#30DaysWild Day 11 Picnic by the River

 Around 1pm after a morning of gardening and playing there was great excitement. We had announced to the older two boys that we were going on a late lunch picnic to the river at Droxford. Here they are pictured beside my new hamper/anniversary present. We took the pushchair, changing bag, buckets, towels, swim stuff for older boys and of course a couple of trains for the baby. We soon realised that my husband had never been to this particular spot before although I've taken the boys there on many a boiling hot day after school in summer and also of course for the tadpole water expeditions.

 With the picnic hamper it was a very civilised affair in a very beautiful wild place. The usual car park by the church was full so we parked further away near the recreation ground and school then walked down past the church, turned right over the gravestone path then left and onwards to the kissing gate and little bridge over the river. We lifted our pushchair over in parts. Samuel had packed a good picnic that included 3 days of our strawberry crops from home with UHT double cream to eat them with and houmous sandwiches with extra Nutella ones for desert.

 My oldest was very interested in helping me catch fish with the buckets. I saw and pointed out 2 sticklebacks but they were too fast to catch and we just caught a few small fry. Jamie, my oldest had his wild moment spotting a Beautiful Demoiselle Damselfly. Isaac, my 4 year old was much less interested in fish but completely absorbed in a small patch of mud where he could add more bucket water and mess about it.

 At the start of the picnic there were a few families about throwing balls to huge dogs that were bounding around in the stream. After a while they left and it was just us and the wildlife.

Before we went home all three kids burnt off some energy at the playground. The perfect end to a randomly wild day.

Day 10 of #30DaysWild - how a country fete made us go wild!

This will be a count-back post...life has been so full of nature we barely got time to write more than a couple of Facebook posts in #30DaysWild. I am full of admiration for the semi-professional photographers, writers that are keeping their blogs up-to-date and gaining likes by the bucket load. I have a teething baby with a cold that doesn't understand blogging. He just understands the separation anxiety of mummy leaving the room to go on a computer (If I try using my mobile he grabs it and sticks it in his mouth so that's a no-no!)

Anyway, today the oldest children paid the princely sum of 50p each at a local fete to make their own identical flower arrangements to present me with and told me I was the best mummy in the world (Mothers day  x 2 this year it seems). They aren't even wild really but absolutely beautiful so I have to show them.
I also have to explain that the wild bit  about today is what our garden does when we leave it alone for five minutes to go to other things or take holiday with the kids.

I made a good attempt at weeding the front garden where I've planted new roses this year. I enjoy this, even though it is a job that never gets finished. I can keep my eyes on a huge oak tree opposite the road from us which occasionally reveals a Great Spotted Woodpecker by day and a Tawny Owl by night. The love and attention I've devoted to the front while casual birdwatching has meant that the back is becoming it's own wildlife haven. A few weeks back I planted rows of chard, carrot and rocket seeds next to a potato patch with a kid's help but a Borage plant I bought from a green fair at the sustainability centre 2 years ago has self- seeded and now we have this:

One bedraggled rocket plant and one chard seedling has survived slug attack...but for how long? The carrot seeds never worked (maybe they were too old). But does any of the failed vegetable seeds matter when I have this beautiful crop of purple borage flowers that I can freeze in ice-cubes to decorate summer drinks? And best of all Bees love them. Speaking of bees lets go back to day 9:

Day 9 was a Friday, one of my precious last full home-days before my 4 year old starts big school in September. And so in his honour I scouted sites about nature scrapbooking and found this amazing activity to do: hammering flowers. It was easy. Get a hammer out of the shed (or a smaller toy one if you aren't sure your child is capable). Pull out some printer paper out of your printer or any plain paper will do. Sandwich some freshly plucked flowers from your garden between the sheets outside on a hard table or surface. You are not going to press them. This is not for the faint-hearted. The aim of this activity is to make A COMPLETELY RANDOM WILD PATTERN. So, you get hammering. If you are an adult you can go for it. If you are supervising a child let them tap carefully away then when they have waned in interest pick the hammer up and take out your frustrations on those poor flowers. Now get the child back in view, lift the paper up and TA-DA you have RANDOM WILD FLOWER EXPLOSION PRESERVED FOREVER!

