Beach

We went to the beach today and wandered among the mangroves. The tide was coming in and was almost at its full extent. The water was just about covering the mangrove roots which poked out of the sand upwards, and it was as warm as a bath. Little fishes which I don't care to taxonomise darted amonst the roots. Matilda attempted to chase them. She succeeded as well, she just failed to actually catch any.

We waded from one sand bank to another; Eloise got up to her chest in water. We'd taken her nappy off at the car so she only had her swimming costume on. It is UV resistant and gives an SPF of 50+. But it still needs to be washed if somebody has been thinking about number one(s) too much... hence, partially at least, the deep adventurous wading.

Eloise was on good form, throwing the tennis ball for Tiny, who sometimes fetched it, and calling out to Matilda if she got too distracted with her fishing, who didn't pay the blindest bit of attention.

When we got back to the car, there was an ice cream van parked there. We got two plain cones of ice cream which was very reminiscent of Mr. Whippy. Eloise insisted on eating all hers, but took her time about it; most of the time it was dripping down her hand, arm, tum, leg...

I borrowed a lawn mower off Peter next door and sorted out the back yard and front bit. We popped over there later on for a drink, where the Ashes were rubbed in again.