After a long haul and three different flights we made it to Houston where we walked 500 miles and then 500 more to collect our luggage.  At last we were met by a smiley Duncan and a non stop chattering Alex.  My he has grown since we last saw him!  We arrived at Duncan and Dolley’s amazing, brand spankingly new built house to be met by Dolley and to meet our cute, and initially very reticent, little granddaughter Avery who is the spitting image of pics of Katie when she was a baby.

We spent a lovely long weekend with the family and were able to celebrate Duncan’s birthday actually with him for the first time that Bob could remember in years at a very smart French restaurant with the Levan family. Bob bought Duncan a birthday suit as his present, actually a bargain “three suits for the price of one” which turned out not to be a bargain at all.  Ah well – at least Dunc received something he wanted and will be suitably bedecked for a few years to come and at least Bob’s 3 shirts in Macy’s were a genuine bargain and Avery decided to just try rather than buy all the high heeled shoes.

We celebrated little cousin Julia’s 3rd birthday on the Sunday with a gathering at John and Nathalie Levan’s home with a gathering of Levans and Nathalie’s family.  We delved into a delicious Vietnamese spread, including an interesting clam soup and the ubiquitous hot sauce, before having a game a family quiz game  on the Playstation complete with bizarre avatars that were more monsters than people.  I don’t know what happened but I ended up winning in the last round with a couple of complete guesses on US sportsmen.  Go the Frearsons!  We then held our own most successfully in a rather strange game of ping pong with no rules except avoiding the heads of Avery and Alex as they popped up around the table.

After a full on weekend with much catching up, feasting, lego building, Alex interrogations and plenty of play with the little people we left Houston for much needed R&R.