felinedream

My brother is visiting at the moment. It’s lovely to see him but I’m exhausted. It’s not that we’re doing lots but I always find it tiring when we have guests. So far we have spent time at the gym, watched movies, met up with a friend and done a bit of shopping. This weekend I’m nipping up to Aberdeen to see the lovely Emma (and taking my brother with me so that he can visit a friend) so tonight I did a little bit of baking to take with me. I don’t know if it’s because I’m tired or because I was in a rush but my chocolate cakes don’t seem as good as usual. They are still yummy though. I also whipped up a batch of Nigella’s Lemon Raspberry Muffins. These came out really well but they don’t contain chocolate so I’m not going to rave about them. I have a feeling that hubby dearest will love them though.

If I’m honest, I think the real reason I’m so tired is this:

They may be cute, and far better behaved and more charming than I give them credit for, but just look at the way Brodie is holding that fork.

For the past (long) while, we’ve been having problems getting little one into her bed on time. This has had a number of horrific side effects; her being overly tired, resulting in tantrums, stroppiness etc during the day; husband not being able to concentrate on work in the evening; me not being able to study/read in the evening; and most importantly, me being very little child-free time during which to relax. We are all tired and grumpy. I have been reading a book called The Incredible Years by Carolyn Webster-Stratton and came up with The Race to Bed using ideas from it.

The first thing I did was nip to Ikea to buy a cheap clock for the kids bedroom. I then made a poster which displayed their bedtime. This way they knew, well in advance, that when the real clock looked like the one in the poster it was time for bed. There has always been a loose bedtime routine in our house but I decided to formalise it and turn it into a race. Each of the kids has a counter and when they complete a step of the routine, their counter gets moved up a notch. The green and orange posters are reward charts. Every night, when the race has been completed, child gets a sticker. If they stay in their bed all night, they get another sticker in the morning (I cut out 28 little gold and silver circles and used blu tack to fix them so that we could reuse the charts).

This worked like a dream for the first couple of nights. The race really captured their imagination. However, one week on and big one is bored of it (getting him into bed isn’t difficult though) and little one is back to doing her own thing and refusing to go to bed. There are a couple of reasons for this (I think):

• I can’t do it on my own - because the kids do things at their own pace they each need an adult to help them. For example I can’t help little one brush her teeth if big one has already reached the stage of having a story read to him.
• Big one and little one both want (and should get) a different story each night - as he is older, big one tends to get a longer story (we started Harry Potter tonight, yeay) so little one is almost always ready for bed first.
• I don’t think they should be going to bed at the same time because big one is 6 and little one is 2.

It seems to me that bedtime has not yet been sorted out. There are less than 3 weeks before I go back to work and I would really like to sort it before then.

On a Sunday, we sometimes have a family movie afternoon. I thought there was a yummy bag of microwaveable salted popcorn in the cupboard but alas, hubby dearest had eaten it while I was on holiday with the kids. Pay day isn’t until Thursday so I rooted through my baking cupboard looking for ingredients with which to make movie munchies. We didn’t have much in, but I was able to knock up a bunch of Snickerdoodles. I had never made these before but they are amazing. My eldest keeps sneaking into the kitchen to pinch them and even the little one seems to like them.

Ingredients

250g plain flour                              100g plus 2 tbsp caster sugar

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg                 1 large egg

3/4 tsp baking powder                 1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp salt                                       1 tbsp cinnamon

125g butter, softened

• Preheat oven to 180 degrees c
• Beat butter and 100g of sugar until light and fluffy. Add egg and vanilla and beat until mixed.
• In another bowl mix flour, nutmeg, baking powder and salt before adding to butter mix.
• Mix well.
• Spoon remaining sugar and cinnamon onto a plate. With fingers form dough into walnut sized balls before rolling in sugar and cinnamon.
• Bake on lined baking tray for about 15 minutes.

As it always does.

We returned from our holiday on Monday and I feel like it’s been non stop since then. Little one didn’t return to nursery until Thursday so I had 2 days in which to attempt to occupy both children while doing the holiday washing, looking after the household and finishing my book (The most excellent ‘Voluntary Madness’ by Norah Vincent). By the time Thursday came I couldn’t wait for some breathing space from the joy of being a mother. Thank goodness for my gym membership as I put Dev into the kids classes and indulged in some much needed exercise. As a result, the world seems a lot brighter just now. The gym has been an absolute life saver this summer. I have spent many a day in there: managing a workout while the kids are in the kids classes; taking them swimming in the indoor or outdoor pools; lunching with friends while out children play in the play area; and generally chilling out.

