#CountryKids Beaver Sports Day and #Juneathon day 8

Straight after yesterday's Grasmere Gallop we headed for my son's Beaver Scouts district sports' day in Coniston. Lots of fun traditional sports with my son gaining medals in:

1. long jump
2. welly wanging (hammer)
3. sack race

His colony ended up coming 3rd overall in the competition which is their best ever result! It was fabulous watching 6 and 7 year olds trying their hardest to win each event. Even the ones that were outside in the rain they tried their best.

No wonder they all tucked into a hearty tea of bangers, mash and beans in the evening! For many of them this was their first night away from home without their parents (my son of course had me... but I tried to ignore him!). Very late that night after watching a Clutch Powers' DVD they finally attempted to sleep in their colony rooms:

Reasons to be Cheerful: Week 18 - 2014 #R2BC

Welcome back to the blog hop being hosted here. The lovely Jo at Ojos World is having a well earned rest after looking after us all in April. Thanks Jo! Welcome to everyone whether old timers or newcomers we all want to share what has made you smile this week. To kick you off here are mine:

1) Guinea Pig lawn mowers

As the weather has stayed nice our little furry friends are enjoying spending their days nibbling the grass in the garden. Its giving my daughter and I plenty of practice at catching them too! Here is Bubble playing peek a boo:

2) Running

I managed to complete my first proper 10 km race since December this Saturday. It was a bit of a struggle but I accidentally broke my 1 km and 1 mile personal bests on the course:

Reasons to be Cheerful week 9 - 2014 #R2BC

The lovely Jo at Ojosworld has been a super host this month and will be handing the reins back to me for March! I really hope lots of you will continue to join in and share your happy thoughts. For this week I am just joining in with everyone else! 

This week its a complete Proud Mummy edition as we had parents' evening at school tonight:

1) My boy

At his Beaver meeting this week he wrote at lovely prayer as part of his Faith badge:

 I love the mix of thinking of others and himself! He came home at the end of the meeting with a haul of 5 badges that he earned before half term:

He is now 2/3 of way towards Chief Scout bronze award after only 13 months as fully fledged Beaver!

As for school he is doing really well. He is a keen reader (even reading on the way into school this morning):

#CountryKids: Beaver Colony at High Borrans

My son is lucky to be in a Beaver colony with a) an enthusiastic leader b) in such a great area. Tonight they had an outdoor adventure evening up at High Borrans. The weather was foul but wrapping them up in waterproofs and packing them off out in the rain made for a great evening. I only went along at the end as I had my daughter with me but we caught them doing a night line trail:

It was very amusing watching them follow the leader blindfolded along a rope. Being 6-8 years old they kept forgetting to let the person behind know what obstacles were ahead of them! 

Eventually they finished and went back on to the adventure playground area. This had lots of different balancing and rope type challenges:

He really showed his new found braveness with the way he tackled the course (listen to rain falling!):

At the end of the evening they all had a well earned hot chocolate back inside the centre:

I am so proud of how he is growing up fast and I'm sure that in the summer when both my children have their adventure visits to High Borrans with school they will have even more amazing fun. Just have to hope the weather is a lot better!

Reasons to be Cheerful Week 12 Spring? #R2BC

Our linky host is still Seasider in the City whilst Michelle is on her Lent break. So please pop over there to see why she is smiling! Meanwhile her are mine:
1) Spring?
The calendar may say that it is Spring but there are also a few signs around to show that things are changing (despite heavy snow forecast for tomorrow!). We have fields full of lambs and flowers are coming out all over. These are some I found today:

  2) Time with the children
The upside of having to leave work to collect a sick child from school is that I got to spend a lot more time than normal with the children! My son and I got to snuggle up watching movies whilst his sister had a snooze and then played on the Wii. 
Today before picking up her little brother my daughter and I wandered around the church graveyard - strangely we are both fascinated by graves! It was good to look and see what was on the stones:

Then we got to spend time after school in the park with a couple of other brave families (it was a wee bit chilly). Lovely to be able to chat to some other parents whilst the children got some fresh air play.
3) Proud Mummy
My son passed his next stage of swimming so is going to be on stage 4 from next month! He is a cautious swimmer so we will see how he does in this next class... He also earned his 3rd Beaver badge for experiments:

So glad he is still really enjoying his colony and long may it continue!
His big sister was in the school talent show on Friday. Her act was a poem that she acted out as she told it. She may not have won a prize but the head teacher told me how much he enjoyed her act and the energy she put into it!
4) End in sight..
With another dose of tonsillitis keeping her off school I rang the hospital for news on the operation to whip them out. We now have just over a month to wait hopefully until they are gone and hopefully she will be a lot healthier and happier.
What is making you smile this week?