The day after Lily’s birthday we went to the cinema with J&L to the showing & film that ideally we’d have gone to for her birthday treat – Ice Age 3 at Vue Southport at 10.30am on Saturday.  It was fine, but grey, and afterwards we were persuaded that stopping to have a go on the carousel at the pier head was a good plan. We all had a go – Joel somewhat peeved that as a short person he had to be accompanied – and then took a stroll along the pier.

For those who don’t know, the pier at Southport starts some half a mile or so (or it seems like it) inland, on the inland side of the seawater inlet that’s used for sailing and other watersports, and was once the actual seafront. So walking to the end, which juts out over the sea, involves a bit of a track. And until recently, when apparently some dredging occurred, you were pretty lucky if you saw any sea. The beach here is very, very flat. The tide moves at quite a pace, and when the sea’s out, it’s *out*.

On this day, it was in.

Joel wanted to walk to the end of the pier to check for fish. Lily wanted another go on the carousel. So I took Joel to the end of the pier, and caught the tram back (pretty high pence-per-mile, but arguably saved a few minutes) and Steve took Lily back to the carousel.

The mildly amusing part of walking with Joel is that he asks to be carried because he allegedly can’t walk any more, but if you challenge him to a race, he’ll run off as fast as his legs will carry him.

I would like to draw this to my sister’s attention, she who thinks that hill walking in the lake district is a Good Plan for the october half term.

Anyway – it was a lovely morning, and I got to spend some quality time with my beautiful boy, while being very nervous that he was going to go for a swim…