Last camping trip of 2010 - Orchard Camping Suffolk

Another great weekend camping with Sarah Beard et al.

Despite having taken the day off we don't leave home til' 4pm. The journey takes 4hrs instead of 2, at times we are averaging 9mph. M25 on a friday was a bad idea. We arrive in the dark and a friendly chap with a torch shows us a nice spot at the bottom of the hill next to a pond and some trees. Thankfully this is when the campervan comes into its own and we're now pretty good at setting up in the dark - a quick nappy change and then Lydia feeds Olive while I make the beds. 25 mins later O's asleep & we have a fire burning. The campsite sells wood by the wheelbarrow.

Sarah, Charlie and Jon arrive along with some light drizzle and we start dinner, thankfully a fish curry that just needs heating up. Well fed, the rain stops and we get back to the fire and vino tinto as Sarah calls it. Later on 2 bottles of Port disappear very quickly.

A great nights sleep and then we awake to a cloudless Saturday morning and our first proper view of the campsite. We have a cute little spot under some silver birches next to 2 restored Gypsy caravans. The rest of the site is occupied by big groups with many kids who seems to be taking Halloween very seriously - tonight there is a pumkin carving competition !

As we eat our eggy bread breakfast Sarah plans our walk. Its almost shorts weather when we set off. A great day walking thru' the fields, playing Pooh sticks and climbing on haystacks. As usual Olive enjoys facing forwards in the sling - so much to see, enjoying seeing the countryside, mummy and friends and then finally falling asleep for an hour.

We get back to the site just as it starts to get dark, Lydia puts Olive to bed as Sarah starts another fire and we begin carving pumpkins. Charlie puts the bake potatoes in the fire and we get the chilli going. We have another lovely evening, our pumpkin carving ability surprises us all and they all come alive with a couple of tea lights ! Lydia's new tactic of bringing food pre-cooked proves a big success, particularly taking October weather into consideration. We need more Tupperware. Big Tupperware !

After another great nights sleep we look out of the van to a little more light morning drizzle and I start to worry about how we are going to get the campervan back up the muddy slope to the exit. We light another fire with the leftover logs and Lyd's goes about cooking her final dish - kippers en bap !

We all packup and Sarah shoots up the hill in her Civic. Getting up a decent amount of speed appears to be the trick. Lydia and I decide that Olive is probably best kept out of the van for my attempt at exit. I decide to set off across the field to get up speed and attempt a more gradual slope but immediately bog down as soon as I turn uphill. I then turn around floor it and attempt the main muddy track but up the edge, next to an apple tree. I get half way up but then get stuck again. People are beginning to come out of their tents and caravans to have a look. Some are taking pictures. I reverse back down and have another go at getting up speed. My main worry was hitting some poor child blundering out of a tent dressed as Yoda or something but now I realise that there are apple trees everywhere aswell. Well it is called 'Orchard Camping'. My third attempt fails half way up again but by now the owner has arrived with a tractor. A helpful chap arrives with a towing hook for a VW but we cannot work out where to attach it. "Its okay" says the tractor driver, "we'll tow it out backwards". This doesn't really appeal to me but I don't seem to have much sway in the matter. By now the whole site is out watching, trying to work out how to turn on the video function on their cameras. I notice a nice smile from Olive in Lydia's arms as I get back in the van. Tractorman gives me intructions and then attempts the same less steep route on the other side of the field. We fail half way up. He turns around and we do a fast run at the main muddy track again and get no further than the tree I got stuck at before. Franky I was a lot happier doing this in a 2 ton van going forwards. Tractor man turns again and I am off for 5 minutes being dragged backwards all over the field, trying to steer in reverse to keep close behind him whilst occasionally realising I just missed something. On attempt 4 half way up five guys appear from nowhere and begin to push me, we suddenly break free from the mud and are off again at some speed. I veer away from the apple tree, fly past Lydia, Olive and the paparazzi and narrowly miss the playground until I am depositted on the gravel 2 inches from the gatepost. I finally exhale, then get out and shout "Thankyou" to the five helpful chaps. What fun ! I believe Sarah has a video of this.

After a walk on the beach we head home. A lovely weekend.

The Return to France Sept 2010

A lovely walk in the woods around le Brevedent

the pretty Chateau in Sully sur Loire

Olive takes a bucket bath

the cousins in their Out 'n' About buggies

Jake, Maya and Aura enjoy the train trip into Paris.

