ENGLAND, Croft - The Arrival

Hi Family,

One score minus 5 days ago, we landed upon this island of the United Kingdom, an old nation...  The birthplace of Colin, his parents, and ancestors before that, and the birthplace of some of my ancestors too.

The purpose of our journey:

1. Family time with Colin's parents, Grandma and Grandpa Spark
2. A year out and about before Darwin starts school
3. A chance for me to work only one full-time job (mom) at a time

For some reason, Darwin only slept about 4 hours on the 9-hour, perfectly-planned 6:30pm flight from Vancouver to London.  I blame the 3-hr flight delay, and Mickey Mouse (airplane tv screen).  The good news is: this accelerated the transition to UK time since he woke up in the plane for UK morning.  The bad news is: he was a royal PITA until we got the rental car moving en route from LHR to Croft, home of Grandma and Grandpa Spark, and Colin’s later childhood.

After a month of tying up work for a one-year leave of absence, and packing up the house, I was really REALLY looking forward to a 9-hr nap on the plane.  Oh well.

Croft, England

Feb.28 - Mar.1

We had a relaxing no-obligations-whatsoever few days with G&G Spark, with walks around town, walks to the park, and walks/runs up Croft Hill (the only topographical bump in the area as far as the eye can see, which has been slowly scraped away over the last 150 years, as a granite quarry, into a nearly 400m deep hole.  Colin’s claim to fame when we first started dating was that the granite quarry is visible from satellite images of the area).  Mom - read:  "forced marches Linda syle".

Three generations of Sparks heading up Croft Hill, Croft Quarry in the background

Actually, there was one obligation - Sunday carvery lunch at a pub down the road, with yorkshire puddings the size of a football.  Darwin ate his peas.

Additional comforts and pleasures brought by G Spark’s shepherd’s pie, and Colin’s box of vintage toy tractors and farm equipment from when he was a boy - fondly remembered and much anticipated by Darwin after our visit last summer.  And I didn't have to go to work.

Darwin sleeps in Colin’s old room, a much more reasonably sized room for a little boy than his gargantuan cavern in our house in Squamish.

Bedtime stories in Colin's old room and bed

I remain grateful to Steve Jobs and Eric Yuan for the creation of free video communications.  At bedtime, Darwin yells out as he goes up the stairs and waves: "Goodnight Grandma!  Goodnight Grandpa!" like he's known them all his life.  Same with unprompted "Good mornings!" in the morning.  And the same reason he's so at ease with his cousins and family when we go to Edmonton...

Tomorrow we will say farewell to G&G Spark for now, and move on to our next stay.