Grandparents' Tea Party

Aleah's class, and the class below her (Nursery & Reception) held their Grandparents' tea party on Friday.
Aleah was privileged to have 3Grandmothers attend with her! Nanny La-la (her great grandmother),
Nanny (Dean's mum), and Grandma (my mother!)!!! How very special it was to have them all there.




The classes sang some songs around a 'mini-beast' theme. (That's insect/bugs for you USA'rs)




The children then took their grandparents to the craft tables to do some 'mini-beast' themed crafts. Aleah and her Grandmothers make a Ladybird (aka Ladybug for USA).




Then we all enjoyed some lovely tea and cake that had been provided by the mothers.
It was supposed to be held in the nursery garden but due to the rain had to be brought indoors to the school hall.

Rooftop Garden

We've added to our rooftop garden! The 3 youngest wanted to be in charge of some plants of their own so I found 3 unused plastic bins, we bought some soil, and some flowers and off we went.
I also purchased some herbs, baby corn, peas, sweet pepper, and butternut squash - that had already been started. Aleah and I have also planted seeds for baby carrots, beetroot, radishes, and various types of salad.





We did our planting in the kitchen. It was quite windy outside and our roof space doesn't have rails around it.




Aleah was very helpful sweeping up all the misplaced soil.

Dean's Mum has also picked up a few goodies for us from 'car-boot' sales. We now have-

Strawberries - there are now about a dozen strawberies growing!!



and tomatoes!

This is what our garden looks like now...


...yes, we even have a mini scarecrow! It seems to have actually helped the pigeons and the crows from eating our 'goods'!

Busy Weekend

Hi all! Dean and I are off to Wales with a BUNCH of other youth leaders from all over the UK for a training weekend in order to prepare for the summer conference that we help out with. CONTAGIOUS is a fantastic, heavy duty Bible conference for teens (14-18) that will take place in August.(They also have a conference for 11-14's which Abby will attend again this year!) This weekend is going to full of Bible study and prep for the conference. It'll be great to see old friends and meet new people as well.

We could only do this with the help of the great support team we have here by means of family and friends. Our kids are going to be shipped out to various family/friends for the weekend. I know that they will all have a great time and be well looked after. It would still be great to have the rest of our family/friends praying for us as we are apart. We are leaving Friday afternoon and will return Sunday evening.

I do have some other things I want to post next week - so as soon as I can, after all the unpacking etc I will post some of the things we have been up to here at the Dryden house. Stay tuned!!!

Easter

Easter has come and gone. My fridge is filled with chocolate Easter eggs and parts of Easter eggs. Soon we'll be using the chocolate remains for baking - if my family ever tires of eating chocolate.

This year we made gift bags of Resurrection Eggs for all the families in the church. We used 7 eggs to countdown the week before Resurrection Sunday. Each plastic egg had an object or a picture of an object and some scripture to share part of the Easter story from God's Word. My kids really enjoyed opening an egg each evening as we had family devotions and reading about the next part of the Easter story. It really helped to keep things in perspective and hopefully we have a new family tradition.

Because we always get together with Dean's family on Easter Sunday for a meal and a chocolate egg hunt, we do not get our kids chocolate eggs for Easter. Our kids are pretty much guaranteed 3 eggs - which is really more chocolate than they could eat. Dean and I used to get the kids a 'spring-like' gift...kite, skipping rope etc. Last year I started doing my own Easter egg hunt. I made up some coupons/vouchers for things like: 'get out of one chore free', 'meal of your choice-from our kitchen', 'breakfast in bed', '1 glass of diet coke at dinner'....etc.
I also put some pennies and five pence pieces in the eggs for the little ones.
I hide these all over the house and off they go! Last year I made sure that everyone got one of each voucher by colour coding the eggs. This year I only differentiated between the older ones and the younger ones. Solid colour - younger & Multi coloured - older. Once all the eggs were found they could bargain and trade for vouchers that they wanted.


Getting ready to hunt. Aleah is making sure her eyes are open and looking!


Sam thinking about his next move!


Levi making a discovery.


Abby scoping out the kitchen.

City Living

Aleah is my little gardener. She loves a bit of dirt and a spade or two. This is our little make-shift garden...a couple of window boxes.





I'm hoping to get something to actually plant in these window boxes soon. For now, Aleah is happy to just move the dirt around a bit. We have to plan these gardening sessions carefully...Levi has to be asleep because the garden is outside our kitchen window - on the roof of the church.





My clothes dryer broke this week! It's not too bad since Dean has kindly hung a washing line across the roof. I hang laundry and Aleah gets to garden.

I'm back!

I have just been challenged by a friend to keep blogging - it lets our friend and family into our lives. Since we live far from so many of our friends and family I realized that I need to be a bit more intentional about blogging. I am hoping to take up the challenge and be more consistent. Pray for me ...and poke me if I start to slack again.

Here are a few pictures to help sum up the last few months in the Dryden household.

JANUARY - Aleah started Reception (She has to wear a 'proper' school uniform - tie and all)



































FEBRUARY - Samuel's 10th Birthday


























MARCH - Chickenpox Fun
Aleah and Levi both got chicken pox. Aleah was pretty spotty while Levi had a total of 7 spots! We did lots of indoor activities and were happy to have friends that had already gone through chicken pox and were willing to coome over and play with us!

Back to Normal!?!

This is the first week since Christmas that things should be 'back to normal'!
Not sure if normal is a word that can actually be used in our house, but it basically means we are all doing the things we usually do.

Kids are all back at school for the first full week. (Abby and Sam started last Wednesday, and Aleah had to wait til Friday!) Aleah is in Reception now - she has to wear a pinafore, white button down shirt, and a tie! (SO CUTE!) Of course the most important thing for her is that her tie is showing...so instead of wearing inside her dress and cardigan she MUST pull it out for all to see!

Piano lessons, ballet, youth groups, playgroups...and HOMEWORK!!!

Levi is a little lost without everyone although he is enjoying a little more one on one time with me!

I'm sure our schedule will have it's interruptions/challenges as the week goes on - life wouldn't be as much of an adventure with out them. For now, this Mother is quite happy to have a little 'normal' for a little while at least.