Happy Halloween!

We had our third annual Halloween party on Saturday. This year was 'fancy dress' as opposed to Halloween theme, so people could wear any sort of costume as long as it wasn't a typical Halloween one (i.e. witches, devils, monsters, etc were not an option).

We spent the day Saturday preparing for the party. Spent a long time in the store deciding on food. At home we cleaned and got the food ready, which took most of the day it seemed. I made guacamole from scratch. It had a bit of a kick to it; I think I'll use fewer chilis in the future! I also made some taco dip and brownies. John was in charge of all the other food like chicken, sausage rolls, pasta, mini quiches, etc.

We got a load of trick-or-treaters about 7:00. Shortly after, our guests started to arrive. There were some fantastic costumes. (There's a link to the pictures at the bottom of this entry.) The night seemed to go really quickly, although the last ones standing -- me, John, Steve Jackson, Jon Salmon, and John Martin -- didn't go to bed until 4.

As more people arrived it became harder and harder to hear the doorbell, so unfortunately Martin, Caroline, Rob, Jason, Dave, Ruth, and Steve got left outside at the front door for quite some time. Sorry guys! Almost as bad as leaving them out there for ages is the fact that our doorbell is wireless and picks up 2 or 3 other neighbors doorbells, so when someone rings their doorbell it makes ours go off. Well, it only stands to reason that the same happens at their houses, so I'm sure they were getting multiple doorbell rings on Saturday!

It was a really fun night and I had so much fun catching up with everyone.

The next morning everyone felt a little rough. Our cat Abbey kept dry heaving, and I looked in her mouth and saw that she had helped herself to some chicken scraps and had a bit of bone caught in the roof of her mouth. John and I tried to get the bone out ourselves, but she was having none of that so we had to take an emergency trip to the vet. The vet was so nice, especially considering how we were interrupting her day off with a call out. She tried to get it out three times before we decided to sedate Abbey because she was so stressed at that point. It didn't take long for her to zonk out after the sedative was given. The splint of bone was extracted successfully and she was brought back around with an antidote, which caused her to act like a zombie for the rest of the day. It was really weird. She would just sit there in a doorway and stare into space, and then go somewhere else and sit there for a long time and stare at nothing. She would have fit in at any given Phish concert quite easily. Click the picture above to see more Halloween photos.

Scott and Gemma get married!!

Scott and Gemma got married last Saturday, 22 Oct. It was a beautiful ceremony! Gemma looked gorgeous, and Scott didn't scrub up half-bad himself.

The wedding ceremony was lovely, and afterwards some pictures were taken outside the church. Gemma was very cute as she came over to greet me, Anita, and Helen; she was wearing a huge smile and said 'I'm married!!'

There was a crazy older woman who had come uninvited to the wedding. She is a member of the church and shows up at all the weddings which take place there. She definitely has a screw loose upstairs, but she was providing everyone some entertainment as she managed to stay very close to Gemma as she was getting pictures taken and greeting guests. As you look at the pictures you might see an old woman with a red hat in the background, that's her. She had to be ushered around a couple of times to get her out of the pictures. Then when Scott and Gem got in their car to go to the reception she was lurking around the door of the car. I have heard she tried to get in, but I can't confirm that.

The reception was in a beautiful manor house. First there were some pictures and canapes outside, then everyone had some drinks and chatted until dinner. Dinner was nice and the speeches were great. In the evening we all danced the night away.

CLICK THE PICTURE BELOW TO SEE ALL OUR PICTURES FROM THE DAY

GEMMA LIES! (too)

Gemma and I went to Helen's last night for a couple of drinks and some good chatting before Gem says the big I DO this weekend, and she had a surprising secret for someone who seemed shocked and dismayed by my water-shot-trickery at her hen do. Apparently Miss Horlick was also taking shots of water which she was passing as tequila! She was having her sister fix up shot glasses full of water and passing them off as tequila. This would be acceptable behavior if it weren't for the scolding I got the following day when she found out about my identical scam. I think it went something like, 'Mrs Goodwin! Did you take your tequila shot last night?! I have it on good authority that you were actually taking shots of water!' To which I, of course, first tried to pretend I couldn't hear and then responded by hanging my head in shame. Well, Miss Horlick, today it's time for you to pack your bags, because it's YOUR turn to go on a guilt trip!

