Skip to main content

Monthly Munch: July


The weather this month has been beautiful, so we've been out enjoying it as much as we can - fruit picking, fete attending, gardening and walking.  Preschool is finished for the summer; I've planned weekly themes in an effort to stay sane during the holidays, so expect a few activity posts coming up.

Toby

He wanted me to make a box into a TV.  Here he is eating his lunch in it.

- has made friends with the girls next door, and is getting much more confident socially

- still insists on always wearing odd socks

- has been loving the sandbox our neighbours gave us.  Apparently they nicknamed him "The Sandman" at preschool due to his love of digging

- pounced on a writing practice book I bought him, and worked his way all the way through to P, doing really well at tracing all the letters.

- won the hula hoop race at his first preschool sports day

Athlete in action
One of his great big Megabloks trucks

Drawing a car with about a million windows and aerials
Quotes:
In case you were in need of some atmospheric music:
"This song is called 'The World is Over'. (sings it) And this one is 'The World is Over Again the Next Time'. (sings a few lines)  It's a bit like 'Bob the Builder'."

"Those clouds look like cotton wool.  They're syrup clouds."
After some confusion we figured out he meant cirrus clouds.

And I love the way preschoolers speak English the way it should be - very logically, with none of those silly exceptions.
Toby: "Mr Fox had a bouncy castle in his van."
Me: "How did it fit?"
Toby: "It was blowed down."
(Clearly if blowing something up inflates it, deflating is blowing down.)

Theo

 - was given a Cheerio by his big brother as his first food (necessitating a quick talk about not feeding the baby without asking Mum first), and is eating baby rice enthusiastically.

Am I doing this right?

Sucking cream cheese off carrot sticks is good too
- can sit up!  He still has a tendency to fold himself in two (how are babies so flexible?) but the balance is coming.


- was 17 lb 4 oz at his weigh-in this month

- wishes to tell you VERY LOUDLY that his first tooth coming through is EXTREMELY PAINFUL.

- but when it's not hurting he is still a very happy baby.

Uh oh.  He's discovered cars.
Thankful for:

- a fun ladies' meal out at Nando's

- surviving the first week and a half of the holidays

 - being skinnier than I've been for a long time, thanks to chubby baby eating all my calories (I have to make the most of it before he gets onto solid food and I gain it all back!)

Recipe of the Month: Blackcurrant muffins


There's a pick your own farm near us, and we took Graham's parents along one Saturday.  Between us we acquired several pounds of strawberries, gooseberries, raspberries and blackcurrants.  I adapted a blueberry muffin recipe to use some blackcurrants; they are somewhat tarter but still very tasty.

1 cup / 150g self-raising flour
1/2 cup / 75g plain (all-purpose) flour
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)
1/2 cup / 125g sugar
1 egg
3/4 cup / 200 ml milk
1/3 cup / 90 ml vegetable oil
250g / 2 cups? blackcurrants

Preheat oven to 180°C / 350°F.  Sift dry ingredients into a large bowl.  Stir in combined egg, milk and oil, then blackcurrants.  Do not overmix.  Spoon into lined muffin holes.  Bake about 20 minutes.  Makes about 10.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Models of Contextual Theology: Spiritual Formation Book 7

"A theology that neither issues forth in action nor takes account of the way one lives one's life can hardly be theology that is worth very much." Models of Contextual Theology looks like the most boring book in the world. Dry academic title, weird geometric cover design - you'd definitely only pick this up if you were required to write an essay on it, wouldn't you? Well, I wish the outside did it justice, because the contents are much more exciting than the cover. It asks some very interesting and important questions about how our faith relates to the world around us. Is culture mostly good or bad? Is there such a thing as the "naked gospel", free of context? Do you have to be a trained academic to theologize, or can anyone do it? How much does theology from one culture transfer to a different culture? Bevans describes six models of theology which offer different answers to these questions. All are valid, he says, but they all understand the gospel an

Unto us a son is given...

Did I mention something about life getting back to normal in October? Oh yes, I was just finishing work and looking forward to at least two weeks off to organise the house, stock up the freezer and buy baby stuff. Then little Toby threw a spanner in the works by turning up five weeks early! Which would put his birthday in... let's see... October. So much for normal! For those who would like the gory details, here goes. If you are a mother who had a long and protracted labour, I advise you to skip the next bit - or if you don't, please don't start sending me hate mail. You have been warned. You see, we'd been to all the childbirth classes (yes, just about managed to finish them) and learned all about the different stages of labour, and how many hours each lasted. We learned some relaxation techniques and various things Graham could do to help coach me through long periods of contractions. And then we turned out not to need any of them, because the entire thing

A birthday weekend in York

We were surprised to discover that York is only a 90 minute drive from our house. It's somewhere we'd been thinking of going for a few years, but I'd assumed it was much further away. So when we wanted to go away for the weekend to celebrate my birthday in January, York was the obvious choice. The city did not disappoint us. I'd been to York years ago, and my only clear memory was of a tower on top of a grassy mound. That was Clifford's Tower, owned by English Heritage, and recently updated with a rather snazzy series of platforms and staircases inside. We saw a 13th century toilet which had been inaccessible for 400 years (I think I was more excited about this than the boys) and got a great view of York from the rooftop viewing platform. View from the top of Clifford's Tower Most people's memories of York probably involve the Shambles - an ancient street of shops - and York Minster. Apparently there isn't a clear difference between a minster and a cathe