Weekend for the boys.

Very proud parents this weekend, Lewis and Jack had their Karate gradings and both passed. Jack is now an Orange Belt with yellow stripe and Lewis is a full brown belt - he passed with Distinction which is quite unusual - it's as high as you can get at a grading.

Lewis has to go through the routine of his combinations and then a long kata but this is nothing to the end where he has to fight two opponents at the same time. He'd taken a bit of a battering in a different fight and wasn't feeling too good, so when he had to fight we were a little anxious but with encouragement he got through it. It's all good for the character building though so he will certainly benefit in the long run. I have now been uploading the video of the fights onto Youtube and these can be watched now on http://youtube.com/juliandark01

We're really proud of them both - so well done boys. Checkout Youtube anyway, there's a funny video of Jack and some geese!

Sad end to the day...

Well they found Ben last week after about three weeks in the river, it wqould have been awful had they just given up. Today was his cremation and then a celebration of his life at the local church near his school which we went to along with half of Wolvercote and all his scholl mates.

It's all incredibly sad what has happened and there is no way to ever imagine how you would act as a parent to the event of losing your child so young. Liz and Rob have been incredibly strong and even today with the service, speeches by them and the school mates and a tribute PowerPoint display was testiment to that strength that I just wouldn't have.

It was all capped off with tons of free donuts which were Ben's favourite. I hope I never have to go through something like that, it was bad enough losing Grandad.

Golf Lessons

Well, it begins...Natasha it obecome a golf widow shortly, but it's her own fault it has to be said. For Xmas she advised my mum to get me golf lessons for my present and I had the first lesson this morning.

Went really well, although it started a bit ropily to be honest. I said I was left handed and we tried the warm up and swing and hitting a couple of balls left handed and it was pathetic to behold. So we tried right handed, first three shots pinged as sweet as you like. So we reverted back to left handed and guess what, first three shots pinged as well. The pro just looked at me and said we should spent half our training time on left and then right handed work!!!

We plumped on deciding I am left handed though...I got more consistent as the time went on and stayed out with some remaining balls at the end of the session. Enjoyed it and hopefully will take it further. I have more lessons booked but need to get some practice in before the next lesson. My body is killing me though, my shoulders are going to be stiff in the morning.

Let it snow...

It only lasted two days but is was brilliant snow - well over 6 inches deep and perfect for snowballing. As expected the whole of England ground to a halt and the kids were off school. It's all gone now but they loved it and we got some good photos of them playing in it.

Managed to get over to the meadow as well. Snowmen everywhere! It's all gone now unfortunately and we are back to normal.