My neighbors are crazy

Last weekend was good and a bit chilled out for a change. Saturday evening I went to one of my neighbors as she had some girl neighbors around. It was fun. They're all 10+ years older than me, with kids, but they're completely crazy. They gossip about neighbors and know things about the neighbors that make me think they have everyone's living rooms tapped.

We went for a walk around the neighborhood at about 1 am and they were stealing real estate signs out of people's pathways and putting them in front of other people's houses, so it looked like the latter had sold their house, and they were writing CHAV on people's car windows from the condensation. I'm sure lots of people woke up the next morning thinking some kids had been up to no good the night before! And they stopped a passing taxi to see how much he would charge to go to the Lime Pits, which is where Dogging is known to happen (I learned about Dogging last time I got together with these women). The taxi informed them that Thursday night was the night to go to the Lime Pits and there was nothing going on on Saturdays. This was a blessing, as I can't imagine the scene they were ready to cause had he taken them there!

Anyway, I left about 2:30 and was tired and tender on Sunday, but I managed to work at the stables from 2 - 5 which was fun and they were so glad that I came to help because they were short staffed, and I like it when I feel needed.

Nairobi and Safari Day 1

John and I went to Kenya on safari at the end of September. It was the holiday of a lifetime, definitely something we will never forget. Every day offered something amazing.

We had a nice flight out to Kenya, apart from a young woman in the row behind us and down a few seats who was screaming and throwing a fit in her sleep. I felt sorry for her when I realized she must have been having a night terror, but it was very alarming to be awoken on a plane in this day and age by someone screaming. Anyway, I don't know what ended up happening to her because her night terror seemed to keep going on and off for a few hours, and she left her seat and went goodness knows where for the rest of the flight. We never saw her again.

The flight was overnight, so we got to our hotel in Nairobi around 10 am. We went to visit a few sites there. The first was a bead factory where they employ exclusively single mothers. After that we went to Karen Blixen's house, from the book and film Out of Africa. It was a neat house/museum. They said she used to wear two hats when she went out of the house because she thought the sun would melt her brain. After a couple of days in the Kenyan sun out of the shad, I completely understood that line of thinking. Anyway, she was originally from Denmark, and John and I remember hearing about her at a museum in Copenhagen. Then we went to a giraffe rescue center, where we fed giraffes right from our hands. John put a food pellet in his mouth and the giraffe kissed him to get it! And I fed a warthog by hand.

The next day we left at 8:30 am. We headed off for our all day journey to Somburu. The safari vans hold 6 people, designed so each seat is a window seat, but we were only put in a van with one other couple. They were a very nice honeymoon couple from Birmingham (England) called Emily and Alan. Luckily we all really enjoyed each other's company, because in the end you spend every long journey, game drive, meal, and basically waking minute with those in your van. All the people in our larger group, about 17 in all, were fantastic people and we would have been happy sharing with any of them.

About 45 minutes into the journey our van got a flat tire. We stood on the side of the road while it was repaired. The drivers of the other vans from our group turned around to help, and it didn't take too long to repair. The whole time I was watching for a big snake to slither up to us, but luckily that fear was never realized.

We had lunch at a trout farm where we saw an animal I'd never even heard of called a hyrax sleeping in a tree. It was like a big guinea pig. There were also black-and-white colobus monkeys, which some people, including John, fed by hand. They got a little excited and one of them either bit or scratched one of the women from our group. She didn't seem very upset about it, but I would have been pretty worried if a monkey had caused me to bleed... in Africa.

After lunch more unbelievably bumpy roads to get to Somburu. We got to the game reserve at about 4 and went on our first game drive. They lifted up the roof and we all stood up during the ride.

