No longer a clown....that's a matter of opinion!

It's week two of this awful cold I am experiencing and yes my face has sooked itself back up (as much as a 37 year old face can), my nose is no longer as red as a clown's nose or Rudolph's for that matter.  My house is no longer covered in ickle mounds of used tissues and I am no longer sneezing and spitting (that includes food, I know MINGING!!) all over myself.  

I am however facing the truth that I do not sound sexy and husky and all Mariella Frostrup but like I am crying all the time which is embarrassing when phoning school offices and hospitals to cancel orthodontic appointments.  I am blessed, for the first time in nine years, in being able to be ill and in my jim-jams for days on end as my lovely Biscuits have been taking themselves off to school in the morning.  I have been able, for the most part, to stop dead in it's tracks the dreaded 'Mum' law that seems to state we must keep going no matter what or how ill we get.  I was poorly this time last year and 'kept going' and was still not right at Christmas time so this year, thanks to my Biscuits, I have been resting lots, watched lots of films and thankfully (after only one week of wearing a bandage although I'm not going to get into how bad that week was..ooh the pain!!) have been able to knit and crochet again.  

So I am not dwelling on how little I have been getting done or how sick I am being poorly or how I am going ever so slightly mad cooped up in the house but grateful I am getting to have sick days and blessing the invention of Jakemans Soothing Menthol Sweets.   
I have missed some posts I was planning, namely celebrating this...

...the first birthday of my blog.  My lovely wee blog that has enabled me, for the first time in years, to feel more like me.  Not just Mum and Wife and Housekeeper but silly old clown-like me.  I have 'met' a hopeful, 'restores your faith in mankind', large mixing bowl amount of fantastic people and can not get enough of being reminded how similar we all are and I am not alone in my existential thoughts (forever the Philosophy student).  If I am being honest I thought, in my usual way, I'd get bored with it after a bit but no, a year on I'm still really enjoying it.  So thanks peeps for reading!

Here's to another year!

X

A week.....

...it has been.  

Up and down which is usually the way with school holidays.  Moments of pleasure shared with my boys, moments when I consider the legalities of locking them out the house until their Daddy comes home from work.

The bad - after being away at cub Camp all weekend and banning Youngest Biscuit and I from watching Doctor Who (A Crime!!!) until Hubby and Eldest Biscuit came back, aforementioned Eldest woke up very poorly on Monday morning, lay on the sofa for two days, so no going out, and since has been in a mood most foul, many arguments and strops and sending/stomping off to his bedroom have ensued.  It hasn't been pleasant.  To top it, Youngest Biscuit's bestest wee friend was away so that spoiled his whole life apparently so many arguments and strops and sending/stomping off to his bedroom have ensued.  Yes it's been repetitively horrid, yet there have been.....

The good - I received my birthday present from Hubby.........

Martha

Is she not beautiful?  Look at that face!

She is from The Vintage Magpie and I love her.  Deeply.  I feel like a little girl just looking at her and a delighted, heart glad one at that.  Go look, but be warned!  Your purse may empty!

Time has been spent in the garden mainly to bang my head as I hang out washing but we did spot our first Ladybird of the year....

It was huge and it was like receiving a magical present when we spotted it.  It even did that wonderfully freaky wing opening thing that reminds me of the DeLorean from Back to the Future.

I even managed to get my blog giveaway goodies posted to their recipients and was very touched by how welcome those goodies were.

My bunnies...

of Ali's knitting bag, are!!

..and lastly to chocolate cake as, in my opinion, there can never be enough photos of cakes.  Not never, not no how!!

and I got to be girly and my Biscuits still ate it!

I must face my demons now, i.e clean the effing bathroom but there are good things this weekend.  Tonight I am making vanilla ice cream to go with Sticky Toffee Pudding for tomorrow as we are having the postponed birthday meal for my gorgeous Father-in-law.  We are on a mission you see.  Many moons ago, in a former life it feels at times, we ate a meal at Charlotte Square in Edinburgh in the National Trust For Scotland restaurant and were served the best, the most delectable Sticky Toffee Pudding that there ever was.  The sauce tasted of childhood memories of jaw sticking McGowans Toffee and ah we had our benchmark.  We have yet to find a recipe that has reached it, so tomorrow I will be trying a James Martin recipe in hopes of it being that good.

I confess, in a way I hope to never find it as one I wouldn't want to negate that fine, fine memory and two to lose the excuse for continuing to feed everyone and myself one of the best ends to a meal.

Enjoy your weekend!

X

Where's the mute button?

Is there a volume dial on children? 

I thinks there must be as my boys, since yesterday, seemed to have discovered theirs and turned it up as far as it can go.  It may be that due to feeling poorly most of this week volume is affecting me but they are so loud and all I want is peace and quiet.  They were on holiday from school on Monday and Tuesday but youngest Biscuit has had a wee urine infection and had to stay off on Thursday and Friday too.  Of course one Biscuit doesn't make as much noise as two but I really could have done with a child free week.

