2006 April to June

In April Andrew was 8. Mum and dad came up for a visit and purchased us an Historic Scotland card. This gets us in to all the castles around here. We visited Direlton Castle and Stuart may as well have been in Disneyland as they were having a demonstration of kights in shining armour. Stuart got to have a sword fight with one and later with some little kid in the audience and decapitated him!






I've started entering an online photo competition through DigitalPhotographyChallenge and this one of my mum and dad did ok.




May was an interesting month. Stuart was 5 and we had a party at Junglee Fun, Dunbar's answer to Whacky Wharehouse. It's the same idea where you feed the kids loads of sugary foods and then let them loose in a cage full of balls, slides and most importantly padded walls. The 3 of them did the Edinburgh 'Run for Life' race in Edinburgh.



All of us go to Dunbar Running Club and the Junior section is strong and gives the kids loads of chances to race and make some wee pals! May however was dominated by Emma's mum being taken very ill with what is commonly known as the flesh eating disease. Within hours of getting it she had to have substantial parts of her leg removed...her organs packed up and yet remarkably she pulled through. I won't put any pictures here because it's grim, but if you want to see how grusome it is then GoogleImage search 'necrotizing fasciitis' and have a bucket to hand.

June continued to be dominated by Emma's mum who eventually came out of her coma and began to make a speedy and miraculous recovery. Loads of local things were happening like Dunbar Civic Week. Basically they have a parade and crown the gala queen. Here's Andrew having a fight with the fire service on the parade.



I was asked to speak at the Dunbar Churches Together open air service down at the harbour. I was accompanied by the Salvation Army band and I was pleased to do the whole thing because I had recently been teaching children about John Wesley who often preached in the open air in Dunbar. So much so, the first ever Methodist Church in Scotland was formed here and still exists. I did feel a little bit vulnerable and wished I had brought an umbrella when I noticed the seaguls flying overhead. Our Jane and Andy were also up visiting in June and they were staying in a cottage down the harbour.

Dunbar is one of those places where they still do traditional stuff like gala's. I had the pleasure of opening the church fete...at the same time England had their first game in the world cup..it was a quick opening and I managed to catch the second half. Andrew had his flag hanging out of his window and despite reports of English kids getting beaten up in Edinburgh he kept it there. Only a couple of neighbours complained, but that's probably because Kellie Place is like little England full of us no good incomers! Another local tradition was the Sunday School day out to Carberry Towers. It was as traditional as you can get, with egg and spoon races, sack races and stuff like that. The church here has played a big part in helping us settle down. Here's the kids in some of these events.




Emma went on a flying visit to Manchester to see Take That and came back the same day. Apparantly Take That are staying here in Dunbar as I write this. A new posh hotel has opened up and rumour has it they are stopping there for a few days. Emma started to help out in the church youth club. It's mostly kids that don't go to church who are involved.