Weekend Activites

This Saturday we held a party for Maddie. She just had three little friends over to have some crafty fun with felt. On Friday night I let Ellie and Maddie finish off decorating her birthday cake. I had got as far as covering the cake with green icing and let them get busy with some butterfly madness.

I reckon they did a good job all in all, even if more icing was eaten than put on the cake!

I had spent the day before making party bags for the kids. I have been so unorganised with parties down here, which I am sure will make many laugh at home as it is usually my "thing". They each had their own fabric bag to take home with some sweets and then their creations for the day.

Maddie helped me set up the table in the morning and chose who should have which colour of snake. We started off wet felting the snakes bodies and then while they dried in the tumble dryer we started on the butterflies.

They had lots of fun picking sparkley bits and buttons to decorate them with. They all turned out very different from each other which is rather nice.

For lunch we kept it simple and just had pizza, sausages, cheese and crisps followed by home made sundaes. Certain children had a total sweet overload and weren't able to finish them off.
This one below was not amongst them!

I cannot believe Maddie has turned seven, she is my baby! I am officially starting to feel old :(

This one didn't have any difficulty finishing her sundae either funnily enough :) After lunch we finished adding the detail to the snakes and ran out of time before parents starting arriving to add all tongues and eyes. With a manic rush I managed to get all the party guests out of the door with completed bugs. Sadly due to the rush I forgot to take a picture of all the snakes together. I did take some with the guests but I don't want to put them up here without parents permission. Once I have helped the girls finish theirs I will take some more photos to share.

Sunday saw us heading over to what I think is called Mullet Cove. We have never been over there before but it is somewhere you can still take dogs. Mum had reached the end of her tether with bickering and knew that a bit of fresh air usually does the trick which it did. It was a rather bracing day with temperatures at around zero. We have had a bit of rain lately which is unusual in the Falklands and it had left quite a few frozen puddles and tracks.

The kids were in their element smashing the icy tops with the words "be careful that could be deep " echoing in their ears. The girls took to holding hands as one tested the depth of certain puddles. J and I took to placing bets as to who would fall in first.

I wasn't sure what to expect but the beach is rather rocky and muddy in comparison to Bertha's which is just around the corner from here.

There were lots of shells and smooth pebbles on the beach which had my lot scrambling around looking for skimming stones and the chinese hat style shells to bring home.

Somebody furry in our family really enjoyed having a good run around and swim in the ooh so icy waters. He didn't stop racing here and there to check out the next leg of the walk.

Although not a great shot it really does paint the picture, a wet soggy doggy with a very big smile on his face.

While I was busy bimbling along and looking for photo opportunities, the big and not so big kids in the family were busy trying to smash a very large ice puddle we had passed. They must have spent over twenty minutes trying to break up it surface with very little impact. This would be of course after the big kid in the family had earlier told them off for throwing stones!!

Carrying on out to the peninsula there is an old boat which I think was once upon a time called the Lady Diana. The boat itself looks in okay condition but the trailer is rather weather beaten now.

The kids had an attempt at the rope pull but couldn't make it budge even a millimetre.

There was a cold low slung sun which was casting a lovely shimmery light over the water. These three decided to get in the way of my action and strike a pose.

Boy wonder was busy looking over the water to see if he could make out the big black bird on the horizon who kept checking us out. That was of course before Dad decided to throw a bloody great big rock in the water in front of us, soaking the pair of us and my camera. Thanks for that Dad!

We all started to feel quite cold so made the decision to head back for a nice cup of tea and some birthday cake. There was the odd rain shower just starting to appear on the horizon but it treated us to a wonderful bright rainbow behind us.

True to mucky boy fashion Euan managed to break free a large piece of ice using his coat sleeves as you can see in the photo (thanks Euan next time take your gloves) and he was excited by the different patterns he found underneath.

Back to the car to stripe off before getting home just as the heavens opened. Good timing all round. Mum spent the next few hours showering dogs and putting jackets through the washing machine for school the next day. Poor old Fergus spent the rest of the night sprawled out on the sofa unable to move. He was really stiff and his arthritis was quite bad during the night. Thankfully this morning he doesn't seem so bad and he has a lovely fluffy white coat now but I am sure that will not last long.

I am struggling again with my asthma and have had a sore head over my eye sockets so am worried my sinus problems may be returning. I think a quite day today is in order and will just plan to finish up some bits a pieces from this weekends crafts. Love to all Helen x