Family holiday 2009

Jill's 80th birthday with Arthur; Ant and Linda Stocks, Clive, Debbie, Sarah and Simon Evans; Ellie, Dave, Tom and Mike Brewer.

Short skiing trip with Tom in his first holiday after going to Lancaster University.

Short, three-day skiing holiday with Mike after his exams.

A week-long family holiday in Kefalonia. The first visit for Ellie, the second for Tom and Mike and the third for Dave.

Weekend in Liverpool for Ellie, Val, Karen, Nicky and Jenny

Family holiday in Florida doing Disney, Universal, the coasts, the countryside, baseball, malls, crazy golf, loads of restaurants, shopping, food courts and slobbing.

A week-long holiday with Mike to celebrate the end of his GCSEs and moving up to the sixth form.

A weekend with Patrice Schneider and Simon Derry in the wonderful

A week's skiing on mainly red runs on both sides of the Val Gardena valley. Tom and Mike took in some black runs. The snow was wonderful, with a heavy fall on the Tuesday. The weather was sunny and crisp and we were on the slopes about six hours a day. Excellent accommodation, right by the two lifts up to the slopes.

Two weeks in the Italian Lakes, visiting Bardolino on Garda, San Sivino, also on Garda, and Bellagio on Como. Horse riding, swimming, windsurfing and loads of pasta and pizza and (for Ellie and me) good wine.

A last-minute, week-long holiday with Tom on the Greek island of Kefalonia to mark the end of his GCSE exams.

A weekend in Scotland for Mike and Dave, climbing Ben Nevis and going on a sea safari off Oban with Tim and Chris Dixon.

Our second trip to the Giant Mountains in East Bohemia, this time to Spindleruv Mlyn, about 50km further into the mountains from Harrachov, where we were in 2005.

Two weeks in the Colorado Rockies and a week on the Florida Gulf Coast -- our family holiday for the summer of 2005.

Mike was keen to climb the highest mountain in England and Tom was happy to join in, so we drove up to the Lake District for a long weekend at the Greenbank Country House Hotel in Borrowdale. There was a friendly welcome awaiting us and the accommodation and food were perfect. An excellent base for walking in the area. Best of all, the Borrowdale Hotel, less than five minutes walk away, served real ale.

Gran celebrated her 102nd birthday at Roxburgh House with Olive, Mike, Linda and family. Olive said: "She had a lovely time at the party, we had to stop her from getting up to dance. We had a chap singing at the party and she even asked him if he would come back for her next birthday." Thanks to Mike for the pictures. There is a link at the bottom right of the front page to a story about the birthday party on the Bootle Times.

A week of skiing in the Giant Mountains at Harrachov in the East Bohemia region of the Czech Republic. Winter half term 2005. Excellent snow, great accommodation, and a wonderful week all round with all four of us learning to ski and Tom, Mike, and Dave going all the way to the top of the mountain and back.

A rare white Christmas in Liverpool with Arthur, Jill, Linda, and Ant. It started snowing on Christmas Eve and by the morning Tom and Mike had built a snowman. We saw Winnie, Olive, Barbara, Nancy, Donna and Gary, and Margie. Saw Jesus Christ Superstar and Liverpool won 5-0 away at West Brom.

Our 2004 family holiday to New England visiting the Maine coast north and south of Portland, the Northern Outdoors activity resort in Maine, the White Mountains of New Hampshire, and Boston. We flew with Val, Dave, Ian and Little Tom and had three excellent days with them at Attitash, North Conway, and in Boston.