A November Day

To give the kids some fresh air today, I took them over the road to the Downs - a big old expanse of green goodness. We took a couple of kites with us - one stunt kite, one tiny-weeny-small enough to fit in your pocket-kite. The children wanted to fly their kites in the middle of a circle of young trees they've named 'the seven sisters'. Even with my lack of common sense, I knew it would not be a good idea to fly the kites here. So we moved just to the left of them. Before we could start our kite-flying-fun, Grace wanted to find out the age of the trees. She informed me that you did this by listening to them, and proceeded to hug the tree (as above). I, in my ignorance, asked, 'how can you tell how old it is by listening?' Apparently, you'll hear the tree whisper, '7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2 or 1.' Lovely.

As I was starting to assemble the kite, Katie, the oldest of the three who has got her head vert well screwed on, and frequently outsmarts me, started calling my name in a slightly panicked voice. This was a rare moment. Rising to the occasion of being needed, I ran over and asked what the problem was. To which Katie pointed to her leg, where she had managed to get a whole piece of dog poo on her. I have no idea how on earth she managed this. Neither does she. So I was champion-Hannah and removed the offending article, making no fuss whatsoever. Gross. That's all I can say.

More great antics were had, as we managed to get the kite stuck in the tree. I was not worried, I was confident we could get it down. All that was needed was a little tree climbing and I was well up for it. So, with a little leg-up from Katie, I launched myself over the lowest avaliable branch of the tree. I'd like to point out here that this wasn't really a tree-climbing tree, but a kite needed rescuing, and I was the lady for the job. Or not, as it turned out. While I was bent in half over the branch, wiggling and wriggling in an attempt to get my feet up, but only being successful in getting my hair caught in the pines of the tree, with Katie giggling at the whole charade (as was I, which did not aid my efforts to hoist myself up), Will had somehow managed to free the kite. Not the champion-Hannah-for-the-second-time-around that I had hoped to be. All good fun though.