Shopping and memories

With the new school term started and the days getting shorter its been feeling very autumnal and then suddenly today we were back to summer with a really hot sunny day.

When we woke up it was drizzling so a shopping trip to buy all the bits and pieces needed for university seemed a good idea. By the time we had found the cheapest kitchen stuff (if you are in the same position Wilkinsons is very good) the weather had changed and the sun shone in a cloudless blue sky. We finished shopping, bought sandwiches and stopped for a picnic on the way home.

The Vyne is our nearest National Trust property. When we moved into our house, our eldest was eleven months and crawling everywhere. As our house was newly built the garden was just soil and builders debris so there was nowhere for him to crawl outside. That first summer we spent many afternoons here, I brought a blanket and some toys and we set up camp in the shade of a tree. How quickly the time has passed.

We walked round the grounds, through the gardens, beside the lake and through the woods following the same route we have taken so many times before. We even stopped to look for conkers under the tree that we searched under every year when the boys were younger and conker collection was an important event.

Its amazing how many memories are tied up in a place visited over many years, especially as children take in so many details and remember things adults are too busy to notice.

It was a lovely day, a bonus day really because we didn't expect the sunny summer weather and when we set of this morning we were just going shopping but then the day turned into a summer picnic and a pleasant trip down memory lane.