Magical days in the sun

Houghton Bay, Wellington.

I'm so glad I've decided to make time with the girls a priority because we've just had two magical days in a row. It's been gloriously sunny and we've been adventuring.

Yesterday we went to a playgroup at our church in the morning and afterwards, instead of walking home, we spontaneously decided to bus into town and surprise Paul at work. We had a lovely lunch with him and then walked back home to Island Bay.

It probably took about an hour or more to walk home, but both girls fells asleep in the buggy so I managed to get some exercise while they rested. Win!

Even better, on the way I passed masses of calendula plants growing on the side of the road. Well! I've been desperate to get my hands on calendula since reading about its uses on Frugal Granola last week...

How and why you should grow calendula
Harvesting, preserving and infusing calendula

...so I grabbed a bunch of the plants, wrapped their roots in wet tissues and brought them home with me.

Lily helped me plant them by filling the holes I dug with water from her new pink watering can. She had so much fun "making swimming pools".

I planted three of the calendula plants in front of my rhubarb plant, which I boxed on the weekend with some wood my neighbour was chucking out.

Actually, I've ended up with quite a lot of my neighbour's off-cuts. I picked up some little scraps for Lily to build toy houses with:

And larger bits which Lily is using as a balance beam.

I'm hoping to use the bigger pieces of wood to frame my fruit trees so I can plant comfrey around their trunks and not worry about our lawn-mower man weed whacking them all. (He's already taken out my rhubarb and raspberry plants, although both are making a comeback.)

After we had planted out all the calendula, I decided the day was still too beautiful to spend at home so we walked down to our local playground. Sophie fell asleep in the buggy on the way, so it was just Lily who actually got to play at the park.

Today was another blue sky day, although not as calm as yesterday. Initially I was planning to spend the day cleaning, and did get a little bit done around the house before deciding it was too beautiful to be inside so we headed down to the park. On the way Sophie fell asleep again, so I decided to keep on walking around the coastline to the next bay over from us - Houghton Bay.

Lily in the front seat of the buggy, Sophie asleep in the back.

We headed up to the playground on Houghton Valley Road, which is a new one for us, and had a marvellous time. It was a sunny spot, but sheltered from the wind so we really got to enjoy the beautiful day. Sophie woke up after a little while, which meant she actually got to do some playing for once.

On the way back the girls swapped seats and this time Lily fell asleep. I really do love our buggy!

These are the kinds of days that make me so glad I'm a stay-at-home (adventuring out-and-about) Mum.