Auckland has had a bit of a stormy weather, so last weekend we took a trip to Takapuna beach, lo and behold, there was a bit of a wash up! I do love a good wash up, such an opportunity to glimpse the marine life that inhabits the waters off shore.
Luna set to immediately; gathering, searching, looking for treasures from the decaying masses of seaweed. She was very interested in the sea sponges, so we brought home many of them! Fascinating, and VERY smelly.
In just one small area it was really exciting to find so many sea stars, many had died entangled in sea weed, and had dried, legs twisted and distorted.
Did I say it was smelly? Reminds me of summers at the beach when I was a kid. We brought it all home, and thankfully we have an old outdoor work table set up for just such occasions, it’s all still out there, slowly drying and smelling less.
We grabbed a few sheets paper and started making drawings, turns out sea stars a great from making star shapes, we discovered some of the cushion stars must have been blue, while others looked read or purple in colour.
They also had interested textures. Luna was telling me that “Archeologists do this.” Indeed they do!
Blake also explored some shapes and textures of his own…
Lovely fun!
mermaids purse 