Sunshine!

We have had several days of unbroken sunshine this week, spring is most definitely on the way.  As it has been gray and cloudy so much of late we have felt the need to be outside as much as possible.  We woke today with a plan to go for a walk but could not decide where.  Whilst pouring over maps at breakfast our eldest piped up what about the walk we did with Gran and Granpa alongside the lake?  We all agreed it was a great idea and made some lunch, packed our rucksacks and off we set.  The plan was to walk alongside the lake and get a boat back to the car.

The lake was like a millpond, the sun was really warm and the sky all blue. We stopped often to drink and eat and made a hot drink with the Kelly Kettle to have with our lunch.  We saw lots of birds including buzzards, wren, robin, chaffinch, mistle thrush and blackbird.  We walked through many types of tree, oak, beech, silver birch and scots pine.  The ground was very firm with sheet ice in places where the sun does not reach and we found ice crystals in places. 

The last section of the walk was a bit of a race against time as we needed to get to the boat launch for the last boat of the day, it would have been a long walk back otherwise! 

Knitting

This week I have cast on a new project, one that is more portable than the Jacket I am knitting using a cone of wool.  The new project is another knit for me, after knitting presents for other people for six months of last year I am concentrating on myself at the moment.  This is a cardigan, I am using this Rowan wool in the shade sage which looks nothing like the colour reproduced here.  I had wanted something blue in colour and could not find one I liked so I opted for this one which is a greeny blue.  It is actually a better colour than I was expecting.  I have never knit cables before and am looking forward to giving this a go.  I have found several patterns that I love on Ravelry that include cables which I would love to knit in the future.

I finished the book, Raising Girls.  It was a thought provoking read.  I liked the way he broke down the stages that girls go through as they grow and develop.  He offered interesting ideas as to what is likely to happening to girls in relation to their bodies, their emotions and the way they relate to others  during each of these stages.  It has given me food for thought.

I am now reading a very different book.  One which I bought recently in a local bookshop with some money gifted to me by a group I assessed doing their Duke of Edinburgh expedition.  I have wanted a book about foraging for a while and have been looking at various books but could not find one that I liked.  Hedgerow by John Wright is well laid out and written in a witty style.  There is a calendar at the beginning so you can see at a glance what is in season and when.  There are good illustrations showing the plants and similar poisonous ones.  It includes more than just plants you would find in the Hedgerow.  There are recipes and folklore for each plant too.  The proof of the pudding will be putting the book to use which I hope to soon!

Linking up with Tami for this weeks work in progress and Ginny for sharing of knitting and reading.

Water

It is the time of year when we start to receive some of the bills we will have to pay for the coming twelve months, one of these is our water bill.  We live in a small terraced house which does not currently have a water meter fitted, this means that the bill is calculated on the rateable value of the house which is fairly low.  The rateable value is the amount of money we pay to a local council to provide services such as libraries, road maintenance and swimming pools.

We have worked hard over the last ten years to reduce our gas and electric bills to minimum but have never really given any thought to our water bill.  The size of this bill got us thinking about ways we could reduce it.  As we don't currently have a meter we researched whether this would see a reduction.  We found a few water calculators online whereby you input various details and it gives an estimated bill.  The estimate was higher than we currently pay.

The completing of these calculators highlighted to me the staggering amount of water we use in a year.  It made us realise how lucky we are to be able to turn on a tap to receive it rather than having to walk to collect it, or devise our own methods to collect water and it made us think about ways we could reduce our consumption.

Our very reliable washing machine (perhaps I should not say that!), is fairly old and therefore uses a lot more water than those you can buy now.  I would not consider replacing it just to reduce our water bill but when the time comes an important consideration will be the water consumption.

The other massive use of water in our household is the toilet.  Again it is old we have a volume reducer in it, some old household bricks, but still it uses about 10 litres a flush.  We are at home most days so based on 10 flushes a day this amounts to 34 000 litres a year!  This seems such a waste to me and got us thinking of how we could reduce this.  In the long term we will at some point replace the whole bathroom suite, it was in the house when we moved in ten years ago.  I have long wanted to replace the toilet with a dual flush one, even better one that uses rainwater like my parents have installed in their new house.  This would be a huge but not impossible project.  Our other thought was a waterless toilet.  We have no idea whether these are available, how much they cost or whether they could be installed in a first floor bathroom.

