It was Friday today and we would be home all day. Mummy was up very early in the morning, and this usually means that she is busy with her work. She made her style of obento for us to eat at lunch. Mummy then quickly made breakfast, we were dressed and fed whilst a pot of coffee brewed on the stove. When she opened the laptop that meant serious business. Her glasses on top of her head means she is in thinking mode and glasses on her nose means don’t bother me I am on a roll with my work. Verity said and I agree, “It is a hard life having Mummy who is a teacher!"

Mummy said, “I have a lot on today".  Verity and I nodded our head. Mummy asked, “Can you be patient and play with the toys?”  We know the routine already, so we were happy to do this. Verity and I played with my dinosaur egg and dinosaurs. That was fun for a while. Verity has no concept of time so would ask Mummy, “Is it time for lunch?” “You have just had breakfast”, Mummy replied. So, we played some more.  We decided to draw and colour, but that didn’t last long. Today just didn’t seem to be working out for us. I asked Mummy, “Can we go outside to play?” Normally she doesn’t let us do this on our own as we have foxes that come into the garden. Today however, she just said, “fine". This told us that Mummy must be really, really busy.

We put on our jackets and wellingtons too. Verity of course loves any opportunity to wear her pink wellington boots. We looked at one another as though we were going on a big adventure. “Let’s go have some fun!” I said to Verity. As we stepped outside, we could feel the cold air brush against our faces, there was a smell of smoke from wood burning fires. Verity sneezed, “Achoo. Achoo. Achoo!” The sun was out, but we could not feel any heat. Daddy hadn’t had time to cut the grass so, we pretended that we had our own jungle. After all, we could see butterflies and dragonflies fliting and zigzagging across the grass, so it was like our own safari!

Verity suggested we get a fishing net from the shed and try to catch a bug. We managed to open the shed door and stepped into a chaotic mess, but Daddy thought it was organized. I asked Verity, “Can you see the net?”   After a few minutes she yelled, “Yes! It was hiding from us". We managed to brush the cobwebs from the net and took turns chasing bugs in the garden. “Gotcha!” shouted Verity. We managed to catch a ladybird. It crawled around in the net but looked sad. This game didn’t seem to be much fun after all. “Let’s let it go!” I said softly.  We let the ladybird go and felt happy she was free to fly around.

I could see something shinning in the distance so, I urged Verity to come with me to the bottom of the garden to take a look.  Verity grabbed my hand as we started to walk through some very long grass. This time we both sneezed, “Achoo. Achoo, Achoo!” As we reached the bottom of the garden, we reached an old wooden fence. When we looked down, there was a very large worm that seemed to glow. Verity and I looked at it in amazement. It wriggled and moved at a slow pace. “Is it a boy or a girl?” asked Verity. I wasn’t sure. I said, “If Daddy was here, he would probably know". I suggested that the worm looked like a Woo. Verity laughed and said, “I like that name".  We stood and watched Woo for a while but started to think about many things. Verity said, “What does Woo eat? Where does Woo sleep? Does Woo have any family?” Verity and I looked at one another as we knew we were thinking about the same things.

Verity suggested we find something for Woo to eat. “What do you think Woo eats?” I said out loud. At that moment, Mummy called us for lunch. Verity said, “Let’s have a think". Mummy gave us our obento boxes, and we sat on the back steps to eat. Mummy’s idea of an obento box was a pick and mix of rice, chicken nuggets, cheese cubes, cucumber sticks and half an apple. We gladly munched away at our food.

Verity said, “I wonder if Woo has had a birthday party?” It seemed an odd thing to ask but we sat and thought about how we loved birthdays. I said, “Let’s sneak into the kitchen and go and get one of Mummy’s favourite biscuits". Mummy kept rather large cookies that were full of smarties in a special biscuit jar. Verity thought that the biscuits looked like a birthday cake, so it seemed like a good idea to get one to give to Woo. “Let’s have a birthday party for Woo!” said Verity. “Good idea, but we need to work together to get the biscuit,” I said. I decided that I would stand guard whilst Verity would go into the pantry to get the biscuit.