One word? When seven would do…

We don’t seem to stay still for very long…

Up and out early to Wildlife Explorers. Scarlett was first for an hour and her session was about cuckoos. They did some colouring, watched a film about cuckoos and then went out onto the reserve to look for signs of spring. Scarlett said they found buds and shoots.

Meanwhile Davies, Ady and I walked round the newly acquired land adjacent to the reserve, taking a slightly different route to last month. Ady has a bonus coming at the end of this month so there is much debate currently about how best to spend it. Davies was joining in the discussion really intelligently and sensibly, along with stopping to look at things around us such as the evidence of feasting squirrels. Oh and climbing up the odd tree here and there.

We went back to collect Scarlett and I noticed Davies looking very uncomfortable all of a sudden. He then said he didn’t want to go in for his session. He didn’t seem to have a reason for this and I put it down to tiredness so insisted he went in and waved him off. Ady, Scarlett and I were walking back towards the car to get a drink when I hear footsteps behind us and turned to see Davies, in floods of tears running after us. I walked back with him as I didn’t know if they would have realised he’d gone so needed to check. We sat outside and I tried to get out of him why he was so upset and what he didn’t like. I finally got from him that he feels he is expected to be able to do more than he is capable of – I suspect and infact he later confirmed, that this is mostly reading and writing tasks. He said that in the younger group the adults have more time and patience, the older group is bigger and they want to crack on with the rest of the activities rather than support reading and writing struggles.

While we were talking the leader came out and sat with us. She gave Davies a cuddle and asked what the matter was, explaining that if she knew what was wrong then she’d be able to fix it for him. I explained he was finding the transition from the younger group to the older group a bit hard, aswell as the longer session (Scarlett is there for an hour, Davies is there for 2.5 hours) and she agreed that lots of the children do struggle at first. She was keen to encourage Davies to go back in but equally keen for him not to be forced. I was worried that if he walked away then it would build up into an even bigger deal for next time so we agreed to have another 15 minutes composing himself time and then he might go in.

Davies and I sat on a bench in the sunshine and talked about it. We discussed doing things that scare you and how good you feel about having done them, assessing the risk of the worst that could happen about what scares you and how you would deal with it if that did happen, rising to challenges, compared it to a rollercoaster ride where there is that moment at the top just before you go over and hurtle down that pretty much anyone would jump out if they were given the choice but seconds later you are flying and loving it and so, so glad you did it. We talked about why he goes to Wildlife Explorers, what he gets out of it and what he would miss, how he could rise to challenges and so on. It turned out what had tipped him into running out was the first task on the table being paper to write down a list of birds you’d seen already this spring. We talked about how he could have had a go at that and he very easily spelt ‘robin’. I suggested drawing pictures if there wasn’t an adult to help or making a mental list and then asking quietly for some assistance with spelling or just having a go and risking getting the spellings wrong.

Diane the leader then came back out to say they were about to show a film so it would be a good point to rejoin the group but Davies said he didnt want to go back in today but would be back next month. Diane then suggested that rather than lose him she would be very happy for him to come back to the younger group again and be with Scarlett. Scarlett will go up at the end of this year and while I’d hope Davies feels ready to go up before that happens he is clearly not ready to be in the big group just yet. He leapt at this chance and is now really happy about going back next month and into the younger group again.

I am a bit worried that he has done a fair bit of avoiding things he knows he can’t do and possibly feels fretful that he should. He definitely bowed out of Sea Scouts for that reason and I don’t want him to miss out on things particularly if the fears are unfounded anyway – Wildlife Explorers is not school and they don’t as far as I know have any sort of literacy agenda to fulfil so I’m guessing they don’t care at all if he can’t spell bird names although I appreciate they don’t have a spare adult available to sit with Davies and hold his hand through all of the sessions either. I do think a lot of these stumbling blocks are in Davies’ own mind and either they would turn out not to matter anyway or actually if he gave things a go more readily he would realise they are totally achievable for him. Ah well, solution to this one easily found in the end and he will go back to the younger group again for now.

