Archives: playground

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Pleasant weekend.
We did not really do that much, by way of adventuring out, but I’m left with the afterglow of contentment. I would doubt that Jack sees it the same way. He had gone into ‘cocky mode’ to the end of last week, & it was starting to grate. He was not listening, & it all eventually ended in tears. We were having a fine time in Hebden Bridge yesterday. We went to the playground after collecting some sarnies from a cafe, & found that the paddling pool was full of water. Why not? – It was a lovely day after all. Jack & Eve stripped down & played in the water. Jack rushed about & splashed with the others, & Eve kept more to the edges, splashing her feet while sitting on the edge. Enjoying it, but not a boisterously. She eventually decided when she’d had enough & wanted to play on the swings & the rest of the playground. Jack had sunburnt shoulders in the bath that night – “my arms & neck tingle”.

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Jack was keen to go to the fair, so I took them. Louise had to go home with Jude as the pushchair would not have coped. Into the mud we ventured.
“Uh-uh mud
Thick oozy mud
We can’t go under it,
We can’t go over it
Oh no, we’ll have to go through it”
I still carried Eve. We made it through squelching & squertching as well as sloshing through, I hesitate to demean with what might seem an inadequate description: puddles. They enjoyed themselves they went round & round & up & down – they wanted more. We ventured further to a stall. Oddly there seemed few stalls with less people willing to wade. With limited funds we managed to get a Combine Harvester & farm set for Jack & Eve to play with. Oh, & a couple of beach balls on a string & stick – masquerading as balloons (cheap & cheerful). Unfortunately this left only enough for one more ‘ride’. Jack went into ‘the house of fun’. Enjoyed himself a good while with Eve & I looking on. We had to go in the end though. Take our muddy feet home.
Home things:
Eve is teething at the moment. A lower right molar is trying to make an appearance. This drives her a little nutty. She’s was being a right madam & miscreant yesterday; cereal on the floor & hitting Jude to name but 2 offences. Hitting Jude it the one that’s very annoying. She’s also still got a bit of impetigo on her chin but that’s thankfully healing up. It’s meant that Louise can’t take her to playgroup etc though, so they’ve had less distraction that they would usually get. Hopefully it will be deemed cleared up enough for her to go to college today.

Mmm – the weekend’s ‘Agricultural Show’.
Well, last week was pretty wet, but it seemed to be getting better toward the end of the week. The Show was getting ready on Thursday & on Friday the fair set themselves up. Unfortunately there was then a cloudburst on Friday evening – a thunderstorm – a downpour. It was quite impressive really. Jack went from front window to back window to catch the rain pelting (or “hitting” as he puts it) down. Not good for ‘The Show’ though.
We dallied on Saturday morning – there was some football on the telly to watch, but eventually we made our way down to the park to ‘The Show’. People were coming out with shoes & trousers plastered in mud; pushchairs with caked wheels – didn’t look good… Once through the gates you could see the deep furrows the horse trailers & lorries had left over the grassed areas that’re supposed to be the footy pitch… A major annoyance was that as people were reluctant to park their cars on the grass, some fool deemed it OK for them to park on the children’s playground. One suspects the decision maker did not have children of their own. I dislike cars at the best of times, & was not able to just pull back a swing & let it smash into a car because there were actually people sat in some of them… darn.
We went around the paved walkway circling the park (& the show) to survey the prospects of an easy access. Disappointed that the livestock were not here last year. Apparently latent Foot & Mouth fears persist. In a way, it’s just as well as Eve does not like animals really. She was quite scared of all the horses that were around & needed to be carried everywhere. Could not risk putting her down once the decision was made as she would have got muddy feet & thus I would be muddied. We ended up back at the playground & managed to find a little room between the impromptu car park to play. There was even nearly enough room for Eve to have a swing. Shame she had to kick a car while she did it, shame I didn’t let her get her bots muddy & shame some unsporting official asked us to move while another car moved out of the way (further onto the playground…).