Straight away I spotted some giraffes. Then we saw some zebras and impala. Then we came across a big herd of elephants. We couldn't believe how close they were. There was absolutely no need for binoculars or camera zoom, they were just right there eating away. There were loads of them, including some little ones. When a safari van stops for a while to watch something, it attracts other safari vans, who attract more vans, so there were a lot of vans admiring these beautiful elephants. Then we saw three cheetahs from a distance (compared to the elephants, although it was maybe 30 meters away). Then at the end of the drive we saw a pride of lions! They were spectacular. Again, there were loads of vans watching them. There were adult female lions, cubs, and growing males. No big males with manes. We saw them very up close, they even crossed in front of our van in order to lay in the middle of the dirt tracks. We had to drive round them to get out of the park!

The drive ended at 6:30. The lodge is in the game park, with no fencing, but the buildings are solid (not tents). We had a nice dinner with the other people from the larger group. Then we had an after dinner drink at the crocodile bar, where there are crocs who are from the park but come up in the evenings on the bank, with only a flimsy fence separating them from the people.

In that lodge everyone has to be escorted back to their rooms at night because of the lack of fencing and the animals roam freely. There was a big elephant just ahead of our room, and the escort had to scare him off with different loud noises. Eventually he moved into the trees so we could get past. But after a short time he came back and we watched him from our porch for a while before going to sleep (even though every time the guards walked past they told us to go into our rooms). We also heard barking. I asked if it was wild dogs or hyenas, but they said they were baboons and they were making so much noise because there was a leopard around.

Safari Day 2

The morning game drive was at 6:30. When we stepped out of the lodge we saw loads of baboons across the river, which was right in front of our room.

For the first part of the game drive we saw some monkeys, but not a lot else. We crossed the river into a different park called Buffalo Springs, and pretty quickly saw the most gorgeous leopard lounging on a log. He was absolutely amazing. John had been really anxious to see a leopard up to that point, so how lucky to see one out in the open and sitting still to pose for nearly unlimited pictures! We watched him for a while, then went not too far away and saw another leopard in a tree with a killed impala. Leopards can drag a kill three times their weight up a tree. It was really amazing to see it camoflaged in the tree with its breakfast. It was also amazing to see two leopards one right after the other, especially considering we only saw one other leopard during the whole trip.

We also saw more elephants, buffalo, water bucks, orex, baboons, dic dics, giraffe, and lots of different birds including buzzards and vulchers. We also had a great view of an elephant with her tiny calf. The calf was so little that even the driver was impressed with how young it was!

After the game drive and some breakfast (where Emily and I fed these irridescent blue birds some bread from our hands), we went to the pool. It was incredibly hot outside (brain meltingly hot). The pool was a little chilly, but the heat was so intense that even a wimp like me who takes seven hours to get to where the water reaches my thighs had to go in often for relief. A baboon came into the pool area but was chased off by an empoyee.

On the way back up to the rooms after swimming we passed a few monkeys who were on the path, as well as lots of mongooses (mongeese?).

The afternoon game drive started at 4, and early on we saw a cheetah lounging in the shade of a bush. He was just off the track, so much easier to see than the ones from the day before. Then we saw a male lion with a big, full mane. He was very impressive, and before we saw him we saw some impala looking very alertly in his direction. He had the attention of prey who were a good 100 yards away! We also saw a male and female ostrich with little tiny babies. Got some good views of close-up giraffes. And at the end of the drive we saw elephants pushing down a pretty big tree, which was a very cool sight.

After the game drive we went to the crocodile bar to watch the crocs be fed. They don't belong to the lodge, but are of course wild. But they definitely know when the lodge is going to offer some food, as they all slink up the bank about 20 minutes before and sit and wait. While we were waiting for them to be fed, we saw a leopard on the other side of the bank.

After dinner we went back to the crocodile bar and sat with other people from our group. We were all facing the river, and I managed to spot a hippo! We were so excited because we hadn't seen one yet. We were also excited because when we've seen any rarer animals on the drives it's been because there are loads of vans already there looking at it, and it attracts our attention. We'd not seen anything that causes a stir without someone already discovering it first. But we were the first to see the hippo, and loads of people came down to see it. Even the bartender hadn't seen the hippo in six months!

