My Friends

Friends seem to be quite hard to come by.

Friends at playgroup

Mummy takes me to playgroup 3 times a week but there aren't many children my age or older.  Mummy does spend a lot of the time there huffing and puffing because it's too hot or too noisy and I don't think Mummy likes it very much even though she pretends she does.  I also catch her rolling her eyes and then being really silly because she's bored and singing in silly voices.  She also starts showing off if the other Mummies look at her.  Other than that, I love it there.  Most of them get to go to nursery instead of staying home with the No Fun as their Mums have to work.
Anyhow, I had just made friends with a lovely boy named Theo who I liked very much when his family had to move back to New Zealand.  This made me sad.   I do wonder if we will ever meet when we are grown up and if we will recognise one another.
I also have a great friend JR.   I used to hang out a lot with JR but her Mummy had to go back to work and she now gets to go to nursery most of the week so I only see her on Fridays.   We went out together this Friday and had a lovely game of flap the bed sheet.

The Price of having Children

I overheard the Mummies in Balham yesterday talking about how expensive it is to have a child.  They ought to come and live here!  I reckon Mummy has saved money since having me.  Here's how.....

1.  Shopping.  Mum and dad never bought a thing until I was born.  When I did arrive, they were in such a state of shock, they didn't have time to go shopping.

2.  Clothes.  Mummy eventually bought a set of onesies  (grow bags she calls them) in a size 20 times too big and I stopped in them until I fitted them and they started to make my toes curl.

3.  Toys.  You know that story.  Dustpan and brush for me.

4.  Food.  Birdy Num Nums and whatever Mummy and Daddy are eating.  However Mummy did say that as soon as she started breast feeding, the food bill doubled.  Daddy says 'Nonsense. Mummy has always had an appetite.'

5.  Child care costs.  I have to put up with Mummy all day.  Mummy says that just being with me is payment enough.  Puke.  I bet she says something else to Daddy.

6.  Transport.  Oh Mummy had to cough up here.  She didn't intend to buy a pram as she bought a sling but then I got too heavy and she got the hump.  So one day when she was particularly grumpy she marched into Mothercare and demanded their cheapest pram.  She nearly fell off her high horse when they told her £279.00.  She asked if it came with an engine.  Anyway, she's had pram envy ever since. A day doesn't go by without her complaining how the handle isn't adjustable.  So far then - £279.00.  However, Mummy walks everywhere, and now that I am starting to stagger she is making me walk everywhere too......  I have got calves like Bradley Wiggins.

7.  Baby cosmetics.  Mummy doesn't bother with soap on me and definitely not shampoo.  She says it's Isle of Wight (Mummy has some strange rhyming slang). She does massage me with olive oil and sometimes uses coconut oil and tells me it is very high quality.  But the point is that if she weren't massaging me with it, she'd be cooking with it.  I just hope I don't get picked on at school.

8.  Books - yes you've got it.  The second hand book shop.

9.  Music - Daddy's sound tracks or Mummy singing :( Mummy sings really loudly and at play group during nursery rhymes, all the other Mummies turn to stare.

10.  I know Mummy says that the food bills may have doubled, but she has saved money on not buying clothes as she can't squeeze her chubbly belly into her normal size clothes anymore and now she is a Mummy she can't bring herself to buy any Mummy clothes and has become quite attached to her pregnancy trousers.

11. Since she went all worthy and hippy, she doesn't spend money any more on cosmetics for her and makes do with essential oils and a darker room.

12.  No huge restaurant bills. No more tasting menus for Mummy.  I can only bear to sit through a main course and a pudding and then I get achy buns and have to leave.

13.  No more fancy hair cuts at salons that offer you cocktails.  Mummy tried it once with me and had to leave half why through with only half a hair do.  Local mobile hair dresser for Mummy and I get to sit on the floor and make her off cuts into a small Yorkshire Terrier.

12.  And of course she has saved thousands since she stopped drinking and smoking and gallivanting round the city and haggling for a cab home at 4 in the morning.

