December 2019 Christmas letter

It seems to come around so quickly. It happens, then before you know it, it’s about to happen again. We’re talking, of course, about Hearts’ record of defeats at Tynecastle over the last 12 months. The girls have been accompanying Craig on an alternating basis into Edinburgh to get some quality daddy-daughter time. It hasn’t been all bad, with a cup final and two semi-finals generating some extra excitement (of sorts).

The year started, or rather 2018 finished, with Eilidh becoming a mummy! Not a phrase that we expected to be writing this early in her life, but in this case, it’s because she’s a gerbil-mum! That Santa Claus has a lot to answer for!

Regular readers of this blog (if such a person exists) will know that January is the time when we celebrate Eilidh’s birthday (because that’s when it is). This year, reaching the grand old age of nine, Eilidh decided that she wanted to have a sleepover, and in a foolish moment, we agreed. We started by taking the group to Honeypot Creative Café, where they made bath bombs and painted pottery. Back at home, it was the usual pizza and film, before sending 7 girls off to bed for an early night. (Two of the three events in the previous sentence happened successfully.) By means of indulging in sophisticated surveillance techniques (listening outside the bedroom door), we were able to overhear plans being concocted to set phone alarms for 3am, at which point intervention was required and phones confiscated.

February started with Gwen and the girls going to the Strictly Live show in Glasgow, having received tickets for Christmas. It was the first time for both girls, and will be something they remember. Of course, with February being one of the coldest months of the year, it meant Craig had a compulsive urge to go camping. This year, the SubZero camp coincided with the arrival of Storm Erick, which meant that not only was everybody cold, but we sustained £800 worth of damage to tents! Fortunately we had insurance to cover it.

Later in the month, we headed to Ayrshire for the Church weekend away. We were staying a short distance away from the main group and decided to cycle to and from the main event each day, an idea which seemed reasonable enough looking at Google Maps, which accurately portrayed a simple enough journey but didn’t mention the steep hills or the driving rain which started on the first morning the second we left the house!

Into March, and Eilidh sat dance exams in modern jazz and tap. Or took dance exams at any rate – there wasn’t much sitting involved in it! A couple of weeks later, she got the results back saying that she’d passed both with flying colours (or distinction, to use the technical term)! Eilidh’s first Cub camp of the year came later that month, a fairly chilly and damp affair – but there were wetter and colder to come! But first, Iona’s birthday and Easter!

Iona also went to the Honeypot Creative Café with friends to have a science party to celebrate turning six, where they made slime (what else?!) and a volcano out of clay, baking soda, food colouring and vinegar. Another consequence of Iona being six is that she is now old enough for Beavers, which she duly started after the Easter holidays.

In a change to usual traditions, Easter started with a Christmas present – tickets for Disney on Ice in Glasgow. It was a great way to start the holiday, before we were joined at Sallachy by the Peplers. We were really lucky with the weather as well, to the extent that we needed to buy suncream for our trip to Landmark!

This photo was taken in Scotland!

After Easter, we entered a bit of a camping extravaganza, with Eilidh being invited on a sixer and seconder Cub camp (before actually being made a seconder), then the whole family going away camping in the Peak District with Gwen’s cousins, with some bank holiday weather more reminiscent of the Christmas holidays than the early May weekend! The next weekend, Craig was away on a hike and camp with the Explorers, before a rare weekend with nobody doing anything was followed by Eilidh going on the Cubs’ District camp. Another weekend off took us into June, when Craig had a rather soggy camp with the Explorers, which provided a stark contrast to the equivalent camp one year previous when we’d been enjoying a heatwave!

Cycling from Linlithgow
to the Falkirk Wheel

As summer began to make itself known (and then unknown again a bit too quickly for our liking), Iona took part in her gymnastics display show.

Well deserved ice cream
at the Falkirk Wheel

Craig had planned for the second half of the year to start with a veterans’ football tournament. However, due to not being able to get an old enough squad together, the nearly-forty-year-old found himself playing in the main tournament with the young whippersnappers!

Gwen and Eilidh chilling
on the canal in Ghent

With summery weather being scarce in the months which pass for summer in Scotland, we decided to take ourselves off on holiday to that well known sunspot – Belgium. Having decided to camp in Spain last year in the hope of some sunshine, we weren’t holding up too much hope. However, our arrival on the continent coincided with a European heatwave, and our tent became uninhabitable after 8am or before 10pm as it was so warm! On a couple of days, the temperature topped 40C, which we countered with going to a water park, and being in air-conditioned buildings in Brussels. We did a trial run of bringing chocolate home, but by the time we got it from the shop to the car, it had pretty much melted! A highlight for the girls was the Walibi theme park, which we think has provided Iona with some inspiration to grow a bit, as she was too short for some of the rides! We also  kayaked along a canal into Ghent, did a canal tour of Bruges, went to the Waterloo battlefield, and got lost cycling in an enchanted forest! On the way home, we had a sobering morning driving via some of the war memorials and museums in the Somme.