Safari Day 3

We left Somburu this morning to go to Treetops. Before we left we had breakfast, and a monkey got up on the empty table behind us and took some bread before he was chased away by some staff!

We had to go through the game park to leave, and on the way we saw 2 lions, very close up. The walked up to our van, and Jeffrey (our driver) said they were getting a little too close. We also saw a cheetah, from quite a distance.

As we left on the same extremely bumpy roads by which we had come, our exhaust broke. We made our way to the village outside the game park and sat in the car for about an hour while it was welded back together. I think we all felt slightly at ease being in a village which was probably not used to tourists. We had some people coming to the windows of the van to try to sell us jewlery, but not as many people as I had expected considering we were a captive audience. We all bought some jewlery for very cheap to get them to leave us alone.

We got to the equator and stopped for the demonstration the locals put on for the tourists (more ways to make money! They find endless ways). A guy did a demo to show how the water drains clockwise in the northern hemisphere, counter-clockwise in the southern (I might have mixed those up, who knows. I wasn't a very good student that day, I think the sun really had melted my brain), and doesn't spin around at all but goes straight down on the equator. This goes for regular drains like in the bath and sinks, toilets, and even tornados.

Treetops is a unique lodge in that there are two watering holes right outside of the lodge, and there are lots of observation desk all over the structure. You sit and watch the watering holes to see the animals that come to drink, instead of going on a game drive to find them. You can only take a small toiletries bag there because the rooms are tiny, just big enough for two single beds (and communal loos).

Treetops is where Queen Elizabeth became queen. She was there when her father died. 'She went up Treetops a princess and came down queen.'

There are four floors, each with several observation areas. When we first got there we went to the top observation deck and saw warthogs, buffalo, waterbucks, impala, and birds. Shortly after sitting to dinner the waiter told us there were elephants outside with babies. We all got up to go see and film them. There were some very big ones and lots of younger ones, including a tiny one which was only a few weeks old. The herd was gathering around the baby in a very tight group to start with. It wasn't until a while later when they had taken in their surroundings that they spread out.

After dinner there were even more elephants than the hour before. We went to the ground floor to view them. That was incredible because they were very, very close and we could get a different view of how massive and beautiful they are.

All night it was buffalo and elephants that were at the watering hole. Very briefly two spotted hyenas came around, but they left very quickly. John, Al, Emily, and I had been dying to see hyena because it's one of the things we haven't seen yet. I had gone to our room to get a blanket and had asked John if he wanted his. He said no, but as soon as I got up there he decided he wanted it so left for about 3 minutes to get it. And wouldn't you know as soon as he left I saw a couple of things moving by the vacant watering hole, got the binoculars and saw they were bloody hyena! Everyone who was on the top observation deck was looking at the other side at the elephants, and I kept trying to get everyone's attention but no one could hear me because you have to be really quiet so I was loudly whispering. By the time John had come the hyenas were out of the light. He got to see them a little bit in the dark, but they got scared away and never came back. We didn't see any more on the whole trip and never had good enough light in that brief viewing to take a picture of them. But at least we saw them. And obviously I was pleased that I was the first to spot them! :-)

I went to bed about 12:30, as nothing new came for a long time. John and Alan stayed up for another hour, and although the elephants and buffalo left, nothing else appeared. They got to see the moon rise over Mt Kenya, though.

Each room had a switch you can turn on to be alerted if any game is seen once you're in bed. If something is spotted and you have the alert switched on, a noise will go off in your room. We put that on but it didn't go off all night.

Safari Day 4

We left Treetops at 7 am and drove to Thompson Waterfalls for a short visit. It was a huge waterfall, but when we got out of the car we didn't know which way to go. Eventually I spotted it, and we all felt stupid for not having seen it since it was so massive!

From the waterfalls we stopped at the Great Rift Valley. It runs from Isreal to Mozambique. We got talked into buying some stuff from the locals, a neat decorative plate meant to be hung up, and a small stone rhino which has the map of the world drawn on it. We talked them down to 500 Kenyan Shillings for them both, which we didn't think was too bad since they seller had started at 800 ksh for just the plate. We though it was pretty nice stuff besides.