This will be a long term project but, much like our gas and electric bills, we will work towards reducing our water consumption and reduce our bills.

Reading

A recent visit to a local bookshop resulted in us coming home with this lovely book, First Picture Nature.

A friend of mine is an Usborne bookseller, which is great as we are big fans,  and I had seen this book in a catalogue and dismissed it as being too young since it is aimed at age 2+.  I need to remember that ages for books are only advisory.

The book introduces many words, hence it's age two rating, but it does also have some lovely text as well.

Now that we are heading into spring I am starting to consider spring books for our seasonal table and this book has lots about spring and seasons in general.

It has been read several times since bringing home and I can see this books being used for a while, as my youngest is developing an interest in words and letters, to assist with reading.

Joining in with the The Children's Bookshelf a sharing of all things related to children's books.

Weekending

This week has been spent with family.  We spent the week staying with my mum and dad.  They live next door to my brother and his family, their youngest is slightly older than my eldest and the two of them spent all the time they could in each others company.

Monday was my mums birthday, I managed to finish knitting her socks.  I cooked lunch and tea for everyone as this is something that I like having done for me on my birthday.

On Tuesday we visited my great aunt, she is the only member of her generation left in my entire family.  She lives a long way from where I live but it is possible to visit for the day from my mums.  She is the most wonderful company, I could listen to her talking for hours.

The following day we traveled again this time to my brother in laws house to spend time with his wife, not sure if I call her my sister in law, and their three children.  Again they live a long way from us but not too far from my mums.  We have not been able to see them for two years so it was great to catch up.

On Friday we had a quiet morning at mums and went swimming in the afternoon, Saturday was much the same except we went to a park rather than swimming in the afternoon.  Today we have journeyed home.  Back to circle of our life here, shopping, cooking, spending time with friends.

Gratitudes

Joining in with Taryn for her heartfelt Sunday tradition.

A time to reflect, to slow down, to be grateful.

This week I have been grateful for...

...so many lovely meals cooked for my family it has been wonderful to have a week off.

...my generous brother and sister in law for allowing my eldest to spend so much time in their house this week and looking after him.

...a chance to spend a week with my mum and dad.

...a lunch out with my elderly great aunt, she is wonderful company and generously paid for lunch for us all, I see her once or twice a year and it always such a pleasure to see her.

...spending an afternoon with my sister in law and nephews who we have not seen for two years it was great to see each other again.

...spending the day with my mum on her birthday.

...my nephew for playing with my eldest all week they get on so well and never seem to fall out over anything.

...my husband for driving us safely to see family.

Eating

In the early days of this blog I posted about how little attention it appears some folks pay to the food that they eat.  Food that is convenient, cooked for you and has in some instances little in the way of raw ingredients that I would use.  I have been reminded once again of the reliance on convenience foods with the recent revelations in the media regarding certain meat products.  I am not one to eat this type of food I much prefer to make my own from scratch.  It does take longer and requires more thought but it is in my opinion tastier and, whilst I have no proof, I am sure is nutritionally better for you.

I have been pondering for some time why some people rely on these foods.  I know for many it is the convenience they lead very busy lives.  It is possible to be very busy, working long hours and still eat fairly well, if you have the money, there are some very good quality ready made meals that you can buy.  For some though I wonder if the convenience is because they are unable to cook.  To some of us it may seem unbelievable that anyone is unable to cook.  But if you grow up in a house where nobody cooks a meal from scratch how will you ever learn.  Cooking is a skill that is passed on from one generation to another.  I rarely if ever cooked when I lived with my parents my mother, however, cooked a meal from scratch every night.  When I left home I continued to do the same, it was the only way I knew how.

