Greg, Andrea, Lena and Mitchell

August 30, 2010

Summer Holidays 2010

We have lived in the UK for 4 years but not had much holiday time locally. So we decided this year to take a Staycation! This meants we had plenty of time to check out the things to do near where we live, enjoy a few guests and more than anything relax!

Some of the highlights of our summer were

  • a visit from Baba
  • a ride on the London eye
  • Lena riding on Daddy’s head
  • Mitchell’s 1st  birthday
  • Fresh produce from the allotment
  • A fun trip to Littlehampton beach
  • Finding a massive spider in the house
  • Andrea’s friend Jane visiting
  • Eric, Anne and Darcy’s pizza party
  • A trip to Odds Farm
  • A visit to the Natural History Museum in Tring
  • Playing in the park!

Here are some pictures!

July 14, 2010

Nadine and Efren’s Wedding

Filed under: Family,Friends — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , — Greg @ 3:07 pm

So a wedding is always a lovely reason to take a trip, so when Nadine and Efren invited us to come down to Dusseldorf to celebrate, we couldn’t resist.
The trip took us through England, France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany, and we enjoyed a nice stay at a spa hotel and then off to the wedding. It was a good party and we enjoyed the coffee and cakes and then had a fun night watching the German team perform admirably in the football world cup against Argentina.

On the way home we managed to catch up with Mike and Sheetal in Eindhoven. We looked around the city, enjoyed a nice meal at a Grand Cafe, and then we made our way back to the channel tunnel and had fish and chips for dinner in Dover with the setting sun.

July 5, 2010

Dad’s Camp

Filed under: Family,Friends — Tags: , , , , , — Greg @ 10:23 am

Lena and Greg went to Dad’s Camp on Cookham Dean old cricket common. It was a fun weekend with about 40 dads and a hundred or so kids. We turned up, pitched our tent, and made sure the kids had a great afternoon with a big walk and treasure hunt.  Once we had fed the kids and put them to sleep, then there was a couple of hours for us Dads to have fun.

Thanks to Porteur, Mike and Darryl for organising a great event and getting everyone together.

April 11, 2010

Dean at the Dean

Filed under: Friends — Tags: , , , , — Greg @ 9:09 pm

Friday night was the Gents Dinner night at my cricket club (Cookham Dean Cricket Club). We had a fab night – the club is hosting a beer festival over the weekend, and in addition, all the food and drinks was great. The guest speaker of the evening was English Test Cricketer Dean Headley, and he entertained us with some stories and answered a barrage of questions on playing cricket at the highest level.

September 24, 2009

Summer pics from my Blackberry

Filed under: Family,Friends,Sport — Tags: , , , , , — Greg @ 11:07 am

Sometimes I get about without a camera on me. Luckily the Blackberry is handy. I wouldn’t say that it takes good pictures, but it is always there for when something fun happens. Also, with Mitchell’s arrival, Lena still deserves some of the limelight…

April 16, 2009

Munich: Dee and Martin’s wedding

Filed under: Family,Friends,Munich — Tags: , , , , , , , — Greg @ 6:05 pm

 

Lena and Andrea

Lena and Andrea

We had a lovely easter in the sun, to celebrate the wedding of Dee and Martin, in the Munich Ratskeller. A Ratskeller is not a place where rodents dwell, rather the cellar below the Rathaus or town hall.

The wedding started with a drinks reception in the courtyard of the Rathaus, and then we went downstairs for the ceremony and then dinner.

Dee and Martin's cake analogues

Dee and Martin in cake form

the happy couple

The happy couple

The service and facilities were top notch, and it was great to see Dee and Martin marry.

Lena celebrated in style by driving her SLK Mercedes (ride on edition) around the restaurant.

Highlights for us were the well organised wedding – meant we could just have fun!

The food was good, and of course it was great to see everyone there too.

Well done Dee and Martin – we wish you well!

February 23, 2009

Lena and Alody at the allotments

Filed under: Friends — Tags: , , , , , , , — Greg @ 9:29 am

As part of my lazy updates to our family blog – Lena brought her little friend Alody up to the allotment (with a side trip to the park as well of course). Lena and Alody have lovely matching mauve jackets and every time they see each other it leads to a crazy squealing contest.

Anyway – I thought this picture was cute :-)

 

Alody, Andrea and Lena at the swings

 

Check out more about Alody here:  Our Family: a field trip to the allotments.

February 11, 2009

Snowboarding in Bulgaria

Filed under: Friends — Tags: , , , , , , — Greg @ 2:43 pm

Francois's picture of the groupLast weekend I visited Bulgaria with my work mates and got to see a ski resort and country that I barely knew anything about outside of games of Diplomacy. Bulgaria is a former communist country bordered by Romania, Serbia, Macedonia, Greece, Turkey and the Black Sea. We went to the resort of Pamporovo (Пампорово) near the Greek border, about 3-4 hours from Sofia where we flew in. My colleague Peter owns an apartment that has recently been built in the burgeoning resort.

As far as a countries go, I think Bulgaria has a long way to go. I could describe it as stepping into a time machine, but only partially, because you see loads of soviet style architecture, half finished houses and buildings. But there is also a mix of new developments, mansions, and some just plain odd looking stuff mixed in. Also the roads ranged from recently built to scary bumpy tracks that people overtake on in the middle while cars pass each side.

For skiing, the resort had a fair size, and on good days would have a nice assortment of runs, ranging from easy to nice fast black runs coming down the face of the mountain.

It was a fun trip of poker, snowboarding, pool and watching sport, and while I mightn’t go back soon, I would say it is an experience you will only understand if you go yourself.

January 14, 2009

Lena’s Friend Alody

Filed under: Friends — Tags: , , , — Greg @ 9:42 pm

One of Lena’s best friends lives just a couple of houses down the road, and is half-South African, half-French and of course all English just like Lena (except Lena doesn’t have the paperwork to prove it).

They get up to all sorts of fun games together including playing scarecrows, and sleeping bunnies.

Playing Scarecrows

Lena and Alody playing Scarecrows

Alody’s mum and dad come round and drink coffee, tea and wine whilst the girls play.

Alody has her own family webpage with her little brother Timo and posted some of this first here: Lena’s friend Alody.

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