Summerlee, Museum of Scottish Industrial Life

This place is a sure fire hit with our family.  There's a working tram.

We have visited Summerlee several times now and is a good choice when the weather looks changable (your fairly typical Scottish day).  If it's sunny when we arrive, we head straight for the brilliant play park.

This photo shows the start of the play park, which is brilliant for little ones.  Further back there are things for bigger kids including a flying fox.  Don't forget to bring your bucket and spade as the floor of the start is all sand (and quite clean at that).

Following that we step aboard the Vulcan, a canal barge, which has a small exhibition inside.

There are two main areas to the museum, the exhibition hall and the miners' cottages and mine.  These are connected by a tram.

Usually this is a mid-century German tram but we have been lucky enough to ride this one before.

The miners' cottages have been furnished to show life at different time periods, from 1840s to 1980s.  See if you can spot the 1990s artifacts in the 1980s cottage!  One of the cottages is an old-fashioned sweetie shop - a word of warning if you don't want your child consuming sweeties, you will need good excuses up your sleeve.  We've always got away with it.  We haven't been down the mine yet; that's really more suitable for much older children and grown ups.

Inside the exhibition hall there is a lot to see and it's got lots of interactive stations.  There is a train table, a dance hall, a pretend grocers and much more.  Quite often there are craft activities on; we haven't tried these yet and I think there might be a small charge. Upstairs is a small, changing exhibition space, we have seen themes such as the 1980s and weddings.  I imagine they're designed as social history exhibitions suitable for primary school visits.  Again, they are curated to be interactive.  Watch out as the lift can be tricky.

Sometimes, we will go back and ride the tram again or back to the play park before ending our visit.  We spend about half an hour in the playground and half an hour at the miners' cottages, around an hour in the exhibition hall plus lunch and tram rides.  If you lived locally, you could easily pop in for a short visit but for us it's a day out.  They have lots of events on and are worth following on Twitter.  We have been known to stop at the Fort on the way back if we have things to pick up or fancy lunch there (Wagamama anyone?).

There are lots of spots to enjoy a picnic, including two indoor spaces.  The cafe is quite average for lunch.  When we have had lunch there, we have always had soup, it has always been lentil and it has always been quite salty.  Usually, we aim for a picnic lunch and stop for coffee and cake mid-morning or mid-afternoon.  Their cake is good: lots of traybakes, empire biscuits etc.

The museum is free to visit.  There is a charge for tram tickets though.  On our last visit adults were £1.60 and under 5's are free (there are other fares).  A ticket lasts all day, so you can ride as much as you want.  The staff will happily help you load your (folded) buggy onto the tram.

The toilets and baby change are clean and copious, although the nappy bin was overflowing on my last visit.

The museum is in Coatbridge and easy to access.  It has a small free car park directly in front and another small free car park next door.  Even though there is not much parking, I have always found a space easily.  It is also close to the train stations as it is close to the town centre.

Lunderston Bay

Lunderston Bay claims to be the nearest sandy beach to Glasgow and it's in between Gourock and Inverkip.  One sunny Wednesday, I took a trip (during the school holidays) with just the two boys (3 years and 3 months).

The bay is very scenic with views across the firth of Clyde.  The beach is sandy but with lots of shingle too.  I think the southern end of the beach may have been sandier than the spot where we were as I could see lots of castles being built.  If you want fine, golden sand, this isn't it.

It's a small stretch, may be 200 metres at the most.  In between the car park and the beach is a small area of grass with some picnic benches.  There are also toilets.

 We threw stones in the water, spotted crabs and shells (I think the rockpooling there might be good), built a sandcastle, had a picnic and a paddled.  The water was very clear and waves gentle.  The beach was very clean with no litter.  Our fellow seasiders were friendly.  We also walked along a short section of the coastal path.

After all this, we went across the (fast) road to Cardwell Garden Centre, which has a large cafeteria, for ice-cream and a go in their sandy play area.  The road was quite hairy to cross with the pram and a three year old, especially as everyone had parked clear across the pavement.  The Garden Centre seems to be in a 70s time warp and the service wasn't too good but the homebaking was excellent and they had  good range of ice cream.  Angus could have spent a long time in the play area.

We arrived at 10.45 and left about 3, so it was a full day out.  There was lots of parking early on but very busy when we left, so my tip would be to get there early, play and then have your picnic.  It was a very easy drive from Glasgow and took 45 minutes.  You go straight along the M8/A8 and then it is residential roads and my sat nav was definitely needed.

You can get lunch in the garden centre and there was an ice-cream van in the car park but no other catering.  The toilets were terrific, very clean with hot water.  Logistically, I found the trip tricky as my travel system couldn't negotiate the beach.  It would have been much easier with friends.  There were lots of dog walkers, so if your child is worried about dogs, it's not the best beach for them.