So all in all - although she spent £279 on the pram that makes her life a misery.  I reckon she is quids in.  Kids are cheap. 


Your purse is chock full Mummy

Sprechen Sie Baby?

I may have mentioned it before but Mummy isn't great on speaking Baby and so I have had to take up several alternative methods of communication. 
In the beginning, I tried to explain some really important phenomena to her.  All I got back were those damn raspberries.  I thought they meant something really meaningful so would blow them at her and instead of paying attention to what I was saying, Mummy would laugh at me.  Very annoying. 

You're not listening Mummy

The same thing happened with coughing.  I got into trouble for coughing because another small person was chatting to me in coughs and Mummy thought I was clowning about and imitating them.
I then spent ages perfecting my Elfdalian with a touch of Khoisan.  Disappointingly, this was of no use here as Mummy doesn't know any Swedes or Bushmen. So I have now added pointing.  My Great Uncle Joe showed me the finger.  He is always waving it about.  That is going fairly well but Mummy is always bringing me the wrong thing.  She can never see exactly what I am pointing at even though it is pretty damn obvious.
So I have added 'THAT' and when she gets warmer 'THAT THAT THAT THAT THAT' building up to a crescendo which usually gets her attention.  However, Mummy can never see when I am pointing at Birdy Num Nums.  They get in the way.  She thinks I am pointing at her and picks me up when I don't want her at all.  I want feeding. So I have added 'THIS' - specifically for Birdy Num Nums to prevent any further confusion.  When I am nursing, I stop from time to time, point at them and say 'THIS' and check she understands.
Now that we have cleared 'that' up, I have moved onto 'Yesthsh'.  Daddy says I sound like 'Sylvester' but he should try it with only 5 teeth.  I only say 'Yesthsh' though when I am answering the telephone, television remote control, a camera or this morning, a banana - or when I am really, really hungry.
Speaking of hunger, Mummy tried to fob me off with yet another meal of lentils this lunchtime and I spotted that she was eating garlic mushrooms on toast and I have just discovered that I loooooooooooooove mushrooms.  YESTHSH!!!!!!

Mummy says I sound like a hedgehog chewing a slug.  Lip Smaken Uncle Ivo.  Lip Smaken!

EASY PEASY QUICK LENTIL STEW 3 MEALS IN ONE

A really quick nutritious meal when you have nothing in the house to eat.  Mummy rehashes this and makes several different meals from the same one.  She thinks I don't know.  But I do.

Daddy said this photo didn't inspire him

1 Onion chopped
2 cloves garlic chopped
2 sticks of celery peeled and chopped
4 large carrots peeled and diced
200g green or red lentils
1 tin of tomatoes

I can't even give it away

Put lentils in a pan and cover with water (about 2 fingers higher than lentils - Mummy's fingers not mine) and bring to the boil.  Skim off that scummy scum scum.  Add all the rest of the ingredients EXCEPT  (sshh Mummy don't shout) the tomatoes and bring to boil then simmer for about half hour.  When lentils are tender, add the tomatoes and simmer for a further 10 mins.
Eat with spinach for a balanced meal or cover with mashed potato for vegetarian cottage pie or eat with wholemeal spaghetti for a vegetarian Bolognese sauce.  Let me know if you think of any other combinations to try and baffle me with....................................................................

QUICK AND EASY DRIBBLY FISH AND COURGETTE CURRY

This one makes me dribble.  I am a big fan of curry.  Mummy says that she is taking out the chilli from the recipes every since I pulled my face at a radish (which was particularly hot).  Anyhow, you can use any type of white fish.  Mummy uses Pollack.  (She uses this word a lot I have noticed).  If you don't over cook it, you can take out a piece of fish at the end and make sure there are no bones in it.  Mummy does this with her fingers so she can feel if there are any bones.  We usually have it with brown rice.