We enjoyed our July trip so much that we returned to France in September.

Week 2 we were booked in to Huttopia Versailles with Aura, Ramon and Jake & Maya but for week 1 we decided to not book anywhere, tour around south of Paris and risk places being full. We needn't have worried as September appeared to be a winding down time for most sites ... there was always plenty of space and oddly no kids around.

We went back to le Brevedent first as we just thought this was such a relaxing place in July. We managed to get out for a good 6 mile walk this time thru' some woods on one side of the valley and then back the other side. Great sunshine, a chance for Olive to get in the Baby Bjorn sling and a small picnic.

After that we headed south, staying one night in Forest View, enjoying a great 5 star french meal in a nearby pretty hotel. Lydia liked this.

Then we went to a picturesque site next to the river Loire at Sully. A short walk along the bank of river took us to the simple small town and pretty Chateau. Another great lunch and some Belgian beer.

Lastly 3 nights in Troyes, the capital of the Champagne region. Another nice site with a good pool. The short walk into town was rewarded with fantastic old streets, cute shops and cafes and another great lunch. When I ordered veal in mushroom sauce the guy at the next table told Lydia that I had made an excellent choice and would be asleep all afternoon !

Then to Versailles Huttopia to meet up with the Horca Stones. Most days were occupied by running from the rain but every evening we ate well, drank various Cote de Rhones and played some great games of Scrabble, Receding Whist and our very own game of Horsy-Man-with-Cups. On a wet trip into Paris we managed to find "Ma Salle a Manger", a cute little bistro where the lady owner looked after us all brilliantly. After a quick wander around inside Notre Dame we enjoyed a boat trip down the Seine, apart from Jake who slept thru' it all !

Finally we got some sun and had a good look at Versailles food market which provided the ingredients for a great BBQ. A last sunny day was spent around the pool, Olive had a little swim and Jake recruited an entourage of children who all did as he commanded from his base in the paddling pool !

La belle France July 2010

Olive in van

At Mont St Michael

Camping at Le Colombier

my birthday pressie mugs

Olive falls asleep mid attack of 'Cordy Roy'. A great gift from Charlotte.

Olive seemed to take about 3 days (nights) to get used to the van again but then slept more than she has ever before . . . 9 3/4 hours one night ! Opinions still divided as to whether this was fresh air, heat, general cosiness of her camping merino wool sleepsuit or the fact that the van is v dark in the back.

We were all glad to see her hair seems to be growing back after being worn away.

I'm looking forward to when we can put her in a seat on the back of our bikes as there were lots of opportunities for a good bike ride.

Quite keen to return, perhaps in September !!

La belle France July 2010 Part 2

Breakfast at le Brevedent

Olive relaxes in her sunshade

The Chateau from other side of lake - our van bottom right

Remains of BBQ - bottles of Normandy Cider, a local speciality

View from our pitch

A few pics from our holidays in Normandy and Brittany. We really loved the first site we stayed at - le Brevedent. We had a pitch by the fishing lake amd enjoyed a good few days of just sitting and watching Olive fall asleep in the heat.

The campsite was part of the Castel group which are in the grounds of Chateaux and usually run by families who are just wanting to keep hold of their beautiful family estates and need cash to fix the roof, tennis courts etc ! We stayed at 2 others and were very impressed.

I really enjoyed the whole holiday - camping and France go so well together. The countryside was beautiful, fields of rolling corn everywhere - when you're driving along the deserted roads you can pretty much wind down the window and touch it. The campsites were all charming and well run - you order your croissants the day before then pick them up fresh the next morning. The French seem to have a healthy disregard for rules - kids running around enjoying themselves, four-year-olds seemingly swimming with parents nowhere to be seen !

I'm sorry no pictures of Olive and the Bayeaux tapestry which was amazing. Olive, who loves looking at picture books, was at the perfect height in the Baby Bjorn and stared intently as we walked along this 70 metre long comic strip. She fell asleep exhausted by the end. I think it was all too much for her, trying to spot Meg and Mog !

First Wedding Anniversary - what a difference a year makes.

Our first anniversary. Its difficult to remember its importance compared to our 10 week old baby.

I couldn't have imagined how our lives would change in just 12 months and how happy I would be as a husband and dad. I rush home after work to try and be there when we put Olive to bed. Lydia tells me what they've been upto, how she's been, then we put her in her sleeping bag and watch her drift off to sleep, bliss (hopefully).

