A Romp of a Day

  Well, we've had a lovely week, but not a lot to show you in pictures.  We've had some friends over for tea, that's dinner for everyone back home.  The kids have adopted a pet hermit crab that lives in a bucket outside the front door.  They've found an ice cream tub size collection of sea glass down on the shore and collected a pile of other treasures that will require some culling if we're to make our weight limit for the return flights.  

   But today we had a fun weekend outing with friends that had me snapping the shutter again.  Here is the McPhereson family we keep talking about.  Samuel and their littlest are both hiding in high chairs at the end of the table there.

We went to a fun local event on the pier where the local fire engine and rescue boat were open for touring.  Here's our own "Fireman Sam."

The rescue squad is bigger than life!

We also played soccer at the city park and attack hide and seek at Clickimin Broch (wonderful old ruins) but the rain clouds kept my camera securely stowed.  But we finished up the day back at our little cottage (this week we're down on the South end of the Mainland again) with pizza and movie night.  The kids loved watching "Babe" especially with all of the sheep we've been seeing here.

Our trip to Scalloway

Well, I'm almost caught up.  We had another adventure last week to Scalloway Castle.  Isn't the town too charming?

 Here's the great hall of the castle and the stairway that I praise God we all came back down in the same condition as we went up!

Ayre Roe Beach

Andy's kind of beach day.  It was a sunny 54 degrees and we were off to the shore in our wellies and woolly jumpers.  But the kids decided it was warm enough to roll up their pants and get their toes wet.  What fun!

We moved on Monday!

We moved to a new island on Monday called Muckle Roe.  We are so thankful to a lovely Christian family for sharing their home away from home with us.  They recently bought a Church of Scotland Chapel that was no longer in use and turned it into this beautiful house by the water.  

We can't get enough of the view from the rocking chair.  Evelyn sits there all day and Andy and I take turns in the evenings.  

We've loved doing school at the table here and just making ourselves at home.

The neighbors are frisky but don't mind us staring back at them

And the view is just amazing.  Shetland weather can change through four seasons a day, but the light here can surprise you with new hues and glows every time you look out the window.

A Day of Time Travel

Welcome to Jarlshof and thousands of years of history!  This is where we spent our Saturday morning.

The first picture of the family is taken from the platform in the house in the background of this one.  The kids were being brave explorers - they had an amazing time.  The house is a laird's house from the Middle Ages.  It was seen in decay and called Jarlshof by Sir Walter Scott and is featured in his novel The Pirate.

Here the kids are exploring Iron Age ruins, a whole village of round houses.

 These are the real Viking ruins that Samuel's been waiting for... but I think he likes the stone houses next door better.  You can see the main longhouse in the center.

And here's one of the wheelhouses built by the Picts.  The whole site is really fascinating and worth seeing more of on their web site. 

Fishing in a Loch

We just finished listening to the children's story, The Water Horse.  It's a delightful story about the origins of the Loch Ness Monster.  I was hoping the kids would play along and enjoy pretending about something mysterious and exciting in the loch, but they were much to realist for that... or maybe they just enjoyed their own pretending more than mine.  

There seem to be fun stone ruins everywhere.  Samuel was defending the fort here - thank goodness his dip net is also a powerful gun in the hands of a fine marksman.  Evelyn and I are thankful he saved us from the invaders.

One rarely gets a picture of Samuel smiling.  I'm glad he was having too much fun to remember to growl at the camera.

And here are the fishermen.  Sadly, they only caught rocks today.  Hopefully we'll have trout for supper next time.

Samuel Meets an Orka... or Our Visit to Sumburgh Lighthouse

 We parked our car down by the little light, which once served on Muckle Roe, the island we'll be staying on next week.  Now it serves as the entrance and ticket office to the museum.

Here's Drew with a model of the light house.  It even included a model of how the fog horn works, with a pretty good sample blast.  Everyone needed a turn pushing the button!

Now here is the actual light, looking toward the "Mainland."

And here's Samuel's new friend.  There's a nice marine wildlife museum at the complex and it is a great place for bird watching.  We all got to see a puffin, but alas, the camera wasn't out.