No coriander to be seen anywhere

1 Onion chopped
Big slosh of olive oil
6 cloves of garlic chopped
5cm grated ginger
11/2 tsp. cumin
1/2 tsp. turmeric
1/2 tsp. ground black pepper
1/2 tsp. paprika
Large handful of chopped coriander
1 Tin chopped tomatoes
3 medium courgettes diced
juice of half a lemon
350-500g of white fish fillet

Heat oil and drop in cumin until it starts to pop then add onion, garlic and ginger.  When lightly browned, add courgettes, and rest of dry spices.  Fry for 5 mins. then add tomatoes.  Cover and cook for 20 mins.  Add fish and cover and cook for a further 10 mins (or until fish is cooked)and add lemon juice.  Serve with coriander if you can remember.  Mummy forgot again. Yawn.

Look my spoon is too short

The best toy in the world

Mummy is rubbish at buying toys.  Mostly she buys things she likes.  She spent ages today looking at miniature plastic animals.  I thought that they were only good for chewing but she kept trying to persuade me to like them.  She was making a chicken and a lion kiss.  I had to howl to get her out of the shop.  I think she wanted to get a glass cabinet and to start collecting them. 
Anyway, she thinks I can make do with a colander and spoon.  Most mornings I spend with the brush that Nana bought.  Nana always buys brushes when she comes.  She has a thing for a 'soft long brush' whatever that maybe.  She also likes a soft cloth for cleaning.  Mummy once caused a scene when she discovered that Nana's dish cloth was a pair of old underpants.  I think it might be something they do up North.  (That's where Nana and Mummy are from.)  Mummy keeps trying to teach me Northern.  She has a horror that I will grow up speaking Southern. She makes me practise rounding my vowels.

Brush Baby

Anyway, thank goodness for all my aunties and uncles because I have a huge selection of toys but I have to say that Mummy surpassed them all today and bought me the best toy I have ever had.  She really surprised me as she didn't say anything about it and then I found it on the kitchen floor.  It's soft and furry and slightly bouncy and it plays peek-a-boo with me.
 I spent about half an hour with it this evening and I just couldn't put it down and walk away.  I keep having to go back and check that it's still there. 

It's fabulous.  Thank you Mummy.

Prams of Fire

I was out with Mummy today in the park and I suddenly had the urge to do my 'Prams of Fire' (as Tati Suzy calls it), gain my independence and push the pram.  I broke free from the No Funs and edged my way towards a pram and started pushing - quite successfully and at speed. I discovered that if I lent hard to the left I could make it do hand brake turns on the play ground.  Rubber was burning and I was making skid marks on the bouncy tarmac.
 Just as I started to gather an adoring crowd, Mummy No Fun came shouldering her way through.  Apparently it wasn't our pram.  And apparently there was a baby in it.

Pfffff

MUMMY'S MAGICAL TOMATO SAUCE

This is one of my favourites and I particularly like how it stains my face and lips red and is especially effective on white paintwork.



Yum yum in my tum

1 tin organic tomatoes
1 chopped onion
3 cloves chopped garlic
1 peeled and grated apple
4 peeled and grated carrots
1 pinch paprika
1 pinch oregano
3 grinds black pepper
Splash olive oil

Fry onions and garlic until clear then add apple and carrot and fry for 10 mins.  Stir in oregano and paprika and pepper and add tomatoes. Cover and simmer for 1/2 hour, stirring occasionally.

This was so delicious I fell asleep in it

Mummy adds a tin of cannelloni beans to make me believe that this is better than Heinz or she puts with whole wheat pasta or with mashed potato or with bulgur wheat or anything else she has to hand.



BULGING BULGUR AND ROASTED VEGETABLES

Brown is cool

I just can't get enough of this one and it annoys Mummy as she reckons that bulgur wheat is the hardest thing to sweep up as it just keeps on rolling....  You can use most kinds of vegetables. Just make sure you chop them small so they roast well and I don't get hard bits of skin to gag on.  Mummy used mushrooms which made it quite brown, but small people like brown.  We get freaked out by all those primary colours.  But you can use whatever you like.