After the flower hammering I decided to keep up the happy vibe and mow the lawn for my husband (since I was last pregnant it has been his chore to do) and get fit. Not a wild thing at all until you consider my approach to the task. The lawn has been neglected for at least three weeks and has turned into a beautiful yellow composite flower meadow with clovers and is covered with buzzing bees etc. Please don't ask me what it's name of the yellow flower is...a baby dandelion? Should I give it a name really if I'm about to decimate it with a machine? I don't want to deprive the bees but if I leave it another weekend our lawn mower won't cut it. It has to be mowed. Quick, because if I don't it will rain again and the kids won't have anywhere to play but long soggy grass. I decide to do two things differently to my husband. 1. Lift the lawnmower cutter to highest level to leave a few flowers and grass bit longer 2. Leave some of the wildflowers at the edges and around trees for a bit longer or until my husband finds where I've hidden the strimmer. A happy wild compromise.

The simple pleasures: I picked 2 bowls of strawberries from our garden and listened to a male goldfinch singing. Recently I have also watched Starlings nesting in the neighbours roof with the baby pointing and explaining in babbles. I added this to the Facebook #30DaysWild group so I couldn't be caught slacking on this blog! Now can't find where the photo I chose is though so you have to imagine those delicious berries.

Wind in the willows and blown-in butterflies

A painted lady on a Scabious plant I put in last year

Common spotted orchid dodging...

A red-tailed bumblebee on Speltham Down

Oldest Son showing Wild Art giraffe made of stones and buttercups modelled on baby's toy

More than 2 years ago I wove my own willow fence with kid's help to support a struggling hedgerow

My overgrowing garden and established hedge still supported by willow frame on Day 9 of #30DaysWild which coincidentally is my 9 yrs wedding anniversary i.e. my willow anniversary!

With the weather being so gusty and the ground too wet to mow I wasn't sure what would turn up today. I stepped outside the front door before lunch and was rewarded with the first ever sighting I have made in my garden of a painted lady butterfly which was feeding near a bee much to the pleasure of my 4 year-old. After lunch, inspired by this one sighting we headed up the down to do a butterfly transect, that is myself with baby in backpack and 4 yr old Isaac. We counted a few meadow browns and dodged hundreds of common spotted orchids that lay in our path. Towards the end of our survey it was really too windy so we went home to meet my oldest boy Jamie. Jamie had his own idea for a wild thing to do and quietly got on with the giraffe picture while I brought in washing. I didn't have to cook dinner as my husband was bringing take-away to celebrate our "willow" anniversary with the kids. I decided not to buy him a "willow" gift as everytime I fancied one of those posh willow picnic hampers he's made noises about how they weren't practical so instead I got him chocolate marzipans and a card. Just for the willow bit I've been posting him photos of our joint effort garden creation (he cut and helped me place the hazel stakes I wove the willow into). P.S Anyhow, needn't have worried about a special anniversary present...husband turned up with the takeaway AND a willow picnic hamper for me! (he said phew ..you didn't buy one for me then!)

Feeding Fledglings

 Day 6: Please forgive me adding too many baby photographs but Tuesdays in term-time are a baby-led day so we fit around and go-with-the-flow of the 14 month old. We get back from pre-school drop-off with an hour before any play group. Mummy has not eaten breakfast and Baby has only had one blueberry wafer out of a shiny packet as a bribe to get in the car seat. So the first thing we do at home is think of food.

 Baby goes to the window and points. He has been surrounded by blur of wonderful sights and sounds for most of his life but the new thing is that now he actually wants to point things out and talk about it. Usually he talks about trains "ch-ch-ch-ch" as he demolishes his brothers' train track which often has to be rebuilt by mummy before other children collected from school and pre-school. Today he talked about the wind in the trees "ssssss....ssss". Now he's at the window pointing. Something really good is happening....

 I go to the window and he is watching an adult Great Tit feed a beautiful newly grown fledgling. I'm concerned and surprised. We have Cuddles the rescued bird-eating cat. Quick scout to find her location. Luckily she's asleep in a warm place inside so I try and get a picture of the feeding...but too late the adult Great Tit flies off. I don't know where they nested. Our nestbox was quiet this year. If they had been in that I would have heard the chirps while gardening.

 The adults seem pretty hungry and go to our peanut feeder. Another concern...shouldn't we have emptied the nuts by now? The fledglings are pretty much full-sized and don't seem at risk of choking on the small bits of nut and caterpillars that the adults are feeding them it appears. Even so I will just change the feeder to sunflower hearts at the weekend.

 We can't wait until snack at playgroup so I whip up some plum baby porridge. As my own fledglings father is out of the way at work and not hovering anxiously with a wash cloth I decide to let him grab the spoon to self-feed and applaud the resulting wild mess

 Its pouring with rain now and all three kids are booked in to help our friends walk her dog at the woods after school. I will be too busy to blog later because I will be washing mud off boots and checking kids for ticks as they never fail to play den making in the long grass.

