My Easter Safari Mothers Day Weekend!

A different kind of wild weekend to the one I went on a few weeks ago.
This weekend was very random, so much so that i've named it the 'Easter Safari Mothers Day Weekend'
I know what you're thinking, Mothers Day was last weekend, Easter is next month and Safari? Allow me to explain!
Last weekend was indeed Mothers Day but thanks to work commitments and the distance between my mother and me being 250 miles I didn't get to see her so we arranged this weekend instead. Whenever I ask my mum what she wants for Mothers Day I get the same reply each year, "It's a gimmick don't waste your money". Well if I can't waste my money on my mum who can I waste it on? So I suggested doing something for a weekend as she's not close enough to just pop round for a home cooked dinner. This is where the Safari part comes in, I thought about where we could go that wasn't too expensive but where we would all enjoy ourselves. The answer? Longleat Safari Park

Longleat is less than an hour from where my mum lives but i'd never been despite me spending most of my life so close.
On Friday I packed up my car and set off for the long journey from Yorkshire to Wiltshire. The child in me bouncing up and down asking the sat nav "Am I nearly there yet?" but the grown up in me cursing myself for never visiting when I lived so close! After 4 hours I arrived at the Travelodge in Wiltshire and was able to kick off my trainers and de-stress after the hecticness of the motorway. Then all I had to do was wait for my mum, sister and littlest brother to arrive.
That evening we went out for a late Mothers Day meal in a little village pub, which was delicious, then returned to the hotel to tuck into some handmade cupcakes,

I'm really not sure whats going on with that rabbit!

I made these myself and its the first time i've ever made anything out of icing! It reminded me of polymer clay although these tasted much nicer! I have to say though that I have a newfound respect for cake makers. My ideas of beautiful iced flowers became... well you can see what they became!
The next morning we woke up bright and early and set off to Longleat, I have a lot of photos and stories to tell you but it was such an experience over 2 days that i've decided to do a couple of seperate posts about it throughout this week so please check back later in the week (or you could click to follow my blog so you don't miss it!)
Finally I just want to tell you about the Saturday evening, we went to legoland last year for 2 days and knew how shattered we were at the end of each day so we knew this would probably be just as exhausting so we decided to celebrate Easter on Saturday evening (I'm working for Easter weekend this year so I won't see the family) my other brother drove down to join us for the evening and we got a delicious takeaway (well several - subway, chinese and indian!) which we ate in our PJs tucked up in the hotel beds watching Britains Got Talent! Just when we thought we'd had enough out came the easter eggs and we suddenly found a bit of extra room in our bulging tummies!
I arrived back home today and I have to say i'm more tired than my colleagues who had to work night shifts over the weekend! I'm going to have a nice bath then settle down in bed with the laptop to browse through the other blogs taking part in Handmade Monday.
Please come back soon to find out about the safari.
Until next time
Jem
x