Goodbye to Christmas. Hello Waterfalls and Coots

This week we officially said goodbye to Christmas. We took all our lights down at the weekend but Grandad wanted to wait until Monday to take down the tree. he wanted to do it with Bear. Good luck I thought but Bear was brilliant, helping with all the baubles until a string of beads came off, he was fascinated for ages! Just letting them fall from his hand. Toy manufacturers take note. Please produce a toddler safe set of very long and shiny beads.

Bear helping. This bauble was found later hidden in his garage!

Bear loved putting the baubles into a box

Bear playing with the beads and then Grandad put the Christmas tree cape on him. It fitted perfectly and he looked so cute

Bear then had a day off with Mummy and Daddy as they were all going to the dentist. Mummy tells me he was very good and got a sticky badge. He now has eight teeth with another molar and two canines on their way. No wonder he's a tiny bit grumpy. They all came over for lunch and Daddy spent ages sorting out our very slow computer. Thankyou! It's now so much faster than before, all down to a problematic Windows Update thingy.


Wednesday Bear wouldn't nap. His teeth are really playing up. He had a great appetite and really enjoyed chewing on everything including crusts of bread. Then a miracle happened. The sun came out! This is the first sunny day for weeks and weeks. We quickly grabbed our coats and off we went to the park. We had to stop by Bears house to get his shoes so we went to a lovely park near there called Cefn Onn. It is a woodland with lots of streams and lots of Rhododendrums and Camellias too. Grandad is a Friend of Cefn Onn and volunteers each month. He is a retired Arboriculturist (Tree Surgeon to you and me) and he just loves trees and cutting things up with saws and axes! Oh and he occasionally does really good, free, guided walks around Cefn Onn.

Usually these waterfalls are just a trickle but they were so full after the recent rain

A friendly crow; a very mossy wall; entrance under the M4 motorway with a lovely mural; right next door to a golf course; fantastic way-marked walks along the Rumney Ridgeway Path start from this park

View through the shrubs to the lake. Hidden somewhere in the greenery are Bear and Grandad

Bear fascinated at the rushing water going under the bridge

and out the other side. We walked back and forth until I distracted Bear with something else

I said say cheese! Great, we did it at different times so I look a complete fool

Then surprise! The sun shone again on Thursday. It was a fantastic day but really, really cold and very windy. We decided to go to another local park, Roath Park. It has a play area but it also has a lake with boating in the summer and lots of wild fowl. Mostly ducks, swans and geese although there are cormorants and herons. Today someone was trying to feed the ducks with bread so we only had seagulls. Hundreds of them and a couple of Coots. It's a real shame that people feed the birds here with bread when proper food is easily available from the glasshouse (and probably the cafe too). Seagulls are a real problem in Cardiff, being so near the sea, I have been bombed by them, not here in the park but where they nest near the civic centre.

Roath park Lake with Rumney Ridgeway just visible in the distance. This is the ridge you can walk from Cefn Onn Park

Scott Memorial at Roath lake

This doesn't do justice to the number of gulls

Two Coots keeping away from the seagulls

Acer Palmatum "Sango-Taku" need to know the name of a tree? Ask Grandad.

Bear and Grandad having fun in the park

Bear "enjoying" the sunshine. Psst he hates it in his eyes!

Just to conclude a very busy but fun week, what is Bear saying now?

He says everything we say. He sings with a melody. He says wow-a-wow-a-wow-a in a sort of sing song slightly siren type way.

Stuck- he got stuck under the kitchen table, he likes to hide there and I heard him call "stuck! stuck!" I should have got a photo then released him but, like a good granny and terrible blogger, I just helped him out!

His understanding astounds me every day. he can follow really complex instructions such as "pick up whatever and take it to Grandad in the kitchen" or "If you don't want to eat that food just take it to the rubbish bag in the kitchen and don't leave it on the floor". At the moment he loves obeying, yes I know, enjoy it while it lasts!

Have you enjoyed any sunshine this week? I'd love to hear of the places you managed to visit.

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