Theatre for Under 5's this October

There's so much on, particularly over mid-term 2017 this year, it really makes me wonder whether the powers that be couldn't spread it out over the year rather than everyone cramming it into 11 days.  Anyway, here we go...take your pick and let me know what you think:

Stick Man: Friday 22nd to Saturday 23rd September at King's

The Adventures of Robin Hood: Sunday 24th September at East Kilbride Village Theatre

The Story of the Little Gentlemen: Wednesday 27th September at Johnstone Town Hall, Wednesday 4th October at Eastwood Park Theatre, Saturday 7th October at Tron, Tuesday 10th October at Platform

Sprog Rock by Starcatchers: Saturday 30th September at Beacon Arts Centre or Saturday 21st and Sunday 22nd October at Platform

The MacDougalls (different shows): Saturday 30th September at Theatre Royal or Saturday 28th October at Theatre Royal or Wednesday 18th October at Rutherglen Town Hall

Once Upon a Time: Superworm: Friday 6th October at Theatre Royal

Hairy Maclary: Sunday 15th October at Eastwood Park Theatre or Monday 16th October at Town House Hamilton

Shark in the Park: Monday 16th October at Rutherglen Town Hall

The Wonderful World of Lapin: Wednesday 18th October at Platform

The Night Pirates: Wednesday 18th to Thursday 19th October at Town House Hamilton

White: Friday 20th and Saturday 21st October at Cumbernauld Theatre

Once Upon a Time: Owl Babies: Friday 3rd November at Theatre Royal

The Gingerbread Man: Saturday 4th November at Paisley Arts Centre

Don't forget there's also the Scottish Mask and Puppet Centre, which has performances every weekend and through the mid-term.

Kelvingrove Lawn Bowls and Tennis Centre

Angus has been admiring people playing bowls for quite a while and when a friend visited it seemed like a good opportunity to give it a go.  We went to Kelvingrove and had a great time despite being rained on (the full Glasgow experience for a tourist).

It's a very picturesque place to play and the greens seemed well kept (I suppose you are playing at a Commonwealth Games venue!).  The best part is...it's free.  Actually the service was equally good.

I don't think you can book, it's first come, first served.  At the pavilion, we asked to play and the attendant provided us with all the equipment we needed and took us out to show us the ropes.  He couldn't have been friendlier and explained the game simply.  The only proviso to playing is that you are wearing flat shoes.

The game is simple, you bowl the jack and then bowl the rest of your bowls aiming to be the closest to it.  The equipment is all free to borrow, including the mat.  There were special, light bowls for toddlers/children too.  The only tiring thing about playing with a toddler is that you can't play the full length of the green.  This means you have to keep collecting the bowls up and bringing them back rather than switching ends like usual.  If wasn't for this I think Angus would have wanted to keep playing for longer.

We played for about half an hour before moving on to visit the play park, get some lunch (at Firebird, review here!) and then visit the gallery.

Parking is easy behind the gallery and £1 for four hours.  We didn't use the toilet facilities so can't comment on them).  The Centre is open from Easter to the September Weekend.

Rouken Glen Park

Rouken Glen Park is in East Renfrewshire, near Giffnock and is fantastic for a residential area park.  We go fairly often when the weather is sunny.

The park undulates without being hilly, so is good for buggy walking, scooting and is actually where I learnt to ride a bike.  There are lots of paths and the different features are well signposted.

Our first stop is always the play park, which has lots for children of all ages but would be especially good for toddlers who are just toddling as a couple of the slides don't have ladders/steps etc.  It is designed to have equipment for wheelchair users and others with disabilities, which makes it very accessible for all.  The park is always busy and is fairly safely enclosed but it can be difficult to always see your child.  I would say this is the best play park I know in terms of variety of equipment, maintenance and quantity of activities.

Next we walk or scoot past the outdoor gym equipment up to the boating pond and the Boat House cafe.  I highly recommend the cafe for lunch but there are lots of picnic spots too.  I will review the cafe one day!  You can buy duck food in the cafe and feed the ducks and swans.  At the other end of the boating pond is the waterfall.  If anyone is using the skate park as we make our way back to the car, we might watch them.

I would say the park is a half day out, although Angus can be so tired at the end that the rest of the afternoon is a DVD treat.

The main car park is signposted from Rouken Glen Road and is a right hand turn just after Speirsbridge roundabout.  Don't speed up too much after the roundabout or you'll go past it.  It is also the car park for the garden centre and is very large although on a sunny school holiday it can still fill up.

There are adequate toilets in the Pavilion next to the play park and behind the cafe at the boating pond.  Apart from an incline up to the boating pond (which can be avoided if you take a longer route), it is very easy with a buggy.