Anna’s Hope – Big Fairy Picnic in the Park

Yesterday we had a really fun day out and it was mainly just the girls (Jelly Bean gatecrashed) as we went to the Big Fairy Picnic in the Park at Burghley House. The Big Fairy Picnic is a fundraising event for the charity Anna’s Hope. Anna’s Hope was inspired by Anna Hughes who died from a brain tumour when she was just 3 years old and has been set up to give hope to children and young people diagnosed with a brain tumour. The charity aims to raise money to fund research into a cure for children with brain tumours and improve rehabilitation facilities and support.

Founder of Anna’s Hope and Anna’s Mummy, Carole Hughes said:

‘Anna loved dressing up as a fairy and we were delighted that everyone had such a great time at last year’s fairy picnic. There were little fairies, big fairies, sumo fairies and soldier fairies and lots of fairies have asked us to have a picnic again.’

Being a Mum myself, this story really pulls on my heart strings and so as I was preparing this post, a recent email sprang into my mind. I have been contacted by the AO Happy Badger and asked if I would like to select a worthy charity who the AO Happy Badger can make a £50 donation to and so I have chosen Anna’s Hope. To find out more about the AO Happy Badger just click on the badge at the bottom of this post or in my sidebar to the right.

Yesterday, fairies and elves of all shape, size and description gathered together in the beautiful grounds of Burghley House to have a picnic, play games, try out new crafts, get their faces painted, listen to music and generally have lots of fun. All those who dressed up were given half price admission to the Garden of Surprises.

Please accept my apologies before you continue, as usual I got a little trigger happy with my camera and I’m afraid I just couldn’t cut them down any further than I have done already so there are quite a few photographs to plough through.

Little Bean loved making these leather keyrings, she chose the pictures and hammered them herself. She made one for herself and then asked if she could make one for Beanie Boy, then just as we were about to head home she asked if she could make a bookmark for me where she chose a different picture for each of my four babies and I love it!

After we had tried our hand at the activities set up at the Big Fairy Picnic we went into the beautiful Garden of Surprises. I was secretly excited about the prospect of this because I think you will agree that Little Bean looks soooo pretty in her fairy dress and I just knew that the Garden of Surprises would offer up some great opportunities for some stunning shots of her and I am soooo happy with the results . . .

I’m getting pretty good at the old #Mummyfail at the moment and I didn’t disappoint again on this occasion. Despite knowing full well that we would be going to the Garden of Surprises and that Little Bean would want to play in the water fountains, I completely forgot to take her a swimsuit. Luckily I did have her spare fairy dress so I didn’t mind if she wanted to play in the water and get it wet, it adds to the pictures too and I just love the look of joy on her face – she had a wail of a time!