May Day bon fire and barbecue

Yesterday it was May Day, and everyone was off work and school (except for my kids!) The kids did school work as usual as they are having a day off on Wednesday. In the afternoon we went to my Mum and Dads field/site with my sister Jenny and her girls. Mum and Dad are in the process of building a new house there. The field is beautiful, although parts of it are like a building site at the moment. At the back of the field is a little stream, and behind that there is a hill with sheep and rabbits. There was also a heavily pregnant horse watching us from the next field. There was so much wildlife in that field. I plan to take the kids there for a day when its sunny and study all the little bugs, insects, wildflowers etc. They do nature study every week and they really love it, but there isn't much nature in our back garden. The kids will enjoy identifying little beetles. Luke spent quite some time looking through the grass for ladybirds. I've never seen so many in one place. He found plenty of them, a few spiders and some metallic green beetle bugs. Down by the stream there is wild mint growing and you can smell it wafting in the wind. Gorgeous. It beats the smell of smog any day.
We had a barbecue in the evening, and a bonfire was burning throughout the day. I took plenty of outdoor toys for the kids to play with, but as usual they needed none of them. That field and building site was better than any toy. All the kids (my sisters included) spent hours playing in a huge pile of sand. They built a slide down it, built meer cat tunnels through it. Luke played with a trowel in it. Next Christmas I'm just going to order a ton of building sand for the kids to play with! Luke is now at the age where he can join in more with the older children, so he is less of a challenge to entertain.

Then there was a huge mound of topsoil, like a mountain to the kids. It was all grown over with grass so it seemed just like a mountain waiting to be explored. They climbed to the top of it countless times and waved down at us.
After the bbq the kids put on a few plays (I think that was Sam's influence - as usual) Firstly they did Snow White, then they did a hilarious short version of Romeo and Juliet (Sam and Jude are reading Shakespeare plays at the moment). Then it wasn't long before Dad was up doing the conga round the fire! Needless to say, everyone else joined in and we did the conga round the field. I'm sure the neighbours are just delighted that they sold their field to my Mum and Dad!
The kids all had a great time, and I love to see them outdoors enjoying the fresh air. We were supposed to be going to this organic farm tomorrow on a homeschooling trip, but I got that appointment through to get my arm x-rayed so we had to cancel the trip. To make it up to the kids we will do our own little trip after my appointment to the Exploirs aquarium in Portaferry. Luke is very excited about it, but Sam and Jude are disappointed that we cant go to Rossinver.

This afternoon we took a big box up to Sam's room and emptied it of all the toys that he doesn't play with. Jude is going to do the same with her room. Sam's room got a good sort out and clean in the process. The kids want to do a boot fair with it and then maybe we will use the money to take a little camping trip or something in the summer. I have photos to go with this post but blogger isn't letter me upload them so I may have to add them later on.