What beautiful weather we had for Saturday night. When we planned the BBQ we knew it was quite risky , thats why we had it at Dick and Irens . We figured that if it rained we would all fit inside. But as it turned out we didn’t need to.The first BBQ we have had this season ,so far. Iren and I had been busy preparing food, people said that we should go into catering.We had put on a good spread, I did some good old BBQ favourites that they had not had before. Anyway all the food went,so we must have worked it out OK.

We had a fantastic night plenty of food, bevvies and great company. As usual Iren and were last in bed at 4:30 am, so needless to say I am doing it hard today……….

and then…………

Well today has been a bit slow, I had to work, officially my last Sunday at La Senza, woohooo! Yesterday we had a family wedding and besides having to work  today we were all fairly hungover, starting to feel a little better now 8pm.Lots of fun was had by all. Leah is Gwynfors niece, and she is the daughter of Gwynfors eldest brother. She is the first of that generation to get married, the last family wedding was ours, 12 years ago. There’s something about getting the glad rags out and causing havoc with family at a wedding. I will show you some befores and then some afters…….As you can tell Leah looked absolutely stunning and very elegant. I thought my girls looked beautiful as well and they really enjoyed their rolls as flowergirls.

                                                                    Aislin and Ella                                                       All the James Girls                         Leah                                     Greg,Leah,Ella and Aislin

                                                               Bridesmaids and flowergirls                    Nain, Leah and Greg                                                                All of us

                                                      Bryn,Dick,Iren,Matthew,Tom                                   Gwilym,Huw,Anne,Dewi,Miriam                                        David,Garallt,Carwyn

                                                       Some of the James cousins                                            All the James Boys                                                              The Brothers

                                                                     Nain and the kids                                                    Jill, Anti Ann, Eurig                                                   Jill and Iren

                                                                                                                                          And some afters……………….

Yes the James’ know how to party and we all hate having a drink and a good time….hehe . well the kids lasted until 2am , Aislin did fall asleep about 1am. But they danced all night and had a ball with the cousins and everyone. We had a beautiful day and a fun filled evening.

I wasn’t working this Sunday so we decided to go for a drive. If you look on the map of Wales, Anglesea is the head. It is joined by two bridges. On the way we stopped off at "Lllanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch" and yes this is seriously the name of a place. Don’t ask me to spell it without copying it, the kids are very proud of themselves because they can say it.

Then we went to the beach we thought we hadn’t had the metal detector out for a while, and we had talked to one guy at the beach near us and he had said that he always finds heaps around the Anglesea coast. They did find lots of stuff, bottle tops, coins, nails , bits off boats , drains and lumps of metal, much to Rhys’ disappointment no treasure chests or treasures were found today…

Bit lazy this morning so I am combining these 2 nights.

Iona and Ieston’s wedding was lovely, we went to the night do. Weddings over here are structured a bit different they have the actual wedding before lunch then family and close friends go to  the "day do", then in the evening they have the night do where they invite all their friend as well. It is a long day for the Bride and Groom but get to catch up with everyone and you party more in the evening. Gwynfor and Iona went to school together and they also did quite a bit of travelling together, she went to Australia with Gwynfor and another mate the first time he came over.

We had a great night catching up with some we hadn’t seen much of.

We organised a surprise 40th for Iren, she spent her actual birthday in Spain so while she was away we organised the party. As if she could turn 40 and not have a big bash. She had absolutely no idea about  it and thought she was meeting us at the local pub for dinner and a couple of drinks. I think there was about 90 people there ,a food buffet, DJ and the room was decorated. I have never seen anyone shake so much. She was still buzzing a week later and said that she thoroughly enjoyed her night.

, the bar is copperBig Day , driving from St. Valery to Calais, crossing to Dover. Then instead of staying with Sian and Kieth, Gwynfors cousin we drove straight up to Gill’s. Gill used to own the Grapes where Gwynfor worked  for a long time. She has brought another gorgeous little pub in the Cotswolds, along with her son Jamie and girlfriend Titch. Being a Monday it was closed so the kids thought it was fantastic being able to be behind the bar and running around. Gill also has B+B rooms they let out and we stayed in them. I hadn’t been to the Cotswolds before but it is stunning countryside and the houses are beautiful, and expensive. It was really nice to catch up with them all for the night, and I think we will be back down there again . Maybe without children!!!!!!

