The sun is shining, it's a very nice day, Belinda and Benjamin are coming out to play

It's so hot today bedlinen is drying on the line in an hour or less, and comes off feeling crisp and ironed, which is bizzare. It's too hot for me to go out into the garden so I've been indoors folding and putting away our huge backlog of dry laundry. I am also being the Hat Enforcer, because the children keep taking off their hats when they are in the shade and then can't find them when they need them.

This morning I ordered Emer a sunproof swimsuit with long legs and sleeves. I thought she had outgrown her sun intolerance but yesterday she came up in a bumpy rash after only a few minutes' exposure to strong sun and we had to put her cardigan on to stop the itching, which of course made her far too hot.

However, yesterday we also found sweets with a high xylitol content, which will make things easier for us; she can have one or two after meals and snacks and it might help. I keep meaning to ask Rob to ask his Swedish relations to send us some of the specifically-for-children's-dental-health xylitol chews available over there and I keep forgetting.

Also, I think tomorrow is Post Office Day. I have about four parcels to post and it really ought to be manageable tomorrow.

Hot'n'sunny, every day, hot'n'sunny - what are you, a [CENSORED] lizard?

Today has been hot enough that the children and I have had to be very careful about how much time we spend outdoors. We had breakfast outside, but not lunch. And we're going to eat dinner outside, too. But Linnea got a bit sick anyway.

We started making a sundial at about 1:30pm when Linnea asked who invented clocks (I'm not sure, but we talked about sundials and Egyptian water clocks and things). We marked 3pm and 4pm and then she made a guess for 5pm which wasn't particularly accurate - I really need some kit for managing the solar system better than random objects I pick up and spin around each other in a demonstrative way; we'll have another go at marking times tomorrow morning and try to get a template on card to make a more durable sundial out of something like air-drying clay or something.

I did yet more laundry; the stuff we stripped off beds this morning will go back on this evening, fresh and crisp and ironed-feeling, because of the heat. It's due to be about 24 degrees C until after the kids' bedtime today. I'm glad we still have the portable aircon from Argos in the attic, if July is as hot as this the new baby will really need it.

Rob was out most of the day - he brought Emer to meeting (I couldn't walk from the bus-stop to the Meeting House today, it was too hot for a support belt) and then went back after lunch to attend a first aid course, specifically first aid for infants and children. He learned a lot he didn't know at all and is pleased he went. It wasn't too harrowing, either, which is nice - practising CPR on an infant model is not much fun, after all.

This evening we emptied the huge plastic paddling pool/sandpit thing we were storing the final dregs of topsoil in, and now we can wash it and see how watertight it is. If I have a sandpit or paddling pool in the shade out there, they children will spend a lot less time getting mild sunstroke. There's a limit to how strict about hats I can be, it turns out.

The children are painting a huge canvas and mixing all sorts of colours. We shall see how it turns out. They've painted both sides of it. And, um, their own faces. Ah well.

All Moral Guidance Is Contained In LJ/DW

I kind of want to water the grass this evening. It had its very first mowing today. But the waterbutt is empty.

Also, we need to know where and how to get the blades on the (manual) lawnmower sharpened.