Crayfish fishing!

We've had a wonderful day today with my gorgeous friend Sammi and her family. She always has the best schemes afoot and today suggested going crayfish fishing at Minster Lovell. It is a beautiful old ruin in the Cotswolds with a river teeming with crayfish!
Everyone helped carry the stuff from the car...

 It is such a stunning place!

We attached bacon to string weighted with rocks and tied to sticks to make our fishing rods.

Then set up the kids and rods and waited for the crayfish! It only took around 10 minutes for the first - within a 2 - 5 year olds attention span with the new novelty of fishing! Apparently they are even easier top catch in the summer with less of a current as Sammi had been the previous Summer and said that they had a bucket full within no time at all!

We took a break to have our soup and picnic and then revisited the rods for a second catch! Then after a quick game amongst the ruins we checked again for a third! Joplin managed to bring this one in on the net and it was a whopper. We did have a massive 'one that got away' but the string snapped! Sammi blamed it on the crochet thread I had used in the place of the lack of string!  

It was massive amounts of fun and we will definitely return in the warmer months! 

On the way home we stopped at a fantastic playground at Shipston-Under-Wychwood. A really fab one and definitely worth the visit! Joplin and Alfie loved the giant see-saw whilst Eden and Dotti loved the wide wooden see-saw! The tractor was a big hit too!

Back to Sammi's and she cooked us a wonderful roast dinner! It was certainly a day of treats! The kids had a blast is the garden and really got on well. Thanks for a lovely day guys! xx