Belfast for half term

After 6 months of relocating the girls to the other side of the world and dealing with everything that comes with that experience, I was heading back to Northern Ireland again in February to give Joan a much needed break during half term for the girls.

After picking the girls up from school and dropping Joan off to the airport for her long weekend away in London .... eventually, after a flat tyre drama in Dungannon, we made the short drive into Shaws Bridge in Belfast and checked into our favourite "fancy" hotel again for 3 days of awesome fun in Belfast ... or so we thought.

The first evening was fairly uneventful, we had a lovely dinner in the hotel restaurant, watched some Six Nations rugby and then went for a great swim before heading to bed. That night poor old Scarlett was hit with a nasty gastro bug and the poor pet spent the whole night getting up and down spewing. The next morning she was no better, so Frankie and I had a lazy day in the hotel room while Scarlett tried to catch up on some sleep. Scarlett perked up in the evening so we had a quick dinner in the hotel bar then went back to the room for the night.

The next day everyone was feeling great so after breakfast we jumped in the car and headed to W5 - an amazing science and technology museum/activity centre in Belfast. We had a brilliant day exploring, the girls completed the scavenger hunt and we managed to put in a few hours there no problem at all. Everyone was hungry so we went for some awesome pizza at Little Wing, but Frankie started crying saying that the hot smell in there was making her feel funny, I never thought anything of it, but given what had happened over the previous 24 hours I should have. Halfway home Frankie erupted and power chucked all through the back of the car, turns out the stomach bug that Scarlett had was contagious. Another quiet afternoon and night was spent in the hotel room, while poor old Frankie worked through the bug - she crashed early so Scarlett and I had room service for dinner and had another early night.

The next morning all the patients has recovered so we had a nice breakfast, and another swim before heading back out to the airport to pick Mum up.

Another new tradition that is forming is that Frankie likes to do Daddy's make up on the last night before I head home, so after she had done that, I put the girls to bed, kissed them good night and got a couple of hours sleep before another extremely early bus to Dublin airport and my flight back to work.Read more