Edinburgh

Edinburgh was one of the highlights of our visit with Lawton and Debbie. We were lamenting the fact that we were missing our annual dive trip but I think we all agreed, Edinburgh is in the top 5 list of cities to visit. The trip started out like an MTV reality series. 4 adults and 5 kids in a foreign country. A 4.5 hour train ride to a medieval city where Scotch is the drink of choice. Let's see how they get along after 4 days. You get the picture.

The castle is one of the coolest we have visited and we have

punched the clock at a number of castles. The 1.5 hour wait to enter was lower on the highlight list but once inside, it rocked (no pun intended). This shot is from the bottom of the hill, just down from the Grassmarket. Here we are at Maggie Dickson's pub in the Grassmarket. This was our favorite stop. The Grassmarket was where all the hangings took place and it was a nice threat when the kids didn't behave.

Maggie Dickson was hung but when they put her body on a cart to take her for burial, the cobblestone streets caused a CPR effect and she was resuscitated.

Since she had already been punished by hanging to the death, she was free to go. Our Maggie liked this most of all.

We spent an afternoon on the Britannia, the royal yacht of Queen Elizabeth. Very cool tour. We also dove into the Scotch Whiskey experience in hopes of learning about how it is made and perhaps finding something we liked.

Despite all that we learned and tried, we came to the conclusion we are not

Scotch people. Cool picture with the collection though. Our best spots were dining outside on the High Street. Once the kids chowed down their food, they were off to watch the street performers. That let the grown-ups almost have some quality time. The Scottish Clans were in town so we got to watch the clans parade with more tartan and bagpipes than you have ever seen. Holyrood House was closed as Prince Charles was in town and there

were games going on. The queue was quite long and we skipped this one but you can see the house behind the kids.

We had other random adventures like a creepy tour of the old underground city on a street known as Mary King's Close. We nipped into the National Museum and spent a good bit of time on the Royal Mile.

SC Invasion

July saw an invasion from South Carolina. Lawton, Debbie, Hannah and Harris came for a couple of weeks and we got into all kinds of interesting adventures. Since they needed to reset their time clock, we took them to family day at the July Course in Newmarket. If you just read Vivian's blog on ladies' day, this was a different experience. She figured she knew how to bet and by the end of the day, MJ's college savings is all but gone.

Emmanuel College is part of Cambridge University and Debbie's uncle taught there during the summers for over 20 years. Here is a picture from the courtyard. We also enjoyed Punting on the Cam during our day in Cambridge. We took them to Wimpole Hall which

is a working farm with a great manor house. The best part of that is the hay bale maze. We hopped over to

Framlingham Castle for an adventure. Here are all the kids perched on the wall. I think they got in trouble for this one. Speaking of trouble, the real trouble came when MJ unwrapped the drum kit he got for his 14th birthday. Lucky for us, we had

Uncle Lawton

over to help put the whole thing together. He also gave MJ the quick lesson on how to play. While he was at it, he also proceeded to make our back door neighbor hate us by doing his best Tommy Lee impression for an entire day.

Our neighbors, the Downings, hosted us for a cookout one night and we got to engage in a girls versus boys Kubb battle. Kubb is a game that

originates from Sweden and is supposedly a Viking game. If you dig into the history though, you can't verify that. Regardless, it was an a very nice evening and as you might expect, the men won. Remember, boys rule and girls drool.

The find of the week came from Millets, our favorite outdoor store. They are the Team Crabby

t-shirts for Hannah and Harris. Uncle Lawton always takes us to the secret crabbing spot when we are at Edisto. We load up the crab pots and head home for a crab boil. He has been deemed Captain Crabby for his knack for finding the perfect spot and now his kids officially sport the team shirts.....

Newmarket Ladies Day

I attended Ladies Day at the Races with 15 other women. We were dressed for the occasion with hats and fascinators on top of our heads. Alison had to help me because I didn't know how to fasten my fascinator! We gathered at 11:00 am and then carpooled to the racecourse. It made our drive quite interesting. I couldn't turn my head without pulling the feathers that had attached to the roof and it was very difficult to see past Alison in the front seat with her wide, pink hat! We set up a tent and then set our table, complete with tablecloth and a vase of flowers, thanks to Jayne. They pulled out champagne glasses, as I was expecting Solo cups....We visited in the tent and admired everyone's outfit before heading into the race course gates.

Karen's husband recommended one of his horses for the first race so I bet 5 GBP each way (meaning that he would get 1st, 2nd or 3rd place) and I got a 22 GBP payout. I was off to a good start. We watched the horses parade, then

placed our bet and then went to the grandstand to watch the race. We decided to place bets on the 2nd & 3rd races and go back to our tent for lunch. We enjoyed eating so much that we missed 3 races but got back in time to bet on the 5th race, where once again I had a winner: 16.60 GBP I bet on a few USA horses too....got to be loyal to my homeland! I had a few losers but overall it was a great day!

We stayed in the parking lot until 5:30 and then went to Alix's home for a Bar-B-Q. Here is a picture of a group of the ladies but some of them have changed clothes and I am not in the picture. We had plenty of food supplied by all of us and the party lasted until 11:30 p.m. when I announced that the Skelton mobile was leaving. Many did not

want to walk home so they climbed in my car and I made the rounds through the villages dropping everyone off.

This is an annual event for these ladies and they make a full day of it! I am thankful to have been included and certainly enjoyed my first UK horse race, where I actually saw the horses unlike the Carolina Cup....