From there we went to Naikuru National Park. The park has hundreds if not thousands of flamingos on its lake. Absolutely beautiful. So many flamingos that the lake just looks pink because of the masses of flamingos crowding it. We also saw lots of rhino (completing our Big Five sightings -- Elephant, Lion, Leopard, Buffalo, Rhino -- top five most dangerous big game according to hunters, which is interesting since three of them are herbivores), the Rothschild Giraffe, lots of buffalo, zebra, impala, and giselles. We also saw our first eagle! I'd been hoping to see one and every large bird we'd seen I kept asking our driver if it was an eagle. I'd finally gotten the answer I was waiting for! It's a remarkable bird, huge and beautiful and elegant. No elephants at that park, but they do have lions, cheetahs, and leopards, but we didn't see any and neither did any of the other vans in our group.

We had lunch in a lodge in the park. Afterwards we watched some baboons playing nearby, one of which was a tiny little baby that was being carried around on his mom's back.

Then we drove to Lake Navasha, which is where we stayed for the night. We got on a boat ride around the lake as soon as we got there. There are hippos in the lake, so I thought we'd just see a hippo and that would be it. We saw loads of hippos, but we also saw 2 eagles (or it could have been the same one twice, I'm not sure), 2 Masai giraffes (that means we saw all three kinds, becuase the ones in Somburu were Reticulated giraffes. It's all to do with their markings, but those are the three destinct types), water buffalo, and lots of different birds.

There was a couple from one of the safari groups who managed to get stranded on the other side of the lake somehow, on foot. Our boat spent time trying to pick them up but couldn't get close enough, but a smaller boat managed to get to them. Our boat drivers were saying it was really dangerous for them to be where they were, because hippos are really aggresive towards humans and can be deadly.

As we were getting ready for dinner in our room, we kept hearing noises on the roof which were monkeys playing up there. Then we had a nice dinner with the rest of the group and got a well-earned good night's rest.

Safari Day 5

The next morning we went down to the lake with Emily and Alan and saw a hippo grazing, much closer and better viewed than the one we saw grazing while we were on the boat. Then, at 8 am we left Navasha to head to the Masai Mara National Reserve. It was another long, bumpy, dusty ride.

We went to the Masia village before going to the game park. They had traditional tribal dress on and did some dancing and singing for us. When we were in Somburu we had seen a tribal dance, and this was similar yet different. In Somburu they had made me get up and dance with them, which was pretty embarrassing, and during one of the Masai dances they take turns jumping as high as they can and John joined in for that dance.

They took us into one of their houses. The houses are made of cow dung which is dried in the sun. They have parents, children (around 6 per family), and grandparents all living in a tiny one bedroom hut. There are 2 sleeping areas in teh main bit, each between a single and double size. In the same space, in the middle, is a cooking area which hardly has room to sit around a small fire with an earthen pot for cooking. The fire is on all the time, and the hut was very, very hot because of it. The parents' bedroom was off the main room. It was very dark in the whole house. No windows or lighting.

They showed us how they make fire with sticks and straw. Then they took us to the 'market' which had loads of tourist stuff to buy, like what we had seen everywhere. They followed us around while we looked, and we were completely surrounded by many tribesmen who were very overbearing. We did end up buying a couple of little animal masks, more out of the pressure than anything. I'm so glad I don't live where you have to barter all the time because I'm completely rubbish at negotiating and walking away when it's not working!

We were told by our friends who had been to Kenya to take pens because the locals love them. So I had brought a couple of packs and we handed some out before we left the village. The kids went crazy for them. I don't know what they do with them, but it's true that the poorer Kenyans love their pens! We even had people a few days earlier come up to the windows of the van and ask for pens, and at the end of the trip we used them as tips a couple of times when we were low on money.

We got to the Masai Mara and went on our game drive. We saw a pride of lions, who had a sweet little cub and several older youngsters. One of them was starting to sprout a mane. He had the likeness of a teenager who has started to get some fuzz oon his upper lip.

