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Sunny April days

It's been a very busy week with lots to do in the garden, grandchildren on school holidays, wildlife to catch up with and sunshine to enjoy.  Here are a few photos recording things I have enjoyed over the past week.

On Tuesday I took three of the children (the fourth staying at home with scarlet fever!) to Foxlake, a wake boarding centre near Dunbar.  As well as the wake boarding, they have a low ropes course challenge over water - this is how they describe it.  There are two routes with differing challenges - the kids love it!
In the cheerfully decorated little cabin, there were three girls cooking up some tasty smelling grub for hungry wakeboarders.
We didn't stay for lunch but moved on to John Muir Country Park and the play area by the salt marshes, behind Belhaven Beach.  The children played and then had their picnic lunch.  The sun was hot, but the wind coming off the sea was cold, and after a while I was quite glad to get back into a toasty, warm car to head for home!
On Wednesday morning Tilly and I turned right out of the garden gate and walked around two different fields.  I saw a couple of yellowhammers and a reed bunting.  Neither bird is in sharp focus in the any of the photos I took, which is a bit frustrating, but I am posting them here, just for the record!
Tilly and I went out a bit earlier yesterday morning.  The sun was just up, golden pink in the sky, and casting a beautiful glow across the landscape.  You can just see this frosted nettle picking up the light, as it hit the plant at very low level.
I stood and watched a young deer cleaning its fur, and quietly mooching around in the warm early morning sun, before elegantly leaping over a fence and away into the pine wood.  Earlier on I had seen it jumping around in circles, just for the joy of being alive!
The field at the end of the drive, which I thought had been planted up with potatoes a couple of weeks ago, was only a state of preparation.  Seed potatoes have now been planted, on Thursday, and despite the hazy quality of the air, yesterday, North Berwick law appears to be incredibly close in this photo!  It is, in fact, about five miles away!
The sea at North Berwick yesterday was like a millpond.  On the left in the photo below you can see the Seabird Centre, and on the right is the little island of Craigleith, which will now be buzzing with puffins.  We have until the third week of July to get out there to see them.  I have never seen a puffin, so that's something to aim for this year! 

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