The abundance of ready made convenient foods is, I believe, further eroding a declining skill.  It's enabling those that have money to work longer hours and or be busy doing other things and then pop a meal in the oven or microwave when they return home however late it is.

For those on low incomes it is often cited as an affordable way to live.  It is cheaper than buying the raw ingredients and sadly in many cases it often is.  Although the ingredients that have been used are often dubious as has been demonstrated in the last month.  In the days before refrigeration their diet would have been other convenient foods such as bread which could be bought daily and at little cost.  The need for convenience was I suspect due to very basic, if any, facilities for cooking on.  Over the years and with the introduction of refrigeration the demand for cheap convenient food has not diminished and will continue to grow with each generation as cooking skills are not there to be passed on.

Knitting

On the needles this week is the jacket that I am still working on, it is slowly growing.  I hope I can finish it before I the weather warms up to a point where it will be too warm.  Nah British weather never does that!  I have nearly finished the second front piece then it will be the sleeves, it is a while since I knitted something that needs sewing up, I hope I can remember how to do it.  I need to find another project to carry around with me, the socks I shared last week are finished.  I am knitting this jacket from a cone which is getting smaller but it is heavy, I will be casting on something else soon no doubt.

Reading wise I am nearly at the end of Raising Girls and it has been a great read, I would recommend it to any mothers of girls at any age.

Joining in with Tami for this weeks work in progress and Ginny for this weeks knitting and reading.

Changes

Welcome to the February edition of the Simply Living Blog Carnival - New Beginnings cohosted by Mandy at Living Peacefully with Children, Laura at Authentic Parenting, Jennifer at True Confessions of a Real Mommy, and Joella at Fine and Fair. This month's topic, our writers consider where they are with their New Year's Resolutions or new ventures of 2013. Please check out the links to posts by our other participants at the end of this post.

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In my post as part of the last carnival I talked about how important rhythm is to my family.  It is what gives our week shape.  The rhythm that we have is one that has developed over the last eighteen months and has pretty much stayed the same over that time, that is until recently.  For the last few months it has been changing.  Most of our rhythm revolves around meeting up with families on a regular basis.  This has become really important to my children, it's predictably anchors their week they know which day follows which.  The recent changes have left them unsettled and disappointed.  I had hoped that things may return to as they were over time but I have now realised that that is not going to happen,  I need to make some changes.

I have been mulling this over, over the last few weeks trying to decide the best way forward.  I don't want to sever ties with friends but I need to accept that the current situation is not working for my family.  I have had a long conversation with one friend regarding one of the days and now feel really positive about how that could work in the future.  But what I need to do now is plan and think ahead.

Each weekend, or earlier if need be, I will think about the week ahead, where plans are not tied down, I will confirm them. If it is not possible to do this I will plan alternatives which might be meeting with other friends or a day out as a family.  I hope that by preparing in this way we will not have as much uncertainty over what we are doing each week and hope this will give my children back the stability of their rhythm.  A simple plan to continue simply living.

***

Thank you for visiting the Simply Living Blog Carnival cohosted by Mandy at Living Peacefully with Children, Laura at Authentic Parenting, Jennifer at True Confessions of a Real Mommy, and Joella at Fine and Fair. Read about how others are incorporating simple living into their lives via new beginnings. We hope you will join us next month, as the Simply Living Blog Carnival focuses on Clearing the Clutter!

 

• Using Special Time to Simply Connect - Amber at Heart Wanderings begins to focus on simply connecting with each of her children for a few minutes of Special Time each day. A deeper connection and sense of joy, softening of emotional outbursts, and less sibling rivalry have resulted from this practice.
• Redefining Simplicity - Living within our needs - Survivor from Surviving Mexico talks about how moving from a first-world country to a third world country has changed her family's perception of simplicity. Adapting to this new life has not been easy, but can be done with an attitude of gratitude.
• Changes - Sustainable mom writes about how she is bringing back a beat to a rhythm that has been falling apart.
• Listening to my Kids - Christy at Eco Journey In The Burbs is seeking peace and freedom after over-scheduling her daughters.
• Thankful to Begin Again - Mercedes @ Project Procastinot learns a lesson from her twins.
• Changes for a New Year - Mandy at Living Peacefully with Children is concentrating on making small changes this year in an effort to make better habits.
• Parenting Two: A Fresh Start - Joella at Fine and Fair embraces the transition as her family grows as a new beginning by being gentle with herself and realistic with her expectations.
• Finding Balance - At Authentic Parenting, Laura looks at where she's gotten fighting depression and spiraling to a more harmonious life.

