Following a post on Pippa's blog about making willow rings, I had lots of ideas as to what I could do with them. But failed miserably on my first attempt.
However, this evening we were invited to Mum's for a barbeque, and to christen her Chimenea we bought her for her birthday last year. Mum has the most fantastic weeping willow in her back garden, so as Stuart cooked the food on the barbeque, I stood by the willow taking off the trailing branches and made a couple of willow rings. It took far longer than I anticipated as Sophie was intrigued by the barbeque! I am really pleased with the results, and hopefully can harvest a bit more willow from the tree!
The boys had their own fun with the tree, first of all hiding within the curtains of branches, then Ethan decided he wanted to see if he could be Tarzan. He discovered he had to hang on quite high up to avoid hitting the ground, and he also needed quite a few branches to hold his weight. The older ones also joined in, but it was Ethan who was entertained by this for ages, with a bare patch appearing on "his branches" where he'd been holding them!
Sophie also joined in the fun with trying to eat the leaves, but also with showering herself with the stripped leaves.
Isn't it great when so much fun and entertainment can be had from just one tree.
I LOVE weeping willows, they are such beautiful, graceful trees. There are some by the river in Spalding and the lousy council butchered them, leaving only huge stumpy branches and no 'weepy' bits at all. I used to love plaiting the traily bits when I was little and searching for buff tip caterpillars on them! Glad the rings went well in the end, it's quite addictive isn't it!!
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