Five little ducks

On a recent holiday to York, Daughter 1 and her husband took the children to Pizza Hut. This is a rare event - indeed I think the first time they'd been - and the children thought it was wonderful. Pizza! Chips! Salad. Unlimited drinks! Unlimited ice cream! So Big Grandson has been suggesting that we might try the Edinburgh Pizza Hut and we did this on Friday. Big success. Pizza! Chips! Salad. Unlimited drinks! Unlimited ice cream! (Fortunately they were quite full by the time it came to the ice cream.)

"We could do this every Friday," suggested Big Grandson, optimistically.

Yesterday we went up north to see Son and family. The children have been unwell with colds and coughs but Medium Granddaughter was quite lively. We had a game of Connect 4 and I decided to try hard for a while - and then to let her win. (She's three and three months.) I did try, and before I could stop trying - she won. Hmm. I wouldn't say that games like that are my strength, but she's three! Must try harder. Our niece was a huge Connect 4 addict when she was about five, and the family spent many collective hours playing it with her one Christmas, so I sent her a photo of Medium Granddaughter playing it and to our amazement, our niece didn't remember anything about her addiction, which was presumably only a temporary, seasonal thing. That was time we'll never get back... .

Some painting also happened.

Also some admiration of her little brother, who is now 6 months, sitting up and chatting volubly if not comprehensibly.

We also went to Dundee Science Centre, where Medium Granddaughter examined a dinosaur with that orange magnifying glass that you can't quite see.

This morning, we chatted with Small Granddaughter over the phone, and watched her pretending to have a nap in her cot, with her quilt pulled over her. She sang us a whole verse of "Twinkle, twinkle, little star". I don't want to overemphasise her genius - it wasn't pronounced precisely right all the time, nor was it exactly in tune - but it was quite recognisable. You know, if you knew it in the first place. Which we do.

 And this afternoon we went to The Yard with the Edinburgh grandchildren, where you see Big Grandson playing with bubbles and Big Granddaughter dressing up as a pirate. "A good one."

I was just wondering what on earth I did with myself Before Grandchildren but then I remembered: I worked. I worked very hard. That seems like a different life now. This one's probably better, but the snag is that we're getting rather old - Mr L is 71 and I'm 69. We must try to survive, so that we can see these lovely children grow up a bit.