The girls were sparkly and the boys were relatively smart. Tyler was sporting a tie! Not a real one but a fake one with velcro to fasten it. After buying it he tried it on and because it was velcro tried ripping it off with a flourish. It ripped off. It fell into small pieces. I had to sew it back together, I think partly because I was somehow being blamed - a bad example or something.
We made one small mistake in getting there in that I was in the driving seat with Frances navigating. After half an hour of driving around the narrow streets of Cambridge we swapped drivers and peace and calm was restored.
The church right in the centre of town was beautiful and we found a spot on the balcony where the kids could see. Jess sang at some point, and there was a band from some of Alex's friends and we sang Hark the herald at the end.
The reception was in St Catherines college. Mathew, Gemma, Frances and I sat with the younger 4 kids whilst Archie and Peri got to sit with grown ups. There were some lovely speeches - and there was Neil still the same age as he always has been, because the age of the people around you never changes, but here was his boy all grown up.
There was a lovely old room where we could stand around and talk, with a more modern larger side room where we ate and then the band played. One of Becky's grandmothers unfortunately had a fall and had to be taken to hospital with a suspected broken arm, which put a bit of a pause on things for a while. Alexander and Becky started off with a slow dance then took off into "I got the moves like Jagger!" with such joy, whirling around the floor. Fantastic! Frances and Peri and I all danced and danced. Occasionally I had to step outside where we timed the boys in laps of the quad. I think Toby eventually held the record at 26 secs with Tyler coming second in 29 secs. Darcy managed 39 secs but she did it whilst being a horse. Various pacing estimated the distance at around 140m. A great night - we disappeared off to our taxi and hotel at 10.
The next morning we ate ice creams in front of Kings College as it snowed.
