"In philosophy if you aren't moving at a snail's pace you aren't moving at all."

Seriously, whats happened to the weather? a week a go i was desperately looking for a paddling pool somewhere and it was only up for two days and now this. We've got loads to do in the house today and Opeie doesn't fancy going out in the rain so this weeks LEGO picture (in fact pictures as i couldn't decide between the two) for our 52 week project is inspired by this glorious British weather and Opeie's new love of snail watching.

At least the army of snails that have taken over our garden are enjoying this heavy down pour...

Check out our previous posts...

Week 1: Meeting the Queen

Week 2: Raindrops keep falling on my head

Week 3: Fun at the beach

"A library is the delivery room for the birth of ideas, a place where history comes to life."

Yesterday we had planned to go out for some scooting fun with our friend Lucie (from MageeandMagoo) and the kids. We were really looking forward to it as we had not been out on them for a week or so. Surprise Surprise the weather had other ideas though and about an hour before we were supposed to meet, the heavens opened and it thrashed it down so that ruined our plans to get the Microscooters out. At least the snails were having a great time...

Lucie Suggested that we meet at the library which i thought was a great idea as shamefully i had never taken Opeie before. Until now we had picked up most of our books from charity shops, Amazon or eBay and the boys go through a lot. We arranged which one to meet at and i didn't even know it was there despite Opeie going to his dance class a while back in the same building (Mrs M says i walk around with my head in the clouds). Opeie was pretty chuffed when we arrived and he got his own special card for taking out books.

I don't know why i hadn't taken Opeie before, there were so many great books to choose from and the fact that you can take out 16 at a time is great. A large pile of books quickly formed and Opeie was pretty excited about being there which was great, hes a bit of a bookworm and we plough through piles every week so our new use of the library is going to work out perfectly.

 Lucie and the children soon joined us and Opeie got even more excited. It was a great place for us to chat and catch up while the children picked the books they wanted to read and we managed to find some great new books that i probably wouldn't have found elsewhere. It was great to see some Miffy and Dr Seuss books too but no need to take them home as we have them all haha.

Opeie made it his mission to hunt for every Fox related book in the childrens section and managed to fing a fair few which i thought was great. He's got even more in to the whole fox thing recently which is so cute and we definitely have enough pictures now for our next foxy installment so stay tuned.

 We took full advantage of the 16 books limit that we could take out and now have plenty to keep us occupied until.. well probably tomorrow knowing Opeie. With books so easy to buy these days i think the Library probably gets a bit of a rough deal. The supermarkets these days have a great selection so id not had any reason to go but yesterdays trip made me realise again that there is so much available and at no cost. I used to love going to the library myself when i was younger and hopefully it will be something Opeie will see as exciting over the coming weeks.

"Then toads and beetles, bees and bugs, Brother snails and sister slugs, Uncle ant and earwig aunt Clap and cheer and chant this chant."

If your children have a keen sense of adventure and curiosity and you are creative in your parenting then you can find all the fun you need on your doorstep or rather in your garden. It was another glorious day in sunny Shropshire and a chance discovery of a magnifying glass we thought we had lost a while back kick started an afternoon of discovery and learning.

I asked Opeie what he wanted to go searching for and he said 'bugs', so with magnifying glass in hand we began our investigation into the greener areas of our lovely garden. It really is amazing what you can find when you are really looking and with every different species found there was more excitement from our little adventurer.

When it comes to creepy crawlies Seth is pretty much frightened of everything but Opeie is so different, he thinks everything is 'cute' and if I catch spiders in glasses in the house he has to kiss the glass before saying his goodbyes and setting them free, so as you can imagine our bug hunt this afternoon was lots of fun.

We searched the ground, found webs high up, a colony of worker ants in one of the compost bins and some big fat slugs in the other compost bin that Opeie calls the 'smelly bin'. And with most of the things we found Opeie either picked them up or was happy to have them running over his hands. I don't want Opeie to be frightened of anything so i try and treat all bugs and spiders as friends.

Opeie was fascinated by the snails and we lay on our tummies and watched them for ages before Opeie picked them up to have a closer look. Our garden seems to be some sort of meeting ground for all of Shropshires snail community I've never seen so many hiding under all our bushes and plants.

We even spotted a very rare breed of snail too later in the day...

I try and get Opeie to do some sort of writing during each day and i try to keep the theme of the words relevant to keep him motivated, so in keeping with our mornings fun I wrote down some of the things we had found for Opeie to write also while I hung out the washing to dry. He was so proud of himself when he had finished and called me over to show off his work. His handwriting is coming along great and we 're so proud of the way he is progressing.

When mommy got home from work we continued our day of Entomology (thanks Google, hahaha) with some relevant literature. Superworm and The Hungry Caterpillar were part of today's reading, read beautifully by mommy. A fitting end to a creepy crawly yet creatively cute day of fun learning.