Sheffield

My best friend from school, who I haven't seen for a number of years, contacted me via a networking site.

He's living with his family in Sheffield, and invited us to come and visit last weekend. We went across on Friday night. Frodo and Samwise always enjoy 'sleepovers'. They were a little unsure beforehand about having to play with girls - but were fine with this when they got there.

A weekend of good food, wine and catching up.

We took the children swimming at Ponds Forge Leisure Pool on Saturday afternoon. This has a wave machine, and a "Lazy River" i.e. a current that circles the pool, where you can grab a float and go round and round. Both of these were new experiences for Frodo and Samwise. Frodo who had been swimming in a real river on Tuesday, particularly enjoyed being carried away by the current.

Frodo and Samwise were introduced to Club Penguin. I had to give parental authorisation to two accounts that were created for them.

Some more old friends came over from Leeds and joined us on Saturday evening, so more food, wine and gossiping into the early hours.

We had a barbecue on Sunday, and finished off with chilling out to the third Pirates of the Caribbean film.

My younger Sister lives a few streets from where we were staying, so we popped over to her house for a cup of tea, before we headed back home across Snake Pass.

So a great Summer weekend that came out of the blue thanks to the interweb - we'd almost lost touch. It's been a good year for reunions.