A Sunny Spring Sunday

As I sit here typing this it’s the middle of the Easter holidays and we’ve not long arrived home from a week-long holiday in Cornwall. The husband is on his way back from taking the teenager home (*sob* – we’ve loved having her for the week and wish she could stay for longer) and I’m taking a break from the mountains of washing and cleaning that need doing. We had an absolutely wonderful time away and I’ll be writing plenty of blog posts all about what we got up to in the coming few weeks.

I was actually intending to start one today and then I realised that I hadn’t finished writing about a gorgeously sunny spring Sunday we had together the weekend before our little holiday. So I’m writing about that instead as I hate things being out of order on my blog – I’m a bit funny like that sometimes – and you’ll just have to wait in anticipation to find out more about our Cornish adventures!

It was a beautiful, bright-blue-sky kind of day at the start of April and we’d originally intended to spend the afternoon at Shugborough Estate. It’s been shut throughout winter as it’s been being turned into a National Trust site/property during the off-season. It finally re-opened at the end of March and we’ve been keen to see it’s transformation ever since. However, it seemed like everyone else in Staffordshire had the same idea as us! The car park was absolutely packed and we couldn’t find a space anywhere, so rather than waste time driving in circles and searching for hours we spontaneously decided to pop down to one of our favourite places instead – the Stepping Stones – which is literally a two minute drive further down the road from Shugborough. We’ll try Shugborough again another day.

As we arrived at the Stepping Stones car park we realised that a/ we’d never brought Sophie here before and b/ we hadn’t taken Daddy to the rope swings we’d discovered back in the autumn. And so we explored, starting off with our usual route and then heading off the trail to get lost amongst the trees. We had an absolutely brilliant time (apart from right at the end when Lola tripped over a rock whilst running full tilt and ended up with a deep gash in her side that meant we cut our adventures short and headed home to clean her up and administer plenty of cuddles as medicine).

I know I say it every time, but I really do love every single one of these photos. Seeing our girls out in nature, getting dirty and messy, testing their limits, confronting their fears and learning so much about the world we live in is something that I will always continue to actively encourage (no matter how much they protest about ‘going for a walk’!). Getting outside, unplugging and just exploring and adventuring is such an important part of how they learn about who they are and who they can be – I want them all to look back on their childhood and be able to say that these little expeditions helped shape them.

I love this photo of our four girls. I know it’s posed but I don’t care – I still love getting them all in a shot together like this and I know they’ll appreciate it when they’re older.