Building sand castles, splashing in the sea, eating fish and chips, ice-cream cones and spending pennies in the pier. The summer for me is all about the beach! We try to go once a year, even before having children the boyfriend and I found ourselves at the beach eating ice-cream watching the sun setting. This year will be the first time we take Archie, I'm not so sure how he will react to sand and I dreading the whole fist full of sand in the mouth moments which from what I remember from Eva's first beach day are not fun for either of us. We're planning on our beach trip before summer - next month - as I'm back at work in June and want to have a nice day out before then.
2. Visit a zoo.
Another yearly thing for us. Boyfriend loves zoo's, even as a child his parents had to take him to one every year on his birthday. I think this year is the only year he's been unable to go to one at all due to Archie being unwell with chicken pox, although we are planning to go to bird land tomorrow. Eva visited her first zoo aged 3 weeks, Archie is 6 months and yet to step foot in one, mainly due to Eva being at school now and boyfriends work hours. we only get the school holidays and boyfriend doesn't always get the time off. This year we are visiting Noah’s Ark zoo. (www.noahsarkzoofarm.co.uk) It's one we are yet to visit and seems to be a very child friendly place.
3. Have a picnic.
No trip is complete without a picnic. Whether it be a trip to the beach, a walk out in the country or a simple trip to the park. I normally end up eating sushi rather then sandwiches which sounds weird, raw fish? But I love sushi, I'd probably opt for a veggie range rather then fish while out and about though.
4. Go for a walk in the countryside.
I'm very lucky to be in the middle of the Cotswolds meaning I am surrounded in hundreds of amazing walks and places to explore all year around. I love walking in the summer mainly because the sunshine makes for good lighting while taking photos and the ground tends to turn into a bog during the wetter months. I'm looking forward to going for a walk in the woods to see the blue bells, something we do yearly. We also take Eva on a deer walk, whether we try and see how many animals we can find. One year we found wild boar!
5. Fly a kite.
Kite flying for me sends flash backs of the tantrums my brother would throw when his kite wouldn't fly and ended up being thrown in the bin not long after it was brought. We headed to Worcester Woods last year and brought Eva a cheap (I say cheap but the smallest ones were £10) kite and used the fields to go fly it. She loved it, and was actually better then all of us put together! I've just sorted out her kite from the garage ready for trips out this summer - if it's lasts that long!
6. Slimbridge wetland centre.
Or as Eva calls it "Duck land" because it's all about the ducks here. With loads of things to see and do there it's a winner even on wet days. They have hundreds of ducks, geese, swans and other such birds as well as the wildlife, it's beautiful and well worth a visit. We are going with the in laws this year, nanny being a nature lover she's excited to go with Eva and see what they can find.
7. Baking.
This a must for the summer, with Eva off school keeping her entertained on the wet days will be a mission so that's when baking comes in. I love baking, I'm covered in flour most days from baking biscuits or cakes. I plan to do alot with Eva. She tends to get bored making things so I shall bake things for her to decorate and of course she gets to lick the bowl!
8. Go to the park / feed the ducks
With quite a few local parks I can see us spending alot of time visiting these over the summer. Archie is now sitting up unaided so I shall have to take him soon for his first try of a swing. Parks always come hand in hand with feeding the ducks, we normally buy an extra loaf just for them and I've found that if we are in town when we decide to feed the ducks we end up buying them a loaf from the bakery rather then something cheap! They eat better then most.
9. Swimming.
We do this anyway, once a week at least but it's one of those things that need to be there on a list of things to do in the summer. I may look at taking the children to another pool rather then our local maybe one with slides and things.
10. Take photos.
The final thing on my list is photos. I plan to take alot over the summer and post them on this blog. I feel I've forgotten photography over the past year or so and I've run out of excuses to not get the camera out. Go back to 2012 and my camera rarely left my hands!
