I’m sad that the long Easter weekend is over – although we don’t have to wait too long until the next one!  Thanks to William and Kate for two extra long weekends in a row 🙂

We started our long weekend early with a bit of a grown up treat.  Matt and I both had the day off on Thursday, whereas Alex had the day with Jacqui – so we had our very first day to ourselves since Alex was born. We made the most of it with a trip to a couple of fabulous exhibitions at Tate Modern (Miro and Orozco), a leisurely lunch with cava at Tapas Brindisa (with no highchairs in sight), a wander around Borough Market and some quiet time in our garden at home.  It was an absolutely fantastic day.

The following four days were much more family focussed and fabulous fun! We kicked off Friday with the first of many firsts for Alex – we did our first trip on a bike with him.  I put him on the back of my new bike and we did a little local ride to see what he thought.  He seemed to quite like it (although I think he hated the helmet) – but I did find it a little bit strange to have little feet and hands fiddling with my belt throughout the ride! Here is is looking rather cool:

Following the cycling theme, we visited Herne Hill Velodrome’s Open Day on Friday afternoon to see some fun racing and Alex tasted his first ice cream and tried on some sunglasses for size (he wasn’t much of a fan):

Saturday was hot and sunny, so we met our friends Tim, David and Bergin and little Emmett for a picnic in St James’ Park.  We spent a relaxing few hours supping champagne, eating vast quantities of food and munching cream eggs.  Here’s Alex getting into the bubbly like his mummy:

And here’s Alex chatting to his friend, Emmett:

[Thanks David for the pictures!]

We headed to Surrey on Easter Sunday for another first – Alex’s first Easter Egg hunt at his Uncle Richard’s house!  Seemed a bit daft given he shouldn’t really eat chocolate yet, but he managed to find a few eggs and we came away with a vast quantity of chocolate that Matt and I are gradually working our way through 🙂  Check out Alex with his rabbit Easter egg basket:

We all had a wonderful time in Shere (in the hottest part of the country yesterday) – Alex got to see his cousins and their lovely dog, Monty and we got to catch up with Richard, Margaret and lots of other members of Matt’s extended family.

And here he is looking cute – what you can’t see is Monty the dog walking by which is what made Alex grin like this:

After all that excitement, we’ve spent Monday a little bit more quietly, sticking to sunny Herne Hill.  After breakfast at the Lido Cafe, we’ve spent the day in the local park and the garden.  Alex had fun playing in the garden in his new paddling pool (currently filled with plastic balls instead of water):

All in all a top weekend – roll on the next one.  Wonder if Alex will enjoy the Royal Wedding?!

p.s Bit of a monumentous occasion this weekend that I really must log here, even if it is perhaps a little bit too much information. Yesterday, I finally finished breastfeeding Alex.  After his months of refusing a bottle, I never imagined reaching this point, but since he’s taken to his bottle so well, I’ve gradually been reducing the amount I feed him.  And for the past two days, he’s just had a bottle – even at bedtime, and he’s still managed to fall asleep!  Phew!  Feels quite strange to have stopped, but it also feels like the right time 🙂  Now I’m free to go out for the evening 🙂