Today I have mostly been trudging

which for some reason always puts me in mind of Milly Molly Mandy although there is every chance she never actually trudged anywhere.

I woke up this morning and laid for a while before I opened my eyes trying to guess what time it would be. I’d woken when Ady got up but fallen asleep again until it was properly daylight. I could hear the cockerels crowing and decided it was 903am. I was quite staggered when I was utterly spot on to the minute 😯 Wonder if there is career potential in such a skill? 😆

So, got up, woke children, breakfasted them, let the chickens out and fed them and broke the ice on their water, put some washing on, put some bread on and sat down with a cup of tea.

I think we may have had a little more snow overnight but it was bright and sunny out. I decided we’d walk into Lancing offering fresh air and exercise all round, some being out in the snow for the kids and some local shopping for the few bits we needed for dinner too. So I got the rucksack out in order to have both hands free to clutch children if needed and we set off.

We hailed neighbours as we went and spoke to everyone we passed which was nice – the snow certainly seems to have brought out people’s community spirit. We walked across the big park but the snow is now more like ice and even the untouched, virgin snow is actually just six inches of loosely packed ice now. Very pretty in the sunshine glistening away but no good for snowballs or walking over really. The tops of my legs ache from adapting my gait to account for it.

Into the Co-Op for various bits, including five tins and two large bags of onions which my back is still protesting a bit about now but at least counted quite considerably as exercise and load-bearing exercise at that. We had a look in the charity shops and the pound shop before trudging home again. This time we walked through the alleyways as my back was protesting and Davies said he had cold feet. I did berate him that as a nine year old boy in the snow he should be in his element. Once he’d ascertained what ‘in his element’ meant he explained that ‘but my life is so good I get to do whatever I want whenever I want anyway. I understand that all the nine year old boys who are usually in school think this is really cool but for me it’s like my normal life. But colder.’ 😆 😆 While we talked about this Scarlett was busy counting litter (I didn’t point out that there was probably a lot more litter than she could see nestled under the snow) and came up with 17 pieces which she said was sad but a whole load less than when we did our litter walk on that route and declared she was proud of us because obviously our clearing up, putting up displays at the library and being in the paper had made a real difference and people had stopped dropping so much litter :). And you never know, she might just be right, it certainly was a well executed campaign :).

Ady rang just as we were nearing home to say he’d called in for lunch and where were we. I said we’d only be another five minutes or so and he got the tea and hot chocolate on for us :). He’d come home in the company van having been delivering stock locally that the artics couldn’t get in or out to do and been passing on his way back to the office and wondered if I’d like to go back with him to Chichester to the Lush shop to spend my birthday money. Except the van is two seater only. On the spur of the moment I rang my Dad and asked if he would be happy to have Davies and Scarlett for a couple of hours while I went and spent the money they’d given me yesterday. He agreed so the kids and I leapt in the back of the van for the mile drive to my parents. It was pitch dark and excellent fun :). We spent the journey trying to work out where we were in the dark and were really good at left and right turns and going up and down hills but rubbish at gauging straight bits of road which felt way longer than they were in the dark being chucked about. Davies said it was ‘like a rollercoaster in the dark’ and Scarlett said ‘we have *got* to do this more often!’ 😆

Kids safely despatched with my Dad -and my Mum on her way home too- Ady dropped me off in Chichester all alone :). I had a lovely couple of hours with a lot more trudging. Lush were doing a £20 lucky dip bag of Christmas gifts free with every £20 you spent so I spent my £40 and got £80 worth of stuff – the pile of free things is bigger than the ones I paid for – 3 bags full :). The shops started to shut around me from about 330pm though so I rang Ady and he came and collected me. I sat in the car outside his work for a while (luckily the kids had left their DSs in the car from yesterday so I played on Davies’) and then we came home via my parents to collect Davies and Scarlett and have a quick coffee with them.

Mum and Dad have just booked a 3 week holiday in China so were full of that :).

Back home Ady made pancakes for the kids’ tea while I had a lovely bath with lush bubbles, soap, facepack and shampoo :). Then I made Economy Gastronomy chilli con carne for dinner.