So, we left Pulborough Brooks rather earlier than planned and went to visit Tom at his Dad’s which is nearby. We were there for an hour or so and met their two Tamworth pigs that they are hoping are pregnant after AI last weekend – if so we’re hoping to go along for the birth or very soon afterwards to meet the piglets 🙂

We looked under some tarps to see if we could spot any just-waking-up adders. We weren’t lucky with adders but did find some sleepy lizards 🙂

Their bees are just starting to wake although their chickens are a bit behind ours in starting to lay again. We then went down to the lake where Tom’s dad and brother were chainsawing down some trees. They bought the house and land a couple of years ago and have been spending lots of time and money taming the land to how they want it which includes a couple of very large man-made lakes with fish for fishing to complement the fast flowing stream already naturally running through the bottom of the land. We were very lucky to see a kingfisher flying around the lake, three times which enabled us to point and say ‘isn’t that a Kingfisher?’ at the first turquoise flash and then have two more chances to be sure that yes it was. Amazing sight, I’ve never seen one before and they are far smaller than I had imagined them to be.

Davies and Scarlett adored running wild with the pack of dogs and crossed the stream at shallow spots, encouraged the dogs to leap in the stream and the lake by throwing sticks and generally loved being there 🙂

We spotted some toadspawn and then Ady and the kids (and one of the dogs) had a row round the lake in the little rowing boat. I declined on the basis I was fairly sure they were going to fall in and wanted to be on the bank to capture the photo. They didn’t 😆

It is just so lovely there with a lake to fish and row on, a stream to splash in, woodland and fields, horses, bees, chickens, pigs, a pack of dogs and loads of land for growing fruit and vegetables. Davies and I spent some time indulging a fantasy of ‘if we lived here…’ and Scarlett was practically in tears when it was time to leave she loves it there so much. A real ‘wrong life!!!’ alert moment I thought…

Back home again Dad came over to collect some logs and ended up staying longer than we’d planned. It was lovely to see him and he and I taught Davies how to play several versions of patience with his newly won pack of cards which was nice. Dad and I used to spend hours together playing cards when I was about Davies’ age.

But it did mean that a mere 3 hours before we were expecting Mike and Rose to arrive for dinner I was still googling recipes and writing a list to take to Tescos to buy stuff for 😯

We’d decided to go for an Indian food theme and cook curry, with veggie and chicken options (mainly so I didn’t have to eat vegetarian). Ady had already cooked the chicken curry last weekend and frozen it and was doing the rice, the bombay potatoes and had bought some breadmaker mix for naan breads which was already on. I found recipes for onion bharjees and vegetable samosas and so headed off for supplies.

When I got back we had 2 hours before they were arriving and I split my time up and tried to be all Masterchef about what was left to do. I made pastry for the samosas and got that chilling, made the filling for them and got that simmering. I made the mix for the bhajees, whizzed up cucumber and mint for one dip and coriander and garlic for another and then got the veggie curry on. It was a version of Helen’s much loved camp curry which clearly I can’t offer an opinion on as it was full of cauliflower and various beans but went down well :). I finally made the samosas (they tasted really good but I’d use readymade filo pasty next time as the recipe turned out nice but dry and fiddly to work with pasty so we ended up with sort of mini curried veg pasties rather than samosas).

Meanwhile the kids had a bath and some dinner, Ady got the house tidied up, found candles, lit a fire, got Davies’ bedroom ready for a sleepover for the kids and had a bath so that he could take over making the potatoes, frying the bhajees and samosas (I’m not allowed anywhere near hot fat), shaping the naan breads and keeping an eye on the curries while I had a bath and got changed.

All was well and I was just putting dishes of bombay mix and balti peanuts out when Mike and Rose arrived. We had a really nice evening – Indian beer and non-Indian wine. The food all went down well, conversation ranged from intelligent and grown up to downright silly, the kids reappeared a few times but were very tolerated and well behaved before they finally went to sleep around 1130pm. I’d got turkish delight and sorbet for dessert as Indian food tends to be little, very sweet puddings and this was the closest I could find, but everyone was so full up we only had some turkish delight and some of the chocolates Mike and Rose had brought with them along with coffees and liqueurs.

They left earlier than usual – still after 1am mind you, as Mike’s daughter who is 12 and is with them on weekends has suddenly shown an interest in attending church so they have been taking her to the morning Sunday service and Mike was conscious about needing to be up and ready for that in the morning.

Ady and I sat up awhile talking about favourite songs and playing some of them before finally going to bed ourselves sometime after 2am.