One word? When seven would do…

Saturday I worked in the morning and was kindly on duties not too close in contact with the general public. Every member of staff came and had a good old peer at me though and offered the same line of questionning about whether we’d changed washing powder. Is that one of those urban myths toted out in every case of allergic reaction? Does anyone actually know anyone who has reacted badly to a change in washing powder or is in akin to swans breaking your arms and ladders having your eye out?!

Ady and the kids collected me at 1pm with a fully laden car, sandwiches and a cup of tea and we set straight off for J&J’s. On a really good run it should take 4.5 hours. Unlikely ever to happen given the route includes the M25 and m1 but it was more like 6.5 hours in the end. The M25 was bad, the M1 had various issues including road works and average speed cameras for vast chunks restricting us to 50mph and then we hit an accident that had happened about 2 miles infront. After the first 20 emergency services vehicles had screamed past us and then the air ambulance thudded overhead very low we resigned ourselves to a wait. It actually wasn’t too bad, under an hour and the diversion was off and straight back on again as the accident had happened at a junction. The only sensible reaction is to feel grateful it is you caught in the resulting traffic rather than causing it really. Thankfully Davies and Scarlett are really good travellers in the car having done it since birth (travelling from Sussex to Manchester and back was a regular occurance since they were babies and of course all of our holidays and weekends away are done by car travel so they are just used to it) so aside from the odd ‘how long now?’ ‘three hours’ ‘but you said that half an hour ago’ ‘yes and we’ve not moved in half an hour so it’s not changed!’ we got on with DSing, singing along to the radio and in-car dancing.

We were one of the last families to arrive and were greeted with hugs, wine / coffee, cheers and love. Ady and I decided getting the tent up pronto was a top plan so headed off to do that. Ady did some stone removal and some horse poo shovelling and generally looked scared as he often does while a tent is going up. I bet we’d have it pitched in half an hour and we did. Of course putting in the bedding etc took longer but the tent itself was up. Chris and Alison arrived while we were pitching and put their tents up too. Everything installed we headed back to the house for the serious business of eating, drinking and catching up with friends.

Helen had come up with the marvellous idea of everyone bringing a cake to put together to create one big cake, patchwork style. So 11 families brought 13 cakes all with a letter on to spell out HAPPY BIRTHDAY. Other than coordinating letters and size of cake we had not discussed flavour of cake or anything so it truly was a random selection. All transported collectively hundreds of miles, some lovingly cooked and decorated, some just as lovingly bought and decorate. All indivdually delicious and remarkable and put together just so much more than the sum of their parts. Nearly 70 people singing Happy Birthday while candles on 13 cakes flickered had pretty much everyone feeling a bit misty eyed I think. It was truly one of the loveliest moments I can recall. I hope we’ve started yet another new tradtition :). Missed those who didn’t make it for various reasons and just felt very honoured to have such an amazing circle of wonderful friends.

Cakes presented, candles blown out, plates found and everyone served with cake people scattered again into small groups to chat. I spent a very enjoyable time in the kitchen debating silverback gorillas. I think we all know who the silverback was eventually ;). The kids drifted off along with some of the adults and the remainder gathered into the lounge. We played some toy car into stacking cups tiddlywinks which is about as close as I get to playing games, enjoyed the music (soundtrack to show about two hard hitting crazy Scottish cops) and some of us went to bed quite late ;).

Sunday Started very early thanks to some children waking with the sunrise ;). I managed to turn over and go back to sleep :). When I did surface for tea and sunshine I spent some time chatting to various people before wandering back into the house when the wind got too much and helping with kitchen tidying and lunch preparation. The wind was very strong and Ady spent lots of time tent watching to make sure the tents were all okay. Most stood up to it very well but I suspect at least half of them had been specifically added to their owners tent collections simply for J&J’s field so they should really ;). Ady also took Scarlett and Claudie down to the stream for a paddle / dip / play / soak.

After lunch a walk / geocache was suggested and a large amount of the group went along to that including all four of us Goddards (at least 3 by coersion ;)). It was a fab walk with crazy wind, a reservoir in the middle of the moors that was just amazing with the wind whipping up waves, the blue sky creating a tropical hue to the water and a lovely sound of lapping water. Quite surreal :). It was at the top of a very steep hill which the children rolled down, I came down on my bum and Ady very very amusingly also rolled down. Still can’t believe no one captured that on film, it was amazing!

Back at the house it was approaching tea time. We had some Pimms and got stuck into food. 3 families left during the afternoon bringing numbers down a lot (particularly as one family has 9 people in it! :lol:). More chatting, more eating cake (that was quite a characteristic of the weekend) and just generally hanging out together catching up on each others lives.

