Trousers for dinner and a walk in the slush

'Snow! Snow!' Thing 2 laughed joyously this afternoon - she had spotted a lump of snow about 50cm in diameter by the garden steps .... This excitement may have been more warranted if we hadn't just had massive amounts of snow covering the entire COUNTRY! But, this small remnant of greyish, cold, slush was enough to cause ripples of excitement through all three Things (I don't think Thing 3 really understood what the other two were going on about, but she bounced around like she knew) - and so I was outnumbered by Things and convinced into taking them for a walk in the slush. Each Thing got wrapped up warm and shoed up and then made their way out the backdoor in a blur of incoherent Thing chatter and scuffle. Thing 3 was put into her pram and we headed into our local village. Thing 1 and Thing 2 walked through every bit of remaining slush we came across, then when they got bored of jumping in slush, they decided they 'needed' their photo taking with EVERYTHING.

We saw sheep by the grammar school, the Things 'needed' their photo taken with them.

We saw snow still up on the surrounding hills, the Things 'needed' their photo taking with it in the background.

We went in the shop for some sweets, the Things 'needed' their photo taken with their sweets.

We saw a brick wall, the Things 'needed' their photo taken with it.

We saw a fence, the Things 'needed' their photo taken with it......

This went on all the way back home. I wished I'd held my ground and not given in to their demand to go for a walk in the first place. I'm exhausted and my picture taking clicker finger has muscles!

Upon returning home, Thing 1 announced to me that he is very proud of himself, because he got to keep all of his golden time at school this week. You must understand, this isn't unusual. Thing 1 isn't naughty, nor does he make a habit of losing golden time.
Only last week he did; He had five minutes docked from him. His crime? I asked him, expecting that he'd been talking when he shouldn't or not sat down when asked, but no. Proudly he told me that he'd lost his golden time for EATING HIS TROUSERS! I kid you not, his teacher confirmed it. I asked Thing 1 how on earth he'd been eating his trousers and was treated to a demonstration whereby he plonked himself on the floor, lifted up his leg and gnawed at the bottom of his trouser leg. . . Really.
Being ever the optimist I consoled myself that really he's a smart boy, at least if the world's food supply runs out then he'll never go hungry.