What to do on cold Winter weekends?

Always a struggle to entertain wild children on wet weekends, particularly more so when all you want to do is stay in, stay warm, and finish your Christmas shopping on line!  This morning is blustery and we've got hail showers.  We've already watched the bestest film of all time, Labrinth, and have run out of cheese.

As I've been spending even more time on my laptop writing business plans and trying to finalise new business ventures and create a highly successful business empire to soften the blow of redundancy, I really owe it to TT to take her out somewhere!

So here's our choice that we're going to meander through....

Dean Castle has a Christmas fair on today with "crafted gifts, toys and food items you will find everything you need for the perfect Christmas celebration" apparently.  I've never been to Dean Castle before, so that's enough of a reason for me to go exploring.  Santa has a grotto there too today, and as TT is only just starting to understand what Santa is, that's just the ticket for today.

Then we might meet Daddy Native on how way home from work at Seamill Hydro which looks like it has plenty to keep a wild toddler entertained for a while, with the choice of Santa in his magical ice palace grotto, a giant bouncy castle in Rudolph’s play room, an outdoor ice skating rink  and more.

It's likely that I'll get lost on way to Dean Castle, so good to know also that Troon's monthly craft fair is on too.  I need to go check it out as part of research for my future business plans in any case!

Hopefully I'll have some nice discoveries and photos to share with you to come....

PS....Thanks to Visit Ayrshire-Arran and Explore AyrshireArran for their suggestions this morning via Twitter!

This weekend?

Well for those of you following me on Twitter, you'll know I was hoping to take part in some of Scotland's Food & Drink Fortnite.  In particular I was thinking how lovely it would be to take a little trip to EatBute as I've never been there before and it sounds ace.  Mount Stuart looks stunning and a splendid way to spend a Saturday with my girl, and if I'm lucky Daddy Wild might be able to accompany us too.

And then I got distracted by the many, many events on in Dumfries & Galloway for the Food & Drink Fortnight.  Which actually just prompted me into a big sulk, as it's simply too far away for a day trip, and purely underlined the fact that there is simply nothing similar happening near where we happen to live.  Sometimes North Ayrshire sucks.  Sigh.

Then there's Doors Open Days all September, to which I haven't managed to make a single location.  Some nice places to seduce you this weekend, including some of Glasgow's museums.

If you've ever read my other my blog you'll know I'm well into my foraging.  So I'm also torn to go along to Finlaystone Country Estate's Food For Free foraging walk.

If I were in Edinburgh, I'd head to the Edinburgh Mela with an empty tummy so I could eat my way around the day!

Closer to home, I'm probably most excited about taking part in River Cottage's Seven Mushroom Challenge!  I say this because we've had a mammoth amount of rain this week and all of a sudden today the temperature rose again, which I think makes it pretty ideal for a lot of mushrooms?!  I guess there's only one way to find out....

In reality and complete honesty..... if Daddy Wild is off work this weekend, then we'll be making the most of that by finally building the greenhouse I bought about 2 months ago.
Oh joy of joys.

What are you doing this weekend?

There's so much to choose from this weekend.  Daddy Native has a Saturday off for once, so we shall be sticking close to home & working on projects in the garden then.  Mostly I shall probably be avoiding the heavy lifting by playing with my new D90 so look out for some stunning photography to follow! No pressure here then!
Then we are torn on Sunday between Largs & Glasgow.  Kelburn Castle is awash with Vikings this weekend so we'll be paying them a visit at some stage.  I can't work out whether it'll just be TT & I, or whether we'll borrow some cousins to join us too for the added exhaustion. 
Sunday is also my chance to see if any of the items on my wish list at The Forgotten Island are leftover and available to the public.  I am desperately seeking tyres and some of the wooden items for my new garden plans, so fingers crossed!

Other options this weekend...

• If you're in need of new baby bits and bobs, the Glasgow Baby Booty Sale is on this weekend at Kelvin Hall International Sports Arena from 10.30am.
• If I were in Glasgow's West End I would like to go to Byres Road Makers Market and sample some beautiful crafts.
• If TT were a tiny bit older I'd be galloping to the free Saturday Art Club on Saturday morning in GOMA, perfect way to spend a wet morning!

Of course I shall also come back with daring adventure stories to tell you all, as I try to never let the boring truth get in the way of a good story - read this for similar. Happy weekend! x

Do you believe in fairies?

How do you play? 
We have very distinct playing roles in this house. Mama's good for cuddles and kisses and going on adventures.  Daddy's best for playing though - indoors or outside he'll happily roll around, tickle, play catch, hid in the den, allow himself to be thumped over the head with various toy tractors.  I guess he's the patient one!  I can't help but feel a little jealous of all the shrieks of laughter coming from TT's room after bathtime, but the truth is I'm just not as good at messing around for anything more than 10 minutes or so.  I could argue that I'm too busy however - after all I'm cooking dinner and sorting out the house while Daddy Native does bathtime & tries to find clean PJs.

So I'm drawing plans to make the garden more TT friendly.  Sure there's loads of space to run around, but I'm forever working in the garden, tending lovingly to the veggies and flowers and taking photos for my other blog.  So far, we've cut back a bush in the garden and carved out space for a den and put her play wig-wam in there to show her it's her space.  We've been lucky to receive lots of toys and a slide/climbing frame from neighbours & family who's kids no longer need them.

