolutely the best zoo I've ever been to.

Although this sign made us a little wary of going near the lions!

I wish I'd got some better pictures of Bourton on the Water, it is a very, very pretty village.

And it has a model village (I seriously love model villages) which Bea enjoyed, although it was a shame it doesn't have any little figures, only the buildings and a couple of cars.

A lovely British holiday was had by all!

At the seaside

We were in Bridlington, East Yorkshire for a family do just before easter so decided to stay up there for a week. The weather was lovely so we made the most of the good old British seaside!

There were childhood memories of Bridlington as I lived not far away from the town for several years. And it hasn't changed a bit!

You can just make out the bright beach huts of Scarborough behind Bea engrossed in her favourite holiday activity - digging.

A rescued baby seal at the sealife centre, Scarborough.

The castle on the cliffs at Scarborough.

And a sleepy spring lamb at a petting farm.

Devon

Here are a few photos from a recent long weekend in Devon. They were taken in Dartmouth looking over the water to Kingswear, which looks like Balamory! It was a very cold, misty day so Bea was dressed like an eskimo.

Sorry, did I forget to say I was going on holiday?

I do apologise. We went off for a little break to Spain with my sister and her family. We stayed in a little place close to Portugal and Seville and although I promise we did see some interesting things, and Seville is very picturesque, when looking through all the photos we took I have found that they are all of Bea. There are no landscape views or culture rich snaps. we appear to have spent the entire week taking pictures of our baby!

Oh well, I'll share a few examples of our holiday baby worship with you and you'll have to try and pick out any exciting scenery in the background, or just imagine the colourful sights and sounds of the old city of Seville. Sorry about that.

Bea sunbathing with Mama

Looking quite excited to be on the beach for the first time

We did try to make her wear these sunglasses to no avail

Its hard work being a baby

North Norfolk

We took the bump on her first holiday last week.  Obviously we couldn't fly anywhere this year so we took a trip to the North Norfolk coast with my sister and her family.

My 6 month old niece had her first picnic at the seaside and the inevitable first taste of sand.

We were pretty lucky with the weather but spent our last beach visit sitting under a beach hut at Wells Next The Sea during a hail storm!

Despite the odd shower a good British holiday had by all.  Except that I lost at Scattergories which I'm normally quite good at.  I blame the baby brain.