Last thursday night Olive would inexplicably not stay asleep. This meant I got to watch her drift off 3 times and I enjoyed each time enormously. The first time I had to do the Dutch Nun (curtsy, sidestep, curtsy, step back, while holding the baby) 300 times because I couldn't stick to the No.1 rule - don't look her in the eye. This was because she was staring right up at me with a slight smile in a way that said either 'I feel very contented and safe' or 'Who are you again?'. I tried to arrange my face in an expression that said 'I'm your dad!' ! Pure joy !

Lydia has been wonderful to watch these last 10 weeks. The immediate joy that appeared on her face the instant her new baby was handed to her has evolved into some kind of instinctive everyday care for her. I know she has read the books but it is so much more than just knowledge of what Olive needs. She is just so obviously her mother, you can see it on her face, hear it in her voice. It seems easy being dad when you know Olive has a brilliant mum.

Watching our little girl feed and sleep, feed and sleep is such an everyday joy. When she came home for the first time, less than 12 hours old, she looked so fragile and now she looks so strong, her skin no longer dry and wrinkly, her eyes now so bright as she begins to really look at the world around her.

As she smiles at us, its easier to feel proud that we made her, a fantastic credit to our first year of marriage.

I'm enormously looking forward to our holiday in France this Summer.

Wales Camping & Barn Trip

Just got back from our camping trip to Wales and have had a great time. We camped 2 nights in Port Eynon on the Gower, then stayed in the barn in Llanbedr with Gareth and all and finally had one night camping again in the excellently named Northleach in the Cotswolds.

This was Olive's 2nd camping trip. For a 7-week-old she is now a real pro!

Her 1st trip (aged just 5 weeks) to Norfolk had got us worried about temperature - she woke up every 2 hours at 2am, 4am & 6am and the van was just 13Celcius, about 10 degrees lower than our bedroom. This worried us and altho the always-positive-Mrs-Leach pointed out that she would wake up at 2am and 6am normally (good point) we took a few urgent measures. Firstly I bought a form of insulation for the van roof, secondly we upgraded her from swaddle to a 2.5 tog sleeping bag, and finally our friends Richard and Eleanor gave us some truly excellent Merino wool baby grows (Bambino Merino !!).

In Wales this combined to give Olive her best nights sleep yet !!! 5 hours followed by 4 hours. I woke at 7.55am (1hr 30 mins after Olive's normal awake time) and thought 'Oh my God, someone's stolen our baby' !?!

Things for us to remember

1) Always ignore weather forecasts - we had fantastic sun in Gower and Llanbedr

2) In the van all things have 2 uses - the car seat is also a baby bouncer, and the changing mat is also a baby gym !

Well done Olive. What a great 5 days.

Pics should be - Olive, I & Baby Bjorn on beach in Port Eynon

Mrs Leach cooking up a storm (she brought bay leaves & put a menu up inside the van!)

Our big saturday walk with the full Welsh gang, lunchstop with many many children, nice Team Leach team shot & the 3 of us in the valleys.

Finally a pretty raw quick video - apologies for wind noise.

TTFN

Olive May Leach - Day 16

Things starting to fall into patterns here which is good altho' midwives keep suggesting we change them. First she wasn't feeding enough, now they want us to try and space the feeds out a bit more ?! This does have some advantages - moving from 3 hrs to 4 hrs between feeds does allow you to get more done and leave the house a bit more . . . altho' Olive has other ideas and appears stuck at 3 1/2 hrs but we can live with that and try and eek it out a little longer.

We managed a family Easter meal (see above).

She really has grown lots in just 2 weeks. She put on almost 10% in the first week and its easy to see her beginning to fill the moses basket. She also now fits in some of the clothes we had bought her - hence shots of her in her retro Green Baby 'romper suit' that I bought for her ages ago.

The novelty of nappy changing has started to wear off - we no longer stare at the poo, trying to guage its colour against the NCT factsheet !

I quite like that our o'night routine hasn't changed. I still get up at 2 and 6am to change the nappy before handing O to Lydia for feed time and then come downstairs and make tea and crumpets/toast/bagels etc. Thankfully I snuck out for a run this morning at 8am as my butter intake was starting to show !

