Merry Christmas everyone. I have finished this at last – just in time for Christmas! I started my Level 3 Forest schools qualification in cold and wet conditions in April and several sessions and lots of words later I handed my portfolio in last week hence running late with Christmas preparations. I will find out if I have passed next year – I really enjoyed it – like going back in time relearning how to do knots and lashings, building dens and lighting fires. I have just finished delivering 10 sessions to pupils from Norton Primary which went really well – just another 20 sessions to delivery next year! 

I am still working for the Wildlife Trust and have been involved in some interesting projects again this year including the final year of Green Tees Valley Project, which saw some new species of wooden birds appearing at Portrack Marsh and some splendid windsocks at Coatham Marsh. We also had a visit around our nature reserves from David Lindo - The Urban Birder (occasional presenter on the One Show) – I had the pleasure of showing him around the reserves - we had an excellent day and he wrote an account in Bird Watching magazine.

On the job front Helen has some exciting news – she has a new job – Head of Library Services at Newcastle College! She started in September after 13 years at Bishop Auckland. She was very sad to leave, but is slowly settling into her new role and has the involvement in the development of a brand new Library to get her teeth into. Helen’s mum celebrated quietly her 80^th Birthday and is still as busy as usual and Helen’s dad is doing well despite his Parkinsons. We are off to Chester le Street this weekend for a coffee morning to raise funds for the Parkinsons group.

My mum still has good days and bad days but is now settled in her new flat which she loves, only 5 minutes’ walk to church and not too far into Leigh. My eldest nephew Christopher has just announced that he is getting married on New Year’s Eve 2013 so we have that to look forward to.

We spent last New Year with our usual friends in Kippford on the South West coast of Scotland only 25 steps to the nearest pub which offered Scottish hospitality including lots of Haggis and bagpipes on New Year’s Eve along with a bonfire and fireworks on a nearby beach. Mick who comes with us was counting down to his 50^th – we organised a surprise party for him whilst we were staying in a cottage in Ambleside – he came back from the pub to find his friends waiting and lots of 50^th balloons around the cottage including on the main road nearby. A good night was had by all.

After many years of visiting Scotland by myself in May I managed to persuade Helen to come to Mull for half term and she couldn’t believe what a wonderful place it is. We had splendid weather and arranged to meet up with various friends including a couple we had not seen for over 10 years. We had an excellent week with lots of walking, some nice meals out (Café Fish was exceptional) and saw otter and white tailed sea eagle. We also had a chance to visit Janet and David’s house they have had built on Mull for when they retire – at the moment it is a cottage available to rent…super cottage for 4 if you need the details…..!!!

Culture wise we have managed to keep up enjoying our eclectic choice in music with visits to the Stadium of Light for Coldplay and Red Hot Chili Peppers ( and Sunderland Football Club of course!), the Sage for Bellowhead and the Palace Theatre, Manchester with nephew Chris for the Green Day musical American Idiot which was surprisingly good.

Our Olympic fix included a trip to St James Park to see Japan v Morocco and Spain v Honduras - it had a really good atmosphere and we really enjoyed it. We also managed to see a friend of ours son who carried the torch in his wheelchair in Durham, which was a really uplifting event.

We missed a bit of the Olympics because we were on holiday in exotic climes. We had a hectic week in Sri Lanka followed by a relaxing week on the Maldives. Sri Lanka was interesting with lots of traveling on rough roads in TukTuks and getting to places that were never as you expected. It was hot with the occasional down pour and we managed to see:

·         elephants

·         white bellied sea eagles and a massive water monitor lizard from a canoe

·         the stilt fisherman

·         the botanic gardens

·         a Tea plantation

·         and the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic (a Buddhist temple in the city of Kandy).

We then flew into Malé followed by an exciting trip to our island in a sea plane – we stayed on Kuredu.  We didn’t wear shoes for most of the week walking around the island took about an hour although even longer if you stopped at the bars en route! The food and drink was excellent with excellent service - we ate and drank too much. I did a bit of snorkelling with amazing coral reefs and reef fish.  We saw quite a few birds including the White-Tailed Tropicbird Asian Koel and White-Breasted Waterhen along with lots of flying foxes and Dolphins and rays on a boat trip – so it wasn’t that relaxing after all.

So another hectic year in the Ashton house, we hope this blog finds you well and we wish you a happy prosperous 2013.

Steve and Helen