Brussels

For years parents have always been encouraged to engage children with food.  Allow them to help prepare the food and they'll more likely eat it.  In most cases this is true, especially where cakes and biscuits are concerned.  With my children, the theory also tends to work with most main meals.

Today, the children helped prep the veg for dinner tomorrow.  They happily chopped carrots, topped and tailed French beans, peeled potatoes and parsnips, floretted the cauliflower and thoroughly enjoyed spending time together getting things ready.  

But, how come nobody in the world has mastered the art of convincing a child that the preparation of Brussels Sprouts will have them eating them willingly on Christmas Day?

Busy getting ready for Christmas

Life Without God

Imagine a moon without its shimmer.



A life without God is like a shimmerless moon.

Weekend Break

When your husband works in a hotel with a beautiful setting like this, you consider yourself extremely blessed that you can take advantage of the massive room reduction rate.

 Then you consider yourself doubly blessed because your very treasured friend offers to look after the children all weekend.

Unrequited Love

Joshua is approaching that tender age for boys.  The age where in front of his mates he's a real lad and girls are just starting to get a little bit interesting.  Not a lot, but a little.

He lost his first crush to another school.  The void in his little heart remaining vacant until 'The New Girl' arrived.  We'll call her Samantha.

'The New Girl' is American and Joshua's sweet on her.  So sweet that he confided in me he was going to ask her on a date.  But his timing had to be precise as she has been 'dating' another boy in the class.  We'll call him John.

John and Samantha have broken up at least six times now.  However, John has only managed to impress Samantha with a trip to McDonalds.  Joshua was going to go one better and suggest the movies, complete with popcorn and coke.  How could she resist?!

But it was with a heavy heart he came home and informed me that Samantha liked him - REALLY liked him, but was 'getting over her relationship break-up'.  So, Joshua's going to 'give her time' and then ask her again.

When you're ten years old, time is important and recovery takes 'time'.

So I presume he'll be asking her again on Friday then.  He needs to get in there quick before John gets in for a seventh attempt!!

Messing with my pictures

Why has blogger messed around with the picture settings?  I can't resize or reposition my pictures like I used to.

Big fat raspberry to Blogger for mucking around with it.

Strengthens my inner case for migrating the blog to my own website.  If only I knew how.....

Laugh along with Plass

I've tried three times to get into The Shack.  I gave up when God was based on Rusty Lee and the Holy Spirit was Willo the Wisp.  Sorely disappointed that a book so hammed up to be good was so wrong, wrong, wrong on many levels, which is a shame because the foreword is excellent.

So, I've returned to my favourite Christian author - the one and only Adrian Plass. 

At the moment I'm laughing my way through Bacon Sandwiches and Salvation.

When I've finished that, I'm going to re-read the two books that made me laugh until I cried. The Sacred Diary of Adrian Plass and The Horizontal Epistles of Andromeda Veal.

At the moment I can't cope with anything heavy or intellectual.  My brain is on hiatus for a bit.

Chocolate miracles

I'm on form for Christmas this year.  Not only have I made the Christmas cakes, mincemeat for mince pies, bought some of the food, 99% of the children's presents, sorted out the Christmas cards for the school post-boxes for the children, made chocolate filled crackers for the tree but also the advent calendars for the children have been prepped and ready for over a month now.  Yeah!! Go me!

I'm particularly impressed with myself because usually each year I forget about the cloth pocketed advent calendars stored in the loft and usually end up in 'The store formerly known as Woolworths', buying some gaudy overpriced cardboard monstrosity with naff chocolates you wouldn't even feed to your dog.  This year I remembered the ones in the loft and bought M&S naff Christmas chocolates.  I don't have a dog, so the children are getting them instead.

The children are happy.

Eleanor's extremely happy.

So am I.

The arrival of her advent calendar has had a remarkably miraculous effect.  For the last two days instead of having to ask her at least six or seven times to do whatever it is she needs to do in the morning, like brush her hair, brush her teeth, get dressed for school, put lunch in bag, brush her hair, put lunch in bag, brush her teeth, get dressed, brush her hair......... she's been up, dressed, ready, brush in hand, breakfast eaten and stood waiting by her calendar.

The lure of one little chocolate has turned my daughter from the most disorganised child into a fine example of military readiness.

I'm enjoying it while it lasts because I know come New Year, it will all go pear-shaped and the stuck record of my monotonous repeated ramblings will be ringing in her ears again, Eleanor, get dressed, brush your teeth, eat your breakfast, brush your hair, brush your teeth, get dressed, pack your lunch.......