Will get my walk in though and a nice chat!

How the tadpoles came about and we care for them.

So, we are back at home today for our 5th wild day and the weather isn't really bee and butterfly weather is it? I got one walk in with the baby down the Wickham Railway Lane with a group of buggy walkers but was going at a brisk pace rather than stopping for wildlife or photographs. By the time I collected my oldest children from pre-school and school it was starting to rain in earnest. I was honestly a bit tired from coming back from holiday with jobs to do so supervising nature art didn't seem practical. Then I remembered: The tadpoles! It was time to give them a post-holiday food top-up with the boys. We added boiled lettuce and strange dehydrated bits of meat marketed as tadpole food that our friend had given us a half-term ago along with the tadpoles. The idea was to raise tadpoles from her neighbour's pond in our recycled aquarium ( this functioned as an ant hotel in 30DaysWild last year). Now we have several very large tadpoles that may start thinking about froghood soon. Some are still tiny and haven't caught up. We have made sure we added freshwater to the tank from a clean river at Droxford. Below are photographs of the boys collecting the water for the tadpoles using milk and apple juice cartons one day back in April. It was so wet today though that we just put our wellies on to go to the shed to see the tadpoles and back rather than run a river trip. They still seem to have enough water although the aquarium is filling up a bit with tadpole poo at the bottom the water still seems clear and there is oxygenating weed in the tank.

Day 4 of 30 Days Wild: The family complete a strenuous hike and get closer to foxgloves

 We woke up and at 7am the sun was shining and we could see the mountains from our bedroom! Time to be spontaneous. If we hadn't already done the train yesterday we would have chanced the Snowdon mountain railway...except you can't really chance it as it really needs to be booked ahead for the steam rather than the diesel train as thousands of people hike up Snowdon. But we still fancy seeing the foothills of Snowdon and drive to Llanberis after poking our nose into Conwy Falls and Swallow Falls around Betsw-y-Coed both of which require tourists to pay a few old pounds to get through turnstiles. They were picturesque but did not feel wild enough to elaborate on in this blog. We admired all the Snowdon parkers and walkers then headed to the popular and touristy Beddgelert where a famous dog is said to be buried. We had inspired our oldest after reading him the rather descriptive version of the story at bedtime last night. It is a must-read legend and it breaks my heart to think of that poor dog slain by his unknowing master every time I read it.

The weather was still fine and we needed to hike! I let my husband choose the route as he was to carry our 1 year old plump baby all the way while I steered and encouraged our oldest two. I had convinced him 3 days earlier that every walker needs hiking boots not trainers to enjoy Snowdonia and thankfully he'd agreed to this as well as the 2 ordnance survey maps covering North and South of our cottage in case we just "felt like exploring". So, off we set on what appears to be an easy tarmac track beside the river at Beddgelert. It soon turns into a boulder trail with hand-holds drilled into the river cliff that greatly excite the children. This is when I ask my husband what grade walk we are doing and he says "strenuous". "Oh", I say and think ..."well if the weather turns we have snacks and can turn back this bit has not been too bad".

We get really high in the mountains and have views all around. We follow old miners tracks and amazingly find a stream glugging out of its source hole. This proves to be a valuable reference when we turn too early later on the track and need to re-think our route.

It was not a long distance but we had  to go in a circle over a mountain ridge called Mynnydd Sygun so there was still some rocks to negotiate on descent (not climbing just hard walking). I was extremely proud of our 4 year old, who while has been out of a pushchair for a couple of years still finds even flat walks tiring at times. The boulders had given him and his brother a real sense of adventure.

So I could see why the walk was classed as strenuous but my husband coped very well with the backpack, never faltering...until we reached the kissing gate...the kissing gate on descent that no large people or backpack could negotiate. This is his expression as he climbs over the gate having failed to get through it!

After the train yesterday our 4 year old desperately wanted to "wear" a fox glove so here he is near the river walk poking one. We had all watched the said foxglove for 5 minutes to check no bees were hiding in it! LOVING 30 DAYS WILD.

Day 3 of 30 Days Wild - We take the train through mountains then walk to the beach to find a jellyfish (Day 2 was counting sheep)

You may be asking ...well what happened to Day 2? We were "en route" from Gloucester where we had a family room. It was a beautiful journey (by car) to our cottage in Snowdonia 3 miles out from Betws-y-Coed  which we were hiring from the National Trust. It had been a last minute deal saving us a good %15. Although small for three children the views from the cottage were amazing. In fact Sir Edmund Hilary the Everest Conqueror himself had once stayed in that very place!  I asked my oldest what was wild and inspiring about the car journey on Day 2 and he said "Counting Sheep". Yes, all the family were inspired by the sheer amount of sheep that populate Wales. There were a good few more than we meet at home on Speltham.

