East Head Spit: Checking out the geography of the South Coast, August 2014

A few weeks back we took a field trip to the south coast to check out some seaside geographical features. Ds2 will be taking IGCSE Geography next year, so I took him to the same place we took ds1. East Head spit is a great place to see firsthand, a sand and shingle spit, salt marsh and sand dunes.

I confess it was nice to grab my old camera back from ds1 for a while and play with the black and white feature.

The pitfalls of parenting with non-performing progeny

I acquired some black 'skinny jeans' for free from the local swap shop and ds1 has been living in them for a fortnight now. For the first time ever we have found a pair of jeans that actually fit his legs (and almost his waist when hauled in with a belt!). When teamed with a hoodie and with his long dark hair hanging out he looks like some youff or some mini punk rocker! As he says, 'I'm practising being a teenager'.

It's very cute. Cute that he's playing at being older than he is. Testing it out without having to live it. Yet. But it does make me realise how fast my just-11 year old is growing up and how soon things around us will all be changing. We are on the edge of unknown territory and I'm so hoping that the path over the cliff edge is gentle and with a mild gradient!

At the home ed group on Thursday some of the children put on a Christmas play. Not my children though. Public performance and my children don't tend to mix. Not that I haven't tried...you know, encouragement, gentle persuasion, bribery, and-er-shoving to the front of the stage, stapling their feet to the floor and running away. (Yes even attempts at Pushy Mum persona have been to no avail).

I sometimes wonder how many plays and performances I have sat through that included other people's children, (but not mine). Ds1 sobbed and screamed through 4 years worth of nativity plays at nursery, finally managing to get on stage in his 5th year as a king, (chucking his present at the baby Jesus and legging it as fast as he could off the stage!). Ds2 managed to briefly trudge across the stage as a Gruffalo one year at the Christmas preschoool play, but his first was also to be his last performance. And dd? Well she refused to even entertain the thought of being in a Christmas play. And having the wisdom of a tired mother of 3 I didn't try to persuade her otherwise.

So there I was on Thursday, yet again watching other people's children performing in a play. It would be rude not to watch of course, but without sounding uncharitable I'd much rather watch my own children doing something. Wouldn't you? Another parent in a similar predicament tried to reassure me. 'Well there's a distinct lack of my children up there too,' she said. And then we consoled ourselves with the thought that at least our children hadn't disrupted the play. No, they'd actually been quiet, hadn't wrestled each other to the floor, walked in front of the cast, made rude noises or shouted. We have such low expectations, but, you know, sometimes you just have to give praise where praise is due (and hang on to the small blessings because there aint any big ones coming soon :) )

At the same home ed group we made some Christmas garlands. Dd threaded some popcorn. Well, to be acurate, she supervised me threading popcorn...sometimes I wonder if I have 'slave' tattooed in invisible ink on my forehead (only visible by children). Anyway, back to popcorn string; I was just thinking it would be a nice addition to our Christmas tree, then I turned my back for a minute. When I turned around I saw...

Needless to say, it didn't make it to the Christmas tree :)

We woke up on Thursday to find this:


No, not a child with an oversized mother-knitted crazy jumper!

I mean the snow! Yes snow! Ok, I know it's only a little snow. But it's still snow.

And here are our chucks wondering what all that cold white stuff is (the smaller one at the front is the 'chick' we hatched this year)

So just a little sprinkling of snow. Most of it melted, but a few patches remained, turned icy and hazardous and then topped themselves up with some soggy sleet today. So it's slippy out, but not really snowman material yet. It's funny to have snow so near to Christmas, unusual, kinda nice, in an unexpected way.


So are you all ready for Christmas?


I tackled Tescos today and it was manic, frenzied. 'But there's still 4 days to go yet!' I wailed (not out loud you understand, because then they'd find out the truth about me). I had to stock up on some birthday tea items for ds1 tomorrow and thought I'd get most of the Christmas food at the same time. Big spend. And it's only us to feed. How does that happen? Ah well, at least we'll be able to live on wine and crisps for the next 10 days. A balanced diet.

A quick catch-up. Here are some photos from our week in Charmouth at the beginning of July.

HESFES photos are to follow soon.

Then I need to post up lots more of our past week's activities too (I'm trying to keep up, honest!)

Ds2 fossil hunting at Charmouth on our first day of the holiday:

It's a bit blowy, isn't it?:

Dd models a hawkmoth (very fetching):

Rock-pooling and fossil-hunting at Lyme Regis:

A sea anemone:

We found some beautiful fossils at Lyme Regis

(sadly they were in boulders the size of a large suitcase!)

We visited Lyme Regis museum, which is on the site where Mary Anning lived and sold fossils in the 1800s. [For a good book (historical fiction) on Mary Anning, try 'The Dragon in The Cliff by Sheila Cole']

Take a photo of me Mummy!

Some of our beach finds. The fossil at the bottom of the picture is - according to a very helpful man in a fossil shop in Lyme Regis - a Plagiostoma giganteum.

(Ds1 was hoping it was a trilobite)

And this is the museum example:

We did come back with a huge boulder (I could only just carry it) with some fossilized bones in it. I've named it Fred the dinosaur. I suppose it might come in handy as a doorstop.

We discover the pub life of Charmouth:

And ds2 discovers his acrobatic talent in the pub garden:

For several nights running we had a visitor outside the tent. After the the hedgehog had had his fill of Jack's leftovers we were woken up most mornings by a huge seagull finishing off the remaining crumbs and clanging the dish around the front of our tent.

That'll teach Jack not to eat his dinner!

Ancient dinosaur footprints?

lol.

The kids discover that there is sand at Lyme Regis, not just rocks and fossils:

And then they discover the money arcades...

Well that was a whistle-stop tour of the first week of our holidays. HESFES next.