3 August 2010

Tim had taken a day off, and we visited Drusillas, which is a sort of minor zoo and play attraction near Lewes. It took about an hour to get there; as it was a sunny day in school holidays I suppose I wasn't surprised to find a big queue to get in. We stood in line for 20 minutes but by the time we got to the entrance Emily was really cranky and I lost it a bit in public. She relented a bit once she began to notice the various animals. Tom had been before and knew that there was a Thomas ride, so we had to press on past the monkeys and meerkats to get to that. We queued for quarter of an hour and Emily was very grumpy, but finally we were aboard the land train for the five minute ride around the perimeter of the adventure playground area.


After that we needed to replenish our reserves so we had our picnic, with the two children leaping to their feet to wave every ten minutes when Thomas chuffed past. Then they were off, exploring the various pieces of equipment with ladders, mesh, chutes and slides. Emily was very hesitant and would only ride on my lap, whereas at home she is usually quite adventurous. As it was the fourth day without a poo her mood was very much affected though. Tom is quite the brave little explorer and happily jumped onto every chute alone.

After icecreams all round (hotly pursued by pesky wasps, which seem to be everywhere this summer), we carried on through the rest of the zoo area, taking in lemurs, penguins, flamingos and the like.

Emily was really tired and also bad-tempered due to the poo situation, so we had many a falling-out as she played up and flopped around wanting to be carried everywhere. We had a quick pause to see James and Cranky models

then made our way back to the central grassy area for a quick cuppa. Emily was very hard to handle so I took her to the exit (via yet another retail opportunity where I was relieved of twenty quid in the Thomas shop).

On the way home both kids slept all the way back. Emily would not eat her tea so we fell out again and I retired upstairs for a while. Sarah pointed out how negative I am with her and that I keep badgering her, which I suppose is true but I was close to tears after the strain of the day. I was praying that she would produce a poo and kept her up later than Tom hoping one would manifest itself, in vain. I managed to get a little tea into her, at least.