For some reason little Bea was very tired in the morning but absolutely refusing to sleep. I think it might be because Dada was there and when he's off work she doesn't want to miss a moment of it. Nonetheless we had sleepy, clingy, slightly grouchy girl for the first hour or two, until she finally nodded off in the cafe over her peas and sweetcorn. We wandered around the garden centre while she was sleeping, looking at baby toys. We bought her a new book about animals (her favourite sort of book).
After she woke up, though - wow. Excited, bubbly little Bean. Walking everywhere!
Audrey is a little bigger now than the last time we were there, and it made a big difference. She could walk around on her own investigating things (although she likes to hold hands in strange places or on difficult, uneven ground) and she seemed much more interested in the butterflies than she was before.
We got an information leaflet with pictures of the butterflies to help us identify them, and Audrey loved to look at it on the way home and point at the ones we saw. We also took our My First Bugs book, borrowed from the library. I like to take books that are in some way related to the things we're seeing, as I think it starts to teach her about information and the ways books can be used, as well as helping to cement things in her mind a little better. Sometimes a bit of winding down time to reflect and take everything in is a good thing.
We looked at all sorts of exciting creatures. Audrey wasn't so interested in the creepy crawlies or the snakes, preferring instead to race around holding on to Dada's hands.
There was so much to see that it was tough to keep up with it all.
A lovely moment when a butterfly landed on Audrey's back. She was completely oblivious, still staring at the fish in the big tanks.
Bean LOVES fish. We looked at all the fish in the shop (boo for pet shops, awful places - please adopt your pets from a rescue and don't support these unethical places!) and she pointed and said "ish!" and "wow wow WOW!" while Ian and I wondered if she would one day be wanting a pet "ish" of her very own (please also don't give pets to children - with the best will in the world, they won't treat that pet right for its whole life - adopt a family pet instead with the parents taking an active role in caring for the animal).
It was so kind of Alex to take us.
I'm actually IN a lot of these photos, which is a rare occurrence and totally thanks to Alex. He was testing out his shiny 3D camera on the butterflies (and the Audrey Beas) and occasionally we swapped and got some photos with the other's camera. It was a lot of fun, and wonderful to see the pics. Put it this way, my family are very used to seeing this:
SAY CHEESE!
We went on the swings and slides at the play park, too. She wasn't sure about the slide at all, until I got on it with her. Then she was all smiles and grins.
Finally we were so exhausted and headed home for a quiet evening of enjoying the sunshine and being together as a family. Lovely day.
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