Nice day today. Between us, J and I managed to find quite imaginative ways to avert the various near-strops that F approached during the day, so none of them went supernova.
In the morning we were in and out doing garden things - not actual gardening but kind of getting used to the idea of it maybe, having the kitchen door open and wandering. J burned some cardboard, I measured the lawn in preparation for trampoline and swing-buying at some point in next couple of months, J and I had goes at shooting baskets and I put more water in the base of the basketball hoop stand as it keeps falling over. F did lots of garden pootling, finding sticks, etc.

We need to get rid of loads of rubbish again, which means calling a man with a van sometime. But once that's done we can have the table and chairs out! Luvverly.
F and I went off with my 'futuristic conveyance' (shopping trolley) full of glass to take to the recycling, then on to the library. As we got to the park, we saw F's favourite golden retrievers there, so stopped to chat to their owner. Last week, F hid a couple of things behind a tree in the park 'for T and P' (the dogs), so she ran to get them and presented them to A, the owner. I had been a bit unsure about these items - my dog knowledge is minimal and I didn't think they would like them - but as it turned out they loved them, so F had a nice time throwing the toys for the dogs to run and catch/fetch. She was delighted.

She didn't kick up a fuss when we had to be on our way either, which was nice. We went on towards town, bumping into M and the twins on our way and making a loose arrangement to see them sometime next week. When we got to the recycling point, F was very helpful with the glass, she did clear (Encona hot pepper sauce, Kikkoman soy) and green (Rioja and Chianti) and I was on brown (Fentimans ginger beer). Then we went on into town, where we bought a few books, some compost and various vegan delights such as Booja Booja ginger ice-cream, veggie bacon, soba noodles and all sorts of stuff. Went into Woolworths for F to eye up ponies and other such items. Bumped into someone we used to see at Music and Movement - F and M had the conversation about 'what school do you go to?' 'well I'm home educated'...

On the way back, after the first 5 minutes of walking, F decided to pull the trolley for me - it was pretty heavy with library books, bought books, compost, etc. She ended up pulling it all the way home - we made it into an XBox-type game where each lamppost or signpost was a 'checkpoint' where she rested and I had to ask her if she wanted to 'Save and Quit' or 'Save and Continue'. Each time she would say 'Saaave... aaaand... continue!' and give me the biggest grin! We had different names for the checkpoints and went through 6 levels (different areas) too. She must have been worn out at the end - mainly using her 'easy' hand/arm throughout. She said some really nice things about how she wanted to do this for me so I didn't have to pull or carry anything for a change. I was very impressed and thought it was lovely of her.

Back home she played a little bit of Viva Pinata and read her book again, needing even less help this time. Then I cooked some vaguely Thai food, we watched a lot of Dr Who (Jon Pertwee) and she insisted she was never going to bed, but then got very tired less than an hour later.