Gardening Time

For weeks now I have been busy commenting on some lovely little garden helpers in Country Kids posts. This week as the rain
thwarted our plans to attend the Lostwithiel festival we enjoyed so much last year, I decided it was time to transform the greenhouse from abandoned lamb shelter and bike storage into a thriving veggie house for the season. The children were only too keen to help.

First step was a wheelbarrow for all the old straw and weeds. It took several barrow loads but gave the boys a chance to bring the quad to help take all the unwanted contents to the compost heap across the river.

In the process we found some enormous snails and slugs which the children collected and made a home for.  It slowed down the green house makeover but I was in no rush and happy to be distracted by things that took their imagination. They did frighten the life out of me by uncovering an abandoned toy snake that looked far too real decaying in the soil!

Promising a snail race later we returned to our now cleared and weeded Greenhouse with enthusiasm. I was thrilled to uncover the herb section which had survived the lamb invasion remarkably well and set about planting the tomato plants I had been given at Greek Easter last weekend. The children learned how to turn the pots over and carefully loosen the plants. Dug holes with their trowels, lined them with fresh compost and watered them in. 

Next we tackled the outdoor section behind the green house. Here we planted my rosemary bush out from its winter pot and tried to bed in some wild garlic my Mum had brought up after I had become so taken with scones made with it by Thinly Spread.

The children had been so helpful and enjoyed the whole process so much more than I had anticipated that I took them to our local nursery Cedar Croft to buy a few more things, since they don't actually like tomatoes! They each chose their own plants with helpful advice from the lovely ladies who run the shop and came back armed with peppers, cucumber, strawberry plants and some more herbs for me. Where the labels were missing they made their own.

Our work done we set about the promised snail race. It was great fun and produced much cheering and shouting and just a little cheating when the snails refused to cooperate! I love the tomato podium for the Olympics style awards ceremony at the end! 

The final find of the day was a toad in our drain! The children excitedly photographed him and held him like a pet. Setting him free if was like a send off for a long lost friend! That and the snail race I think were their highlights.

From a day which initially looked so drab came one which excited and enchanted. It just goes to show that so long as you can adapt your plans a wet day needn't be an indoor day.

Joining in with Country Kids.

Country Kids is all about having fun outdoors; spending time away from screens and sofas and enjoying playing, crafting or learning outside anywhere from the garden to the beach. Stretching limbs and imagination and enjoying family time is important for us all. Please grab the badge and add your adventures. There are always plenty of lovely ideas so do take a few minutes to visit some of the other posts here too.

Here are just a few posts that inspired me last week. A season of country fun around a farmer's field from Daisy Bloomfield fairies in the bluebells from Pod Cast and A perfect day out with the National Trust from Kids and Gardens.  

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Greek Easter

Greek Easter is one of the greatest events of the year for the Greek community. With Farmer Nick being half Greek it is a custom I have come to love too. For the past few years we have been to visit the family in Sussex, but this year as we had holiday cottages available on the required dates we invited family and friends to us, included our Cornish friends and Coombe Mill Guests and made it a real party to remember. Our garden and the wider facilities of Coombe Mill turned out to be a wonderful place to host the festivities while the glorious bank holiday weather was a real bonus.

The main feature of the day is a spit roast lamb which has to be rigged up from early hours and tended lovingly for the duration of the morning and well into the party. All the children helped out and had a hand in basting and turning. Nick remembers fondly doing the same as a child and encourages ours to help knowing that one day they will want to host the celebrations themselves. 

Food and drink is the main feature of the party, and there was plenty to go round as I brought out course after course. So many friends and family helped to make the dishes that it really was a team effort. 

This is very much a family day and while the adults chatted the children had their own entertainment. For the youngest I raided the toy boxes of the properties and laid them out on a picnic rug so that they could be part of the party with something to keep them entertained.

The older children all took off around the farm to play, popping back in to visit the never ending food table periodically to see if a new delicacy was on offer. I broke away from the adults at one stage to catch them all climbing a tree in the sheep field and in with the rabbits. It was lovely for them to have the freedom to come and go as they pleased.

The highlight for the children is the egg game and our children couldn't wait to show their Cornish friends how to play this all so Greek game. Each person holds a hard boiled egg, cooked in special red dye, and takes it in turn to hit the opponents' egg to see whose will crack first. The winner is the person whose egg is unbroken. This year's winner was just two years old so the rest of us have a thing or two to learn. With all the eggs cracked it became a free for all for the kids in a massive egg fight.

The adults watched from afar sipping retzina, eating and chatting in the sun!

