Melanie has decided to give snap-fish a try, so the huddleston’s new blog can be found at: http://thehuddfamily.shutterfly.com/

So if you want to keep up with what is going on with our family go check it out.

-Jay Dee

Jennifer and Kelly came to visit the past week, and we had a great time.  We pretty much ran them non-stop.  They got in Sunday morning and left Saturday morning.  On Monday we took them to York and we decided to walk the wall which we had never done.  It was really nice weather and the walk was nice, but a little tough with the strollers.  (there were more then a few steps to go up and down)  Tuesday morning we drove down south of London to Leeds Castle which was a really nice castle.  It was about a four and half hour drive.  We decided to have a picnic on the castle grounds, thankfully it was  nice sunny day.  After we got done visiting Leeds Castle we drove to Bath which was about a two hour drive.  We stayed in Bath for two nights.  Unfortunately it rained all day Wednesday while we walked around the town, but that didn’t stop us.  The boys got a little annoyed a few times, but over all it was still a nice day.  We visited the Jane Austen Center, the Roman Bath’s and we took a city bus tour.  The next morning we headed to Stonehenge.  It was actually smaller then I thought it would be, but it was still very impressive none the less.  Later that day we decided to go to the town of Avebury were they have another stone circle, but you can touch these ones.  We headed back home that night and then on Friday we went to Fountain’s Abbey, which is always a nice place to visit.  The weather was pretty good all week.  The only day that was a little bad was Wednesday when it rained, but it still wasn’t horrible.  Hopefully Jennifer and Kelly had as good a time as we did.

York Wall

York Wall

York Wall

Leeds Castle

Leeds Castle

Leeds Castle

Bath

Bath

Bath

Bath

Bath

Avebury

Avebury

Avebury

Stonehenge

Avebury

Stonehenge

Stonehenge

Fountain’s Abbey

Bath

Apparently not only is Justin not afraid of heights, but he seems to really like them.  Anytime he gets a chance to climb something he moves as fast as his chunky little legs and arms will move him to get there.  The past few days he has been climbing up on Jacob’s toy garage.  He is only about a foot and a half off the ground, but he really enjoys getting up there.  We keep taking him off and telling him to stop, but he doesn’t care.  He has fallen not once but twice today and as I am typing this I need to go because he is at it again.  I swear he has no fear.

-Jay Dee

Justin took his first steps yesterday.  He is really cute when he does it too.  He kind of has the whole Frankenstein walk going were he barely bends his knees and he kind of slides his foot on the ground.  He can take quit a few steps before he falls.  I think he has made it at about ten steps then he falls.

-Jay Dee

We celebrated our Independence Day here at Menwith this past Saturday.  They generally don’t have the celebration on the 4th here because that is one of the biggest protest days at our gates.  There are usually anywhere from 50 to 200 people outside the gates protesting us being here.  So we do the celebration the week before.  This is actually pretty nice for us because we may go down to one of the bases down south this Saturday and watch their fireworks as well.

Enough about that let’s talk about the actual day.  It was a pretty nice day probably in the 70s most of the day with a slight overcast, so we didn’t have to worry about getting sunburns on the little ones.  They had a pretty nice set up, it was almost like being back in the states at a summer carnival. We had funnel cake, lemonade shake-ups, ribs, hamburgers, hot-dogs, wings, and brats.  There was K-9 demonstration that Jacob really enjoyed.  It was pretty neat to see how the dogs perform, I wouldn’t ever want to be on the receiving end of one of their attacks.  There were several different carnival rides, not sure what they were all called, but a few of them were: bumper cars, twister, tea-cups, bouncy castles, swings, and a zip line (which I wanted to do but was too big of a chicken)   Jacob really enjoyed the bumper cars and the bouncy castles.  There was a craft tent as well where Jacob made some American flag magnets and the boys played in some water.  There was also a pretty neat car show.  I was really surprised to see so many classic American cars over here.  I am sure most of them were owned by Americans but I know it isn’t cheap to get them over here.  There was a concert that night as well, but it had cooled off a lot and had started to drizzle so we decided to go sit at home until the fire works went off.  Unfortunately some fog rolled in as well and it was pretty hard to see the fireworks, but we got the idea.  When they started Jacob wanted to go outside and see them, but once we got outside and they went off he took off for the front door.  Oh well, at least Justin seemed to have liked them.

I hope everyone else’s 4th is as enjoyable as ours was.

-Jay Dee

Jacob building an American flag

My little fire-cracker

The boys playing at the water table

Justin and Me

Jacob playing on the blow up castle

Jacob and Noah playing on the slide

Jacob on the BIG SLIDE

Jacob going down the slide on his belly

Jacob and Noah swinging

Bumper Cars

The weather in England has a tendency to get on my nerves! It’s not too bad in the winter, when it barely gets below 32 and it’s green everywhere and the winter pansies are in bloom. And, if it would reach an appropriate temperature in the summer it wouldn’t be too bad. It would be like an Illinois spring, which happens to be my favorite season! So while I normally do a lot of complaining about England weather… tonight I am not going to complain. It just so happens that we have had great weather the last week or so. Today was gorgeous! It was about 70 degrees and in the afternoon and evening there was barely a cloud in the sky! I went over to a friend’s house and the boys even got in a pool! I think if this keeps up I may get a bit of a REAL suntan… not just one out of a bottle! One other thing that I think is very cool about living over here, is the length of the days. It kinda stinks in the winter when in mid-December it is dark around 3:30! But in the summer it can be kinda neat! According to the weather channel the sun rose at 4:35am and set at 9:43pm. The thing about the sun setting is that around this time of year, near the longest day of the year, it never really seems to completely set! It can be very weird, yet very cool! This is a picture I took out of my living room window at around 1 am… kinda cool, right?