Reading

My youngest loves looking and talking about the pictures in this wonderful book.

im Katzenzirkus by Gisela Buomberger (apologies for the link in German only, I was not able to find any other reference to these books on the web) is a riot of colour and provides endless opportunities for discussion.  There are no words in this book at all it it all pictures.

The pictures start off with small amounts of detail, with the cats travelling to set up their circus.

As you work your way through the book the pictures build up in detail and colour.

We have used this book to learn the colours, counting, shapes, relative sizes, looking for objects, learning animal names, and now we are starting to  make up stories based on one picture.  As she gets older I am sure that we will find many other ways to use this book including the basis for writing stories based on one picture or telling a story throughout the book.

We were given this copy and I would love to find others by the same author, I think I will be asking my German sister in law to get copies in Germany next time she is over there as they do not seem to be available over here.

We are joining in with The Children's Bookshelf a sharing of all things related to children's books and reading.

Weekending

This week has been varied and busy.  We started as usual with our trip into the local town for food shopping and visit to the library.  In the afternoon we headed to the swimming pool rather than home, it was the only time we could fit a swim in.  We are trying to go every week and did not fit a swim in last week as we were away.  We popped in to see a friend on the way home for afternoon tea and a catch up.

On Tuesday we joined our usual play date friends for a wonderful celebration of Imbolc.  The following day I took the children to see their first play.  An adaptation of the wonderful book, Stuck by Oliver Jeffers.  It was a perfect length at 45 minutes and they both really enjoyed it.  Thursday we visited friends who we have not seen for weeks, it was great to catch up for lunch and a short play.

On Friday we packed up and travelled to see family.  We stayed with my in laws for the weekend.  My father in law is in poor health and I think we will be making this trip a fair few times over the coming months to share the time he is still in good enough health for us to take the children.

In between times we have been baking, cooking, reading books on castles, knights, armour, Romans, celts, Vikings, medieval cathedrals, drawing, talking about numbers, playing with Lego, play dough, soft toys, making dens, pretending to cook, go shopping and so much more!

Gratitudes

Joining in with  Taryn for her heartfelt Sunday tradition.

A time to slow down, to reflect, to be grateful.

This week I have been grateful for...

...a friend organising a wonderful Imbolc celebration.

...lunch with friends who we had not seen for a while.

...time to spend with my father in law whose health is very poor.

...the longer days which are slowly starting to feel warmer, it feels like spring is just round the corner.

...time to finish knitting socks for my mum for her birthday.

...the good health of my children after hearing that a close friend of my nephews had died.

...the opportunity to take my children to their first play which was just the right length for them and based on a book that they are very familiar with it was a wonderful introduction to the theatre.

Eating

I have never been one for eating a diet consisting of processed food, of food made in a factory which is then packaged and sold ready to eat.  The last few weeks processed food has been in the news pretty much constantly starting with a revelation that products which were labelled as containing beef also contain horse meat.  Various investigations have ensued and further food has been removed from supermarket shelves as it contains meat that is not listed on the labels.  The supply chain for these products is bewildering and I could not make sense of this map at all.

Personally I prefer to buy, what little meat my family eats, from the farmer themselves or from the butcher in my village who labels all his meat with the farm they have come from.  This is how my mother shopped and I well remember, as a child, visiting the butchers shop ten minutes walk from their house.  This butchers is sadly long gone.  The meat I do buy is most likely, I have never compared, more expensive than the meat sold in the supermarket.  I personally would prefer to pay more for meat that I can be sure of its provenance and has travelled few miles.

