A "quiet" family Christmas...

A calm Christmas @ Four Acres!!!!

An acceptable wake up call at 0730 with 4 excited little boys and a bemused Leah as they all came to our room with their stockings, going downstairs to find out what Santa had left.... A scrambled egg and smoked salmon breakfast with warm pains aux chocolat before Chuch, then off to" The Limes" to say Happy Christmas to" Bumpa" and the residents and open presents from Bumpa. Back home to put goose in oven and start opening our presents....

As we had said that not all presents would be opened on the day, the children played with each toy as it was opened, no clamouring for more to be unwrapped but a calm excitment and tidy afternoon with wrappers being bagged at each opening session. We sat to watch "Five children and It" then had a late lunch (1530!) more presents and tv then Christmas pudding and Brandy white sauce for pudding/tea!!! Children in bed and still a few wrapped presents for Boxing day!!!

No time constraints, no pressure,no expectations.... just us! All 7 together for a quiet family Christmas.

Thank You Lord for sending us your son in the form of a newborn babe... The most loving gift ever given.
Let us be mindful to remember Christmas as a celebration of your arrival on earth, your forgiveness and the everlasting life promised us...

A Christmas greeting.

Merry Christmas,
thank you for visiting our blog!
See you in the New Year!!!
PS please click on link for a card!

http://www.dayspring.com/ecards/card.asp?ID=03b8a37d-bok

An eventful day...

What started out as a quick shop, quickly turned into my idea of a nightmare when running round the corner of one of the shop aisles, at full pelt, Isaac ran straight into one of the metal cage display tables...
All I can still see is him bouncing back from it with blood everywhere!!!!! Having split the skin under his nose and with two eggs on his forhead, as with most children's injuries it looked worse than it was, but as he did go very quiet and bit of an odd colour, the ambulance was called out as were the "first responders".
I did feel somewhat out of my depth as Tom was still London way and I had all 5 children with me (well three were in the bus!) But thankfully I'd seen Penny walk out of the shop as I had gone in so I rang her and she made her way back to Sleaford to my rescue...
Penny together with the Lidl staff got all the children rounded up, and then took Leah and Benjamin back to hers' as I went in the ambulance with a very brave if a little too quiet Isaac and big brothers.
To save on too much disruption the crew arranged for us to be seen at Sleaford medical centre who deal with minor injuries. Isaac charmed the nurses with his big blue eyes and by now had started to smile again and chat. The bleeding had stopped and they decided stitches or glue was pobably unecessary. There were no signs of concussion from the whack he'd given himself although he was very lucky his nose had gone between the bars... I dare not think of what might have happened otherwise...
My big brave soldier is now recovering with a bit of a headache and swollen lip and I think mummy's nerves will take longer to get over it than Isaac's face..... What will Malcolm make of having a beaten up shepherd for Sunday's nativity play in church!

Another birthday in the house....

I can't believe it! Matthew is 9!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Only seems like yesterday.......

He has had a great day, starting with presents and warm pain au chocolat for breakfast.... School carol service this morning and freeplay afternoon.... a surprise booking at the "Smiley Club" (afterschool) to have some more party fun and then a very" treat tea " @ McD's! and finally home to presents, cake and...the holidays!!!!!!!!!! How cool is that!!!


A little thank you card from him to you...:

http://www.batchmates.com/ecards/viewcard.asp?card=00390708313079130

The Grandparents

Having saved our last Ollan Mills photo session to give to Maman and Daddy for Christmas to have a photo taken of them with all their grandchildren, having arranged for Poppy to come up for the weekend for said photo session, having received a confirmation phone call for said photo session on Weds...... Picked up a message from Ollan Mills on Friday to say the company has gone into receivership..... NO PHOTO!!!!

I can honestly say that I was gutted but Tom put it into perspective for me.... think of all those young photographers who have just been made redundant, a fortnight before Christmas?!

We decided to go ahead with photo session with Four Acres as the venue......

Well I now know WHY we pay a photographer to take group photos!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Lots of shouting, positioning, laughing, giggling, blinking, tilting heads, looking away, tickling, balancing,crying, sulking, getting bored.......probably in the region of 50 odd photos taken (thank goodness for digital cameras!!!) ... I think we have a charming OK photo! (disappointingly not one that jumped out and said THIS IS IT, although M&D have some more.)

Maybe we need to invite Fiona up again for a weekend and have an informal outdoor photo shoot...But we didn't get much notice for this one!!

A video to watch

Leah showing off her newly acquired pulling to standing skills aged 6mths on the 19th Oct.

