Wow! What a busy and eggciting Easter we have had. (I know, I know... I make the same joke about an eggciting and eggcellent Easter every year but I like it! Simple things amuse simple minds!) I really do mean it though. It has been a great Easter.
Good Friday saw us go to the Aquarium. The zoo is not a great hit with Anna at the moment (I intend to write another blog about that at some point, when I get another spare second to myself) so we thought that the Aquarium might excite (eggcite) her more. There was actually method in our madness. She does love fish. Every time that we go to Forest Tots, she always walks past the cafe saying 'Let's go see the fish'. We have only been in the cafe once but she has remembered that there is a huge fish tank in there. Even at the zoo, her favourite attraction was the shabby and run-down aquarium. The exotic animals like the lions and giraffes were ignored but the goldfish got a 'wow' and 'amazing' from Anna. (The aquarium is so run-down and shabby-looking that Chester zoo don't even put it on their map or signposts but Anna loves it!!!). Her Uncle Steve also recently acquired a fish tank and Anna got very excited at visiting Uncle Steve's house, not to see her Uncle and Auntie but to see the fish. Therefore the aquarium should have been a big hit and certain aspects of it really were. Anna's favourite part was when she was allowed to put her hand in the massive fish pool and stroke the Ray's. Unfortunately, she then thought that every other fish tank and pool was fair game and attempted to put her hand in every single one. The Sharks were NOT happy with Anna and neither was Anna too happy when we kept telling her that she couldn't put her hand in with the sharks. Nonetheless, it was a good day albeit a little stressful.
On Saturday, we met up with Anna's Auntie Sally, Auntie Charlotte, Jemma (Sally's half sister) and Niamh (Sally's niece/Jemma's 7 year old daughter). This was to do the final part of the Bridesmaid fitting. Of course, Anna surrounded by Princess dresses was paradise for her so she was very happy. Racing around Monsoon at 100mph, attempting to catch Anna who was on a mission to show the whole of Manchester her Princess dress, was not the best part of the day for me but Anna loved it! Incidentally, I am still having nightmares about the whole bridesmaid thing. I actually thought that having Niamh as a fellow bridesmaid may help Anna but it appears that Anna may not think the same. Niamh was being ever so kind and trying to encourage Anna to practice walking down the aisle by holding Anna's hand. Anna was having none of it and didn't want to hold any body's hand. In fact, she wanted to run in the opposite direction. Sally also told us that each bridesmaid has a bouquet to hold. I just know that Anna's beautiful bouquet will have no flower heads left on it by the time that they reach the top of the aisle. It will just be a bouquet of stalks! The flowers in the hair will also be discarded somewhere amongst the guests before the wedding march is over.
Sunday saw us go to visit Grandad
Flob and Lynn. They are very fortunate that they live only 5 minutes away from
Formby beach, which is lovely. So, while Lynn was slaving away over a gorgeous
Roa
st Lamb (I did feel guilty!), we all sat on the beach in glorious sunshine. Well, 'sat on the beach' is not exactly the truth. Grandad
Flob and James sat on the beach while I ran after Anna as she legged it to the sea at every opportunity. Unfortunately, while racing towards Anna on one such occasion, a piece of seaweed managed to get in my way and, by the time that I had reached the edge of the water, Anna was already knee high, complete with brand new shoes on, her nice tights and a fancy dress (bought out especially for Easter Sunday!). I had no choice but to wade in after her so my shoes were quickly filled with water as well as my jeans being soaked. I squelched back up the beach with a giggling Anna! Of course, by then, all caution was thrown to the wind and, after stripping Anna of her shoes and tights, hitching her dress up and rolling my jeans up to my knees, we both headed back to the sea and went paddling for the next hour! (Just for the record, it was free
zing). Despite returning from the beach looking very grubby with shoes, socks and a car filled with sand. We did have a wonderful time and the Easter dinner was gorgeous. (Anna refused to have any due to the fact that she managed to eat her massive slice of cake, my massive slice of cake and her dad's massive slice of cake before we even went to the beach)
On Monday, we went to
Chirk Castle and took part in the Easter egg hunt. For those of you with good memory, you will remember that we also did this last year. However, due to blizzard conditions (no
exaggeration), we had to abandon the egg hunt before finding the very last clue. I had already warned James and Anna that this year was not going to be a repeat performance. We were going to stay there until all 12 clues were found, even if it took us to midnight! Thankfully, Anna loved every second of it and, with James seeing my competitive nature at it's peak, he helped too so we did actually manage to
accomplish the task and were rewarded with a very well-earned chocolate egg (The egg hunt wasn't easy!). Chocolate always tastes so much nicer when you know that you have
earned it by running around for the last 4 hours! During our egg hunt, Anna also learnt how to do
sideways rolls. After sitting down in the gardens, soaking up the gorgeous sunshine and feeling the
warmth on our face, Anna sat quietly watching 4 children doing sideways rolls down the bank. It wasn't very long however until Anna was strolling over to them to join in. Unfortunately, her co-ordination
isn't quite as advanced as a group of 8 year
olds so she thought she was doing it perfectly correct as she shuffled down
the bank on her bottom. It was very cute to watch but Anna soon twigged that she wasn't doing it quite right so looked at her Daddy for help. Cue James who then
demonstrated how to do
sideways rolls down the bank. Doing it once wouldn't have
attracted a crowd of on-lookers. Doing
sideways rolls again and again and again while shouting '
wheeeeee' as he rolled down the bank was always going to attract some attention. Anna just thought her Daddy was really funny!
Although our Easter was very hectic and busy, it was also very wonderful and we enjoyed every second. Anna enjoyed the chocolate too... very very very much!!! Well... it was Easter!
