Megan's explorer party, turning 5, 19th November 2011

A 4 hour adventure in the countryside and then back to the garden for picnic and more play. Group of 6 children.

Megan, together with friends Phoebe, Lauren, Anna and Thomas arrived at Swainswick for a small celebration of Megan's birthday. It was unseasonally warm...a beautiful day. We explored the garden firstly; looking for snails, spiders' webs and then the chickens. We smelt a few different smells like lavender and fennel. We looked for frogs in the small pond...nothing there but pond weed...yuck everyone thought!
Into the village next with Megan deciding to travel north. So we went north up Blacksmith Lane, then down Kent Lane. We looked for interesting things and put them in the collecting box held by Lauren. Megan also had an excellent collecting box with a magnifying lens as well. We eventually got down to a huge old oak tree, where we looked around for acorns. On to find hazels nuts, try a few sloe berries (which really should be called blue berries!).  Karen had some emergency chocolate to get us up the slope again to get back to base.
Once back at the garden base, we got the fire going again and played in the garden. The children peeled sticks and decorated them with colourful threads and ripstop to make flags. Ruth hid some animals to findWe ate sausages, fruit, biscuits and then Megan showed us "Smores," for which she gave very clear instructions on how to make them. (Jason and Lauren and Anna's Dad made the marshmallow sticks.)
We made a small den with a capsized boat, using the flags too.  Megan had fun, as did her friends.
Leader: Edward