Fireworks and festivities

Remember, remember, the fith of November.....

Bonfire night,

Charles' Christening,

and Leah's first two teeth!

A walk in the woods

The Autumn chill had definitely made an appearance at Ostler's Plantation when we turned up for our second "Billinghay Family Walk". The few decideous trees had an array of colours as well as the ferns turning a brilliant red... The increased rainfall and general moisture had encouraged a few mushrooms out but the birds we could hear teased us by staying out of eyesight, the children did however manage to catch a very majestic shield bug. The children, had great fun this time running ahead and finding dugouts for dens and trees to climb. There were quite a few brambles in the undergrowth but as long as feet were picked high their tripping up capabilities were kept to a minimum! The sun started to set as we made our way back to the car park and it was decided to have a nice brisk winter walk in December.

Get Your Own! View Slideshow

A very French wedding.

The two Stainsby girls escaped Four Acres for a weekend in Paris!
I drove down to London on Thursday night with Leah,and after spending the night at maman and daddy's with Sarah, we were joined by Kaz and Andy at 0630 and off we went. The three sisters had great fun "being" together ( a feat rarely seen) and winding daddy up!. We arrived in Paris in the afternoon and settled ourselves at Babette and Bruno's townhouse in "La Garenne Colombes". Unfortunately feeling unwell I needed to visit a GP who got me back on track for the wedding festivities. Saturday saw the arrival of countless wellwishing bouquets, a lovely get together lunch and meeting my cousins whom I haven't seen for fifteen years... We got our glad rags on and then to the "Hotel de Ville" (registry office) for a very legal, concise ceremony in the most oustanding room. The bride and groom were beaming with joy and the guests were delighted to be "in" on this very tender and happy union. The reception (once we had extricated the minibus from the very low ceilingued parking) was held in Auvers (where Van Gogh lived and painted the church) and the meal was a gastronomic sensation!!!
Sunday arrived and with the extra hour we lazed around, before suddenly having to up the tempo to pack up the bus ready to leave as soon as the buffet lunch was over (and Andy and Sarah had returned from their shopping trip across town!) We drove back to Blightey, as many other Brits did, hence the enormous queue at Eurotunnel! and arrived back to London rather later than anticipted. We stayed on for the night and drove back home to our boys in time for breakfast on Monday morning.
It was a memorable weekend for the wedding of course but also for having the three girls together with M&D, Leah enchanted all who met her and looked adorable in her dress (thanks Julie)

A busy house for the week

Jon and Janneke came over for the ½term week (21st - 28th Oct) , so with their three children the "dormitory" housed 8 children each night! Busy mealtimes were interspersed by independent or joint activities indoors, outdoors and further afield... Starting off with a puppet show at the New Life Church in Sleaford, a walk around Billinghay to see the Zoetropes, Four Acres garden with it's trees to climb and trampoline! a vist to Lincoln cathedral, Tattershall castle was a great success especially as we watched a eurojet coming in to land at Conningsby.Our friend Simon came over from Nottingham to catch up and Uncle Mark joined in the fun with cousin Charlotte to make for an uncommon gathering of the three Stainsby boys.

Being "cultured"!

½ term was on us and after a morning tidying up we decided that a change of scene was required. We drove into Sleaford, parked at Cogglesford Mill car park and walked along he river enjoying the scenery and making the most of the side sculpture park... We went to The Hub and discovered their "Fold" exhibition where we put our hand to Origami! Our jumping frogs wouldn't have won any olympic medals but the effort was good! We also went all the way up and walk around the roof walkway.

A visit from down under

We were pleased to welcome Catherine for a couple of days (18th-19th Oct) , a cousin from Australia who has been staying with maman and daddy. She took on the challenge of visiting our larger than normal family and was immediately adopted by the boys who found her to be a willing game companion. Whilst the big boys were at school the rest of us went into Lincoln and went round the awesome cathedral as well as enjoying a lunch at Pizza Hut! We then visited the grandly named "Sleaford Castle"! and enjoyed a picnic as we watched the trains go by.

The Feast is here again!

The Billinghay Feast is upon us once more.... The Harvest church festival is on Sunday so it must be the funfair this weekend! Uncle Mark and Charlotte came with us on Saturday night, and a great time was had by all..... Well mummy seriously regretted her friend Julie talking her into riding the Waltzers!!!!!!!!!!

Get Your Own! | View Slideshow

Discovery of a local amenity.

