The End Of Summer.

When planning this year’s school summer holiday, I was quite pleased with myself for allowing some much needed down time where we had nothing to do.

Then school ended for summer and, despite the my well thought out schedule, it feels like our feet haven’t really touched the ground since.

We started with a week in Ipswich with my parents, which involved a lot of playtime for Freya and the chance to look for some of the colourful elephants dotted about the town. Next we moved on to Caister, calling in at Dunwich Heath on the way, for a long weekend at the beach with some glorious whether only adding to the enjoyment.

Back home for a week with a couple of playdates to Bewilderwood and Strangers’ Hall Museum, then Mark had the week off. Now, we had planned to just go out for days but Tuesday lunchtime, Mark decided Freya was ready to go to her first football match – which meant driving 160 miles to the West Midlands to see West Brom play (she loved it and keeps asking to go again).

We stayed with Mark’s parents the next day and went to the fantastic Think Tank Science Museum in Birmingham before driving back on the Thursday.

That weekend, even though we had only just left them, my in-laws came to visit for a week (a trip planned at the start of the year). On the Saturday I spent the morning making Freya a Harry Potter birthday cake and then we drove to Ipswich on the Sunday for a Harry Potter themed early birthday party with all her grandparents together.

With Mark back at work, we did several evening trips (one to Sheringham and one to Happisburgh Lighthouse) as well as popping into Norwich on the bus, which is one of Freya’s favourite things to do.

We were all a bit worn out by then but still had the grand finale to come. We booked a long weekend in St Albans for Freya’s birthday. She thought her treat was going to London Zoo on the Sunday but on her actual birthday we took our little Harry Potter fan to Hogwarts, or as close as we could get (the Harry Potter Studio Tour). She absolutely loved it – although how we will ever top that for future birthdays I have no idea.

Sadly, we all came back a little bit poorly. My first trip after we arrived home was to the doctors where I was diagnosed with a painful throat infection (it was agony for days). Just as I started to recover, Freya started to complain of feeling ill and has been very poorly with a high temperature, sickness and sore throat and mouth.

It’s not the ideal way to end a fantastic holiday but it has meant we finally got some chill out time, which is definitely what we needed.

So that’s it, summer is done. Lots of posts and pictures to follow.

How are you, my friends?