• I had a great day, my sore throat not withstanding, at Stockingford Infants, who wanted to do some writing! I worked with three year one classes – I know, that’s a big infants school!

    The children chose an animal and we got to work building up stories about them. In the first we had a “Mr Motivator” Giraffe, that wanted everyone to bend and stretch. But all the other animals got bored and went away, so it was only the Giraffe that ended up stretched.

    In the second class we had a swimming tiger who met his match at sea when he encountered a shark. I’ve thought about this since and would like to ditch the tiger and make it a tiger fish, if there is a such a thing. It would make the story more logical – but hey, that’s how the process goes.
    gpig
    Our third class went off at a tangent! We wanted to write about Guinea Pigs, but there’s not a lot to write about Guinea Pigs – I know, I’ve tried to do it before. We ended up with a wonderful love story that made everyone go Ah! Even the boys liked it! I’m still not sure about the Guinea Pigs, but they are cute, aren’t they? Maybe if I just tinkered about with the plot a bit…

  • I’m sitting in my shed/studio, waiting for the heater to have some effect, and trying to make my frozen fingers do some artwork for my latest book. The grass outside is frosty, the air is misty and the car widsceen is frozen over.

    I suddenly became aware of a sound. “Wha-woo-woo” A pair od Collared Doves are calling to each other, one in a tree, the other on a tv ariel. I get this sound all summer while I work at the bottom of the garden. It’s only in hearing it again that I realise that they have been silent all winter.

    A tiny sign that spring can’t be that far away…

  • ice-in-pondI thought I saw something odd in the pond a couple of days agao. Something was lurking at the bottom – it was ice. But surely Ice floats! It’s been so cold, the whole pond has frozen solid and is melting from the top down so, as I hope you can see from the picture, there is just a shallow covering of water over a huge block of ice. I do wonder how the pond cratures have coped with it. Just before Christmas, there was a lot of Daphnia about. I’ll have to see when it has warmed up again.