A Rare picture of Nick and I together enjoying our party

If I say so myself, it was a wonderful garden party as part of an amazing bank holiday weekend with all our family and friends together. 

Joining in with Country Kids  

Country Kids is all about having fun outdoors; spending time away from screens and sofas and enjoying playing, crafting or learning outside anywhere from the garden to the beach. Stretching limbs and imagination and enjoying family time is important for us all.

Here are just a few posts that inspired me last week. Playing with stones from Becky at Baby Budgeting,  Snails and worms from Sabrina at Brinabird and Son and I could just see my boys enjoying the day Goblin had at Mountfitchet Castle from Taming the Goblin. 

Please grab the badge and share your outdoor adventures here on the linky. Do take a look around the other posts as there are always some wonderful ideas.

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You may also like to join in the Spring Carnival blog hop with your Country Kids post

A family Day out to Cornwall Crealy Adventure Park

The children adored Crealy when they were younger but we haven't visited in years. Several of my friends have membership and the children really wanted to join them for a family outing so we packed a picnic, left Daddy tinkering on the railway line at Coombe Mill (this one is really starting to annoy him now) and set off. Crealy is only half an hour from Coombe Mill but compared to our sheltered valley the exposed hilly coastal location always means an argument with my kids to take a jumper for the cold and a waterproof coat for the wet rides! I had a free pass for two of us which only left five to pay for. I was expecting it to be expensive but £80 for five was still a shock! Small children do get in free but my only just 9 year olds counted as adults which I thought was a tad steep! Up grading to £150 gave me annual membership so I figured it was worth the extra for the younger ones. We will have to make plenty of use of it now! 

Something for Everyone

There is plenty to keep young children amused with small ride on play, sand and diggers and seasonal shows, Peppa Pig was there on our vist. The toilets are good and dotted all around the park which is handy with little ones. 

As an adult I appreciate that there is plenty of green space, picnic tables and a beautiful lake to take a wonder when my kids have dashed off to do their own thing, though I do wish they would put wi fi in, with no phone signal and no wi fi it is really cut off. 

There are plenty of farm animals too but given where we live my kids didn't give then a second glance, though they did find the reptile house fascinating.

It is the rides that really do it for my children, they had a wild time dashing from one daring ride to another and the queues were only minutes. This is where I would love a decent camera to capture their faces flying down the slides and log flume. It is far from my perfect fun, but I did brave a few rides with them and managed not to look too green at the other end!

The kids would have me back again tomorrow, but there is only so much Crealy I can cope with. Still it was good to get out and have a forced break from any work and a totally different sort of day for my Country Kids.

Joining In with Country Kids

Hoping you have some outdoor adventures to link up. From play to learning, the garden to the beach, please come and share your inspiration for enjoying the outdoors. Please grab the badge and remember to check some of the other lovely ideas here. A few that stood out for me last week were the tadpole to frog explanation from Cafe Babe, a lovely day out from Silk Scarf Mum and how could I not point you to this wonderful first day of the holidays from Edspire. I also promised a mention for the Lollibop Festival 2013 at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, London on August 16-18 which looks like a fun family day out. They are selling tickets now and I saw lots of good feedback on line from the event last year, but sadly a tad too far away for me! 

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The Triplets Birthday Party

My babies were 9 on Sunday and to celebrate we organized a Birthday Party of epic proportions all based around simple outdoor fun and games on the farm. Three hours responsible for seventeen over excited nine year olds always scares me, silly really as I have organised so many parties over the years, but I always feel so responsible for other people's children. In the end I counted two falls but no broken bones or tears which I consider a success from my side. As for the triplets, they described it as "Epic" and "The best party ever" followed by "please can we do exactly the same next year?" as I cleared endless party popper and paper remains from around the garden.

Here's what they did:

After excitedly opening presents the boys hurried off to feed the lambs and see the much talked about Camp Skull

The girls headed for a game of tag in the play barn.

After an hour of "free time" they drifted back to the house and I engaged them in some pre planned team games:

Coombe Mill Farm Treasure Hunt

Before the party began I had hidden 7 clues per team out around the farm, each with a letter on the bottom. The boys and girls were in competition to complete their clues and return to the house and make a word from the letters on the clues. The rain had been forecast to fall for the exact 3 hours of the party and did exactly that. In anticipation I had wrapped the clues in cling film and hidden them in walls, under play equipment and in the BBQ hut to ensure they were still readable an hour later when they were discovered. Thankfully the children loved the excitement of running off in search of the clues and the idea of being in competition girls against boys and no one seamed worried about the rain. Only I was bothered as I tried in vain to clear droplets from the camera lense!

