Introducing

the first family of cygnets I've ever come across since I took up photography (which is some years now) :)

What an exciting morning after a lousy night's sleep!  

Yesterday I took Billy for his annual jabs, and discovered he may need one of his main teeth and possibly others removed which is rather a worry given his age and also the cost (now I wish I had taken out insurance, but I couldn't afford the payments)...

My neighbours are away and yesterday as I came home I spotted a window open.  I didn't know if their son was there, so I left it until I called Billy in and because it was still open I texted to let them know. Thankfully they could call their son and have it closed...  Whilst I was sorting that out and checking, I found a hedgehog on the doorstep :)

I digress!  

I badly needed to get out and away from the stresses of life at the moment, so I decided to walk down by the canal this morning.  Again I parked in the football club car park and once again the stupid machine wasn't working (and of course the office was shut!!).  I will be sending a strongly worded email to the council now...it was another stress I didn't need :(

I had a very pleasant walk along the canal.  It was cloudy to start with, but then the sun came out for a while.  I saw the bridge at the other end swung open for the first time ever since I moved here (1993!) and there was a boat going through the lock too :)  I met a couple I knew which was nice and we chatted whilst the bridge was being swung back :) 

I met another couple of people and chatted again as you do...then as I passed a man, he said something to me.   I didn't hear so I asked him to repeat, and he said 'I see you have a camera, have you seen the cygnets?'  Well!  Believe it or not I'd walked straight past on the other side, I'd seen the lone male swan and taken pictures of him, but not the pen and the cygnets!  SO MUCH excitement from me :)

Of course after that nothing would do but I'd wait to see if they went on the water, but they didn't, so you have Mrs Swan introducing her babies :)

Following that as I was walking back to the car along the towpath I met some friends with their children on scooters.  As we walked and talked C said to me, can you see E?  I couldn't!  So their little girl had disappeared...  I spent some time helping them to look and checking places she may have gone but we were in the main street and it was very busy with pedestrians.  Luckily she came back to where T was scanning the crowds...  So glad she was safe :)

After all that I thought I deserved a coffee, but running out of time in the car park so I got a take out latte and a lemon muffin :)

Some more shots in my extras, the hedgehog!  Dad guarding the family and the goslings I'd seen earlier plus some geese in flight which may have been my blip shot just before I heard of the cygnets :)  The rest are in flickr :)

Now I must do a bit of housework before resting this afternoon as I'm doing my Street Pastor shift from 10pm tonight!

Happy Saturday folks :)