All I've wanted to do was get myself on the couch (Youngest Biscuit was hogging it) and watch a film like this.........

 

......and feel all snuggly warm from the inside.

So I'm feeling a bit sorry for myself, want someone to bring me tea (Hubby works on Saturday morns), want to run away from the Ironing pile monster threatening to consume the whole house, his friend the Dust monster, the 'I need tidied' monster and the 'You're supposed to provide the meals' monster.  I never invited them but they feel obliged to reside here, unwelcome!  Maybe just runaway full stop.

We have promised to take the boys to see the new Percy Jackson film at the cinema today and I kinda wished we hadn't.  I would love to see it (sometime!!) as along with Eldest Biscuit, we've read all the books (recommended by Stephanie Meyer who wrote the Twilight books) but the thought of having to make myself presentable, leaving the house, being enthusiastic about anything, seems a bit much.......

Aaah!! I need to cheer up a bit, I HATE feeling like this, all fed up and moany faced.

Someone (nicely please, I'm fragile today) tell me to get a grip!

X

Pancakes.............Munch! Munch! Munch!

 

A song by Eldest Biscuit, Billabong the Mad

Pancakes for Breakfast

Pancakes for Lunch

Pancakes for Dinner

Munch! Munch! Munch!

It's funny how catchy the tune is that goes with it.  He made it up months and months ago but every now and again it pops in my head.  Sometimes we march round the house singing it in our big voices in celebration of the joy that is pancakes!

So yesterday we made pancakes for breakfast, I say we as we all did.  Sometimes when I say 'we' I mean 'I' with them hovering in and out the kitchen asking when it (whatever it is) will be ready.  Out came the ingredients and the blender.....

 

  

....we could make it the old fashioned way with a jug and a whisk but my boys don't like these things to take too long and do like to use kitchen gadgets whenever possible, so we always make it in the blender following the recipe in 'Nigella Bites' or available at her website here.

After letting the batter sit for a while as suggested, Eldest biscuit took on the duty of making on our ancient hand-me-down griddle (we do love it so!) and with the best pancake spatula in the land from Viners.  It makes a difference, especially as the size of it means small hands never have to go near the hot pancakes or griddle at any time.  It makes my eldest feel very confident in making them for only the second time.

  

How chuffed does he look?

He makes a right old mess which I always have to clean up..........just after this photo was taken Youngest Biscuit appeared wondering what was taking so long and they decided between themselves that they couldn't wait any longer and off they went with a pile of warm pancakes each......

.......leaving me to finish off making them on my own.  By the time I was done they were finished and I sat on my own while they were off playing again.

Such is life!

When it comes to eating there is one thing we MUST have with our pancakes.....

  

..........ooooh we love Golden Syrup!!!

Hope you all got to stuff your faces like we did!

X

Call me fickle........

..........but I would quite like more snow.  Sure the sun is shining but it's all a bit bare and brown.  Under usual circumstances this would be the ingredients for a glorious winters day but that white velvety, thick blanket of the early lain snow was so beautiful.  Fluffy and soft and so lovely in the evenings reflecting in the orange glow of the street lights.  Crisp and sugar sparkly in the day time sunlight.

Look at these and tell me you do not agree....

 

  

  

.....from our recent jaunt to the Highlands.  Loch Morlich and the Cairngorms.  I am pretending to myself that everywhere looks like this to justify my desires of more snowflakes a falling.

Walking back from school this morning there were tiny flakes flickering around me.

I really would like more snow please!

I'll leave you with this photo of eldest Biscuit that tickles me, looking like a still from the famous Abominable Snowman film.

I'm off to make up a snow dance so if it snows on you this weekend you can blame me.  I have very powerful gypsy genes! You wait!!  Heehee!!

X

More Christmas fun!

Saturday afternoon was spent making our 'stained glass' biscuits for the tree.  It is one of the rare times Hubby joins in with baking and he likes to be in charge of the boiled sweeties. So the menfolk got on with the bashing in the pestle and mortar whilst I prepared the dough from the Christmas Tree Decorations recipe in Nigella's Feast.  My Hubby is very methodical and precise ("ahem...slow", she coughs) and therefore colour coded the bowls as best he could.

The boys then got on with rolling and cutting out of the dough.

My eldest, Billabong the mad, is very good at this job. I guess he's methodical and precise ("slow"!!) like his daddy.  Check this out......

He is good!!!

Youngest biscuit helped daddy place the bashed sweeties into the biscuits (no relation).

 Made sure to place a hole for ribbon.

 

The smell from the oven was amazing!

They are pretty!

Yesterday we danced and decorated to Bing and the result fills us with tummy warmth that will last into the New Year!  Ho ho ho!

 Merry Christmas

X

Fun at the Fayre!

