An apple a day

Monday: Gaston Farm
Our annual trip to the lambing was met with mixed results. Bean, 9, Absolutely loved it, mostly the animal handling, we even discussed getting our own chicken eggs to incubate and hatch. Pumpkin, 8, and Plum, 5, enjoyed the trip and liked stroking the animals, Pumpkin did hold the chicks and ducklings and walking across the board through the sheep shed. Pippin, 2, was terrified of all the animals and clung to me like a limpit saying 'scared scared' all day. We did all enjoy the tractor ride and the play park. Bean tried an apple and liked it. He ate two more in the evening.

We were squeezed into a corsa today as our viano is at the garage again, this time replacing a coroded water tank. The good Lord must have known that i'd need a tiny car for our trip to Guildford.

Tuesday: Airhop
We went to Airhop today with friend T only to find that the group booking we were attending had been cancelled two weeks ago because it's the school holidays in Surrey. It was 11am and they had room for us at 1pm. Plum had already declared this to be the most exciting day because she has never been to Airhop before so we booked in for later. We drove to Stoke Park but ended up playing on the large grass areas in the Spectrum. Bean was most upset that our plans had changed, coupled with us having been out everyday for four days and it being a while since breakfast, he got exceedingly angry with Pumpkin over a toy they had in the car. There was no reasoning with him and it led to Pumpkin being really upset too. Bean wanted to go home, we cuddled lots. On the way back to Airhop Pumpkin apologised to Bean which prompted Bean to apologise too and then they worked out who could have the toy.
Plum bounced with T's mum for the hour and i sat in the cafe with Pippin being visited by the others for drink breaks. The boys enjoyed the dodge ball and doing tricks in the main area, jumping up onto the wall. An excellent time was had by all.
Exhausted back home everyone sat and watched their own thing, Fungus the Bogeyman was on again and Bean asked to learn how to play Poker which we did.

Apple eating also continued.

I love ewe

Friday 19th April 2013

I had this grand plan today that involved me finding time to prepare something special for this evening to celebrate mummy and daddy's 10th wedding anniversary. I really must learn to either a) be more organised or b) not put so much pressure n myself. By the time time daddy announced that he was planning on arriving home an hour earlier than usual, I had to ask him to go and buy most of the goodies for the evening meal that I had planned! I had also taken the smalls out for the day and we had an excellent time but I had forgotten to calculate in the guaranteed  sleep that Pumpkin would have as we drove home, in turn guaranteeing that our romantic meal for two would have at least a plus one. Fortunately his choice of activity for the evening was to watch some iplayer so he sat solo in the living room whilst mummy and daddy had a late candle lit dinner (with the occasional interruption)

Today's adventures had taken us to Gaston Farm. I think we went three times last year and pumpkin immediately remembered that he had 'fiddled with the car' and it had broken down! Pumpkin jumped straight in with the animal handling and had a cuddle with two chicks of different ages (and sizes) and an enormous duck! Bean slightly more hesitant but after pumpkin had held all three animals bean was ready to hold a small chick.

This was followed by our first tractor ride and another mother offered to take our photo for me. It's the first time anyone has done this, and I've not thought to ask, it was so nice to have a photo of the four of us and I might think of doing it more often. The boys played on the stationary tractor and we went to have a look at the expecting ewes (no action) and pumpkin went to hold a lamb. This triggered a whole number of questions about sheep's wool and the difference between wool and fleece and my favourite was Pumpkin announcing that lambs are made of wool. They are very soft to touch though.

We picnicked and then did the whole thing again. This included pumpkin handling the animals again and as it was quiet I got to have a go too. And then when we had finished Bean was ready for his turn.

When we went to visit the ewes the second time we saw twins being born and we truly covered the birthing section of any sex ed curriculum. The questions came thick and fast. Bean was particularly concerned about the amount of time it was taking (about 10minutes as the shepherdess was helping out because the first lamb was large and the ewes pelvis was small, so quicker than a completely natural birth) they can take up to one and half hours, so I told Bean that he took a whole day and a whole night. This impressed him. The questions from the boys included, what's that? (Numerous times, to different things) how do they get out? What's she doing? Why is the ewe eating it? Why are the lambs covered in stuff? Was I covered in stuff too? What's that sack? What's it for? And many more.

And after all this we went to play in the village play area. It's a beautiful village with lovely views. We waved to daddy at work only 8 miles away and grandma and pops on the other side of Portsmouth, well, okay, we couldn't see any further than Portsmouth and they are a fair bit further than that but it was fun and we could see the IOW. We also watched the rain fall from a rain cloud far away and spent time on and off all day finding shapes in the clouds.

It really was a great day out.