Seeking Out Autumn

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Several months ago I read an activity post from Multiple Mummy that involved a nature trail in her back garden (her son had chickenpox so they were quarantined). Ever since, I've wanted to do this with The Boy but it's taken time to get prepared. First of all, I had to find some self-adhesive pads which having scoured local shops for, I ended up finding them in a cheap shop on holiday in Dorset! Now things are more comfortable with potty-training, I felt happy to have a go.

With the increasing bite in the air and the occasional, but gentle, rainbursts, it was time to pop on our wellies and waterproofs and go nature-treasure hunting in a local park. Ideally to do this activity you need horse chestnut and sycamore trees, pine trees and possibly an oak. There is a park on the way down to the beach that is perfect for this with the abundance of trees lining the periphery of the park.

The Boy already knew what a conker was because I'd shown him a few days beforehand, trying to get him to find other treasures proved interestins; he's only two, he's never seen these things before. We wondered around the more woodland area of the beautiful Victoria park, straying off paths, climbing up banks and sliding down muddy paths and found a whole heap of nature's wonders. The Boy kept stopping and listening during the still moments between the roars from the cars on the road alongside the park. In those snapshots of serenity he heard the raindrops falling through the layers of the canopies, blackbirds calling, squirrels scampering up the treetrunks, and his absolute favourite was the chorus of the crickets in the long grass. He stood and listened for over ten minutes.

In this emeral and khaki wonderland, under our rubber-encased feet and amongst the fallen detritus, we found pine cones, acorns, beech tree seeds, red leaves, orange leaves, multi-coloured leaves and conkers in their cases and out. Is their any greater joy than opening up a conker case and being the first person in the entire world to see that feat of nature?

Children can only learn what they experience!

(Come back tomorrow to find out what we found in our nature trail)

Tempting Tempura

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This week's Silent Sunday features a plate of food, which was last night's tea.

I am the type of person who eats something new, likes it, sees a similar recipe and mixes them up. I'm like my mother in that respect; rubbish at following a recipe. My Christmas cakes will always have fruit in them that has been soaked in whatever alcohol that's been left in the cupboard: Malibu is quite an interesting one. I see something and adapt it without researching. Before I started writing this post, I checked Tempura Vegetables recipes and came across this one from the BBC Good Food Guide which is when I discovered that I was ignorant enough to not know that Tempura Vegetables were Japanese. I know, I felt well foolish!

It all started when I had them about two months ago at a pub. Then on Thursday, I was perusing the decadence that is Reluctant Housedad's Recipe Shed and I noticed his recipe for onion rings. Following a twitter conversation with him, we decided that I could manage without gram flour and I could use beer instead of water. See already they're not proper Tempura Vegetables. Oh, and I added paprika.

I know, shoot me now!

Anyway here, it is:

A load of chopped up vegetables. The courgettes were rubbish, I wouldn't do them again: too soft.

200 grams of flour and half a pint of Carling, darling. Plus two teaspoons of paprika.

Then dip the vegetables into flour on both sides before dunking in the thick batter and transferring to a pan of hot, hot oil.

Regardless of what Helen from The Crazy Kitchen says, the carrots were yummy.

And while the courgettes look good, they were a bit bland and 'wet'?

When all was cooked, I 'plated up' (oooh, check me out!). I used plain white crockery to show the colours off, two ramekins containing sour cream and sweet chilli dip (I bought it, don't bother asking me for the recipe, Tesco would be better informed) and we ate with our fingers!

It was scrummy!

Recipe Shed

ShowOff ShowCase: The First One

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When I started ShowOff ShowCase it was intended to be for three weeks only with three specific themes: Most Popular Post, The One That Should Have Done Better, and Favourite Post. Some very lovely people complained at me when I said that I wasn't going to be carrying it on, and through discussions with them I decided to carry the link-up going every fortnight alternating between The One That Should Have Done Better and a changeable themed post. Loyal bloggers link up every fortnight and for that I am truly grateful.

ShowOff ShowCase is a good opportunity to give old posts an airing and gain more readers and comments. It does rely on the contributors reading each other's posts, otherwise it's all a bit pointless.

