Bad light day! POTD January 3

Hello all! I've been reading Bryan Paterson (Understanding Exposure) these last day, carry it around as a bible actually ;-) and somehow he makes it look easy! But I discovered yesterday that is isn't!!! After the WB problem, I struggled yesterday with... light! I went outside to take my pictures (I prefer outdoor lighting!! or so I though), took my son and my camera to town and started playing tourist! Technically spoken I am a tourist around here, so I might as well act like one too ;-) We had beautiful weather, the temperatures were OK but the sun was totally saying "spring!). So I discovered that too much sun is, well, too much. In the afternoon my son had a little friend over at our house, they played in the garden but I don't have any good photos of it, because they turn either their back at me (often) or the sun is just too much (shadows in the faces). Here are the two better pictures (not perfect!) that I picked for POTD (I'm not gonna show you all my failures!!):

That is my son in the playground, climbing. I cut out the slides itself, ugly colors (you can still see a little yellow!). As you can see, the lighting is not correct (the exposure) but it is one of the best from yesterday...

Next one doesn't show a face, only (dirty) shoes. I wanted to show you some history of my town, these are my sons shoes on the Rosetta stone, a copy obviously (he's standing on the hieroglyphs part), that is on the most famous little square in town. It is terrible to take pictures of because it is a tiny square surrounded on 4 sides by building totally blocking the light!! When I took the photo I didn't actually realise the floor was that dirty :-) Disappointment there too!!

And to show you another one anyway, this is my son running on that same square and I am disappointed with this picture because my son is not at all well exposed and it could have been a really cute photo.
Well what I can I say? Any CC would be welcome! Oh, and don't worry, I'm not giving up on this, I'll get there!!!

**edit: I shot my pictures either in A mode or S mode, no full manual today!**