Is it ok to pretend to be about to eat fairies!

Aidan was at a chess tournament, so the rest of us spent the morning in a wood we had not been to before.

 

We headed out and quickly realised our mistake in letting the girls wear their new shoes in a very wet and muddy wood. Oh for a couple of pairs of wellies!

 

The girls quickly found lots of sticks that had been made into some kind of short path:

 

 

The girls loved following the path, but being a little accident prone Alex managed to get tangled in brambles, so daddy had to set out on the path to undertake a rescue attempt.

 

Further along the path we found a great climbing tree

 

 

However the lovely Elliot decided that this was the perfect time to fill his nappy to the point of bursting with teething poo ( if you have ever had a teething baby you will know how disgusting this is). So there I am with him hanging out of the buggy, poo covered bum hanging in the air, and typically several dog walkers took that as a prompt to turn up and walk within inches of the stench.

 

Once I had salvaged what I could of his clothes and got him into a semi decent state the girls decided that they need to collect some natural bits and pieces. Somehow they decided that the nut shells were fairies, and they were going to cook them. There is certainly nothing normal about my kids, how many 4 and  year old girls spend several hours discussing the fine details of how to cook fairies!

 

Later we found a tree with a little hollow that had filled with water. Alex decided to dip her stick into the water, to chant some "magic" words and then attempt to poison me with her now magically poisoned stick, lovely.

 

Here is the outcome of their cooking the "fairies"-

 

3 words = slightly bonkers girls

Fun 9/10

Amount of moaning and whining 20%

Chill out factor 8/10

Is is normal to go into the sea on a cold October day?

 

We went to a country park by the sea for the afternoon, which may not have been the best idea for a slightly chilling October day!

 

The kids had a great time despite a little afternoon tiredness moaning. We started by heading straight down to the stone covered beach. I am not a lover of sand, and its ability to get into every nook and cranny, so a stoney beach is my idea of heaven.

 

I collect things for my art projects, so for a while the kids helped me to hunt out some beach glass and drift wood:

 

http://ofsoilseaandsky.blogspot.co.uk/

 

Then Aidan found a little stream bubbling up at the top of the beach, so their mission quickly became to dig up the water and create a river down to the sea.

 

Off we wnt along the beach, but as we were dragging along Elliot in his buggy we didnt get far before deciding to sit down and let the dogs and kids have a play. The girls are avid hunters do they were soon filling up their own dog poo bags with stones, shells and anything else that took their fancy.

Being 10 months old everytime Elliot got out of the buggy and anywhere near the floor, he quickly preceeded to munch on mouth fulls of sand or stones, babies yuk!

Back at the cafe the kids had an ice cream ,with Caitlin  deciding on a packet of crisps instead. I am sure she must be a cuckoo baby, as I have no idea how a child of mine can not like sweet things, how very odd.

There was a great park and Elliot loved having a go in the baby swings. However our aim was to walk the dogs, so we dragged the kids on for a little walk. With all the recent bad weather the track was about 80% composed of very deep and large puddles. On the way out the kids obliged in avoiding the puddles, but this may have been because we were play fighting, and I was threatening to actually hurl Aidan into the deepest puddle we could find.

The second time we reached the beach all bets were off, and the kids started their "can I go in the sea and get my feet wet", which always then leads to " can I jump over the waves and go a little deeper in", which then somehow ends up with them soaked and putting their heads in.

As they were dripping wet we made a hasty retreat back to the car, and they certainly ensured that they walked or jumped through every puddle possible, like they were not already wet enough.

Having no towels or spare clothes it was a typical Taylor strip them in the car park job, and then driving home with the hope that we don't break down on the motorway with 3 nude children.

3 words = water, water everywhere

Fun 8/10

Amount of moaning and whining 30%

Chill out factor 6/10

Just did'nt click in the woods today

You know how some days you have a great family day out, and other times it all just does'nt quite work.

This was one of those days which should have been fun ( and it was at times), but it just all seemed like a bit of a stress.

 

We headed to the woods for their fun day, and it started out badly when we accidentally paid the wrong car parking charge, arggghhhh. The fun day looked good and the kids enjoyed making masks, building a den, and creating a clay critter. However the dogs wanted a run, so we did'nt manage to see all the stalls.

 

In the woods the dogs seemed determined to bark at or hump other dogs, and when they were not doing that they were annoying kids or trying to sniff ladies bums. Not not not what I would call good doggy behaviour!

 

 

The kids enjoyed the playing, but spent alot of the time wanting to go back for the picnic. As you can see Cat enjoyed being with her baby brother as always. The mini Taylors were not naughty, but were a little bit challenging and the mild fighting was just ANNOYING!

 

Even the picnic that is normally a hit was not great, with the kids either not wanting to eat or insisting on running through the food. At one point Alex managed to land in a pot of humous.

 

This outing was:

3 words = something missing today

Fun 3/10

Amount of moaning and whining 40%

Chill out factor 2/10