One of the aspects that I like about it is that people contribute to the themes and I feel it builds up a little community of bloggers that I respect and enjoy reading. I've just asked on twitter if anyone has any ideas for this weekend's theme and the fabulous Dometic Goddesque has come up with the idea of The First One: your first post!

So fish it out; your first rambling post. Link it up below and let's see what people think. Are you a better writer? Are you worse?!

ShowOff ShowCase

How Future Friendly Are You?

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I like to think I'm a bit of an eco-warrior. It stems from teaching primary school children about the 4Rs for a good few years:

  • Refuse
  • Reduce
  • Reuse
  • Recycle.

I'm a big believer in the importance of reducing the amount of waste we create. Did you know that 85% of the contents of your bin can be recycled, but on average only 20% is? With the targets that have been introduced in this country, many councils are now offering more facilities for recycling: but it's not just about separating your plastic and cardboard, we need to stop using so many resources and so much packaging in the first place.

Therefore when I was invited by Proctor & Gamble to take part in their Future Friendly campaign, I was very excited. The challenge is to follow the Future Friendly Sustainable Living Activity: the seven day plan involves undertaking three inspired but small acts a day, for a full week. To help people who want to take part come up with these three small tasks, there is a rather fabulous little online tool which I thoroughly recommend visiting (click on the picture to have a go) as it can highlight areas in your house to help save energy or use less resources.

Did you know that the average family wastes £680 a year on uneaten food? £680?! That is shocking and such a waste on resources. How many of us just scrape away the scraps or bin the best befores? To help reduce our food waste (and cut down on our portion sizes) I've signed up to the website LoveFood HateWaste which has a nifty section of hundreds of recipes. Simply select the food that needs using up and it will suggest some recipes! (Action 1 done!) I've also started shopping online having planned in advance what food we need to buy for the month without being tempted by all the extra goodies at the ends of aisles. (Action 2). Buying some items in bulk can also cut down on the amount of packaging that is used, e.g. larger packs of dried pasta, washing-up liquid, toilet rolls, etc. (Action 3).

Factoid: Did you know that recycling a glass jar or bottle saves enough energy to power a laptop for 25 minutes? As the average family uses 500 jars a year, that's a lot of blogging and tweeting power!

I've actually followed the online tool above and found all of the little titbits of information that can help me to be Future Friendly. The irony is that it told me to print off the list to keep a reference! Funnily enough, I've saved it as a PDF instead!

Here are some of the 21 things that we will be trying to implement over our Future Friendly Activity:

  1. using watering cans to water the plants as opposed to a hose which uses 1000 litres of water every hour it is on (should be easy enough to do, The Boy's water-table is a great water-butt at the moment!;
  2. turning the washing machine down to 30° instead of 40° (Ariel powder and liquitabs are formulated to work at 30° which uses 30% less energy each wash than at 40°);
  3. use saucepans that fit the hob (this is for hubby not me. He always uses a medium pan on the large gas with it up full-whack. So much heat is wasted over the sides of the pan);
  4. measure out the water that I need to boil before putting it in the kettle;
  5. putting wet (not dirty) kitchen towel into the compost bin, along with scrap paper that's been used on both sides. A good compost bin is full of compost critters; they like small holes and gaps created by scrunched up paper which is biodegradable;
  6. install toilet hippos (a few pounds from DIY stores and can save 3 litres of water per flush);
  7. turn off the extractor fan in the downstairs toilet, it's not needed and uses too much power;
  8. put on my cardigan and slippers rather than knocking on the heating!

I'm not going to write all 21 targets up in this post, but I will pop back in a week's time and tell you which other inspired little acts I've got up to with The Boy.

I was provided with a recycling box and a range of P&G products to help me complete this project. My opinions are my own.

Get Digging!

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I love my garden, seriously love it. When we moved in it was a 70ft x 35ft suburban, ex-council rectangle of:

  • antiquated buxus hedges
  • a dangerous greenhouse
  • a random brick base for, I suspect, a long-gone shed
  • a concrete path leading to <shudder> a concrete washing line

and that was basically it. Oh, and a hell of a lot of broken glass. Six and a half years later and we're still picking bits out of the flowerbeds. First thing to go, before we'd even done anything to the house, was the path and washing line. I blogged about the transformation back in May 2011, linking it up to The Gallery.

