As I am nearing the end of my fourth decade, my little sister, Holly,  has just started hers.  This weekend was all about helping her celebrate.  Which means it was an excuse for my lovely  family to get together.

We gathered on Friday to celebrate Harry’s 12th birthday and continued celebrating all weekend.  So much to celebrate and be grateful for.  This all took place in and near beautiful Chichester, where Holly lives.

This amazing structure is known as “The Crown” and sits at “The Cross”.

We had a sunny and sandy morning at West Wittering beach.

We set up camp in the sand dunes and variously relaxed, chatted, swam, read the paper,

sunbathed,

and explored.

Holly’s birthday party began in the afternoon.  In honour of the Olympics and being practical and inclusive of the vast number of children her friends and family have, we had afternoon tea with Olympic themed activities laid on.

Wellies were wanged, races were run, tricycles were tricycled non-stop for about 8 hours by little legs.  The volleyball was always popular with some rather chaotic teams and rules.

We took time out to enjoy a cream tea.

I am hopeless at remembering to take photos at parties.  With so many lovely people to talk to (my sisters and their families, Grandpa Ian and my cousins and their families) I forgot all about the camera.  This is the only photo I managed of the people at yesterday’s event!

The afternoon morphed in to the evening when we had a barbecue and the children kept playing and playing.  The party ended with a live band.

These 2 cousins had an amazing weekend together, as we all did.

I started today with granola, pumpkin seeds, mixed berries and yogurt.

My food consumption over the weekend would not win a healthy eating award but it was not too disastrous.  After breakfast we all went to Holly’s for morning coffee and another catch up.

Quite incredible how we all have so much to say 🙂

At home I made a very simple supper.  Partly because I was too tired to do anything else and partly because our cupboards were bare. Vegetable rice

and Thai green curry.

It hit the spot.

So I hope my little sister has a wonderful fourth decade.  We certainly enjoyed helping her make a good beginning to it.