Mo-vember

During last month Neil joined several of his male colleagues (and thousands of others around the world, mainly in the Antipodes I think) in growing a moustache to raise money for research into testicular cancer. It has to be said his immediate family were not really impressed - Daniel was the most pleased with it as it gave him something else to pull on and investigate - but at least it was for a good cause.

It was lovely to be visited by Monique for a few days; having not seen her since we left NZ nearly 3 years ago we had lots to catch up on and lots to reminisce about. On a day - well, let's face it, a month - of pouring rain we decided to visit the SS Great Britain which apparantly is a great attraction whatever the weather...and it was! All inside or under cover apart from briefly being on deck and for that the rain stopped for the 15 minutes we needed it to!

Daniel's First Birthday!

Daniel is one today! We're celebrating with lots of friends and family through the week but the highlight for Daniel so far definitely seems to be his cake, complete with chocolate buttons!

Sold!

The biggest and best news of the moment is that we've finally sold our house in Sheffield. It had been on the market for a loooong time and even the time from initial offer to completion was six months (with an unbelievable number of hassles along the way) but it's now done and dusted and we're looking forward to where next!

Half term was last week and we went and 'holidayed' in Alastair and Helen's house in Liverpool while they holidayed in France!

Matthew thought it was amusing to be eating a banana whilst standing next to one of the many famous 'superlambananas' around the city and the boys enjoyed 'racing' each other along the steps (designed by their uncle Alastair) outside Liverpool's Catholic cathedral.

We had amazing autumnal weather and so much fun playing in the leaves - me the most I think! I can't get over what a good match Daniel's hair is for all the colours of the season!

We had quite early starts all week as the body clocks of the boys remained on BST for a fair while after the clocks changed. To compensate Matthew still manages to fall asleep in strange places and in awkward positions during the day; a couple of weeks ago I had to carry him to the sofa because he was so tired he'd lay down on a coconut doormat on the kitchen floor to go to sleep!

Growing Up

Matthew started morning preschool this September; not that big a deal as he's been there in the afternoons for 6 months. But he's been "waiting for ages" to go "after breakfast" and now he can wear the 'uniform' too it's all abit more official!

Dublin

On September 4th we had been married 10 YEARS!!! Hooray!!! To celebrate our wedding anniversary we spent the weekend in Dublin (on our own - thank you Ken and Sylvia for looking after our boys!) and had a wonderful time! No digital photos as I left the battery for the camera behind! We learnt lots of the history of the city whilst walking (and bus-ing) the length and breadth of it (therefore crossed the Liffey a lot!), ate delicious food, experienced the buzz of the city when the hurling championship final is on (Kilkenny won for the fourth year in a row but it was controversial - just in case you're interested!), didn't get rained on all that much and thoroughly enjoyed being together - just us!

Summer 09

So, brief catch-up: much is still the same in the Shepherd household but there are a couple of significant changes since the end of June; notably that Sam has now moved to Norway (so Matthew has now moved into Sam's old room in the attic which he loves) and Daniel is now crawling and standing, which changes life dramatically!

We've had quite a relaxing summer hanging out in Bristol and catching up with friends...Emilia was 'home' for the summer and it was so good hanging out



...and family(clearing out our house in Sheffield wasn't exactly relaxing but amusing to reminisce and, yet again, discover the many ridiculous items we've kept over the years! There have been many annoying obstacles to completing the house sale but hoping it goes through very soon...)

The latest addition to the Shepherd clan, our nephew Luke Maguire, arrived at the beginning of August and it was lovely to meet him at only a few hours old.


We've visited a few farms over the last couple of months but the best aspects included a maize maze, go-karts and sheep racing (among the sheep were 'Fleece Lightning', 'Woolly Whippet', 'Lamb-orghini'!). Sally, my sister, joined us at one and the boys really enjoyed her company and participation!



In Hartlepool Matthew went to his first football match (which he managed to fall asleep in!).


Daniel also demonstrated that he will eat anything he can get his hands on; very frustrating when all the time on the beach is spent taking stones etc out of his mouth (in the garden particluar favourites are flowers and bumble bees!) but not as painful as he when he decides to take a chunk out of you!


Although the weather this summer has not been what was forecast it has not been nearly as dismal as last summer and the day we spent at Newby Hall was warm enough to play in the fountain.



We also made the obligatory annual visit to the Downs to watch the launch of balloons at the fiesta; Daniel has taken after his brother and is quite an early-riser too so it wasn't too much effort to be out and having a picnic breakfast at 7am!


The highlight of the summer was a wedding anniversary treat from Alastair and Helen (Neil's brother and sister-in-law) - tickets to see U2 at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff! Neil had never been to a major gig so this was a good 'first'! It was amazing; venue, music, atmosphere, overall 'show' just brilliant and it helped being only about 30metres from the walkway that came out from the stage! No photos - I think you probably had to be there!

Birthdays

Matthew turned three in May and the birthday celebrations lasted for a week, including three cakes! He loves anything to do with football or rugby so a 'proper' rugby ball, football strip, goals and football bedding were the highlights of gifts!

The Shepherd family got together the weekend before Matthew's birthday and the weather was so lovely we went to the beach; Daniel's first experience of sand which took some getting used to! That was a big weekend of firsts for Daniel including sitting unaided, eating in a highchair and rolling over! I guess he wanted a share of the limelight!

On Matthew's actual birthday we went to the zoo. It was particularly wet but there was a new attraction - feeding the lorikeets. Sam came with us, we thought it would be good for him to visit Bristol zoo before he leaves in July :(

Then came the party! Nine 2-5 year olds was not quite as manic as I thought it would be - and we managed to get outside to hunt for 'treasure' in between the rain showers which helped.

I've also had a birthday which had to include a cake and pass-the-parcel as it's obviously not a birthday without them! That was great but I think I enjoyed the visit to the Chocolate cafe in Clifton, the strawberries and wine and dinner out with Neil a little more!