I drew a plan, to scale, and laminated it.

Hubby dug, I directed. I weeded, he moved stuff. We had some fabulous barbecues and parties in the garden, I grew copious amounts of vegetables, I lost copious amounts of brassicas due to a vengeful cabbage white butterfly. Everything  panned out almost as I wanted it to.

One area that has been neglected significantly is the vegetable patch and herb garden. Over the last year, I've had to remove half the railway sleeper defined vegetable patches to create more play space for The Boy. I had another go this year at growing vegetables, confident in my previous success, but my seedlings died when I went away on holiday. The herb garden was going great guns, until the fence against it was blown down in a gale, and it crushed the rosemary bush, thyme plant and the coriander. When my dad replaced the fence panel, he put pay to the remaining rosemary bush, so that all that is there at present is an overgrown lavender bush.

I'm not painting a good picture am I?

For a keen gardener it's quite distressing.

Therefore when Bosch contacted me and asked me if I'd like to take part in a competition to transform part or all of my garden, I jumped at the chance. During the two months that I have to complete the challenge I will receive support from Bosch Lawn and Garden, GreenThumb lawn care, and Best4Plants in the form of garden equipment, lawn treatments and plants for the areas I'm making-over.

There are eleven of us 'competing' for the prize of a day with leading gardening expert Helen Yemm and two tickets to RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2012.

MummyMummyMum
TheMumBlog
Seasider in the City
Mari's World
Mummy Needs
Who's The Mummy
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Mummy, Daddy and Me Makes Three
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Not SuperMum

Exploring Science!

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Today we met up with an old school friend of mine and her little girl who is two months older than The Boy. She had some Tesco Days Out vouchers which we used to gain free entrance into Techniquest, a science exploration centre in Cardiff Bay. I've been there many times over the years, either with nieces and nephews or taking a class there. This is the first time, I've taken The Boy on a dedicated trip just for him.

And he loved it!

Techniquest is a hands-on centre with dedicated exhibits exploring all aspects of Science. My personal favourites are the marble-run (massive display with different sized marbles and different routes), the water play, the shadow room, the walk-on piano (like in 'Big') and the headless table! If you are ever down in the south Wales area, then it is well worth a visit as your little ones could happily kill several hours there. Just take a spare change of clothes for the water-play area!

I think he's now the age where he wants to figure things out and fully explore them. He was therefore really able to enjoy the hands-on approach to the different aspects of Science that Techniquest promote. Mr. TheBoyandMe is going to be really chuffed that he enjoyed it there, as he has been desperate to go with him many times, but The Boy hasn't got it before now. We spent a really enjoyable couple of hours there, until our stomachs over-ruled our quench for play, and we headed off to Pizza Express.

Privacy

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I've spent the weekend in Manchester, failing to see Justin Fletcher filming his new CBeebies show. After a horrendous seven hours travelling 190 miles, and missing his MBE-ness by forty minutes, I have learnt several things.

  1. I like people-watching.
  2. The Premier Inn, Trafford Centre West is a fabulous budget hotel. I'd recommend it.
  3. The Trafford Centre is just crazy.
  4. I have met some amazing friends through twitter and blogging.
  5. A rather sage piece of advice that I need to remember more often:

'No one can make you feel inferior without your consent' (Eleanor Roosevelt)

Now, I've recently been asked by someone why I had her on limited profile on Facebook but not another person. That there is why I don't tend to add twitter/blogging people to my 'real' Facebook account. People know I'm a teacher in a small-town and that I like to keep my family's anonymity. If I have added someone as a friend to my 'real' Facebook profile, I do not see why I have to explain that to someone else.

Being told that I've made someone feel really down about themselves is emotional blackmail, and instead of making me change my settings, it's only served to make me angry and want to press delete. I did that about six months ago and had to deal with the fallout from various people's insecurities then.