Forced to eat outside so Mummy can hose it down



Add 1 cup Bulgur wheat to 2 cups boiling water.  Cover and simmer for 10 mins.  Leave covered until no water remains.  Meanwhile chop into small pieces - mushrooms, peppers, onions, garlic, aubergine and green beans (or what ever soft vegetables you have mouldering in your fridge) and place in roasting tray with olive oil.  Roast until all vegetables are very tender.  Add to bulgur wheat with the juice of one lemon.  Mix together and enjoy.   If you can remember (Mummy always forgets and leaves them on the side) fresh herbs such as mint and chives go well. This makes enough for all of us, plus a couple of peckish neighbours.  

 

TEETHING WONDER WINGS

Mummy says 'he's teething' quite a lot.  Even when I'm not.  Usually, it is when she has annoyed me and I am fed up - not teething.  Or she has kept me awake at night - rustling about the house like a burglar.  Or she has dragged me to some arts and crafts thing when I wanted to sit at a pavement café and watch the world go by.  Anyhow, on the rare occasion that I am teething, these chicken wings work wonders.

Is that a pink bib with fairies on?

Rub Organic Chicken Wings with lemon juice and roast at 180 for about half an hour.  When cool get Mummy to break the wing tips off and discard and then remove the small bone from the second joint.  Chomp and make crooning noises whilst rubbing chicken grease into the newly washed hair of your mother as she bends down to pick up the bits from the floor.

BEETROOT SOUP

Red Light

This is worth eating to make the most interesting
coloured poo.  If you eat spinach for breakfast and butternut squash for lunch and then this for supper - you get traffic lights.

4 large beetroot washed but unpeeled
1 onion studded with 4 cloves
2 large peeled and chopped potatoes
4 grinds black pepper
1 peeled and chopped carrot
1 peeled and chopped celery



Note the washing basket full of white clothes....
 

Cover all ingredients with cold water and bring to boil. Simmer for around half hour until beetroot is tender.  Cool. Remove beetroot and peel. 




Remove cloves from onion and discard.  Put all into food processor and puree.  Dress in white to eat and make sure Mummy is wearing her best clothes as you experiment with your spoon handling skills.

THE SOUP TO MAKE ME EAT ANYTHING


Mummy makes a wonderful chicken stock and then uses it as a base for lots of my meals.  As I love the chicken stock she thinks she can slip in all kinds of weird vegetables (Jerusalem artichokes) and I won't notice.  I do notice Mummy.  I just don't mind the taste.  Anyway, when I was younger, she just used to give me the stock to drink (this was great if I had a cold as she would also add 1 tsp. of turmeric, a pinch of sage and some grated ginger root) and then as I got older she would add vegetables and puree it all up together.    She would put it in a cup and then I could help myself.  Nowadays, she just adds it to any of the vegetables I am eating.  It's so easy, I could make it myself.

Who needs a Chateau Lafite

1 Organic chicken carcass (or a chicken leg)
4 large carrots chopped
1 Onion chopped
2 cloves chopped garlic
1 bay leaf
2 peeled and chopped sticks of celery
a grind of black pepper

Put chicken in pan and cover with cold water and bring to boil. Skim off that scummy scum scum.  Add rest of ingredients and bring back to boil then simmer for 45 mins. (until meat is leaving bone).  Remove carcass when cool and spend a good 20 thoughtful mins.  picking the meat off the bones and then discard bones and put meat back in stock.  Try not to throw the meat out keep the bones like Mummy often does.

Either sieve out the vegetables and serve stock as a drink or puree all together or add other boiled vegetables (potatoes, sweet potatoes, carrots, beans, etc.) or mash with cooked whole wheat pasta brown rice, lentils or bulgur wheat.  Wow - the combinations are endless Mummy.  No wonder I get to eat it all week. 


