What a Difference a Week Makes

Not overly springy but I thought it was pretty good for a 4 year old 

This time last week, the temperatures were lifting and the sun was shining. We were (and still are) car less and Daddy was working from home. So in order to give him some peace, and to indulge Daniels new found love of ducks, I took the kids to Charnwood Water. I had the vaguest sense of hope that we might be seeing a turn in the weather, so I suggested to beth that we look for signs of Spring. I gave Beth my phone and asked her to take pictures of anything she saw that was springy.

We got lots of photos of new leaves and buds, but I had to try and hurry her along from taking a photo of every flower in every garden, as we were starting to get some funny looks.

Some of the pictures Beth took

When we arrived we were set upon by the ducks, geese and swans. There is a sign up asking people not to feed the birds bread because it is essentially just sugar - basically duck McDonalds. Now from what I can tell the birds have been on a diet all Winter and I rock up with a bag of duck crack, the ensuing madness was not pretty but we were prepared*. We slipped past the main way in where the swans and geese hang out and found some high ground to throw from. Daniel loved it! He has started to make some animal noises and was quacking and shouting "look duck!" His quack and oink are very similar though so I'm only guessing it was a quack.   

Look Ducks Quack! 

Swans from a defensible position

On the way into the park Beth saw some furry buds, but we couldn't reach them. However we found some later on the bank and Beth felt them, she said they felt furry, warm and soft. She asked if she could help Daniel touch them so we took the pushchair off road and let Daniel have a go.

We then carried on round and found the part of the park where the fairies live. Beth went for an explore to see if she could find any fairies out and about...

...and came back with a "fairy bedroom".

We decided to play "sink or float" and Beth collected some bits to drop in the water as we finished walking round and I picked some bits for Daniel, its a pretty simple concept you throw bits of nature and see if they sink or float.

Some of the things Daniel threw

               

* in the autumn we had gone to feed the ducks and I was bitten on the bottom by a swan whilst trying to move the one that had stuck its head in the pushchair and Beth was chased by a goose.