Bubbles and Puddles

After some recent "Long Walks" I came up with the perfect cunning plan to help us move forward and beat the snails to storytime at the library today. Old faithful, a bottle of bubble mix. The plan was to blow bubbles and have Boy chase them, allowing us all to enjoy a walk without constantly trying to find ways to hurry up a bit (ooh, want to walk on that wall up there? ooh look at that dog across the road, come on, let's run and chase that jogger etc etc).

Unfortunately I forgot to have a planning meeting with my old buddy, the freezing February wind, who decided it would be a fine jape to blow the bubbles in the opposite direction to where I was heading, no matter which direction that might be. Twice I had to run and pop the bubbles myself to stop Boy chasing them onto the road. However once he knew I had them there was no going back. More bubbles! Want more more more! Want more bubbles! At one point I discovered if I knelt down the bubbles went straight towards Girl in the buggy, much to her delight. They also hit the ground faster and because it had been raining, many of them hit the ground without bursting, so we were able to see the rainbow colours and our own reflections before stamping on them and screaming POP in a very un-pop-like fashion. That was fun.

Boy spotted some dew on a green plant and spent a good while trying to pop the dewdrops while exclaiming "flower bubbles!" Wrong on both counts, but cute, so I let him off.

Finally I caved and used the even older faithful - puddles - to distract from the contrary bubble fiasco. Boy has a fine pair of colourful wellies that I NEVER remember to put on him. I convince myself several times a week that it's OK for him to ruin his shoes at this point because he'll surely grow out of them soon anyway and need a new pair. I don't listen to the tiny voice of reason who points out that Boy has freakishly small feet that never seem to grow - he's been in the same pair of size fives for nearly six months, and that's only because he lost one of the last pair (also size five). His toenails don't grow either, but I'll save that mystery story for another day.

So the pair of us danced up the street jumping in every puddle we could find on the pavement - yes, that big puddle on the road is for cars - and forgot about wet socks and shoes for a couple of hours. The librarian probably wasn't delighted by the footprints, but both babies were tired out by the time we arrived and for the first time Boy sat (or stood) and listened to a story, while Girl sat on my knee flashing toothy grins to anyone that looked her way.

There's something quite therapeutic about splashing in puddles and I couldn't help feeling a bit sorry that Girl missed out on the fun. Her day will come too though, probably sooner than I would like. I just hope she reminds me to put on her wellies.