I love Fridays, as we don't have set plans, but lots of options... a few months ago I was crippled by the indecision involved, and the fear of missing out that accompanies lots of choices. However, I have decided to work with this by simply enjoying what we decide to do to the fullest, even if it is simply hanging out at home. Last Friday we had a chilled out day because my ankle was hurt, so plenty of book reading and cuddles. Today, my ankle is much improved, and I gave the kids a variety of options - Forest Friday, Museum, crafting, sorting out the garden or continuing our journey down the Porterbrook. Evan chose this last option. i was pleased, as I thought it would be great to visit again before all the trees become bare. We were noticing the shapes and forms as well as the sounds of the river along different point. Evan was noticing how the river carves out the sides of the river.
I loved this bit - the kids said it was like a shower, and certainly sounded like it. Around this point I remembered I have a sound recorder on my phone and we decided to record some of the different sounds of the river at various points.
Here is one of the first tributaries which we noticed, it joined the river underneath a small bridge on the path - leading into a pond-like spot where it is super deep, and therefore didn't flow very fast. It was fascinating noticing the different speeds of the water depending on the width and depth of the water at different points.
Evan noticed that today the river wasn't flowing as fast as last time - and this was confirmed by the fact that along the path, last time a lot of it was covered with water, but this time it was just squelchy. He spied a bit where it seemed like if the rain came down hard it would travel down this path from the path towards the river, but he believed it to be blocked by leaves and some excess stones, so he spent a while adjusting this to make a smoother path for the water. We watched as the water which was pooling in the area slowly head towards the river as he freed it up, bit by bit.
This is Evan by the last bit of this path.
Here Evan noticed that there was a fast flowing current going directly downwards to the mini waterfall, whilst the water close to his feet, where the 3 lobed leaf lies was actually very still, but for a bit of wobbling.
Evan noticed the tributaries tumbling down the side of the cliff in the form of mini waterfalls which were really nice and loud. (Difficult to see in this photo, but check out the middle)
Now this is why we love rivers.
This was great to see, and do a sound recording of, there was two quite separate sounds coming from each of the waterfalls here.
The path up.
Squelch.
Mushrooms
Some great sounds were heard near to the bridges. Quite gurgly.
Nearly done, we return with a few more sound recordings. The trip was loads of fun. We sat down for a while and listened and contemplated the shapes and flow of the water. We decided to write a poem, so came up with some lovely descriptive words from this... We set out to write it at home after lunch, however....
A wonderful lady I know had posted on facebook about how there was exciting stuff going on in Tudor square in town, as there was the filming of the Cbeebies panto (I knew about this, but forgot it was happening on this day. We had applied for tickets and didn't get them.) Anyway, she had said there were plenty of good stuff to do in the square outside the Crucible, so we decided to head on down there and check it out. The first thing we saw was Rastamouse, Autumn had a little dance.
We saw Sid from Cbeebies give us a rundown of what was going on, and then with a plan in mind to come and watch the live performance and 4.30 on the big screen, we went off to put some more money on the car meter and get some food. On the way we played a few games and things. Here is Evan lighting up the Christmas tree with his pedal power.
Autumn and Evan used some programmable toys to take the buzzy bee on a little journey. They played a ghosty game, and then returned in time for the performance.
So we sat down ready to watch the performance, and watched the warm up guy getting the children to do lots of things. Then some BBC people came up to us and ushered us into the Crucible Theatre, and before we knew it we were sat there in front of the Panto, surrounded by film crews, and right there in front of us was Cat, from Cbeebies. And the deluge began, Andy, Mr Bloom, Captain Jem, Cerri, and so many more. The sight of Mister Maker nearly made Evan's eyes pop out of his head. To my surprise he stood up and joined in with the singing and all the other actions.
Unfortunately we had to rush off at the end as I had to get to work, but OMG, what an exciting day.
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