Village fair

Today was Remembrance Day and the Village Fair. We arrived at the fair just in time to hear the service for Remembrance Day. Ryan was very excited to see some real soldiers. The Village Fair was as it always is, although, I thought there were less stalls than usual. Talking to some stallholders they thought the same thing. I noticed particularly that the Breastfeeding Association wasn't there. No-one was serving pancakes! Ran into Justin Frick and his (pregnant) wife, so that was a pleasure. The kids took some of their pocket money and delighted on spending it all on lollies and lucky dips. It was a good chance to discuss with them how all the money we spent there went towards community organisations, so it didn't really matter if your lucky dip sucked or I didn't win any raffles.

Later in the day, I noticed a tiny baby bird outside. We get quite a few this time of year (just like last year), they are starlings I think. I guess they either fall out of the nest or are just really bad at learning to fly. This baby bird was near the dog's bowl, and I also noticed an adult bird nearby with a piece of dog food in its mouth. Normally I try to put the baby birds under the trees as I figure they might be a bit safer from the cat. Today I was quite pleased as I realised the cat wouldn't come anywhere near it due to the dog (she will grudgingly skulk from the back door to the laundry to eat, but not through the cat door, only if you actually open the door for her). So I called the girls outside to see the bird. We all huddled around it to examine it. Rufus came to see what we were doing. Then ate the bird. Oops. The girls didn't need to see that. Actually, he just put it in his mouth, so I yelled at him and grabbed him and got him to spit it out. Sophie and Bethany started crying, though it was me yelling more than the dog eating the bird that started them. Hannah just delightedly described everything that was happening. 'Rufus is eating it! He won't be hungry now!'. I grabbed hold of Rufus to keep him away from the bird while I calmed the girls down. The bird died while we were watching it and talking about nature and nests full of other baby birds. I don't think Rufus actually killed it though, it didn't look quite right anyway (some strange thing going on with its neck) so maybe the parents ditched it. Of course we buried it with full ceremony. Later I found another dead baby bird on the lawn - the other's 'grave' didn't appear to be dug up, so I assume there were two. I didn't mention that one to the kids...