So, crafting and baking are taking a back seat just now. Why? Well, the 3 stone I lost last year was starting to creep back on so I’ve thrown myself into watching what I eat again. Baking doesn’t really lend itself to that because I have to taste what I create otherwise how can I expect other people to eat it. Right? I’m shelving crafting in favour of life I’m afraid. I have 3 weeks left of my summer holidays; 3 weeks which will be crammed full of things and stuff. Next week my brother comes to visit (yeay) and when he leaves I will be packing up the kids and heading to Aberdeen to see the lovely Emma. When we return life will be a whirl of: school uniform shopping; toilet training; appointments with hairdressers, doctors and dentists; prep and paperwork for the new academic year; working on my Forest School Leaders folio; exercising; and looking after the children. In addition to this is the trip to Edinburgh to see Dylan Moran, something I’m really looking forward to.

So, for the next few weeks my blog will detour a little. There will be less of the crafting and baking, and more of the juggling life, children, work and studying.

I wanted to write a quick blog about this before I dash off on holiday for a week, so…

A couple of weeks ago I signed up to do a swap on Vonnie’s blog. The swap was to send a box of home-baked goodies, a recipe card and an additional gift. This was the first swap I had taken part in so was a bit nervous about getting it right (and trusting in Royal Mail to deliver it). I was to bake for Debbs. I figured my chocolate cake with gooey icing wouldn’t travel particularly well so I perused Nigella and Rachel Allan looking for inspiration. I charted a couple of my ‘experiments’ earlier and in the end went with one new-ish recipe and one tried and tested favourite.

In the large box is some Jamaica Ginger cake with lemon icing and in the smaller box, Devin’s favourite, Caramel Shortcake. For my recipe cards I took a couple of coloured cards, drew cupcakes on them and applied glitter. My additional item was bottles of orange blossom water and rose water. I often use them in flavouring icing and love them.

Yesterday I received my package from the lovely Livi.

I received a multitude of tupperware boxes filled with these huge Fudge Brownies with Peanut Butter frosting. Yum.

I also received these amazing mermaid and seahorse brooches, which Brodie is very taken with (so I’ve hidden them from her). All in all I’d definitely say that my first swap has been a positive experience and I can’t wait for the next one.

I hold my hands up. I am rubbish; I have no willpower when it comes to shopping for my kids. I think I enjoy buying cute items for them a million times more than I enjoy shopping more myself. The problem is that I’m not much of a bargain hunter and I tend to frequent shops like Next, Zara and Debenhams for the kids clothes. In addition to this they have much more than they need. I am going to try making stuff for them myself soon (I promise) because I have been amazed by the variety of fabric available to buy, however until that happens I need to come up with something else.

This is Brodie sporting her new night dress and shoes for her holiday. The shoes cost me £2 from Asda (reduced from £6, hurrah). She is extra specially chuffed with them because Peppa Pig is her favourite and her best at the moment. I am more pleased with her night dress. In this hot weather she has been wearing PJ bottoms (and no tops). This makes no sense as her legs are always covered by the duvet and her upper body is exposed. I’d been after a night dress for a while and tonight it finally dawned on me to use one of Devin’s old t shirts (I had always thought the age gap between them was too much for hand me downs as she is 2 and he’s 6, and we have no storage in our tiny flat so keeping more than we need to is an issue). Brodie is obsessed with cars so this works well for her but I can’t wait until Devin discards his batman t shirt.