I keep hearing that it is the consumer that is going to loose out, that the price of food is going to go up.  My argument is that surely that is what has caused the problem in the first place.  Good quality beef is expensive, as I would expect it to be rearing a cow is expensive.  Beef is only eaten two or three time a year in this house because of that.  So in order to make products containing beef cheap how do you keep the costs down?  I guess it has been bulked out with other ingredients which we now find includes horse meat.

One of the products that has been removed from the shelves in a number of supermarkets is beef burgers.  My mother always used to make these when we were children, whenever I cook them they remind me of the summer weekends as a child as we often had them barbecued and ate outside.  I have not eaten meat for nearly twenty years, the rest of the family eat meat so occasionally when I have some beef mince I make these:

Homemade Beef Burgers
500g minced beef
2 medium potatoes peeled and grated
1 medium onion finely chopped
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley

Mix all ingredients well.
Shape into burgers
Chill for about half an hour.
Grill, barbecue or fry for approx ten minutes.

Imbolc

On Sunday it was a new moon, so our Tuesday friends organised a day for us all to celebrate Imbolc.  We started the day making some food to share, in our case gingerbread stars.  We use the recipe from Baking Bread with Children and they are always delicious.

On our journey to meet up with friends we met a serious accident that had closed the road.  We had to turn around and travel almost back to our house for an alternative route, it felt like an auspicious start.  Luckily we were not too late and we joined everyone making Brigid Crosses, these are a representation of the all seeing eye of Brigid watching over you for the year.  I had one of these as a child that an uncle bought back from South America, it is wonderful how traditions are so similar around the world.  We all sat round the table creating our crosses and sharing the food that everyone had bought.

With our crosses complete we went outside and lit a fire for us to celebrate the awakening of the earth, as spring approaches.  It has felt in the last week or so that spring is not far away despite the cold and snow there is a freshness in the air and little green shoots are starting to show.  We danced, sang and beat our drums to awaken the snake, or the earth ready for the spring.  We burnt our winter greens that had been in our houses since the solstice.  It was a lovely celebration with friends.

Joining in with Friday's Nature Table a sharing of all things nature related.

Knitting

On the needles this week is two nearly finished socks.  I have turned the heal on both and am knitting the foot part on one and the gusset on the other.  I have until Sunday to finish them, we have a long car journey to make on Friday so I am hoping I can get them knitted in time to give them to my Mum for her birthday on Monday.

Reading wise I am taking a break from Shock Doctrine to read something very different that I found in the library this week, Raising Girls by Steve Biddulph.  I read the book he wrote about raising boys just after my eldest was born, I read very few parenting books in those early days but I liked his writing style.  I am only a few pages in so far but I am liking what I read.

What are you knitting and/or reading this week?

Joining in with Ginny for this weeks sharing of knitting and reading and Tami for this weeks work in progess.

York

We spend three days in York last week.

The first day was spent at the wonderful National Railway Museum.  We have visited this Museum many times before.  There are two huge halls with engines and carriages.  One has a collection of carriages used by royalty and in general use over the last one hundred years.  The engines are mostly steam, you can walk around them and underneath one.  There is also a Japanese Shinkansen or bullet train the only one outside Japan.  These remarkable trains reach very high speeds, are very reliable and have their own dedicated line.  There is a collection called the warehouse which contains objects from railways stations, model used in planning, signs, crockery and many, many others.  We love this museum.  We usually visit once a year and stay for as long as we can.  You can take your own lunch and eat it inside at this time of year or outside in one of the gardens in the warmer months.  As this is a national Musuem it is free!  If you are in the area I would recommend a visit.