Jamie, Gills son is also a chef and he runs the kitchen side, Titch is charge of the beer and pipes and both her and Gill work the bar so it works out well between the 3 of them.Can you see the flowers that are on the roof and run along the beams, they are actually hops they get new ones ones a year and they dry out, they look fantastic, the bar is made from copper, the whole pub has a really cosy friendly feel.

My new fascination with France, it is a beautiful place. People say the French are arrogant but we found them great, as long as you had a smile on your face and at least said " Bonjour", "Merci", "Oviour"(not sure how to spell that one) and pointed and got through the rest they were lovely. The counrtyside is stunning, flatter than I expected, in the area we were in anyway. It is much bigger than I visualised as well. We had been to Paris last time but out in the actual country I had know idea how big the country actually is. We have only touched on the North and along the coast but there is much more of France to explore. Some of the reasons I love France, besides the bread, cheese, pate, cider is the colour and how everyone takes pride in how their houses look, the flowers that are everywhere, just lovely feel about it. I started taking photos to explain what I mean, I am going to print up some of these when I get home and make them a feature somewhere. It became obsessive, even the girls were shouting out "there’s a pretty".

The kids are funny they have taken a disliking to Motorways(UK call them),Highways (we call them) Autobarns (Europe call them)" they are boring!". But sometimes they are the quickest and most direct way of getting to where you want to go. So Yep from Bayeux  to Rouen we were on the Motorway, we had intended on going along the coast but we ended up on the motorway which was easier to stay on. Madge took us straight into the city , it has an old part and newer part, with no fuss. It is a beautiful medieval city, sometimes you come across a place that you would definitely go back to and spend more time in ,and this is one. One of the main tourist attractions is the square where the young heroine Joan of Arc was tried and burned at the stake .The city itself was badly damaged in WW2. But there is barely any signs of that now. We strolled through Rouen for ages and came across some actors reenacting medieval songs and plays of that time.

Again we spent more time than what we thought we would have here, so it was too late to go to Givernay which is where Monet painted for most of his  years. The main attraction is the gardens that inspired him so much in his paintings he also painted the famous waterlillies there. Oh well ! I will just have to put that back on my to do list. We headed for St.Valery where we were staying the night before we went onto Calais to cross back into UK the next day.

With regret our time was up at Dol De Bretange, so we packed the night before and headed off early, so we could catch a few sites on the way up North. Our first stop was Bayeux, this is where millions of people come to see the Bayeux tapestry. I hadn’t heard of it before but Gwynfor had studied it at school.

We couldn’t take photos inside where the tapestry was, so I haven’t actually got pics to show you but it was very well done when you think how old it is. It is 70 m long, they had it displayed in a huge glass cabinet which you walked around in the shape of a U,(  imagine it about 1 and half the length of Olympic swimming pool) we walked around stopping at each number with an audio which told you about what each scene depicted, they had a kids version and they found it very interesting. Basically to cut a long story short, the tapestry was about William the Conqueror in about 1077 , they did it to record what happened to him and Normandy as so many people of that time could not read. looking closely you could see many little patches but otherwise well preserved.

Bayeux was a nice little town and as so many do, had a beautiful cathedral. We had packed our lunch and ate it in a nice little park.

Next stop was suppose to be the D-Day Beaches in which the battle of Normandy took place but somehow we took a wrong turning Madges(sat NAv)  fault and ended up far away from there, so we skipped that idea and went onto Rouen.

There wasn’t any kids club or anything today ,so we decided to head off to check out Mont Saint Michel. This is one of the classic postcard images of Northern France. Driving up to it was absolutely amazing although we couldn’t get amazing photos as it was quite hazy to start with. The very top part is an Abbey, and as legend has it  that the abbey was found in the 8th century when the  Bishop of that time was visited by the archangel Micheal in a dream. Again the little town at the base of it ,is filled with restaurants and touristy shops that line little narrow walkways. It was great exploring nooks and crannys around the town and then we climbed the stairs to the top,walked around the abbey,what a view…….and how in hell did they build it???

St. Malo is a gorgeous walled city only about half an hour from where were staying in Dol De Bretange. St. Malo is surrounded by coast, it was an important port in the 17th and 18th centuries for merchant ships and Pirates. You can completely walk around St. Malo, on the ramparts ,it is about 2kms to walk but it was really nice. with amazing views and you could see the coastline winding in and out for miles. Once inside ,through the city gates it is a maze of wonderful shops and restaurants. As we do , we wanted to try national dishes so we went to a craperie for lunch and of course ordered typical French crepes, we all enjoyed them, so thin and crunchy. Lovely day out.