I'm designing a little obstacle course which I plan to build..... sometime!  I want there to be space for her to grow her own flowers and take pride in planting them herself, whilst also being able to climb and wriggle and hide and do rolly-pollys there.  We're lucky to have such a good sized garden  & I was greatly inspired by The Forgotten Island and hoping to source some tyres for free, build some grass ledges and add texture and colour to the garden with ribbons and crafts that we can make together.

Mostly however I'm super excited by the fact that she's started believing in and understanding what fairies are!  I had a funny conversation with a friend this week about how his fairies are very different from mine!  It had never occurred to me that everyone has their own idea of what a fairy might look like!  I'm going to wallow in reliving my own child hood here and put up some fairy doors on the tree trunk, and create plenty of evidence for TT to nourish her fairy imagination! 

What do you think makes the best play space in gardens for toddlers to grow & explore in?



Going to Edinburgh with a toddler... Part 1

I have to admit something here, at home we actually refer to Baby Wild as "The Terrorist", due to the tantrums as mentioned previously.  So from now on, or at least until she matures into a more mature and calm child again, I shall abbreviate this to TT for blogging here.

I wanted to meet up for lunch with one of my bestest friends in Edinburgh.  As said 'Terrorist' can be a bit of a handful if things aren't going her way I played it safe by driving us through rather than getting the train.  So entailed the beginning of the usual military precision planning for such a major feat......

First off where would we go for lunch? Where was toddler friendly? Lets be clear here- this is completely different from child friendly.  Babies tend to keep themselves to themselves, and children above the age of 3 should be well enough behaved to be allowed in public places occasionally.  But who and where is happy to put up with a tiny tearaway who is referred to by her parents as the terrorist?

A google search pretty much came up with soft plays, pubs with soft plays (Like Brewers Fayre etc), really expensive tourist attractions.  The websites such as Tripadvisor and Babycentre etc only had ideas for babies or older children.  Yawn.  What about us?!  After some furry at the uselessness of babyfriendly.com and many facebook messages with my friend, we decided to have a picnic.  Is this a gap in the market?

Anyway, so ever hopeful of the weather we arranged to meet at the Meadows, so should the sun be in our favour we could let TT run riot whilst we were suitable close to coffee/toilets/toys/shelter all available at The Pavillion Cafe.  The sun wasn't shining, and the ground was soaking, so we abandoned the picnic to the car and ordered lunch in the cafe.  Totally recommend it for kids of all ages, maybe not babies though as there's no baby changing and it is tiny inside.  Only downside for toddlers is that there is no lock on the toilet door - so I spent lunch concerned that TT could storm any poor punter whilst on the loo! The staff were really friendly, trying to get TT to dance with them.  There are toy trucks and scooters outside and jigsaws & books inside for kids to help themselves to.  Now, I wouldn't recommend this to you unless like us you went to art college, or have a quiet hippy living inside your heart.  It's not a conventional cafe, it's independent and a spin off from the former successful Scott's Deli near Morningside.  So TT's generous slab of homemade pizza was amazing, with a wholemeal and cheese base.  I think TT's favourite part though, was charging through the puddles outside, destroying everything she was wearing!  What can you do, puddles are the bomb!

Kelburn Castle, Largs

One of my favourite places to take kids to (as an excuse - I LOVE this place!) is Kelburn Castle and the surrounding estate.  Huge bonus for not being far from where we live, another huge bonus for being really cool and not very expensive.

We're planning a trip there soon, I've been a little pre-occupied with my own estate of recent weeks so we have nowhere new to write about as yet, so I thought I'd inspire myself by remembering to plan a trip soon!

The castle, dates back to the 13th century, and is still lived in by the present Earl and his family.  It hosts exotic gardens, famous trees and many historical features. There's also the Kelburn Glen with its waterfalls and deep gorges, and beautiful woodlands with great views over the islands of the Firth of Clyde.
There is HEAPS to do as facilities include a Pony Trekking & Riding School, Indoor Playbarn, Pet's Corner, Adventure Course, Gift Shop with cafe, and Ranger Service Events.

It is common knowledge that I HATE SOFT PLAY places, but Kelburn's Playbarn is pretty darn good.  It's cheap as chips, small and friendly.  A visit also can't be made without appreciating the amazing Graffitti Project where Kelburn brought together four of the world's leading graffiti artists from Brazil and created a burst of colour, covering the walls and turrets of the south side of Kelburn Castle.  It's fantastic!

Then there's the Annual Garden Party, which I'm afraid due to the appearance of certain toddler I have yet to take part in. However this year it's on the 2/3 July and I fully intend to make it this year!

In the meantime, I'll post some photos up when I manage to drag my muddy arse away from the garden for long enough to treat Baby Wild to an afternoon out!

Logistics / 10

baby friendly            10
toddler friendly         100
toilets/changing         10
accessibilty               10
car parking              free & plentiful
cost                         Adults £7.50, Child/Conc £5.00, Families £25
(Family day ticket entitles entry for 2 adults and up to 3 children).