The second day we visited Jorvik.  I had heard so much about it, many people raved about it and its website suggested it was really popular and recommend you book tickets in advance at busy times.  I visited York as a child when the digging was taking place and remember the big hole in the ground in the middle of York.  I was disappointed by it.  I am not sure who it is aimed at but certainly not short children several of the exhibits were too high up for my youngest.  It was really dark inside the whole building, they provided a map of one section but it was too dark to read it and interpret what you were looking at.  There were several really good audio visual displays but they were so close together that it was difficult to hear the one you were trying to listen to.  It was not a particularly big space inside and it was fairly busy when we visited.  Some of the exhibits are positioned such that if someone is looking at them you cannot get past as they are in a narrow space.  Outside there is a board stating it is a fifteen minute wait from here,  it would be horrible to be inside when it is that busy.  It was hard enough to see some of the exhibits with a few people inside with many more it would become impossible.  It took us fifty minutes to walk through and I came out feeling is that it.  I cannot imagine ever returning.

We were very deflated when we came out, I had wrongly thought it would fill more of the day so had no plans of what to do next.  Luckily right by the exit was a stand of leaflets of places to visit in and around York.  So we headed off to the Yorkshire Museum.  We had a bite to eat in the rather wonderful gardens next to a Roman tower with a view of the river and the remains of Abbey Walls.  The Museum itself had several collections including roman objects, dinosaur fossils and biology specimens.  There was a lovely room on an upper floor with comfy chairs and many many books.  We spent nearly an hour at the end of our visit resting in the chairs and looking at books.  We loved this Museum and will definitely return for another visit especially as we did not manage to see one of the collections as it was closed for refurbishment.

Our final day was spent walking part of the city walls.  We got on the wall at Lendal Bridge and walked round to Micklegate Bar where there was an interesting small Musuem which we had a look round.  We ate our picnic by the river before heading to Clifford's Tower which the children really wanted to explore.  You can climb a winding staircase within the walls of the tower and walk around the 'top' of what remains of the tower.  The views are great but it was very cold and windy up there!

We used the wonderful Park and Ride to get around the city.  It is cheap and the buses run every ten minutes so you never have to wait long.  We love visiting York and now that we have found somewhere to stay all year round I am sure we will be back for many visits in the future.

Reading

We have been reading lots of books about Winter recently and we have had lots of lovely story books from our local library.  I wanted to buy one book to add to our new seasonal table that I have created.  I scoured blogs and the Internet for good ones and asked for suggestions on the forum that I visit.  One suggestion really caught my eye, it sounded like it would be suitable for both my children so I went ahead and bought a copy.

The Winter Book by Rotraut Susanne Berner is a compilation of stories,

poems, songs,

writing on winter festivals including Diwali, Winter Solstice, Hanukkah and Christmas, and lovely pictures.

Both the children have loved having different parts of the book read to them and my eldest has read much of the book himself.

I very much hope that this book will be read and looked at for years to come.

Joining in with The Children's Bookshelf a link up of all things relating to Children's books.

Weekending

It has been a very different, but busy week for us.  We started with our usual trip into town on Monday morning for food shopping and a visit to the library.  In the afternoon I packed the car and headed off to York with the children.  We had three nights there staying in a camping pod to the east of the city.

We spent three days exploring the city, which I will post about another day.  It was bitterly cold but, thankfully, dry and we arrived home utterly exhausted.  On Friday we had intended to go swimming but none of us wanted to leave the house, especially me!  We stayed at home and played, read and sat still.

Over the weekend I visited a local famers market to stock up on local food, sadly the veg stall was not there this time maybe the snow stopped them coming.  But I did get some cheese, eggs and a chicken.  The rest of the day was spent with friends to catch up with them before they go on holiday for six weeks, we did it want to make it any longer as we had been away this week.  We went and had a run around in the grounds of a local castle.

Sunday was spent at home, playing with cuisenaire rods, setting up traffic jams, talking about castles, knights, armour and medieval food, completing jigsaws, reading stories and watching the final part of the BBC series, Africa which we have all really enjoyed watching.

Gratitudes

I am joining in with Taryn for her heartfelt Sunday tradition.

A time to reflect, to slow down and be grateful.

This week I have been grateful for...

...a roof over my head, a place I can call home that is warm and cosy, after visiting a city and seeing those that don't, frozen on the streets.

...a few days away with my children, enjoying their wonderful company.

