Frosted Clovers…

Frosted Daisy…

Emilia (the small child i care for) and I go out every morning for a walk around the neighborhood. I strap her into the little red wagon, and we meander through the many construction sites along the dirt and gravel roads. Our journey always starts the same. She points at random things on the ground and calls out äiti (which means mother in Finnish, but she believes it to be a multi-purpose term which can be applied to anyone and everything she might want). I look at where she is pointing and randomly decide what she can have. Usually it is a rock or a stick but it doesn’t really matter what i give her… it’s always the wrong thing. Once we reach the path way, away from the road (but still nearish construction) i give her the option to walk. Most of the time she does. If there has been rain we spend quite a lot of time jumping in puddles, or playing in mud. But our main goal is to go feed the sheep. The pathway that the sheep are by is an advertised coastal pathway popular with cyclers and walkers, but we start our walk where the pathway ends no longer so near the coast. People always seem enchanted when they stumble across the sheep. After they get over their amazement they bend down, rip up some grass and try to feed them. This of course resulted in bare spots in front of and around the sheep’s pen. Cleaver me decided to collect sheep food from lots of random spots along the walk as not to make any one place noticeably bare. This was in the beginning when we spent a good 30 mins feeding the sheep. Now i rather the sheep be more of a pit stop than a destination. Emilia of course does not understand this concept and sticks to routine. She stops every 10 seconds and calls out äiti as she walks over and points to the grass, the clovers and the daisies she wants to feed the sheep. She used to be happy if i stood there and waited for her to pull some up as long as i at least had one clover in my hand. But now as the weather has grown cold, and her hands are encased in mittens too big for her tiny hands to have power over, she is unable to effectively rip plant life from the ground. She just points says ” äiti “, and waits for me to pull things up. If i am too slow she walks over, grabs my hand and takes me to the spot she has deemed worthy. We had a lot of those moments this morning. I was reluctant to rip up the grass, the clovers, or the daisies. You see.. i had no mittens on and everything was mostly still covered in frost. I distracted her with taking photos. In the end i was forced to gather food for the sheep, but i only picked the ugly grass.