I hated them when I was a child and there were just an additional day of a weekend which Sundays were already a day too much of and I hated them when we worked in retail and not only did we have to work when everyone else wasn’t we also had to put up with work being busier than normal because everyone else was off work. I hate them now because they have all the trappings of being a weekend day – everywhere is busy, people are doing things as a family with none of the plusses of a normal week day.
Today Ady had hoped to be finished by lunchtime so I’d left the day free for us to do something this afternoon. I dislike going anywhere just me and the kids on a bank holiday for the reasons mentioned above as well as that single parent feeling. I have nothing against single parents but somehow being out with the children alone when everyone else is out as a family just irritates me and gives me the feeling I never normally get of being a ‘childcarer’ rather than a parent. Probably totally irrational and loony but there you go. We needed a quiet morning anyway as we were all tired and grumpy. Davies and Scarlett did some playing, DSing,watching TV, drawing, some jigsaws and general bumbling around the place. I did some online stuff and some reading and plenty of drinking tea.
At about midday Ady rang to say he wouldn’t be home early after all so I was very stroppy with him and after lunch took the children off to the beach. Despite half of Sussex being at the beach and the bank holiday market in full flow the sea worked it’s usual magic and I calmed down after walking briskly along the pebbles and the children got to roll up their jeans, clamber on dangerous rocks and scream into the wind and the sea to let off steam. They had been playing a Famous Five game before we left the house – Scarlett is agonising over who to be; she doesn’t like Anne because she’s ‘silly and gives away all the secrets’ but she doesn’t like George because ‘she doesn’t like being a girl and thinks boys are better and actually girls are just as good as boys and she should be proud of being one’. George tends to win over Anne because then she gets to use a cuddly toy to be Timmy the dog :lol:. When we left they were constructing a Kirrin farmhouse, island and cottage set up with tunnels and beach so they just carried on with that at a real beach. I think the grouping of rocks was supposed to be a rowing boat with the sea lashing at it’s sides :).
I sat on a rock and enjoyed the sunshine and then Ady rang to say he was home after all. I told him roughly where to find us and we walked down to the road to meet him (having walked about a mile along the beach away from our parked car). It was by now 3pm gone and both children had soggy jeans from the knee down so options were limited but we discussed what to do next. We decided to drive along to another patch of beach for ice creams but on the way drove over the bridge that crosses the river Adur and noticed the tide was very low and people were out on the river bed looking around. That seemed like a pretty interesting thing to do so we parked up and joined them. The river continues to flow with a very strong current but at about a quarter of it’s usual width so the river bank is very wide with with beached boats and loads of rockpools. You are walking on what forms the river bed for much of the time and it is made almost entirely of muddy sand and shells:
Oh and crabs! 🙂
Scarlett collected a full double handful of tiny ones, I think she had about 12 of them which she let go at the end in a handily situated rock pool
Davies found a decent sized fully intact dead one which he’s brought home to dissect and see ‘how it works’ wanting to know answers about bones, muscles and so on. I have delegated supervision of that to Ady, our resident cut it up and talk about it’s insides expert ;).
It was heading towards teatime so we stopped at McDonalds for the children to get Happy Meals and Ady and I to get icecreams before coming home for more Famous Five story. It started a fairly crappy day but ended on a high note :).
glad it wasn’t all bad. I do love your beach. We’ll have to try and come down soon and see you all (and the beach ;))
I am passionate about the May bank holidays as they are rare family days for us. Every year I have the distinct feeling that it will be the last one before my work decide that we just have to open. Most other university libraries do open – as it is exam time there is a lot of demand.
Crabs are great, aren’t they? I think I sometimes forget how lucky we are to live by the sea. It is magic and always calms me.
I never read famous five but remember the TV version. I was always (unsurprisingly) a George fan but always thought she was a bit of a pain with her anti-girl stance. I used to get accused of wanting to be a boy when all I really wanted to do was sit up trees and ride my bike.