This morning we woke to the details of yet another hideous terrorist attack in my beloved city. I’d stayed up far too late last night watching it unfold alarmingly close to home, hearing sirens blaring from the city. London Bridge is a 10 minute train ride from my house, and Borough Market is somewhere we frequent as a family all the time (I just found this photo of a much smaller Alex at London Bridge). We even got married in that part of London. It’s somewhere that’s really special to us. I’m trying not to let recent events cloud my view of this wonderful place I’ve called home for nearly 20 years, but I must admit it’s getting harder to roam the city with our little family in such a carefree manner. But we will.  We must.

So, today – we took a deep breath and did probably the best thing we could do on a day like this – we spent it in the company of close family.

My dad celebrated his 65th birthday last week, so we met my parents, brother and his family for a leisurely pub lunch at the beautiful Cricketers Pub in Cobham. It was an absolutely ideal place to meet with four small children. At the end of a quiet lane, the pub was sat on the edge of a huge village green complete with extensive play areas for kids – so the children could safely run around between courses and after our meal.

Alex and Sophie were thrilled to see their cousins, Lucy and Rose, again. Here they are together in front of the quintessentially English country pub!

We enjoyed a delicious meal together in the shade of a tree – loving the scrummy roasts and huge puddings!

And the extensive play space for the kids meant I could enjoy some bubby and catch up with my mum in peace!

Meanwhile, Alex was completing an obstacle course:

Sophie and Rose were exploring the grounds…

…and enjoying the slides together!

The children raced each other across the common – Alex being very sweet and letting the little ones win!

My dad got a bit over-enthusiastic with his rugby, and encourage the children to tackle him – which they very successfully did (he’s fine after the onslaught by the way!)

Meanwhile, Sophie was pretending to be a knight with a stick sword and pulling very scary faces in the process!

Back in the pub, my sister-in-law Sarah enjoyed some dancing with Lucy!

And Sophie entertained us with more ridiculous faces – she’s so expressive!

It was a truly lovely lunch – relaxed, familiar and just perfect for today.  Here we all are on Cobham Common:

And we even managed to get a snap with everyone pretty much looking at the camera – a Michael family first I think!