Wales

We're trying to make the most of our 3-4 day weekends. Hard to believe a year has already gone by since living here. Planned a somewhat last minute trip to Northern Wales (only a 5 hour drive). Really, it was like a month in advance but it just so happens to be term break for the British schools so a lot of places were booked and prices of everything are double what they usually are. We found one cottage that didn't jack up their prices and it ended up being the perfect place for us to stay!

It was a terraced home. Ours is the one on the far left....with the red car in front of it. It had a beautiful mountain stream running right in front of it as well.

 

The mountains were right behind the home. There was a steam train railway along the mountain. We heard the train a couple times but never saw it. There was also a mountain path behind the house but we never got to check it out. It rained 3 of the 4 days we were there. :( We still had one and a half days of nice weather. There was so much rain that everything was muddy though. We made the most of it and had a great time. It is so beautiful there! We may have to go back!!

 

Since it rained so much the first day we were there all of my pics are on my phone......so not the best quality.

 

Our first stop was Ty Hyll, the "Ugly House", in Betws - y- coed. Don't ask me how to pronounce any of that. The Welsh language does not make any sense to me. I can't tell you how many times we were talking to people to ask for directions or whatever and Derek and I would just smile and nod, walk away and we both would say, "did you get any of that!?!" Anyway, the Ugly House is not ugly at all. There is supposedly a 4 lakes walk that starts somewhere behind the house, and that is what we were planning to do, but we couldn't find it.

 

 

Then we went to Swallow Falls. Breathtakingly beautiful!

 

We had dinner at the Stables. There was no available seating inside so we found the last semi dry/covered table that was outside!

 

Sunday morning/early afternoon was gorgeous out! We made our way to Conwy.......walked the city wall, found Great Britain's Smallest house, and then explored the castle.

 

Walking the walls was kind of stressful. There wasn't much to keep anyone from falling, especially kids. Blake is at the age where he is hitting his terrible twos and he does not want to listen, loves to run off, hates being restricted, etc. He wasn't happy to have someone constantly holding his hand. If we let go for a second he was off!  I am not a fan of heights either and there was one point where we were up quite high......little to no protection to keep us from falling.......I just about had a panic attack! I was shaking and had to take deep breaths. Derek was just laughing at me!

 

 

 

 

The views were awesome though.

 

 

Then we made our way down and found Britain's Smallest House.

 

 

Blake didn't care about the house. There were boats in sight!

 

Next we went to Conwy Castle. The kids had fun solving the kids challenge (even got a badge afterwards for completing it!) There were some spectacular views from this castle.

 

 

Here is a view of the wall from the castle You can see the highest point (scary) in the background.

 

After we left Conwy castle we set out to try and find an amazing abandoned castle. We found it from afar......just couldn't figure out how to get to it. It would have been so neat to get up close to it. At about that point it started raining.....and rained for the rest of the day. We decided to go back to Betws y Coed and hike to Fairy Glen. On the way we went through this town and across this bridge. It's hard to tell in the picture but the bridge is v-shaped. You cannot see if another car is coming from the other direction and there is only room for one car to go across! If you get to the top and there is another car one of you has to back all the way up! Luckily we didn't run into a car.

 

Fairy Glen

 

The next day we finally had great weather! It didn't rain until we were back home and in bed! We had booked a steam train ride up to the top of Mt Snowdon before the trip. So glad we did as it was the only available day and time slot left while we were there! Since it was in the middle of the day we had to find something to do beforehand. We went to the village of Portmeirion. It is a village right along the ocean that was designed to look like a little Italian village. So pretty!

 

 

 

Next up was the train ride to the top of Mt Snowdon!! It's a 2 hour round trip train ride......or you can hike it. Takes about 6 hours round trip to do that -- probably without kids! ;)

 

 

 

 

 

 

After we got back down we walked to another castle. Dolbadarn Castle.

 

The next day was time to head home. It was rainy, of course, but we wanted to get one last hike in. We went back to the Ugly House to try and find the 4 lakes walk again.....still couldn't find it. We did find another hike and just went for it. It ended up being really fun!

 

We ran into this guy.

 

The hike led us through a field of sheep.....

 

and along a pretty river

 

It was a great trip!!!!!!!!!

 

If you are wondering how the kids keep entertained on our excursions.......this pretty much sums it up.

Mother's Day

I had a good Mother's Day. Little stressful at first as it was our first week at our new church. I always get nervous whenever I go anywhere or do something new. The kids weren't thrilled about going somewhere new and don't understand why the sudden change so I was nervous for them too. But........it was great! Kids adjusted extremely well.

I did wake up to breakfast, flowers, a card from Derek and he even printed out pictures for the kids to color!

 

The pictures on the right are ones the girls did at school. Avery was VERY excited to give hers to me. When I opened it she asked me if I was going to hang it in my room. She said I need to hang it up so I can "memorize" her! :)

 

This gave me a good laugh.....from Avery

 

 

I also got an email from Avery's teacher with a list of all the students and why they love their Mom. "Avery loves her Mom because she helps her with her homework."

 

Allie's teacher sent out this video.

 

 

Teacher Appreciation Week

I went a little bit simpler with gifts this year and I think they turned out great! The girls enjoyed helping with the design and colors for each of their teachers. Threw in a couple gift cards and.....done!

Easter, Broken Bones & Castle Acre Priory

We didn't have a very exciting Easter. I still wasn't feeling well. I felt bad that we didn't have anything for the kids so last minute Saturday night Allie and I went to the store and got some candy to put in the eggs, picked out 2 small things for each of the kids and got some eggs to color. I guess they now know that there is no Easter bunny. Funny that there weren't any questions asked though.

After church we did an indoor egg hunt since it was raining outside. I didn't take any pictures because our house was a mess (remember I had been sick for 2 weeks at this point!) It's a miracle they found all the eggs! Then we colored eggs (and took the picture a whole week later!)

 

To help make up for the pretty uneventful Easter I took the girls to a free craft event on base the next weekend. (Derek and Blake spent some quality time together grocery shopping)

 

 

The week after vacation Derek finished the playhouse! I think it looks great especially since it only cost us the hardware for the door, the house #, and the clearance paint.

 

 

It's hard to get a good pic of the inside.

 

 

Last week Derek broke his hand playing football. It happened as he was catching the ball, then he fell and his finger just snapped all the way back. He didn't drop it though.......and he kept playing and went on to catch 2 more touchdown passes. He had to get 3 screws put in.

 

 

 

This afternoon was such a beautiful day we wanted to get out and enjoy it. There is an old castle and priory not too far from our house that we hadn't been to yet so we decided to go enjoy the day walking around the grounds.

 

Castle Acre Castle & Priory