Monday I woke very itchy again. I was feeling quite sorry for myself and took additional antihistimine and mourned the fact I wasn’t improving as quickly as I’d hoped I might. In the morning some of us took various small girls (all girls for some reason!) to the stables to see Tipsey’s new foal. We’d hoped to see Megan’s pony too although Patience the foal more than made up for that in serious levels of cute. We also spent some time in the pen containing chickens, ducks, rabbits and guinea pigs and several of the children had a sit on the back of the horses there. Scarlett was more interested in the furry animals and declined the offer of sitting on a horse.

In the car on the way back I had Chloe, Megan, Beth and Scarlett and we had most enjoyable converations about rubber replacement feet and other surreal medical ideas. I do love listening to – and even better joining in – with kids’ conversations :). We also debated what potential damage we could do to Ady’s shiny new 4 day old car that he was a bit precious about me driving and filling with girls in horse poo covered wellies ;).

Back to the house for lunch, more cake and another walk. Note I am glossing over the fact the walks contained geocaches. Not because we didn’t find them – we did, but because I don’t get geocaching I don’t think. I guess I am not competitive enough and don’t want to exchange plastic tat for more plastic tat or worse still explain to my kids why a shiny stone is not a suitable swap. In future I will raid the pound shop in advance for genuine plastic tat rather than found treasures 😆

Only Scarlett and I went on this walk – Davies was feeling a bit washed out so rested in the tent and Ady sat with him chatting. Ady says what he likes most of all about these types of weekend is going to bed early with the kids and having interesting conversations. Which is just as well really as I have no intention of going to bed early 😆

I struggled with the walking up so steeply at the end and had to pause several times and use my inhaler. I would have been happy to wait lower down for all the others but Barbara and Michelle very kindly waited with me chatting when I paused and urged me to make it to the top. It was very worth it as the views were just spectacular. They’d found the cache including a Happy 40th Birthday badge which seemed incredibly fortunate so that was swapped to bring home for our hosts.

We walked back and I loved how at different times people slowed down or increased pace and fell into step with various other people, both combinations of adults and children. I spent a fair bit of the descent with Lulah, Beth and Scarlett which was very entertaining :). Back at the house again yet more people had headed off while we were out and aside from Marcus, Michelle and Chloe and us everyone else left after tea and cakes. Ady and I went to Morrisons for butter and strawberries and came back for a very low key tea with very dwindled numbers.

After eating M,M & C also left leaving just us and our hosts. Jan wasn’t feeling great so retired early. A lovely alliance was formed between Catie and Scarlett on the basis of chatting about dolphins and evolution looking at a poster while queuing for the loo and then Catie read some stories that Scarlett really enjoying listening to. Ady stayed up with Jonathan and I for a while and then left. We stayed up a fair bit longer emptying wine bottles and chatting – it was really nice :).

My itching got worse and by the time we said goodnight at 230am I was really suffering. I cast a cat off my pillow to go to bed and laid there scratching and not sleeping until it was 5am and daylight. Half insane I went for a shower in the hopes of cooling off and then elevated by head with 3 pillows. It finally worked and I think I fell asleep about 6am, only to be awoken shortly afterwards by Ady as we needed to get going.

Monday Ady had to visit some Middlands stores this week so to save his company money and tie in well with him not having to drive loads we had stayed an extra night at J&Js and come home down the M6 rather than the M1. We left not long after 8am and got home at 930pm so a very long day :(. Ady only actually *worked* for about 3 of those hours, the rest was sitting in the car, in heavy traffic, on 2 hours sleep with continued itching. 🙁

We went into a garden centre where Ady had a meeting / presentation and the kids and I spent ages looking at pets, overpriced gifts, underpriced books etc and I actually bought them a book to share then we went back to the car and I had a 30 minute nap while they looked at the book. We had lunch at KFC – Ady and I had both been saying how familiar the road looked when we realised it was where a Travelodge was we’d stayed in when we visited Cadbury World years ago. One more garden centre and then heading for home.

Yet more traffic (overturned lorry on M25) meant the time was ticking away and we finally got home at 930pm. Ady bathed and fed the kids while I dashed to Sainsburys for bread, milk, etc. It might have been late but my bath, dinner and bed were all very welcome :).

I spent a lot of time this weekend reflecting on how incredibly lucky we all are to be part of this group of friends. I adore how Davies and Scarlett’s memories of childhood will be weekends like this – playing til long after dark with friends, white Christmas at Helmsley shared with 50 friends round the table for Christmas dinner, walks and trips on moors, downlands, beaches and woodland, hanging out, forming alliances and friendships that I hope will endure through the years. And for me? I feel so priviledged that decisions have led us to meet such an amazing group of people – so diverse, so different and so dear. I love how we have shared laughter and tears, been there for each other, celebrated and comisserated in our very 21st century fashion supported by blogs, email groups, Brightkite, twitter and facebook but most of all I love falling into step with 20 different people on a 3 mile walk, the in jokes, the affection, the knowing each other, the support, the love and the real, genuine, 100% friendship we share. You’re all bloody amazing and I love each and every one of you.xxxx