I've got my own insecurities and issues to deal with, without having to deal with someone else's. I'm the type of person who spends too much time worrying what other people think of me, I always have. I would never do anything to hurt anyone intentionally, and think that if people just had a few more kind words or a smile to share with people on a daily basis, then the world would be a far happier place.

However, I don't owe anybody a Facebook friendship. My work colleagues and immediate family are on there. There's photos of my brothers and sisters, mum and dad, my husband, my child and me on there. I try not to let the worlds merge too much because I like to remain, as HimUpNorth once called me, The Stig of blogging. There are some people who I have added, there are some I haven't. Deal with it.

This is my life, if I wanted everyone to know who I was, then I wouldn't have a pseudonym would I?

People Watching

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This weekend we travelled up to Manchester for various reason (that's a whole other blog-post!) and stayed in the rather lovely Premier Inn Trafford Centre West. When Mr. TheBoyandMe was putting The Boy to bed last night, I went down to the hotel lobby with my laptop and bought a drink. I then sat people watching, and this is the result.

21:30 I am sat in the hotel lobby while hubby puts The Boy to bed. People watching. There may be some random tweets that follow. More than normal.

21:31 The most 'manicured to within an inch of her life' woman has just teetered past me in orange 4-inch high heels. They matched her tan.

21:32 Her hair had not a strand out of place; evey highlight and lowlight knew where it should be, her false eyelashes needed a suspension bridge.

21:33 and Jesus Christ the hemline of her LBD almost covered her arse. It was a good St. Tropez.

21:35 Woman who came in this time last night has just sauntered back in with her filofax & laptop. I reckon she's head office.

21:36 (to someone who demanded a twitpic of the LBD's hemline) perv'. She's gone now, her and her orange heels and tan.

21:36 She's gone. I suspect her 'ride' had arrived 😉

21:37 And the 9yr old (?) boy who was hanging around last night is here again. Is that his mum or sister on reception?

21:38 Although not sure about the parentage of this boy. He seems to belong to the hotel, like a dog. Everyone knows him.

21:38 Now, is she Spanish or French?

21:41 She really shouldn't be wearing those tight salmon pink cropped yoga pants.

21:43 Two hippos wrestling!

21:44 Receptionist looks like she's seen a ghost. Foundation too pale, hair dye too dark, eyebrows too plucked & ponytail too tight.

21:45 Love seeing everyone struggling with the slow-moving revolving doors when they're an automatic door right next to it.

21:47 Two deaf people ordering at the bar. Barman not speaking at all. They look most amused at his signs. Pretty sure they can lipread mate.

21:49 Mate, you should not be wearing that bright green, silver sequinned top. Definitely not.

21:50 Who is this hotel boy? He's people watching as much as me, but the beauty of him being a kid is he asks people the questions I'm thinking!

21:51 Oh an Italian barman, but naff accent like Gino d'Acampo. Someone's ordered champagne.

21:53 Are they Spanish? Hmm. Dressed in puffa jackets in August? Definitely Mediterranean…

21:54 Ooooh someone's just brought in a Pizza Hut take out! Is he allowed?

21:55 Who is he? (http://yfrog.com/h811kcmj)

21:56 My word, that hair (http://yfrog.com/hwpt4j)

21:56 'Love Lipsy'? You also love peroxide and hairspray love

21:58 And tell your mum her bum's too big for those leggings #bitchytweet

21:58 I aim to offer a light entertainment alternative to the X Factor.

22:01 An 8yr old girl has just walked past pushing a pushchair and texting pn her crystal studded mobile phone. Where's her childhood gone?

22:02 OMG OMG! She's wearing tummy flattening pants under her salmon pink dress. I can see the waistband and bulge above. She's didn't need them.

22:04 I know. Although people keep looking at me oddly because I'm laughing at the laptop!

22:05 She's definitely his mum. Just handed him a drink of water (no, you're not having coke!).

22:19 Aha, now American accent when speaking English but Mediterranean looking? Aha, that would be Hebrew! They're Israeli. And ginger…

22:20 The receptionis has changed her top to a black one. Think that means she's on the bar now

22:21 Also, she's just shown him where Norway is on the computer screen.