So, with only a week  and a bit since we found out we were actually going to Snowdonia and over 20 years since my last visit  our research on the region and what we actually intend to do weather-depending has been limited but we do know one thing: all of our kids love travelling by train and we need to do at least some walking or running around after yesterday in the car. With the holiday budget saving of leaving everything last minute we find we can afford to travel on the FFestiniog railway that takes in stunning scenery. There is a lot of finger pointing from the baby and we are stunned by waterfalls, wooded valleys, slate pits, mountains and the rest.

 It is very easy to spot wildlife from the train. We spot Foxgloves in vast swathes, Cottongrass, Buzzards and several sheep again (we can include sheep as wildlife can't we?) The parents decide to just do the one stop at Porthmadog (end of line by harbour) so we have three hours to walk before last train. As we approach the Harbour and the mountains descend to sea and estuary views we spot Mute Swans, Shelduck and Oystercatchers through the window. We have effectively introduced our kids to a huffing, puffing bird hide when they thought it was just a train!

Porthmadog is an exciting place for the children. There are people eating icecreams and children catching crabs off the harbour wall. As we are wild tourists we head into the tourist office to ask the locals whether our plan to head to the beach before the train back is feasible. They have much useful tips such us when high tide is (this can make it difficult to walk between Borth-y-Gest..the nearer, smaller beach and the further Black Rock beach) and the bus you catch if you're out of time to walk home (https://bustimes.org.uk/services/GYCO099 )

Feeling optimistic We walk past marinas towards Borth-y-Gest. There are very few people and it is very pretty. We have time so we take the cliff path a little and reach Black Rock Sands above.

We scramble on rocks to get views still wearing our hiking boots and explore slatey pools. This is when we find a decomposing jellyfish. Although I'm trained as a marine biologist I'm not %100 sure what type it is so we take a specimen photograph. Once home a couple of days later we email a jellyfish expert who answers mummy promptly while the kids are asleep. It is a barrel jellyfish! They can reach enormous sizes and are food for turtles. They can sting to stun plankton but not a really horrendously dangerous sting (just one that gives a rash) The kids did not touch it!

Day 1 of 30 days wild (we couldn't wait so we started 31st May !!)

Common Blue Butterflies Out

So, we get it...it's 30 days of spontaneous random acts of wildness to back the Wildlife Trusts Campaign that starts the 1st June. However, We have a journey up to Gloucester onwards to Snowdonia planned that day and planning isn't too spontaneous with small children travelling. Sooo.. We started a day early and I took the three boys on half term out in the sunshine to a much-cherished local patch: Speltham Down in Hampshire. We counted butterflies, checked out Elder Flowers, climbed and swung on trees and generally had a great time. Even after the natural playground the boys wanted to go to the small playground in the nearby village of Hambledon. This is small, local and there are no public toilets. Mummy is aware of this so we head over to the lovely pub aka "The Vine" where the boys can go to the toilet and Mummy buys a lime soda to drink in the courtyard garden. Happily this post ends on a butterfly note. You only need to pop into this pub to see Holly Blue butterflies dancing above the holly bush in the courtyard at the moment.

Loving our home

Something inspired me to get back to my blog: my six year old son. Last week he told me he'd learnt about the world last week. He couldn't remember which countries though. Today I asked him if he'd learnt about the world. He answered "no mummy ..I've been learning about the deep sea creatures" His face lit up on further questioning "I learnt about the Dumbo Octopus, the blob fish and micros that glow in the dark". So here I am a poor mummy has-been marine biologist who barely has had time to watch Planet Earth or any t.v thanks to baby teething and I'm googling these creatures. To my surprise they really exist they are not just cartoon names. I don't remember learning about them before: I specialised in shorelines. Thank you so much to my son for taking me to the deep sea. I feel so at home now since we returned from Baby Art's first trip across the sea to France. I'm not sure he thought he was ever coming back and to see his little face as he recognised home was wonderful. Here are some photos of mainland  "home" nature. Watching my son's pond dip at Hillier gardens, as excited as me to be shown a newt. Baby Art having a walk in backpack at Bracklesham Bay the weekend before Easter. The Best thing we explored nearest our home: an ancient yew tree near Boarhunt Church where people have sheltered over a thousand years. Home.