Poo ed

Yesterday as we were on our way to catch the train to go to Nic's for the afternoon, we saw a yellow chalk circle drawn round some dog poo on the pavement and the word 'POO' written in the circle, with an arrow pointing to the item. F has recently asked for help to learn to read, so I encouraged her to have a go at interpreting the 3 letters. On previous similar occasions, she might well have hazarded 'pavement?' or 'don't walk here now please!' or 'yellow circle', but this time she quite quickly decided that it said 'poo' and we then moved from there on to 'boo' and 'loo' and 'zoo', and even a bit later to 'zoom' as we walked along, me spelling things out and her guessing/sounding out.
Had a lovely relaxing time at Nic's, with Lucy arriving a bit later too. There were various phases of one child or another feeling left out. Always a tricky one, so we talked about that quite a bit. I think it's inevitable over time really, and as long as it's not always the same child, or caused by aggression, it's not such a bad thing. Although that's my basic summary, there's room for a lot more discussion in that area, but not going to go there right now.
Also at Nic's, did puzzles (god I love jigsaws and F not keen at all, so am a bit deprived), ate muffins (not vegan, so sue me, face, bovvered, I am 99.9% vegan, etc.), F and D played XBox at some point (Monkey Ball, Project Zoo, SpongeBob), F tried to play with S and D with a W&G playset but didn't know how to grab her space, having had no siblings to grab from or be grabbed from.
Had nice chats with Nic and Lucy about all sorts of stuff and saw the chickens, they're absolutely beautiful, very fine, healthy-looking birds and very used to handling too. F not terribly interested, think she is not much into animals generally. Except fictional ones maybe. Oh, and woodlice, but not always reliably kind to them.
I felt very relaxed - it was my planned relaxing time before a few days of: tons of paid work, F birthday prep., house stuff and washing backlog.
Train journeys were companionable with F. On one train she was able to watch a Barbie film through the gap in the seats in front of us and has now decided a portable DVD player would be a good idea, perhaps when she is 7...? Dozy Mog got a bit rowdy on one of the trains but was calmed eventually.
What else?
F has made various 'activity books' and 'games' - things like 'spot the difference' or 'join the things that go together'. Lots of drawing (mainly mammoths at moment, or Dr Who characters).
Last night (at bedtime!) she wanted more help with the reading, so we looked at more 'oo' words - boot, room, broom, hoop, hoot - and then did some others - top, stop, hop, mop. She is getting the idea now. She keeps firm control over what we do though, I don't think she'd accept a 'lesson' or a 'reading scheme'. If I start taking over, she soon stops me.
Much watching of Ice Age, a few Dr Who episodes and other bits and bobs. Jumping around, going on swing, eating raspberries from garden. DSing (Little Mermaid) and XBoxing (Marble Blast and Zuma).
Right, got to get on with work and stuff now.