There were loads and loads of carcasses and bones throughout the game park. Everwhere we looked there were more carcasses. The Masai Mara has less of the variety of Somburu, but much more quantity of the animals it does have, which means there is more prey to eat and more predators to eat them. Because it was the time of the wildebeast migration from Tanzania into Kenya, there were hundreds of wildebeast and other prey. We were told that the lions just start to get greedy and kill even when they aren't very hungry, just because the prey is there. Then they don't eat it all.

In addition to the lions and lots and lots of wildebeasts, we saw elephants, Masai giraffes, zebras (including a 'zebra crossing' where about 5 crossed in front of our van), impala, water bucks, birds of prey, etc. The lions were the main (mane) attraction of this particular drive.

At dinner there was a bat flying around. That undid the winding down the two glasses of wine had done, but was kind of funny.

Safari Day 6

We had to be up at 5:30 am for the hot air balloon ride. Neither of us got a peaceful night's sleep because we were worried that the wake-up call, my travel alarm clock, and John's alarm we'd set on his mobile would all fail because 1) John wasn't sure if he'd made the wake-up call for 5:30 or 6:30, 2) I kept dropping my alarm clock on the floor when I pulled stuff out of my suitcase and it kept falling apart when it hit the floor, and 3) John went swimming briefly the day before and forgot he had his phone in his pocket, so it got completely submerged and we weren't sure if it worked. But we got the call at the right time and were ready for pickup on time.

The starting point wasn't far away. When we got there they were starting to inflate the first balloon of three. It took about 10 minutes to get the balloon ready for takeoff. While we were waiting I was keeping my eye out for snakes. I didn't see any, phew!

The balloon was really cool. We saw the sunrise from it. We didn't really go too high at any point; we stayed low to have a better chance of seeing animals. We saw two lions walking toward their recent kill. We saw a jackal enjoying his kill. Obviously we saw wildebeasts, as well as buffalo, baboons, zebra, impala, gazelles, and waterbucks. We saw our first reedbucks and four grown topi with four topi babies.

We had what the pilot called a soft landing, but it seemed very hard with a couple of big bumps and a big tilt which seemed like it would topple us. Apparently it's not uncommon for the basket to tip over. I don't want to know what a hard landing is like!

After the ride we were driven to the champagne breakfast. That was good fun, chatting to everyone. Emily doesn't drink but had a couple of glasses of champagne, and she was drunk! That was funny.

They took us on a game drive after breakfast. We were in land rover type vehicles instead of our regular vans, and I sat in the front with the driver. I took the opportunity to ask him if there were many snakes in the Masai Mara, and he said, 'Oh yes! There are vipers, mambas, pythons... all the deadliest ones!' I'm pleasantly surprised we never saw any snakes at all.

That drive was brilliant. It started with a close-up encounter with two cheetahs who were lounging under a bush. Then we saw three sleeping lions and a couple of elephants, one with 'five legs' (he seemed to be very happy to see us). At the end we saw a momma cheetah with 5 little cubs! They were the cutest little fluff balls! She was on the move, so we got to see them jumping along behind her. That was fantastic.

After the drive we laid out at the pool. It was very, very hot, and the pool was really cold. It was so hot though that I actually got in all the way to my shoulders. Very brave!

We could hear the hippos from where we were laying out, and they sounded like they were on the other side of the bushes from where we were. We were able to confirm later, though, that they were pretty far away, just so loud that they sounded nearby.

After the pool we went down to a hut with a bar where we could watch the hippos who were cooling off in a pond and elephants eating plants and trees. We heard later that a lion showed up. The lodge has no fencing, so the animals from the Masai Mara are free to enter as they please. There were also monkeys on the path down to where we were watching the hippos.

On the afternoon drive we saw some elephants with little ones. There were some brush fires we could see in the distance, and Jeffrey said they were happening in Tanzania and were controlled fires to try to control the migration.

