Lovely visit to the beach

So this afternoon, my daughter needed to run, actually cartwheel off some steam before bed time so we decided to make a quick trip to the beach. With no expectations, except to enjoy the glorious weather and low tide, the children wanted to wear their swim things and took a towel each. One took a spade with them, the other took a plastic screwdriver and saw (don't ask why, I'm not sure either!)

They both had a dip in the sea, and then daughter ran up and down manically, followed by trying to break the world record for consecutive cartwheels! While son tootled off to search for all things natural, as is his way. Once daughter had got rid of the excess energy, well some of it, she joined her brother in the nature spotting, mainly in the little pools along the groynes. We found quite a lot.

Mussels

Anenome

Hermit Crab

Fossil Shells

Crab

Razor Fish Shell

We found this too, not sure if it is a small fish or a shrimp as both were around in the pools. It's very well camouflaged with the sand. Anybody have any idea what it is?

Daughter interspersed the nature spotting with other activities as well, she loves to fill as much into life as possible. So some drawing in the sand, with borrowed screwdriver and saw from her brother, (they were useful!).

And a game of jump the waves, which the sea was just perfect for today, small, shallow ripply waves and lots of them.

During the nature hunting, we realised it would be good to have a net and a big bucket. There was another family pool hunting too, and they caught some lovely things to look at, they shared and showed us their finds. We decided we would like to do that too, so I need to add a net and a bucket to our shopping list before our next visit.

I think we were then tuned into our surroundings, as on our walk home we noticed a bee on the lovely purple thistles, and a load of ants, some winged, some not, preparing for the nuptial flight (according to hubbie who keeps ants for a hobby!) 

Bee on a Thistle

Winged Ants

So that was our trip to the beach, none of the activities planned, just child led, following their interests, and what's fun for them. An amazing 45 minutes of happiness.