This was taken around 1am

~Melanie

Last weekend was really nice weather here, so we decided to put up our kiddie pool in the back yard.  It might have been a little chili when the wind would blow, but the water was great.  (I used tap water)  Not sure how we did it but we all managed to fit in that little pool.  It was actually really nice to just lay in there and relax, plus with our privacy fence no one even knew we were out there.  Justin tried to drown himself more then once.  He keep trying to dive in the water to get a toy.

The next day was even nicer so we decided to do some yard work.  It was a little more difficult then either Melanie or I had originally thought it would be.  Melanie pretty much ended planting everything while I keep Justin busy.  Jacob and Justin were racing each other down the side walk.  Justin is getting really good at walking with his little push walker, still no sign of walking yet but I don’t think it will be long.

Jacob swimming

Mommy, Justin and Jacob swimming

Daddy, Jacob and Justin in the pool

Justin playing in the sand box

Justin swinging

Jacob in his car

Jacob and Justin racing

Jacob helping mommy

Mommy planting flowers

Jacob watering the flowers

The final product

-Jay Dee

First off I want to wish my dad a Happy Father’s Day.  I only hope I can be half as good a father towards my boys as he was to me.  Thanks for everything dad, I love you.

My father’s day was a good one.  We decided to go to Bolton Abbey today.  It turned out to be a really nice Abbey.  That was the first time we had went and I am not sure why we haven’t gone to that one yet, but we will be going back for sure.  We decided to bring sandwiches so we could have a picnic.  Justin decided we weren’t tearing his sandwich up fast enough so he took the whole thing.  We walked around the Abbey and the land a little bit.  Jacob ended up  getting mad because he wanted to go play in the sand.  Jacob and I went and threw some rocks in the river, which I think Jacob really enjoyed.  We didn’t stay out there really long because we had gotten a late start today and the boys were starting to get a little cranky, but it was a nice day none the less.  Melanie made diner for me as well which was nice, she made roast pork tenderloin, cheddar mashed potatoes and cheddar biscuits.  It was yummy!  Melanie had also made a cookie cake which was also very yummy!  After all this eating I really need to go on a diet, but I will worry about that another day.

Justin eating his sandwich

Bolton Abbey

Jacob and Jay Dee throwing rocks

Father’s Day Cookie

-Jay Dee

As most of you probably already know I am big sports fan.  I like to play sports as much as I like to  watch.  Since I have joined the military I have played everything from Softball to Flag Football to Volleyball.  I have played on a softball team every summer except for last summer.  I didn’t think Melanie would really appreciate me going out and playing right after Justin was born.  I have however started playing again this past Tuesday.  I think I am an above average player.  I am not great by any means, but I can make some great plays at times.  I played my first game on Tuesday and then we had a double header tonight.  That is two games back to back for you none sports fans.  Well we won Tuesday and then we won our first game tonight.  The next game didn’t go so hot.  We ended up getting beat pretty bad  I don’t really know what the final score was other then a whole lot to not enough.  Anyways back to the real point of my story.  I played 3rd base for most of the second game.  I had some pretty good plays and some not so good plays, over all it was pretty crappy honestly.  Well our shortstop had to leave so coach asked me if I could play shortstop, I haven’t played there since I was 12 but I figured what the heck why not.  I played one inning with nothing spectacular to report.  The next inning was not exactly the same story.  I had a chance to turn a double play and I got the lead runner but my throw to first went wide and ended up out of play, not what I was trying to do.  A few batters later there was an infield fly and the second baseman and I both went for it and I ended up getting an elbow to the top of my head.  (I made the catch though)  A few batters later there was a rocket shot towards me.  I was in position to make the play and throw to first to end the inning.  Well the ball bounced up and I was thinking no big deal just knock it down and throw to first.  It bounced a little higher and faster then I thought and this is what I ended up with.

yes those are the stitches from the ball

It actually didn’t hurt as bad as it looks, of course everyone wanted to make sure I was okay.  One guy took my sunglasses off and made me fall his finger with my eyes to make sure I didn’t have a concussion.  He also asked me if I knew where I was, I wanted to say that I was right here with him, but I thought better of it.  (didn’t think he would find it as funny as I did)  I think next time I am going to use my glove.

-Jay Dee

We had a nice little family birthday for Justin’s 1st Birthday Party here in England.  Melanie made a beautiful safari cake, and decorated the dining room with cute animal stuff.  Justin seemed to really enjoy it.  He wanted to play with his cake more then eat it, which anytime that kid turns down food is fine by me.  For his birthday gifts he got a telephone, some maracas and an activity center.

Here a few pictures from his birthday.  Like I said in another blog, Melanie will update Piczo with a lot more pictures.

Smash Cake

maracas

phone

Activity Center

-Jay Dee