22:21 These two blokes want to get into Manchester & can't understand why they can't get a taxi. #gaypride

22:21 I'll have those bhajiis if no-one wants to claim them

22:22 And I'm sure he was wearing a black shirt earlier, but now he's wearing purple and on reception. How random.

22:25 The bar is ever so busy. I'm wearing black, maybe I should go and help out?

22:26 Oooh now, he's got a purple shirt on but gone back to the bar! No no, you need to be wearing black to be on the bar

22:26 Now that's confused me. He's just called her Scarlet, obviously not his mum

22:27 Some bugger has left the automatic door open & now I'm cold

22:32 The nice lady who smiled at me came down for a drink with her daughter & was looking for a seat. Surrendered my place for her so am in room.

22:33 and now she's on reception again. All wrong!

22:34 I miss the lobby. Sod an early night, I might go back down in a moment. I miss the man in the green sequinned t-shirt.

22:37 When I go home, I may just go and find my nearest Premier Inn lobby and live there every Saturday night.

I know it's a load of old piffle, but there's now't so queer as folk!

ShowOff ShowCase

Sizzling Sausages Struck by Lightning!

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I am discombobulated.

It has just been thundering and there have been flashes of lightning. Today's date is 25th August and we've just had a thunderstorm. I haven't had my summer yet where I have lounged on my sun-lounger with my toddler playing alongside me in the sweet smelling summer grass. I haven't got a cushion for my sun-lounger and the grass is far from sweet-smelling.

But that's not the point!

I haven't had warm, soft, balmy evenings with the jasmine and honeysuckle sweetly scenting the air, the condensation from my glass of Pimms trickling over my fingers and friends laughing while the barbecue sizzles in the background.

Even before The Boy, I don't think we had a barbecue like that. Let's face it; the barbecue always manages to smoke everyone out, Mr. TheBoyandMe is usually worried about the chicken cooking all the way through, I forget the tray of jacket potatoes in the oven (true story! The oven had been turned off post cooking, but the next day I opened it to find 25 beautifully crispy jacket potatoes on a baking tray. We had potato salad for days afterwards), we run out of lagers but have too much rum left over (why do I buy it? No-one drinks it), and half way through the evening we have to come inside because it's too cold or raining!

However, did you know that the British are spending more on summer barbecues than they do (per person) on a summer holiday? The average amount per summer season of barbecues is £724.02, with an average spend of £141.67 per barbecue! Now bearing in mind, I haven't had one this summer, that means someone has had some marvellous barbecues and not invited me!

Apparently though, it's not just the hosts who spend money; it's the guests too! Gracious guests spend over £22 on goodies to supplement the already groaning feast-laden table. When I read that factoid, I'll admit to thinking: if each guest spends £22 on goodies, all I need to do is co-ordinate what they're bringing and I needn't spend a penny!

It's the last bank holiday weekend before Christmas (!) this weekend, it should be the time to have one last almighty bash at a fabulous barbecue. I won't be able to partake as we binned the underused and rusted barbecue last year (I'm vegetarian, he's a meat-eater, it never worked out easily), but here are some top tips to help it go well:

These factoids have been taken from The Pimm’s Summer Time Report, conducted in June 2011 by One Poll, which surveyed of 3,000 UK men and women, 25-45 years old. I wasn't asked to write about it, I've not been given anything, I just wanted to moan about the weather and show off my photo of one of my favourite drinks!

Please drink responsibly.

Our Wee-k in T-wee-ts!

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I've tweeted a little bit, a fair amount, quite a lot this week about The Boy and our potty training experience. Reading back through them, it shows a massive journey for my little man. I may have felt like going mad at times, occasionally rocking in frustration and due to cabin-fever, but we seem to have done it.