It's Christmas!!!!

I am getting a little bit excited about Christmas now, when I say a little I mean ALOT and with yesterday being my boy's school Christmas Fayre I was definitely full of Christmas spirit.  I was let loose on the Home-baking stand and what fun, what joy, what a lot of concentration it takes to add up 20 and 50 pences over and over and over.  I just managed a few pictures before the masses decended........and they did really quickly.

 

 

 I do love a cake stand!

 

my knitted cakes- including the 'boob' 

(sorry the for the blurry photo - I was in a rush)

one of the mums made these; aren't they really cute?

 All of the above disappeared at lightning speed which is usually the way with yummy scrummy cakes and tablet.

I'll leave you with my little tigers, now don't be scared........

'raaarrrrrrrrr!'

Merry Christmas!

X

It's oh so peaceful until.................

You can hear a pin drop. You can smell the concentration and you can probably guess what an unusual occurrence this is!  My boys silently, diligently getting on with their homework.  No chatting, no silliness and no mischief-making until.............................

 

.................Evie really does weave a web of mischief! 

X

Just wanted to share...........

............these lovely photos of my boys enjoying sparkler fun.

 

 

My eldest out in the garden in his jimjams unable to go to his Cubs Bonfire Night because of being poorly, we made do.  He's never been ill for such a length of time before and although he's back at school this morn he is still not 100%.

I have no idea how my Hubby took these.  He used some mad setting on the camera.  I don't know what most of them do!

We also celebrated my mum's 60th birthday this weekend with a meal for her..............

I do love a laid table.  Don't you?

 

 

......of Chicken stuffed with Haggis and Black Pudding, wrapped in Bacon, Creamy Pepper Sauce, Roasters, Boilees and lots of Green Veg.  Followed by a Chocolate Lime Cheesecake from Nigella Bites.  It was delicious, if I do say myself!  The napkin rings are a purchase from chachkedesigns at Etsy.  I love them and managed to find the perfect flowers to go with them.

I also baked her a cake which felt like my first 'proper' one.  I have made many a novelty cake for my boys in the shapes of things like a Tardis, the Mystery Machine, a Ben 10 Omnitrix and the like, but that feels like playing with plasticine, this was from a Peggy Porschen recipe and even had marzipan in it for goodness sake.  I am very pleased with how it turned out and it tasted really good.

I have been asked to make a wedding cake for a friend next summer so this was a starter cake and I will be baking a tiered one for my parents-in-law's ruby annniversary in January as another practice run.  I have to say it's not something I would like to do as a living or set up as a business.  It's fun but only, I feel, for friends and family.  I don't think I'd enjoy the pressure of exacting standards required by the public.  I like knowing if it's not perfect my loved ones won't mind.  I have never had a disaster but am a bit of a perfectionist and am never completely satasfied with the end result.  I always think I could have done something better.  I bet I'm not the only person out there like that!!

It's a beautiful, bitterly cold, frosty day here in my part of Scotland today and I took lovely photos to share on my way home from school but my camera batteries died so I will show them tomorrow.

Ali X

Clumsy Mummy!!

This is one of my many titles.  Now I could complain at this ever so slightly negative description but alas I must admit the truth of it.  My boys learned many, many moons ago that if Mummy touches it, Mummy could break it, so take your chances.  Hubby thinks it's a miracle that meals, baking etc appears without injury.  That I do not sew my fingers onto fabric or impale myself on a knitting needle. I have suffered the odd slight burn from the oven but, and this is the shocking bit, I still have all my fingers.  Hubby cringes when he sees me yielding my cooks knife but after seeing that CRAZY woman on The Restaurant c/o Harry Hill, I see I'm not that bad.  My problem in the main is spacial. I have no concept of it!  I do have to accept I am clumsy, it is a fact and today again I proved it. .............

( I am also very easily distracted - hence why my boys wandered up to school this morn wearing each others coats.  I must clarify, the coats are not identical,  similar coloured though. I only noticed when back at home I looked at my eldest ( who's still poorly) and thought something's not right.  In retrospect I did think my youngest looked a bit 'drowned ' in the one he was wearing as he was walking off into the school building ! As any mother knows - this was my fault for not placing them on the correct door handles after removing them from the cupboard!!)

.......So my clumsy act for today which I will have to explain to Hubby this evening and he will give me the 'why didn't you know better and leave it for me' look, was to drop the £7.45 fancy low energy daylight bulb before I got it anywhere near the lamp it was to go in.  I don't know what happened, it was in my hand then it was crashing on to the floor.  As I said, I can accept I am clumsy but cannot and will not have to rely on a man to change a lightbulb, that would be ridiculous.  In my defense, and I will be using this tonight in the 'explanation', I did manage to change the other five without mishap.  Of this I will stand up and be proud!!!

Fingers crossed it is a one off event and not a theme for today!

Ali X