Beach Trip

The weather predicted rain for a couple of weeks so we decided to make the most of a really sunny day last week and get to the beach. It was a beautiful day, not a cloud in sight.

The children spent quite some time playing on the sand and in the dunes before deciding to do some paddling and beach combing.

We ended up walking quite a long way along the beach at the shore line and found many things of interest to look at and discuss.

We found lots of sea gooseberries that had washed up with the last tide, these are not technically jellyfish they are a marine invertebrate. They tend to only live a few months and die after spawning but just in case any were washed up by accident and were still alive the children decided to return them to the sea.

Finds like this usually inspire the children to learn what they can about the life cycle and this link leads to a wonderful website called Arkive where you can find out more about this creature and see photos of it in the water if you choose to.

My daughter also found a fish head and some dog whelk shells which were slightly worn away to reveal the beautiful inner spiral.

Our disappointing find of the day was some rubbish and lots of old fishing line and hooks which we decided to collect and take to the nearest rubbish bin as we were a little concerned that someone or one of the beach combing sea birds could have been injured. It is important to keep our wild spaces rubbish free and safe for all, it only takes a second.

Paper Quilled Sun

I thought I would have another go at paper quilling, this time a sun for the summer solstice. We have already made tea light lanterns for the garden, so this will hang in the window and hopefully catch the sun.

First, I shredded a sheet of yellow card as you can see above, the quilling tool was made by my husband and If you would like to make one yourself I will put a link at the end of this post.

I made lots of different sized circles very simply by rolling the strips of card around the quilling tool, loosening slightly and sticking the end down at the required size. Some circles are made with the full length A4 strip and some with half a strip. They were then fixed with a spot of glue into a circle of card to give the body of the sun.

Then I made these shapes to go around the outside, I made the circle in the same way, loosened to the desired size and pinched one side of the circle. This gives you this tear drop or flame shape. Do enough of these to totally go around your sun.

Stick them at random orientations around the outside like the photograph above to finish the sun shape. After this I sprayed just a touch of gold paint on to the sun, not enough to cover the yellow but just enough to give a gold glow in the sun.

 

 A piece of gold thread was added to the top so that it could be hung in the window and I wanted to add a bell or some glass beads to the bottom but I couldn't find any so sequins have been added to catch the sun.

Here it is in the window, not a very sunny day but hopefully this will look lovely with the sun shining on it.

The link to the post for making your own quilling tool is here.