What a lovely afternoon we had for our first venture joining in with the "Billinghay Family Walk". We met up at the Mosaic and then headed off in convoy to Ostler's plantation. The walk was gentle pushchair friendly although we chose to use the backpack and baby carrier and it was lovely to see all the children running off along the woodland paths...

A few mushrooms were found but our knowledge didn't strech to recognising them let alone naming or knowing whether they were edible!

Thank You Chris and Sue for organising the walks, we look forward to the next one along a different route on the 4th November.

A beautiful busy day...

The boys set about a little bit of work building and filling a woodstore and lots of fun together on Saturday as they made the most of some glorious sunshine.

Get Your Own! | View Slideshow

My first lunch!

Ok mummy...I trust you but this is strange.

What do I do with it now?

OK this is quite good... can I have a go?

Looks like sweet potato was a success today! We've given in and started on solids a little earlier than 6mths as she is crawling around so much, burning her milk calories and she has also tried taking food of my plate!

I'm sitting! Well sort of!

The problem is I want to be crawling and getting stuck under armchairs!!!

Out for lunch!

Thank you David for a Lovely lunch out at the Penny Farthing on Sunday. We all tucked into a roast at the carvery and the children hungry as ever, were on their best behaviour.

Campanology

A lovely day was had when on Saturday together with Mark, Charlotte and David we joined Tony Lees and some of the Sherwood youth ringers as they toured some Lincolnshire bells! We started off at Caythorpe, the children went up the bellfry to see the ringers in action David stayed on terra firma and listened to a variety of "methods" such as: Grandsire and Stedman (Triples and Caters),Plain + Little Bob (Major and Royal), Rutland, London and Belfast Major and Yorkshire Royal.

Heydour was a ground floor ring which allowed David to chat to the ringers between rings.
We said our goodbyes at StDenys Sleaford having thoroughly enjoyed the somewhat tiring afternoon!

My birthday

Today is my birthday, can you see how many candles on my cake?

Mamine and Papytail took me to "Crazy Bongos" for a special birthday treat yesterday lots of ball pools, slides, levels to climb.... I slept like a log last night!!!
This morning we left them behind at Four Acres and went to walk with dinosaurs!!!! It was a BIG surprise and we had a GREAT time! (I think they may have been a little scared if they'd come!)

Brave Joseph

Well here he is, our brave bunny with his ever faithful smile!

An early start this morning as he had to be in Lincoln Hospital by 0800, and lucky us he was first on the list! So after a chat with the anaesthetist and consultant Joseph had the pleasure of bed travel and a stretcher flight to the operating theatre. He was very brave as they put in his line and as the anesthetic went in he was asked to count down from sixteen.... He barely managed fifteen and was out! A little teary I went back via a prayer stop at the chapel, ( I found it really comforting that yesterday's gospel reading was that of Jesus healing a deaf man)to wait on the ward where Leah was snoozing. The operation went well and thankfully there were no swollen adenoids so it wasn't as involved, and after resting , eating and drinking (and playing on the playroom's playstation!) He was discharged.
Tired, he will have another day off school to recover fully from the medication. But other than that back to his cheerful self.
Thank you to Penny who looked after Benjamin for the day and Cath who picked up Isaac from school at lunchtime and looked after him for the afternoon. It was a great comfort to know they were being cared for.

First day back to school.

First day of term photo

Smart and eager for school

Well the boys have started a new school year, Matthew is in year 4, Joseph year 3 and Isaac is a "Robin" in nursery five mornings a week including staying for lunch! Let's hope for a successful year full of fun and learning.

Big girl!

Here I am in my big cot!! I'm in with my brothers now... that way I won't miss on all the fun!

Grapevine

Well we just got back from our camping weekend (Fri-Tues)@ Grapevine, a Christian worship festival set in Lincoln show ground....

Packed worship meetings with over 5000 in the Big Top!

Absolutely BRILL! The children had their own worship groups to go to, Jelly Beans for Isaac(learning about Joseph's journey), Kingdom Network for Joseph (finding out who is God?)and Powerpack for Matthew (cre8,activ8 getting them to be comfortable with their faith and even blessing people). The littlies stayed with us and although there was an optional Sparkies group for them with parent, we perferred to all go to the Big Top for some Wake up smile!Life looks funny being in a green tent! uplifting worship (waiting now for the preordered CD to come so we can share the music again)and some pretty good preaching. This year's theme was "Forward" and all the talks focused on how to help the church revival by looking forward and doing rather than harping back at yesteryear.... some sound ideas and now up to us to live it day by day; I pray that the momentum we've built up during this refreshing weekend will help us go "forward" as we set out to carry on God's will in our community.