Better late than never!

So.... a little later than intended but here follow some photos of the very lovely, but VERY HOT day we had in London last Sunday. We got up and at 'em first thing on Sunday morning so that we could be in South Ealing for 10am! Yikes... and it was 26 degrees at that time. (I've got a feeling I might harp on a bit about how hot it was... sorry.) So we arrived and went to the service where not only did Nick become a Godfather to Joseph, but managed to show his new Godson up on first outing! The Curate made the foolish mistake of asking for a volunteer to come out to the front to play the generation game. And the rest is history as they say. Two of my favourite quotes;
1) about a batik of Jesus - "Something about Jesus"
2) another item he really SHOULD have remembered - "Oh yea, a PhD thesis, should have remembered that one really!"

So that was that. Back to chez Gaskell for a spot of lunch and some more sweating (you can only imagine the heat, the car said it was 32 when we got in at about 3pm!). Followed by an impromptu visit to Uncle Pete and Aunty Courtney, which changed from saying hello and having a drink to tea for the girls and lots of train spotting, a little bit of hiding and guess what? Some more sweating! (Don't know how hot it was by then!)

So we finally got children into PJs and bundled them into the car for the journey home, all tired and VERY HOT!
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So that was then. The week was fairly uneventful, bought a paddling pool, which the girls enjoyed, la, la, la.......

Then, yesterday John, Lucy, Ella and Thomas came to see us primarily for John to help tidy up some bits in the house. Picture the scene. Everything's running along smoothly, children playing nicely, Nick standing around looking useless, asking for descriptions of what "that" tool looks like so that he can pass it to John who's toiling away putting up a new shed door, screwing sockets back into walls, blah, blah, blah.

Around 8pm They decide they'll have a look at what's underneath the dodgy laminate flooring in the kitchen. I almost wish they hadn't. Pictures to follow, won't go into too much detail in case you're eating, suffice to say the waste pipe which is boxed into the corner of the kitchen has been weeping ikky "wet stuff" onto our kitchen floor for years and flooded the downstairs. We'll keep you posted but we're thinking the entire ground floor may have to come up!!!!! Fun and japes!