...warm sunshine on my face, it feels like spring is just round the corner.

...eating breakfast outside, in February, with the sun shining down.

...a gently used book sent to me by a lovely mama on the forum I visit.

...homemade soup for lunch from the freezer.

...a cuddle in bed with my youngest before we get up and start the day.

...my eldest enjoying a book I was reading aloud for him, it is such a long time since he has requested this, it always gives me immense pleasure.

...my lovely husband who moved two fruit bushes in the garden whilst we were away, we have been waiting for a window in the weather when the ground was not frozen or saturated with water.

Glamping?

Well not really as it is February but Glamping to me.  Glamping is glamorous camping, for those who  do not want forego their luxuries.  Camping and February in the UK are probably not two words that many would put together.  Staying in a tent with children at this time of year is not something I am ready to contemplate at the moment ( I lived in a tent for ten months starting at the beginning of February with snow on the ground).  I was looking for self catered accommodation and stumbled on a rather lovely looking camping pod, a wooden tent, that was open in February.  So for three nights this  week this is where we were staying.

It was not really Glamping as you had to go outside to cook, but when the sun is shining and you are protected by the wind it was really warm.  OK I was wearing a hat and coat, but it is winter!  I did eat my breakfast outside on two mornings when the sun was warm on my face it was wonderful.

So if you want a cheap self catered accommodation near York, this is your place.  It is cosy if you are two adults and one child or one adult and two children you will be fine anymore and I think you would find it too small.

I will post about our adventures and trips out in York another day.

Eating

Breakfast is a meal that I have never given much thought to since leaving home.  I always ate cereal of some sort or on the odd occasion something cooked such as egg or mushroom on toast.   For some time I have been thinking about alternatives, cereal is not a particularly healthy breakfast and it bears little resemblance to the grain it is made from being as it highly processed.  I made my own muesli for a while using grains bought from my local health food shop, but still the grains I was using were processed.

But what to eat instead.  I started to notice a number of articles in magazines and programmes on the radio talking about breakfast, the history of the meal, of cereal and what people now eat.  None of this provided any inspiration for what to eat as an alternative to cereal.  I started to make porridge, as I am unable to tolerate cows milk in its pure form, I can and do eat cheese and yogurt, I made it with water.  It does actually make a good porridge in my opinion, I now most people prefer it made with milk, I add fresh fruit chopped or mashed.  I also started to eat plain yogurt with fresh chopped fruit in it.  Then friends suggested making pancakes for breakfast, they all had their own recipes and preferences some involving large numbers of eggs, some with buckwheat flour which I sometimes struggle to get hold of, some which involved overnight soaking and one with oatmeal.  I took bits of each recipe and made up my own very simple one.  I call them pancakes but they are not like the thin pancake that you would traditionally make on pancake day, more a solid fritter type like a scotch pancake.  They are quick, easy, tasty and filling and I often make them camping.

Oatmeal Pancakes
1/2 cup oatmeal
1/2 cup plain yogurt
1 egg

The night before mix the oatmeal and yogurt in a bowl, cover and leave overnight.  

In the morning add the egg and mix.
Heat a little butter in a frying pan and add heaped desert spoons of the mix and flatten slightly.
Cook until you can lift the pancake easily and turn over, you may need to add a little more butter, flatten slightly and cook for a further minute or so.
Continue cooking until all mix is used, you will need to add butter before cooking each batch.

The cup measurements are based on an American cup measure, but as long as the amounts are fairly equal it does not matter how much you use.  This quantity makes about six small pancakes.  If you want to make less I would reduce the quantity of oatmeal and reduce the yogurt quantity by more than the oatmeal otherwise your mixture will be very runny as you cannot reduce 1 egg very easily.  For this quantity of yogurt I have found you can increase to 3/4 cup of oatmeal if you want to make more pancakes.  I sometimes put a teaspoon of ground cinnamon in the mix.  I eat mine with chopped fresh fruit.

Weekending

It has been another busy week in these parts.  We started the week with our usual trip into the local town for our food shopping and a visit to the library.  I also bought some material from the sewing shop to make some trousers for my youngest.