Just thought I'd share the change:

Saturday 13 August 2011
09:51 10 mins into #pottytraining. He's just done his first tried for wee on the potty. Wahoo! Be sure it's a different story in an hr.
10:12 Wee no.2 on potty #pottytraining
10:18 Oh no 🙁 #pottytraining
10:19 Don't worry everyone it won't be wee/poo tweets from me all day. Can I just ask what do you say when he has an accident? Show him? Explain?
12:26 #pottytraining Ok so we're doing lunch at the mo with a towel under him & limited drinks at the beginning. 10 successes so far, 2 accidents
12:58 #pottytraining We got through 45 minutes of lunch with no accidents! Wahoo. Asked to go once, taken once, success!
16:34 Right, nap over, he's properly come to, nappy off, pants on, round 2 'ding, ding'.

Sunday 14 August 2011
09:46 He's only done 1 wee in the past hour. Progress or an imminent disaster? #pottytraining
10:13 #pottytraining Just wet a bit & managed to get follow-through on the potty. Never mind, all part of the training
12:45 Question re: #pottytraining Day 2 & he's having more accidents but he's telling us that he wants to go as he's doing it. Is this progress?
16:36 I know none of you care but he's just done his first deposit on the potty! Wahoo! #pottytraining

Monday 15 August 2011
07:57 Morny. Going to be flying solo today with the potty training, wish me luck and patience!
19:47 You know this #pottytraining lark? I think he's doing ever so well. 30-45 minutes between sittings

(I was incredibly busy that day unsurprisingly. Not enough time to tweet!)

Tuesday 16 August 2011
01:03 Reading Gina's 'potty training in a week' (yes I know I'm on day 3!) & thinking "really? *Really*?" over so many things!
01:08 I mean, sitting him on the potty for 5-10 minutes every 15 minutes? *Really*? #pottytraining
01:17 Right, I'm talking to myself now, no-one else is around in the whole of twitter…
07:46 Morny!
08:04 Oh poo pants #pottytraining
10:29 #pottytraining He just said "I'm doing a wee" but hadn't actually started. Got him on the potty in time. Progress in the right way?
11:41 Ironing The Boy's bodies. He won't be needing them anymore will he? *sob* Where's my baby gone? #pottytraining
13:09 #pottytraining I prompted him but he's just toileted himself independently from pants down to back up again
19:24 I've been out! There's a world out there, with people in it! And they can say words and *everything*! #pottytraining
23:51 I have just spent £15 on a potette. Hubby has just asked me what something was in the spare room. Passed down from my sister? A potette!

Wednesday 17 August 2011
10:52 He just completely toileted himself independently! #pottytraining "Oh no, oh no, they're coming off" took pants down & went on the potty!
14:02 #pottytraining Sorry for this. I've just got him to sit on the potty & do a deposit! He made it happen! #firsttime
14:06 And then we had a little wee accident (but he got to the loo in time to finish) #pottytraining
14:10 All non-parents of infants/non child-related companies, sorry for my #pottytraining tweets this week, but it's real & our life this week!

Thursday 18 August 2011
10:26 Our buppy pads have arrived for the car seat, I feel happier going out in the car now #pottytraining
13:43 Poo. Literally. Everywhere. Note to self, when cleaning potty out from a no.1, leave another potty behind. #pottytraining
14:17 I feel a bit down after the no.2 accident, followed by the week one. Please reassure me!
19:52 #pottytraining Just stopped playing, pulled shorts & pants down & did a wee (on the potty). Hurrah, we're getting there!

Friday 19 August 2011
07:47 Biggest news today: His nappy was dry as a bone this morning. First time ever!
11:39 #pottytraining Twice today he has taken himself to the potty by himself.
14:49 #pottytraining You all want to know that there was no poonami today. Just a success!

Saturday 20 August 2011
00:31 RT: my hubby Son just woke up. Wanted his potty. Straight back to sleep afterwards. #pottytraining
09:06 Aside from the wonder that was The Boy waking up at midnight & asking to go on the potty, his night-time nappy was dry again. #pottytraining

And then I had some fabulous tweets of advice and support from some lovely tweeps, I started to name them all but the list got a bit ridiculous and I felt like I was accepting an Oscar! However, if you are embarking on potty training then I'd suggest you follow these three lovely ladies because they helped me lots and lots, and two of them were completely new to me:

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