It’s funny how your idea of a good time changes as you get older. For our birthday’s hubby and I tend to have people over to our place, for drinking, food and chat, rather than go out pubbing and clubbing. A lot of the time this is to accommodate the children, and they really enjoy tearing around the place with the other kids. However, this year hubby decided he would like a child-free party. I half suspect this was to encourage me to have a little tipple as usually, with the kids around, I avoid the drink; responsible parent who is unable to get up in the morning if I’ve had a drink. So, with the children packed off to Devin’s dad’s, people started to arrive…and with them they brought baked goods. I was seriously impressed. I had baked a lemon syrup cake and a jamaica ginger cake for the occasion  and hubby had commented that he didn’t think sweet things would be eaten as they don’t mix well with alcohol. A woman he is not! The lovely Vonnie made her outstanding Chocolate Mouse Cake, Fiona brought the best Rocky Road I have ever eaten and Vicki made some moreish chocolate, peanut butter and cashew cookies. The baking went down a storm, but it did make me think that the type of parties you enjoy definitely change as you get older (or was the abundance of baked goods a sign of the credit crunch?).

And, in a crafty vein, hubby also received a rather outstanding piece of artwork as a gift from our friends Sara and Barry, so I shall leave you with this amazingness (the picture really doesn’t do it justice).

Hubby really likes gingerbread and so I thought I’d give this recipe of Nigella’s a try. However, to me, this is far more like Jamaica cake. It is dense and sticky and yummy. Still, hubby didn’t complain and has been wolfing it down, leaving very little for the guests at our soirée this evening (luckily I’ve also made a lemon syrup cake). Although it was very easy to make, it did seem to take quite a long time and I made a huge mess of my kitchen in the process. It got very sticky in there. The icing isn’t a necessary component for the cake but I felt it cut through the dense stickiness and gave it a sharp edge.

Recipe

150g butter
200g golden syrup
200g black treacle or molasses
125g dark muscovado sugar
2 teaspoons finely grated ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda, dissolved in 2 x 15ml tablespoons warm water
250ml milk
2 eggs, beaten to mix
300g plain flour

• Preheat oven to 170c and line roasting dish (30×20x5cm) with greaseproof paper.
• Melt butter, sugar, treacle, syrup, ginger and cinnamon on the hob.
• Take off the heat and add milk, eggs and bicarb.
• Put flour in a bowl and pour the liquid on top, mixing well.
• Pour into dish and bake for 45-60 mins (I went for 45 to keep the cake quite sticky).

• Wait for it to cool, ice  (if required) and cut into 20 squares (I used a lemon icing which was made from 175g icing sugar, 1 tbsp lemon juice and 1tbsp warm water mixed together).

I think my only criticism is that it’s a little too treacle-y for my tastes. Next time I might add less treacle and a touch of ground ginger to see how that affects the flavour.

A few months ago I saw some beautiful Alexander Henry material on eBay and bought a couple of yards of it.

Now, I haven’t done any sewing in years but my intention was to purchase a pattern for a tunic from Amanda at Kitschy Coo and use some of the material for that, and leave the rest to make a padded sleeve for my aging iBook. However, my confidence wavered and I knew I didn’t really have the skills to pull either of these feats off. Then I saw some amazing Comic Book Hoodies Amanda had made for some lucky wee boys and decided that my material had to become a hoodie for Brodie. I sent the material over to Amanda and within a flash she had crafted the most exquisite hoodie a 2 year old has ever owned.

I can’t articulate how beautifully crafted and outstanding this hoodie is. It exceeded my expectations, which were pretty high anyway having seen Amanda’s blog and the garments she’s been making. So a huge thank you to Amanda from both me and Brodie. And, just incase you missed the earlier link, go visit her blog at Kitschy Coo.

This was another of my, let’s make something that doesn’t have chocolate in it, baking endeavors. I’m going to confess to something here, I’m a bit of a chocoholic. I think it’s safe to say that I have a passion for chocolate and I think that is reflected in my baking. So, as these didn’t have any chocolate in them, I can’t say I’m that passionate about them. I love the texture, cakey but with a nutty crunch every so often, but they were lacking in taste. I’m guessing this was down to two things; I used the wrong type of coffee powder so it didn’t dissolve properly in my mixture and the lack of chocolate. If I were to make these again I think I’d substitute a tablespoon of coffee for cocoa and/or 100g of the nuts for 100g of chocolate chunks. Anyways, the recipe was, once again, from Nigella (I am systematically working through one of her books) and makes about 30 splodges.

250g plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
200g unsalted butter, softened
75g caster sugar
60g light muscavado sugar
2 tablespoons instant espresso powder
2 large eggs, beaten
200g walnuts, roughly chopped

• Preheat the oven to 180c.