Weekending

A huge and heartfelt thank you to each and everyone of you who left messages on my last post. 

The kind words were so very much appreciated. It was very touching that those we have never met, but through the wonders of this blogging community have shared so many of our family times over the years, took the time to leave a caring message for us all and especially T.

For T, as you can imagine, losing his brother has been devastating. 

We are trying to support him in every way we can whilst we all work through the emotions associated with our grief.

We have muddled through the weeks since half term when Liam's funeral took place and we have relished the weekends when we can all relax a bit and try and unwind.

S and I spent some time blowing bubbles, such a soothing thing to do, and she was fascinated by a bubble which moulded itself into the shape of the leaf it sat on.

We tipped mixture into small bowls and added a couple of drops of food colouring to each and then blew bubbles at sheets of paper to make some bubble art.

During a conversation with my sister one evening she asked if we had ever done the walk from Swanwick Shore Road. No we hadn't I replied and made a mental note to check out the details. A local walk we hadn't done before definitely needed to be investigated. There was a tiny car park just to the left of these houses although next time we are thinking of taking the train as later on in the walk there is the opportunity of taking a water taxi and then we could complete the journey home by bus.

So with two attractive(!) walking companions

and new star patterned navy pumps

 off we set for our stroll along the waters edge.

When G and I took the train to work the line ran along the opposite side to our walk. It's just behind the row of hedging you can see in the centre of this photo.

I don't know the details of this wreck but on recent reading it would appear there are a few on this stretch of water, maybe something to read up about before our next outing along here.

We spotted a pale blue phone box sat on the pier at the marina, looking a bit Tardis like.

I loved the simplicity of this little wooden boat sat moored on it's own away from the bigger ones.

An unexpected sight was a field to our right which was home to some donkeys and three alpacas

We didn't make it to our intended destination as we turned off the foot path and went into Holly Hill Woodland Park to find a spot to eat our picnic. We did a spot of exploring whilst there and found a rope swing.

A split second after this photo was taken S had fallen flat on her bottom as you can just see in the picture that the wooden handle snapped in two.

We decided to halt our day out shortly afterwards as we realised we didn't have enough time to reach the end of the walk as we had side tracked ourselves with unplanned exploring and we also needed to make a quick dash to Tesco and buy S new trainers for school.

There was some extremely childish giggling done in the supermarket as another customer had clearly decided that the shop models looked a little over dressed!

The following weekend we took ourselves back to Holly Hill as we decided we wanted to see a bit more. It was whilst we were walking down to the sunken garden I remembered that I had been there once before with my dad, the year before he became too poorly to go out. T and I had also visited here with my aunt and two youngest cousins, he had only been about 5 years old and he couldn't remember when I mentioned it to him. You can just see him, the dot of red!

There is a huge lake with picnic spots situated all round it, another visit is due in this summer holiday I reckon.

These stepping stones were met with much laughter, something a bit different to try out.

And finally we are at last weekend. We took ourselves off to Eastleigh for a day of street art events. The young girl who hula hooped with several at once was very impressive and S enjoyed watching her. G enjoyed eating his enormous ice cream! He bought it whilst I was off watching the drummers and when I took the photo he said it had actually been twice that size to start with!

The Wheelhouse was definitely our favourite of the day. The performers acted out their little journey as they propelled the wheel up the road, us audience walking alongside them. The 'house' had windows and doors and cupboards and all manner of odds and ends attached. Some ornamental and some used as props to tell the story of their journey.

Should you ever be at an event they are at make sure you make the time to watch them. S was totally captivated as she watched I was just as absorbed by her concern for the female performer 'fell out' of the wheel and was nearly run over.

There was so much we didn't get to see as well and some of the shops had displays in them. I fell in love with this red, white and blue dress in the window of Oxfam. Unfortunately it wasn't for sale but I really like the simplicity of the design and the big pocket which had a big red button sewn on to it. It had the look of a patriotic deckchair and I wouldn't mind one for the summer.