Feeding the Ducks

For those of you who don't know, the kids and I are currently in the US visiting family and extending Emerson's Spring Break (on the front end) in hopes of enjoying some Spring sunshine. While we have had a few beautiful sunny days, it now appears that we have brought the Scottish grey, rainy weather with us. Before I start adding the pictures of our fun time with family, I have one last post from our early spring in Scotland.


A few weeks ago on a Saturday some friends and I all had the same idea. We looked out the window and saw blue sky and got very excited. But oh, those blue skies can be deceiving! We headed up to Arthur's Seat for some kite flying, walking, feeding the ducks and some general outdoor fun. At first glance it seemed like a clear, cool, breezy day but once we got out there and got the kites up in the air we realized that it was too windy. As the cold air started blowing Emerson and Ward quickly abandoned the idea of kite flying and were eager to walk up to the pond and feed the ducks. We headed up the mountain with Emerson's friend Hannah and were soon followed by the kite-flying crew. Here are the pics from our beautiful, but COLD day!

Calling his friends over.

Ward's attempt to play golf on this windy day.

I love this view of the city.

The girls running in the wind.

Emerson taking a quick break on the walk up to the pond.

Hannah, Emerson, Benjamin & Alexander feeding the ducks.

Jeremiah, Sarah, and Hannah

Bev with Hannah, Jacob, Benjamin & Alexander

Emerson was reluctant to leave.

Ward was cold and ready to head home.

Girls Day Out

During school breaks in Edinburgh, the museums, the city council and historic sites do a fabulous job of providing free or low cost activities for children. A few weeks ago there was the mid-term break and I had a week full of play dates and outings planned. In the weekend leading up to the break Ward caught a stomach bug that circulated through our family and back to Ward again and almost all of our fun outings for the week had to be canceled. By Friday of the break, Trey kept Ward so that Emerson and I could have a girls day out. Holyrood Palace was hosting a "Fashion Day". They did a great kid-friendly audio tour of the Palace which included a activity sheet and questions to help Emerson pick up on some of the fashion trends of previous residents of the palace. She toured the palace looking for clues in portraits and display clothes. At the end of the tour we went into the coach house where they had garments for the children to try on and a craft activity that allowed Emerson to use fabrics, feathers, sequins, glue, and glitter paint to design her own princess dress.
The finished project:

Emerson wearing a corset, bum role and ruff:
After the tour we hit the cafe for hot chocolate and a "jenormous" (Emerson's word) piece of cake.
Our walk home included some sight seeing along the Royal Mile. Emerson always loves to check out the statues. She likes to read the plaques to see who the statues represent and why that person. Sadly, I don't remember the details on this one....have to check some other time. Glad to know I'm just soaking in the rich history of our fine city!

After we finished taking these photos and walked hand in hand up the Mile, she sweetly said, "Mommy, thanks so much for bringing me today. This was the best outing EVER!"

Snow Days

All of a sudden the sun is out in Scotland, but we had a long winter and snow as recently as a week ago. Here are a few pictures of our snowy winter.
On this first big snow day, Emerson earned the right to tell her grandchildren (some 60+ years from now....) "When I was a little girl I had to walk 2 miles to school in the snow". She can't quite add on the "barefoot" part of that legendary tale, but she did walk the mile and a half to school and back without a single complaint. On the way home, it was snowing so hard we could barely see. Ward on the other hand stayed totally dry under his buggy cover.

Later in the day it cleared up enough for snowball fights and building snowmen with our neighbors. Trey and his baseball skills from years gone by were making him quite a threat to the neighborhood boys who were all good sports and were quick to shoot right back.