The girls were home with their anagram complete a good 5 minutes before the boys who had cheated and not found lost a clue along the way!

Pinata Mayhem

Instead of buying Pinatas we gave the girls and boys sellotape, brown paper, bags of recycled paper and plastic and a prefilled box of sweets. The challenge was to make a pinata for the other team to play. Again boys against girls they embarked on the task with heaps of enthusiasm in their bid to make a parcel the other would never manage to crack open. The girls worked with relative quiet concentration while the boys just had too many team leaders in their group and the noise was deafening!

Nick hung the finished pinatas from the veranda while each team found themselves a stick from the farm to whack their pinatas. Once again it was the girls who triumphed, competitive spirits riding high. I have to say I think this was the event of the party and under the shelter of the veranda it kept the rain off perfectly!  

Who's the Mummy?

While Nick worked on the BBQ I handed each team a toilet roll. They had to select their Mummy from the group and all take it in turns to add layers. They found it surprisingly hard not to let the paper rip in their quest to wrap their team mate quickly in the allocated 5 minutes. I declared this one a draw to save face for the boys!

Time was running on and many of the parents had begun to arrive by the time we ate the BBQ and cut the cake.

I would have loved them to have waited for their tea to settle before diving onto the bouncy castle which had largely been ignored until now thanks to the rain, but there is no stopping an excited group of nine year olds. The water guns made it even more slippery just when the rain had eased off, but they claimed that just made it more fun!

No wonder the hours just flew by. 

Joining in with Country Kids

Country Kids is all about enjoying the outdoors, whether it be the freedom to run and play or a craft or learning activity, outdoor time away from screens and central heating is good for mind and body. Please come and join in by grabbing the badge and linking up your outdoor fun with the kids. The Linky is every Saturday to Thursday, even if you have forgotten to take the camera out and have nothing to add, please take a look at some of the other ideas here and remember everyone enjoys a comment. Last week with a whopping 78 link ups I am struggling to pick just a few to suggest to visit, but in the end I decided on the pond work from Navigating by Joy for her home schooling adventure  A beautiful trip to Victoria Park in London from Liska and a day out with The National Trust from Sara - Jayne Jones

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The 4th Coombe Mill Annual Raft Race

It has become a bit of a tradition over the Easter break to hold a raft building and racing morning. I would love to take credit for this one but I have to hand that to a family of our regular guests. My contribution being more to inform those unaware that they are missing the event of the week and to come on over and join in. This is one that works in numbers and with a little guidance the children just love the whole thing.

It all begins after the morning feed run as the children gather round the outside of our hosting family's lodge. Prepared with the best of Coombe's recycling, gathered twigs, masking tape and a bundle of Farmer Nick's old baler twine Mums, Dad's and children set to work to build and name their raft for the race. 

To sustain the builders were some delicious homemade muffins; perfect on a chilly morning.  

Building complete it is down to the river. I did my best amidst the excitement to gather the children for a quick photo with their rafts

Then they are handed down to the water for the grand send off. Much shouting, cheering and a few prods from a good stick when they run ashore and they are away.

I love to watch the video; the excitement in the children's voices is obvious as they dash down to the finishing line along the banks of the river.

The winner once again is the original raft of 4 years ago. This one comes back each year to face the new challengers but is yet to be beaten. It has been into school for show and tell, used as an example of ideas with water and explaining buoyancy in science; a true treasure from Coombe Mill.

There were many tactics tried this year from a little water or sand to prevent capsizing, to taller and wider sails. It made a great science experiment never mind the fun!

Down at the finishing line the children waded into rescue their rafts before they drifted off downstream.

Only my boys had to go one step further and jump off the bridge to the calls of "please can we do that" from the guests children!

My sincere thanks go to our guests for organizing a great morning on the farm.

Joining in with Country Kids 

If you have been enjoying some fun outdoors please come and join me here on the linky. Whether City or Country, the garden or the beach a little outdoor freedom is good for mind and body. Grab the badge and remember to check out some of the other lovely ideas here. A huge thank you to all who linked last week, it really was a bumper week for outdoor Easter Fun. If you are short on outdoor ideas do take a look at 30 things to do with pavement chalk from Mummy Alarm and I hope I am putting an end to winter weather by suggesting checking out these wild weather ideas from Creative Star. Finally a 3 cheers for Becky Willoughby who managed 3 entries last week, my favourite being rambling in Cumbria as the landscape reminds me of Bodmin Moor.

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