We then came across three lions, two females and a male. Jeffrey said they were preparing to mate, so we stayed and watched them for over 1/2 hour to try to see them mate. They never did while we were there, but we did see a lot of foreplay by way of tail flipping, rubbing against each other, growling, and exposing bellies. They were probably smart lions and waited until the last bus had left before mating.

Up in the bushes in the hills we saw a pride of sleeping lions, including several cubs. They were well hidden though, and we didn't get a very good glimpse.

After that we saw a female lion with three little cubs. When we got to the them the female (adult) was on the move, and she came right to our van and then around it. This caused the cubs to follow her, again right in front of the van. They were very cute and playful. It wasn't long until there were at least a dozen vans following them. We decided to move on and found three lions a little way off. Because everyone was still watching those cubs, we got to watch these lions completely on our own. They were out in the open, chilling out, so we got a good view.

From there it was time to head back. We saw 2 jackals who looked like they were going through some mating rituals. We also saw the most gorgeous red sunset on the way home.

After the drive we went down to the hut bar to watch the hippos. There were about 17 of them in the pond. We saw 6 or 7 of them get out andstart grazing once it got dark, including 2 little ones.

The next day was the last day. We were sad to leave, but it was such a fantastic trip that we didn't feel any extra days could have improved it. We drove to Nairobi and hung around the hotel for a few hours before our overnight flight back to London.

CLICK THE LEOPARD TO SEE ALL THE PICTURES FROM SAFARI













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Gemma's Hen Do

Gemma had her bachelorette party this weekend. It was in Brighton, and Helen drove me and Anita to it after work on Friday. Gemma had 10 girls there to help her celebrate. I knew or had at least met all of them but 2.

Gemma was adamant that she didn't want to wear a veil or have to wear anything silly, but since she's the hen she doesn't really get to say what she has to do, so we put a veil on her before we went out on Friday night. But since she had to look silly we all wore headpieces that said Hen Do on them that lit up.

First we went to a bar for some pre-dinner drinks. Anita gave Gem the task of having to get a kiss on the cheek from boys through the alphabet. At first Gem was really resistant, but by the letter D she was all fired up to find the next name.

We went to Mamma Cherrie's for dinner. That restaurant was on Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares this year. It was really good food, very spicy. They dressed up the table with all sorts of hen do paraphanelia, and she had a cake which had lots of naughty chocolate bits on it.

After dinner we danced in the hotel bar for a while and then called it a night.

Saturday morning we went on a cruise along the Brighton coast. It was really rough and choppy, which I found quite exciting and fun, but poor Helen and Anita don't like boats and found it scary. Even though it was a fairly big boat, we still got quite a bit of spray and most of us ended up being pretty wet.

After the boat ride we got some fish and chips on the pier and then went shopping through the lanes. We found a busker and made Gemma play tambourine with her. She also managed to do a little Irish jig while she was performing, which completed one of her given tasks.

During the evening we went to dinner at a Tex Mex restaurant, where we were given shots of tequila. Gemma managed to take 3 or 4, and Anita helped me avoid taking mine during the group shot-taking by pouring water into in empty shot glass. Good thing it was clear tequila! I got away with it that night, but someone dobbed on me the next morning. I hate tequila! Then we went on to the club. We were all dressed in red except Gemma who was told to wear silver, and we had sparkly cowgirl hats. It was a lot of fun. Lots of dancing and making Gemma do dares. It was really easy to spot everyone if you got separated, thanks to the hats.

Click the first picture to see more pictures of the bridal shower from last weekend and the hen do.

Since Michelle Goodwin was at the hen do too, I managed to catch a ride with her up to her mom's, where John was helping her celebrate her birthday. I hadn't arranged to go there but it worked out since I hadn't driven, so instead of going back with Helen and Anita I went back with Michelle to Madelines, and then home later with John. We had a good visit and went to the pub for lunch. Then home to talk to the Williams' about their new baby!

Robby Blair has arrived!

I'm an auntie again! Dusty and Tami had their second son on Friday via C-section. Mommy and baby are doing well. They left the hospital yesterday. He was 6 lbs 13 1/2 oz, 19 1/2 in. long. Click the photo to see more.