Lara had the pleasure of my company for much of the Bank Holiday weekend; on Saturday we went to watch some of the cricket at Littlewick Green, followed by a visit to Anton and Becca's; on Sunday we went shopping in Wycombe. Well, we went round the shops but we didn't buy much. It turned into a bit of a pub crawl really, as first Lara needed her lunch (so we went to our local), then later I needed my lunch (so we went to a pub in the town centre) then on the way home Lara needed her tea, so the only convenient place where we could sit was, you guessed it, back in our local!
While watching that Britain From Above programme on BBC, Olga and I decided we'd like to go and see Oxford, as it formed part of the programme we had recorded from the weekend before. It's silly that it's only a 30 minute drive and we've not been, so we went on Monday afternoon. Funnily enough, we stopped in a pub near the centre so Lara could have her lunch (we would have had ours too if they'd been serving anything more than toasties), then we tried a restaurant for our lunch but they were so busy it would have taken all afternoon to get our food, so we left after being seated. How very un-English!
After trying a couple of other pubs that were too busy or too small (those 17th century architects just didn't have even maclaren buggies in mind) we tried The King's Arms, and it was perfect. Enough room for us, and they even had a high chair; Lara should have been dozing but after being in her fifth pub in just over 24 hours, she was determined to enjoy it, so she happily entertained herself in the high chair, being coo-ed at by Russian tourists; it's fun to encourage Olga to earwig on conversations that other people think can't be understood. We learnt that this group's hotel was nice but they couldn't quite work out if they would be served at their table by a waitress or if they had to order from the bar.
After out lunch we wandered past more colleges, and had ice-cream in the grounds of Christ Church College, and Lara had her tea. I know! NOT in a pub. Although to be honest we had been aiming for the Head of the River pub a few hundred metres further down the road, but decided to sit in the park instead for a change.
There are a couple of photos from Oxford in the New Photos bit on the left of the blog.
Showing posts with label Bank Holiday. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bank Holiday. Show all posts
Wednesday, 27 August 2008
Tuesday, 25 March 2008
Easter without a sniff of chocolate
We managed to get through the Easter weekend without any Easter Eggs, in fact the only chocolate in the house that was eaten was a whole pack of choccy digestives.
Saturday was a bit of a lazy day, the poor weather meant we didn't want to do much outside, so I spent some time looking after Lara in the afternoon while Olga and Lucy did girly things. Looking after Lara meant letting her watch me play on my ancient Nintendo 64 games console in our bedroom, and listening to the football scores on the radio before we both had a mid-afternoon nap.
In the evening we watch The Fully Monty on video, as neither Olga nor Lucy had seen it, and they'll never listen to Donna Summer's Hot Stuff again without thinking of the men dancing in the dole queue.
On Sunday I decided that no matter what the weather was like, I had to get some work done in the garden, so I got up at 7.15, and walked Mishka in the snow. It snowed quite hard during the morning, but didn't stick for long, which was a shame, and by lunchtime it was all gone, but I had been able to move some things up from the garage and the bottom of the garden to the decking area, where it was supposed to be. I started work on Olga's vegetable patch, and she tidied up the summerhouse. We tried having Lara out with us but after a few minutes she decided that she preferred being inside, so we left Lucy to look after her while we slaved outside.
Lara's clearly growing up now, she didn't sleep the whole time when we went to the pub in Marlow in the evening for a drink with Chris & Cara - that was a first.
On Monday I cracked on with digging up the veg patch, it's 4m x 2.4m just in front of the decking, but the fact it slopes diagonally from back left to front right is making it an interesting carpentry project for me, and taking up the turf that covered just half of that area took a few hours and some heavy lifting. More work is required next weekend to finish the box I'm building to contain the soil; trying to make a level area on a sloping surface is, shall we say, a challenge.
We did put some reed screening up against the front of the decking though, so you don't see the ugly area under the decking anymore when you look up the garden from the house, which is a big improvement.
Saturday was a bit of a lazy day, the poor weather meant we didn't want to do much outside, so I spent some time looking after Lara in the afternoon while Olga and Lucy did girly things. Looking after Lara meant letting her watch me play on my ancient Nintendo 64 games console in our bedroom, and listening to the football scores on the radio before we both had a mid-afternoon nap.
In the evening we watch The Fully Monty on video, as neither Olga nor Lucy had seen it, and they'll never listen to Donna Summer's Hot Stuff again without thinking of the men dancing in the dole queue.
On Sunday I decided that no matter what the weather was like, I had to get some work done in the garden, so I got up at 7.15, and walked Mishka in the snow. It snowed quite hard during the morning, but didn't stick for long, which was a shame, and by lunchtime it was all gone, but I had been able to move some things up from the garage and the bottom of the garden to the decking area, where it was supposed to be. I started work on Olga's vegetable patch, and she tidied up the summerhouse. We tried having Lara out with us but after a few minutes she decided that she preferred being inside, so we left Lucy to look after her while we slaved outside.
Lara's clearly growing up now, she didn't sleep the whole time when we went to the pub in Marlow in the evening for a drink with Chris & Cara - that was a first.
On Monday I cracked on with digging up the veg patch, it's 4m x 2.4m just in front of the decking, but the fact it slopes diagonally from back left to front right is making it an interesting carpentry project for me, and taking up the turf that covered just half of that area took a few hours and some heavy lifting. More work is required next weekend to finish the box I'm building to contain the soil; trying to make a level area on a sloping surface is, shall we say, a challenge.
We did put some reed screening up against the front of the decking though, so you don't see the ugly area under the decking anymore when you look up the garden from the house, which is a big improvement.
Monday, 27 August 2007
A Relaxing Bank Holiday? No Chance
So the Bank Holiday weekend is almost over, at least the weather was good for once. Littlewick Firsts thumped Little Marlow Firsts at the Green, by 8 wickets. 6 unbeaten on the run now, and we're off the bottom of the league! POW Rangers continue their low-key warm up to the new season, with our 3rd defeat in a row, but this was a close-run 4-3 loss to the Cross Keys pub. At home Olga and I have made progress in the kitchen, the old one is bare now, and pretty much ready to be removed. The new one is taking shape, well, some of the cabinets are, except they're in the dining room at the moment. It's an improvement to them being in boxes on the driveway.
Cath, Nick and Lizzie popped round on Sunday evening after a flight to the Isle of Wight; both Olga and I practised our baby-holding technique, and Lizzie wasn't sick on either of us, so we must be doing something right.
So this week is going to be "interesting". We're not sure what to do with Mishka while Kevan the Builder is working next week, at least one day we might have to take him to the office. It'll also be take-away week for tea, we'll see if we can do the Quadruple of English, Indian, Chinese and Pizza during the next four days....
Cath, Nick and Lizzie popped round on Sunday evening after a flight to the Isle of Wight; both Olga and I practised our baby-holding technique, and Lizzie wasn't sick on either of us, so we must be doing something right.
So this week is going to be "interesting". We're not sure what to do with Mishka while Kevan the Builder is working next week, at least one day we might have to take him to the office. It'll also be take-away week for tea, we'll see if we can do the Quadruple of English, Indian, Chinese and Pizza during the next four days....
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