Last evening on the island

We arrived safely home last night from our three week stay back home at my parents'.

How can three weeks pass by so quickly? 

A few nights before we left David (5) said to me, 'I thought we were going to stay for lots and lots of beds, like 20 beds?' I told him that we had and he replied, 'Are you sure? It doesn't feel like it!'

So it wasn't just me.

On our last evening my beloved and I lined up some tin cans and had a bit of a shooting competition.

We're quite the romantics, I know.

His aim was far better than mine, but my excuse was that the gun was quite heavy, and a bit rusty too, and obviously designed for a man. Still, I did manage to hit the target, as you can see from the fourth photo.

I always love being home on the island and a bit sad to leave.

However, once we get home to our own wee house, I'm glad to be home here too. I think three weeks was about long enough to be away.

And look what I found waiting in the garden when we got back.

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Another day, another beach..

Today's beach is one of my favourites on the island.

The one in the village my dad is from, and where we spent childhood holidays with my grandparents. For more photos of it see these from last year.

Poor Alasdair got a bit caught out by this wave when he wasn't expecting it!

And I even managed to sneak in a spot of crochet too!

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Recycled Gang Hut

The last few weeks there have been some renovation works going on at my dad's church.

Yesterday, when the boys and daddy saw the bits of wood ready for the skip, they came up with a plan to re-use some of them.

So, after breakfast this morning, they headed over to the church to pick up a few bits and pieces.

They knew exactly what they wanted to build - a gang hut/den/fort.

Shen (my dad) was only to keen to help them out too, as he took delivery of a brand new circular saw at the end of last week, so it was a good excuse to give it a good test!

(there was more wood than in this picture!)

The boys had a great time hammering in the nails.

Although, of course they had to stop for ice-lollies and leave daddy to do some of the hard work!

David was given the responsibility of drawing the flag.

He drew a Scotland flag, with the blue and white bits mixed up, but that just added to the charm.

Some of the recycled wood came from old pews......

........an old door from the house (dad just put new ones in the house last week)....

......and the roof was made from an old carpet they found in the barn!

The finished den has a little slot for keeping away the baddies......

.........and even a comfy chair for the gang leader (also found in the barn - Shen's old one from his study)

I'm not sure where this super stylish part here came from, but I'm pretty sure it's been a few decades since this pattern was fashionable!

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Things I'm loving...

Late again with this week's Things I'm Loving, but we're still away on holiday and in holiday mode!

This week we've been loving beaches and more beaches!

We might not get the scorching temperatures up here that you can get over-seas, but you do have access to plenty beautiful unspoilt beaches, and you tend to get them all to yourself too!

And let's face it, being married to a red-head means that hot sunny holiday locations are far from ideal!

Whenever we visit a beach the boys always dig a big hole.

It's a boy thing, I think.

This has now developed into building a big trench that you could use to defend the beach in the case of another D-Day-type landing attack! Not that I imagine the Outer Hebrides will be high on the invasion list, but it's good to be prepared nonetheless! :0)

Meanwhile, I was down at the sea enjoying the waves.

Of course, every good defensive position needs to be tested out, so here come a couple of attackers....

I'm pleased to report that no-one was injured in the Battle of Dal Beag, and that the defensive position held very well!

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Weekend Fun

There was quite a choice of things to do on the island on Saturday.

Firstly, the tall ships were in town.

We had already been up close to see them the day before, but on Saturday I took this photo of them from the town centre.

There was also a Celtic Music festival on last week, and as part of this, there was an inter-island shinty match between Lewis and Uist.

We popped along to watch some of the match, which was won 3-2 by Lewis. Yay!

After this we went along to the Highland Games.

One of the highlights of this is the strong man competition, which included the stereotypical Caber Tossing.

First challenge, is to get the caber off the ground. They actually made this look pretty easy!

Then they have a wee run before throwing the caber. The aim is to get the caber to flip right over.

This one hasn't quite managed to flip it, so he get's no points.

Now it's someone else's go. 

He had more success, you can see the caber falling the opposite way.

Any willing children were invited into the ring to take part in a tug of war.

First the bigger ones. James is second from the right in the red top.

Then the smaller ones. Our Mr Competitive, David, is at the front.

Calum was in the opposing team, making him even more competitive!

That evening, after dinner, we were having a hit around with the shinty sticks. David was obviously thinking of his day at the Highland Games as he then turned his shinty stick round, held it like a caber and said, 'Look, I'm one of the strong men,'

before then throwing it up in the air like a caber!

Soon they were all joining in, in the evening sunshine.

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