Checking to see what else she has put in

 

VERY FRUITY FRUIT CAKE

I love bread but Mummy thought I was eating too much of it so she came up with this cake which contains all things good for me but is also very, very tasty.   So tasty in fact, I have to beat Granddad and Nana off with a stick.  It has no added sugar and there is no dairy and it is made with whole wheat flour but Mummy says you could use spelt flour instead.  Mummy used organic where she could without re mortgaging the house.



Fruity Fruity Fruit Cake

60g Dates
240g Sultanas
250ml Water
70g Grated Carrot (about 1)
2 Grated Peeled Apples (Cooking or Eating)
260g Whole Wheat Flour (Mummy used Bread Flour)
100 ml Olive Oil
4 Small Eggs
1 tsp. Mixed Spice
1/2 tsp. Ground Ginger
1/2 tsp.  Ground Cinnamon





Goodness Me
 




Put dates and sultanas in the water in a pan and bring to boil and then turn off heat.  Meanwhile beat eggs together with oil in bowl.  Add flour and spices and mix together well.  Add the water with the dates and sultanas and mix
well and finally add the grated carrots and apples and mix.  Pour into a well oiled and lined loaf tin and bake at 170 C for around an hour.  This is a very moist cake so your knitting needle (some of you may have a skewer) may not come out clean when checking if cooked.   Cool in tin before pushing in your mouth and rubbing on the carpet.

 

Is my Mummy a slow developer?

Today Mummy nearly took 2 of my 5 teeth out with the pram.  She hit a pot hole at high speed and I nearly smashed into the roll bar.  I don't know where she was looking - but certainly not where she was going.  Daddy says Mummy used to drive a motorbike but I find that hard to believe.  She is always crashing with me, or getting stuck on speed humps, or up steps.  Other Mummies don't seem to have the same problem.  No wonder I have taken up driving myself.

Look at that big spider behind you Mummy

She also has problems dressing me.  Sometimes she puts things on back to front - and she never ever gets those sleep suit studs all to fasten up even though I have been wearing them for over a year now.  I always have a drafty hole somewhere or the other. She leaves me naked most of the day and even lets me pee in the plant pot. 
I know they had problems with nappies when I was born and they had to look it up on YouTube.  Daddy has the hang of it but Mummy is still struggling.  Most days I spend with the elastic leg stuck up my crevice and a gap in the front where I can pee through.
And whilst I'm at it, she's not that hot on communication.  I had to learn to point at quite an early age to try and get through to her but she still insists on putting me on the potty when I am asking to read a book. 
And she's very slow speaking.  Mummy still hasn't caught up with all the Mummytalk.  She doesn't even try anymore.  She still calls a pram a pram.  She refuses to say 'Doggy or Horsey or even Sippee Cup'.  Other Mummies are pretty fluent by now so I am starting to wonder at what age she is going to start.
She hasn't a clue when it comes to all the baby gadgetry either.  I caught her reading through the baby page of the Argos catalogue the other day so she could have something to chat to other mothers about at the play groups.  She is just so unaware of all the things out there.  She shows no interest in toys or status symbol prams and bags.  She likes books and that's about it. 
She also cracks jokes which might be funny with her friends in the city but they just don't go down well with other Mummies.  And she shouldn't be swearing at her age.
She also doesn't have much sense of proprietary and no respect whatsoever for authority.  I think this is going to cause problems later on.  And she's ever such a show off.  Whenever she thinks someone is looking at her, she starts to misbehave.  A couple of weeks ago she even had a tantrum in a café.  We were all having a very nice lunch when the waitress asked Mummy if she was a nanny.  Mummy went into melt down.  I have never been so embarrassed.  Mummy had a fit all the way home.  She kept saying 'I was a director of a public company and she thinks I'm a nanny!' and it took her ages to calm down even when I climbed up to her level and gave her a cuddle whilst looking in her eyes.
And so I do wonder about Mummy hitting her developmental stages.  It's been 14 months now and she seems very behind. 
She does make me laugh though.  This morning I laughed so much I got hiccups.