I've noticed that Olive stares quite intently at me as I change her nappy which I've decided is partly because of my glasses. I have 2 v different pairs of spectacles and as her eyesight is not that detailed I am probably just a walking pair of specs to her. In fact I think she thinks she has 2 dads so I tend to keep thick black frames for nasty, wakes me up in the middle of the night to change my nappy dad and keep the the silver frames for nice, cuddles & plays with me, daytime dad !? I do think if Lydia (or anyone) put my specs on, Olive would get v confused.

I have managed to finish my little garden raised beds project. Spinach and brocolli planting to start soon when Julie Stone arrives next week. (see above)

Lydia is upstairs talking to Olive. She has little half conversations where she leaves spaces for O's replies. Its rather nice to listen too. This morning at 6am I joined in as Olive was looking at the big animal faces book that we had put in her moses basket.

Lydia: What Olive ? What has chicken been upto ?

Olive: nothing, maybe a gurgle

Robin: Really Olive ? Chicken's been in an accident, broken her wing ?

Olive: nothing, maybe a gurgle, or sneeze

Lydia: But the vets coming around later today ?

it can go on for hours, we're hoping to find out how chicken is doing tomorrow.

Happy Easter from all at Pymers Mead.

Olive May Leach - Day 8

1 week old today, and the sun came out. Having been rained on twice so far we played it safe and just walked up the road to Dulwich Trader. Sun hopefully seeing off the final remains of Olive's jaundice.

Lydia wanted to buy a diary to keep all madam's important events. I am currently keeping a detailed log of all O's feeds (left or right!) and bowel movements on scraps of paper. We decided I would go back and transcribe all this into O's diary but just the feeds so '4am - big poop' wont need to appear. These are the things midwives ask you.

We continue to be getting a decent amount of sleep - feeds at 7pm (Gina Ford special), 10pm, 2am, 6am, 10am. I get up, wake the mite who is dead to the world, swaddled tight like a worm with cute baby head. She is never awake. I undress her and change her nappy which usually gets her alert to say the least. Lydia feeds & burps her in her new nappy to keep her awake. I usually make bagels, toast or hot cross buns and tea. Important to look after mum. I put her back in her sleep suit, swaddle her and put her down. This can take an hour, but still leaves us with 3 hours kip before the next feed o'night. We are undoubtedly v v lucky.

In fact we have both noticed ourselves waking suddenly at 1.55am and 5.55am thinking 'what is it?' 'is Olive crying?'. She never is. We appear to have been trained to wake up every 4 hours, 5 mins before the next feed. A bit like Olive has been doing the Gina Ford treatment on us !! Weird, but clever baby.

Many thanks to everyone for lovely gifts. Lots of great clothes and we loved the 'Olive's first sunrise photo' from the O'Neills.

Olive May Leach - Day 4

Olive May Leach - Day 3

We were a little concerned yesterday when our midwife told us Olive should be feeding at least once every 4 hours. Suddenly the lovely, placid, sleepy baby we had been enjoying enormously became an under-fed, neglected baby. We felt bad and, as all new parents would, we wanted to fix this as soon as possible. I rang the NCT breastfeeding counsellor for reassurance. She told us we needed to feed at least once every 2 hours. I wasn't reassured!

An afternoon ensued where we tried to sort out our perceived problem, the main one being that Olive doesn't like to wake up. Subtle persuation just didn't work so daddy began fairly agressive tickling, resulting in an awake but very upset baby, a quite frazzled daddy and consequently a tense mummy. We could just not fix this. You cannot make a baby feed and tho' we tried to calm down and relax it, we couldn't.

A long day and 7hours and 45 minutes passed before Olive fed at 10pm. Then again 45 minutes later. Then again 38 minutes later and again 67 minutes later. I know because we started to write it down. In the next 12 hours she fed 7 times.

Mum and daughter all well and incredibly contented again. Back to our lovely new family life. Phew!

I imagine a common problem and our first window into parenthood. An enormous basket of fairy cakes arrives with a card 'Congratulations, welcome to 18+ years of worry'. Indeed.

Now some more nice pictures above of Olive. We haven't had time to do the full photo shoot I am planning, the day just disappears, but one rare pic with her eyes open from the hospital and some good ones Lydia grabbed with her phone.

The bear is called Myrtle and was a gift from the Yorkshire Girls. Many thanks, she's v cute but Lydia and I noticed she can start to look a bit sinister. Look again, doesn't she seem to be watching you ??

Well, we laughed. Quite a lot actually.

here she is