Back in the UK, we spent a few days in Lymington with Brenda and Roger. We enjoyed a paddle boarding session in the outdoor salt water swimming pool, did some cycling and chilling out in the New Forest (Craig’s enthusiasm for hammocks extends beyond the night-time camping), and went to the New Forest Show. On the way back north, we stopped off at the Slimbridge bird sanctuary to meet Auntie Lynne, James and Ethan.

We got back to Scotland just in time for Craig’s birthday, which wouldn’t normally get a mention, but then again, he doesn’t normally turn 40! He decided to have an action-packed day, so we spent the day at Foxlake Adventures, doing a low-ropes course (no harnesses, but the obstacles are over a pond!), wake boarding, and doing the “ringo” (an inflatable which we all lay on together and then got wheeched up the pond).  

After a day at the Fringe before the end of the school holidays, it was back into Scouting season! Craig had two consecutive weekends away, first with the Scouts in the Lake District and then locally with Explorers from West Lothian as they vied for selection to an international camp next year. The following weekend, Iona had her first “Nights Away” experience in Scouting with the Beaver Sleepover (which Craig also helped at).

Facing a September weekend with no camping, we took ourselves off to London for the long weekend to visit the Peplers. A highlight of that weekend was going to Legoland on the Sunday, which fueled the girls’ imagination! Iona, in fact, is now desperate to open up a Legoland in Scotland, and is busy working out all the practicalities; she has found a plot of land near Armadale and is sorting out who’s going to sell popcorn, who’ll work in the shop, and how she will design all the robotics it’s going to have!

There was time for Eilidh to go on a Cub camp at the end of September in Northumberland and for Craig to go on an expedition with the Explorers before we went up to Sallachy for the October week. It was lovely to be joined for the first weekend by Auntie Wendy.  We had a relaxing few days walking, cycling and kayaking, and somehow managed to avoid the worst of the rain – and even got enough sunshine in parts for Gwen and the girls to spend a couple of hours paddling up to their thighs! We ended the holiday week by going north to south – down to the Borders for a weekend with the Andrews and the Jenkins.

In November, Eilidh went on a sixer and seconder camp in her own right, having been made a seconder after the summer holidays. She came back even paler than usual, having been proud to have experienced the temperature drop to -2.5. Craig, having decided that he’d spent enough weekends with Scouts and Explorers for the year, decided instead to spend the weekend with other Scout leaders, running a training course.

As we wind down into winter, we we’ve been trying to get a bit into winter mode. Over the course of the year, Gwen has tried a little bit of ice skating (to the extent that she’s started joining in beginners lessons but still can’t skate!). This is no mean feat, given that she has only been on the ice a handful of times in her life, and the last time (around 10 years ago) ended up with a broken elbow! We’ve seen Frozen 2, been to the Christmas Market / rides in Edinburgh, and been to two Christmas concerts; it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

There’s still plenty to come this year though, with the excitement of Auntie Jenny’s wedding in between Christmas and New Year, and hopefully lots of time to see and play with Australian cousins.

Gwen has continued playing for Meadows Chamber Orchestra.and is also teaching Eilidh to play a little bit of the piano! She’s been enjoying regularly going to Bodypump and having a swim when it ties in with the girls’ activities.

Eilidh and Penny setting up camp

Some of Eilidh’s other highlights of the year include writing a book (as part of a challenge for Cubs) about a girl being made homeless– look out for it on Amazon! She also camped out in the garden with her best friend.

She finished playing the violin in the summer, but has taken up the Oboe and choir through School. She and Iona have also started “acro” class (acrobatic dancing), which looks even more energetic than their normal dancing. She was able to try out skiing through the school for a few weeks, and has just completed the “Learn to Swim” programme, to the extent that she’s now giving Gwen tips on swimming technique!

Iona is developing her swimming and moved up a level through the year. She also got the chance to do some fencing through the school, which she loved and was right up her street! She’s started learning the recorder at home, and is continually using her imagination to come up with schemes and grand plans! As well as Legoland Livingston, she’s expressed an interest in building a rocket at home, because otherwise it will be too expensive to go to the moon!

Craig would find loads to do in his spare time if he had any. He still manages to play a little football, and gets a short swim in while Iona’s in her lesson. His remaining exercise usually involves sprinting for the train, and he can frequently be seen running up George IV Bridge in Edinburgh at the end of the working day!

From all of us, we’d like to wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy and prosperous New Year!