Holiday Story Telling

Holidays.

What do they mean to us? We save all year. We work everyday in between. We exhaust ourselves with the preparational shopping, packing, cleaning. That's a lot of pressure on everything. So much so I'm not ashamed to admit we're yet to have one where there hasn't been some varying degree of friction fuelled from the pressure for everything to be FUN. 

Then I get home, like now, I look over pictures, tickets, souvenirs and residual sand in shoes and I think back. I tell stories to myself without the tense edge we had the first morning because we didn't know how to get breakfast. I remember our first trip to the beach without Euna's tired winging from an unsuccessful nap in a strange cot. 

Essentially every storyteller is biased. And if I want to be biased in recalling the good times... Then I think that's ok by me. Unless of course there's some entertainment merit to the part in the story where Steve drags us to the 2 hours across rural France to see the Bayueax tapestry... No. No. There's was no entertainment value there. ;)

So here's a little of our French holiday story...

Every. Single. Morning. I return with an acute case of "Croissant Thigh"...

Where we ate pizza... 

 St Mere Eglise...

So rare we get a family portrait! Thank you self timer and fence post!

 How France is so skinny, I'll never know...

Not this year... *Sigh*

 Splash splash!

Insert Greenpeace pun here... ;)

Many, many more holiday snaps to come!

Home

Home.

Newly appreciated home.

Holiday was wonderful. Memories made. Fresh air breathed. Freckles liberated. All three of us are glowing from it. 

Right now is that sweet time when you realise why you holiday. You realise how precious that time is. Those conversations you had time for. The food you had time for. The sleep you had time for. The interactions. It's written all over Euna's face. It's written all over our family cogs that turn a bit sweeter for the French health check. 

My brain feels a bit more spread out. Thoughts have some edge around them for me to approach them with fresh eyes. Perspective and oxygen. All seasoned with salt water and sunny wind. 

Feels good. Feels like rev-ing the engine. Here we go...

With so many more holiday snaps to come here's a few to get me started :D

SO many posts to come... Bubble bubble blog post boil... :)

25 Weeks

Struggling a little to not wallow a little in "feeling fat" but feeling good besides the whaleness, I'll just be grateful to be back in more clothes once the weather cools off.

Luckily feeling big is all I can complain about. Slight heartburn and a little tired but overall we're doing well. 

Surprised by how far up I can feel baby, right in the ribs now! I wonder if you usually feel it higher earlier on with your second?

Euna is very aware of babies everywhere. I can't decipher whether this is typical little girl noticing of babies, my keenness to see her noticing babies or if she really does somehow get that "baby" is a real topic here now.

Little news on the bump front really... No news is good news they say!

Emily @ The Woods...

BONJOUR from sunny France! Whilst I stuff myself in to morbid obesity on croissants here's a few highlights from a toddler location shoot from last week. Little Emily...

Some Reasons Why Sunshine is Magic...

I'll keep thinking of more as the summer days go by, but here's a few. Sunshine is magic because...

1. It makes freckles. I love freckles. Can't for the life of me understand people who don't like them. They're beautiful on everyone!

2. It gets us outside, in the fresh air.

3. It makes us eat ice-cream and ice-cream is awesome.

4. It makes us have to put suncream on and the good ones smell like coconut. Plus it makes me put aloe vera gel on at night, my skin is always in the best condition when it's sunny.

5. It inspires us all wear bright colours and wearing bright colours makes us all feel a bit more colourful.

6. It motivates us to drink much more inventive cold drinks. Slushies, smoothies, crushed ice coffees, iced tea, orange juice and lemonade, milkshakes, APPLETISER...

7. It gives us vitamin D which helps our body absorb calcium and something else Wikipedia informs me is called "phosphate"... Which must be good. Wikipedia says so.

8. It makes us HAPPY. It makes our bodies release endorphins and they act as natural anti-depressants. So it literally physically makes us happy.

9. It gives us a suntan. I'm not trendy or forward thinking enough to claim I never leave the house without being covered in factor 50. Equally I have no intention of ending up looking like Magda from "There's Something About Mary". But I feel great with a few freckles and a little colour. I just do.

10. It means we can have BBQs and my man is an excellent chef on the BBQ. So nights off cooking for me and I get served tasty grub, that can often be pretty healthy!

11. It bring so much cool food in to season. Asparagus, strawberries, peaches, beetroot, cherries, raspberries... Nom!

12. It means I can wear flip flops. Which yes means some extra foot and toenail maintenance but I'll take that trade off.

13. It makes baby girl wear sun hats and this chickpea rocks a sunhat. Frillier the better.

14. It inspires everybody be a bit more impromptu. "Let's have a BBQ!" "Let's just stay out and eat in the garden!" "Let's take a picnic outside!" "Let's go for a walk AFTER dinner!" And so many of these plans are cheap, because we have sunshine, we don't need much else. Some green grass, food, sand, water, a walking route...

15. (Most relavent to Brits) It is so so appreciated. We don't et a lot of sun, so we really see the magic in it. Despite the heat in the UK being particularly humid we love it.

16. It makes us garden. Given the choice, in this house, we probably wouldn't touch the garden but int he summer we have to. And when we do, we really enjoy it. I love that smell of cut grass. That bitter "plant taste" on your fingers reminds me of being a kid.

17. It gets us outside and when outside Euna gets grass stains. Grass stains are awesome.

18. It means we have to wear sunglasses. Sunglasses are globally cool.

19. It takes us outside and outside means no tv and no laptop. As much as I miss the pageviews I can easily forgive it if I imagine everybody down the beach or walking in the woods.

20. It means we can swim. Euna and I swim every Friday but it's not the same as real swimming outside, all day, till you shrivel up.

21. YOU TELL ME?!?! I need to get back in to the habit of replying to comments... SO give me your reasons why sunshine is magic and I'll add them in!!

24 weeks...