But on Wednesday we had her party – ice cream and Just Dance.

We also had cake – well cup cakes, Ruth was busy making them and practising with her new icing petal cutters.

So rather that buy new ones I thought I would give Yorkshire puds a go in the silicon trays I have had for a long time but only used for muffins.

They turned out looking good but had soggy bottoms.

The girls made banoffi trifles and even did a dairy free version for Jonathan – chocolate brownies (Ruth’s excellent home-made ones, dairy free toffee sauce bananas, whipped cream (or vegan cream) and for some a little Baileys (well Lidl’s cheap version), they  were extremely yummy.

Ruth wanted a Mars bar cheese cake for her birthday cake this year.

And she got a cupcake stand for her birthday which she immediately filled with very yummy cakes – the chocolate ones have a vegan ganache on them.

This is the first really really successful loaf of bread I have made I used Paul Hollywood’s method and it was very very yummy.

This was the first year that we had lots of left over green tomatoes – I made 4 jars of green tomato chutney but still had some left over. So I used the method that my dad used to do to ripen them.  I wrapped them up in newspaper and left them in the dark for a while.  I looked at them every week or so much to my surprise a few more had ripened.

My Mum and dad with Jonathan and Rebekah

would answer “Peace and Quiet.”  I would then ask “what do you reeeeeally want for your birthday?” and he would again answer “I really want peace and quiet.”

Until I had children I didn’t get this, now when I think about what I’d like for my birthday I too would like peace and quiet!  However I am clearly more demanding than my dad because what I really want is a chance to spend a whole morning in bed, in peace and quiet, with a pile of books, a never ending supply of Earl Grey tea and some chocolate digestives, a packet of Thornton’s champagne truffles and fresh sheets (changed them yesterday to ensure this).

I didn’t get a bad approximation of that this morning.  A tray of tea arrived with an almond croissant and somechocolate digestives and I was treated to some gifts and cards too.  I had moderate peace in bed for an hour or so and was then disturbed by life going on (mostly in my head!).  Two good friends have popped round for a cuppa, I’ve had some lovely teenagers sitting around being nicely teenagerly in the house, two younger ones have played nicely and I’ve gained a few bottles and lid thingies to bottle some apples.  A cream tea is baking as I type and martin is making me a curry this evening.

All in all a lovely day

This is our birthday breakfast in bed – a family tradition, everyone seems to be enjoying themselves except Martin!

The campsite at Appuldurcombe has a number of advantages over the other sites – showers, washing up room, flushing toilets and above all a swimming pool.  This was our last camp of the year and we loved the fact that we were just relaxing with a couple of friends and just chilling out!

At the swimming pool this year:

And then here are some photos from the same campsite last time we were there (at Little camp) in 2005:

We managed to camp right by the lovely tree that the children had sheltered under when we were last there.

And here is Jonathan under the same tree 5 years ago.

Martin cooking and warming himself on the BBQ 2010

And here he is long ago BBQing with Russell.

General camping shots now:

Ruth and Livvy being sociable as usual:

Elaine and Nick’s lovely tent (with the tree behind) which outed us all as potential home educators – some HErs from the mainland were camped beside us (with another bell tent!!)

Becca munching brownies

And here are a few shots from 2005

Rebekah celebrating her birthday

And Bran

Think this is Livvy and Freya teaching us the amazing bumble bee song (sang around camp fires ever since).

General sitting about

And I even found one pic from the 2004 camp – not very flattering but it has Jonathan in our beloved sling so i’ll pop it in any way.

Above; me very unsuccessfully blowing out my candles

We had geat fun, played lots of messy games and ate yummy dinner. A very good b-day party!!