I spent the night with Jemima Puddleduck and Miss Tiggywinkle.

No, I hadn't consumed Oliver Reed-proportions of alcohol and gone tripping on an LSD tab the size of Gibraltar.

Let me explain.

Each year 40 members of clan Craddock descend on the genteel Edwardian seaside town of Grange-over-Sands. This is partly because of my family's strong links with the Lake District and partly because of the cheap rate at which we secure hotel rooms out of season.

The north Cheshire branch of the family tree (i.e. me and my lot) arrived late Friday night. Checking into the stately Cumbria Grand, we were handed the key to Room 101. Ah, the place where they put rubbish, according to George Orwell and Paul Merton.

Thankfully, it proved not to be a grey, windowless box used for nefarious totalitarian Governmental purposes.

In fact, its door had screwed to it a plaque declaring it as the Beatrix Potter suite. The room was spacious, situated on the hotel's gable end, and afforded a stunning view of the glinting sands of Morecambe Bay. There was a nice, plump double bed where I pictured myself snoring luxuriantly. Matthew's travel cot was set up nearby. Everything was panning out nicely.

At previous reunions when we were a one-child family we were given a smaller room with a bed for Emily next to ours.

But this year we had expanded to the tune of one so we were assigned more luxurious quarters. As it turned out the Beatrix Potter suite was one of the hotel's bigger rooms.

It was shaped like a dog's leg in which the paw, if I can stretch the metaphor, was a nursery decorated with a Peter Rabbit theme and with beds for children.

My dreams of comfort double-bed style were soon dashed, however. Emily took one look at the nursery, realised she would be sleeping alone - even though the room was connected to the main suite - and began to complain.

My wife soon came up with a solution, bless her.

"Don't worry, Emily. Daddy can sleep in the nursery and you can share the double bed with me," she said without consulting me.

That is how I came to be sleeping in the cubby-hole of Room 101 (not even worthy of the main area of Room 101!) with Jemima and Tiggywinkle for company.