On Tuesday we travelled south to our usual play date.  There were not so many children this week but fun was had none the less with Lego, battleships game, cushions on the floor and flags.

On Wednesday we had a train ride to a soft play area for a birthday treat for our Wednesday play date friends.  It was very noisy at the soft play as it was so busy, and it got really noisy when hail rained down on the metal roof the noise was deafening.

We were up and out early on Thursday to join a friend for a swim, after last weeks amazing achievements in the pool my eldest spent most of the time swimming underwater.  It is amazing how confident he has become.  We had our lunch on the poolside before heading to pick up some bits we had left last week to be repaired.  After we dropped our friends off we popped to buy a pair of shoes for the youngest as her feet have grown again.  It was a long day out and the children both fell asleep really early.

On Friday we joined a local home ed group that we have not met with for a while, it was good to catch up with folks again.  They were making jitterbugs a bit like this except that we used a CD for the body.  It was fun to sit and make them, although our legs kept falling off!  We decorated ours after we got home as we ran out of time.

Over the weekend we joined up with some friends for tea on Saturday.  We headed over in the afternoon so the children could have a play together.  We have not seen them for a while so it was good to catch up.  On Sunday I spent the day cooking and getting ready to go away.  We are off for a few days next week so it will be quiet on here for a few days.  If you leave a comment, thank you, it may be a while before it is published I am not ignoring you just having a short break from technology.  Hope you have a good week, will be back soon!

Gratitudes

I am joining in with Taryn for her heartfelt Sunday tradition.

A time to reflect, slow down and be grateful.

This week I have been grateful for...

...more decluttering and clearing out making more space in our house.

...a friend who provided a listening ear.

...a fun day out on the train.

...swimming pools provided as a safe place for children to swim all year round.

...a shared meal cooked with friends and a fun evening spent together.

...a free source of wood we are stacking for next winter.

...a pile of books lent to my eldest for him to read.

Rhythm

I have posted several times about our weekly rhythm it has been great for keeping us in balance each week.  I say has because, like so many things, it is changing and some weeks it has been non existent and has had to change at the last minute.  After months of it being the same this has really unsettled my children.  I have been giving this much thought over the last week or so, we have come to rely on this rhythm so when it stops beating I have not had alternatives up my sleeve.

We love the rhythm of regular contact with other families, of doing things outside the home.  I need to get my planning head on and talk to other families about alternatives when our original plans do not work out.  This may mean spending some time with new people and branching out to new places or it may mean spending a bit more time at home every now and then.

I found another post about rhythm that I wrote some months ago about the rhythms of our days at home.  I have been lax about this rhythm too of late so I need to bring this back into our lives too.

The last couple of weeks have felt very topsy turvey, I have not been sure of the day of the week most days.  I need to spend time thinking about pulling all these ideas into practice to bring back our much needed and loved rhythm.

Eating

At this time of year, because we eat seasonally, I miss the raw foods that are in abundance in the summer, particularly salads.  I know there are some foods around at this time of year that you can eat raw but I do love salads.  It is also good to sit down on a cold winters evening and eat a hot, nourishing meal.  Every now and then I will sneak a salad onto the menu, usually coleslaw made with grated carrot, shredded white cabbage and mayonnaise or this one.  A red cabbage salad that is incredibly simple and very tasty there is never any left for another day.  I tasted something similar in a cafe one time and this is my own take on it.

Red Cabbage Salad

Red Cabbage
Caraway Seeds
Red Wine Vinegar
Olive Oil

Shred the cabbage, I usually use half a medium sized one at a time.  Sprinkle caraway seeds over the cabbage and mix in, I never measure but you probably want a good teaspoons worth, at least a couple of seeds in each mouthful.

Make the vinaigrette, I mix one tablespoon of the vinegar to two of the oil and I use this quantity for half a cabbage.  I don't like this salad to be swimming in vinaigrette so make enough to coat the cabbage.

Pour the vinaigrette over the cabbage, and enjoy eating!