I Think You’re Bonkers

Dino making his Cub promise - he was very serious and didn’t slip up at all. He was afraid he would but he did really well. 

Receiving his necker, Green woggle to denote his membership of the Green Sixer group and a whole bunch of badges for me to sew on his uniform. 

However, on the way home he announced that he wants to learn to sew and then he can put his own badges on. So, sometime this week we’ll start that with the idea that I’ll carry on doing uniform badges but his old Beavers ones can now go on his Cub Camp blanket and Dino is planning on doing those himself.

Says Mimi on a regular basis, every time salad is served and she carefully picks out the bits she likes.

It’s hot, so salad is featuring quite a bit, especially as we’re growing edible leafy things - yes, lettuce! So, she has some carrot sticks, raisins and slices of apple while Dino and I have everything else, apart from he doesn’t like tomato….. 

About a week ago Mimi helped me pull some baby lettuce for the salad. "What’s this?" she asked. "Salad leaves." I can’t remember if it’s lettuce, what sort it is or what, so it’s salad leaves. There’s a wrinkly leafed one in green, similar in red and a round leaved one in bright green. She tried them all and said she liked the round green one.

She still doesn’t like lettuce, the wrinkly one, but the roundish green salad leaves are alright.   Daft child. Must sow another row of "salad leaves".

Conversations:

Mimi - Can we grow cucumber?

Me - We can try, why?

Mimi - Because I like to make tzatziki.

Me - But you won’t eat it?

Mimi - No, it’s yucky, cucumber is yucky but I like making it.  

Go figure…..

I think I need to make choc chip muffins. 

We cleaned out Fudge’s hutch today, scrubbed and disinfected it so we could re-use it for Mini, and then the spare cage can go back to Kris for babies (umm, baby piggies, obviously, not people babies…. I hope?)

The final cage cleanings got dumped in an almost ritualistic manner on the kids veg patch - "so when we eat the things we can remember him" 

It was drizzling a bit but we stayed outside and planted out some peas, carrots and leeks behind the shed and a melon in the sweetcorn bed near the house. I took some lavender cuttings and if they take then the old (tatty, leggy and falling over) lavender can come out and I can put something else in there - maybe the new acer or fuschia, or both. Anyway, there are 8 cuttings sitting on the sill behind me.

Then we made paper pots and sowed carrot and peas as well as a few ransomes and woad seed - just to see if the ones I’ve saved will actually germinate!

Both kids are doing a lot of talking about Fudge and death in general and in between that and gardening they’ve both done some reading.  

We were in town, it’s Monday and therefore bill paying day - added to the parcels that needed sending urgently after my soap nuts finally turned up this morning. Anyway, on the way back to the bank to pay the last bills in there and we wandered past the butchers we used to use a lot before the kids decided they’d rather have bland sausages that may as well have no meat in. I think it’s a general part of life now that we’ve forgotten what meat actually tastes like, along with what it looks, smells and feels like.

I adore our little butcher opposite the post office, he has posters of animal breeds and butchering diagrams all over the place and the meat in there is fresh and tasty and locally raised, slaughtered and butchered. He makes basic pork sausages as well as some interesting varieties - the pork and apple is just gorgeous.

So, we were walking past when Mimi pipes up "That looks nice, can we have sausages for tea, from here?"  They’ve chosen some of the basic pork and some lamb and mint. We’re having the lamb and mint with mash and baked beans tonight and they smell lovely. I hope the kids like them as I’d love to go back for meat from him again.

Dino - Can we have a snack?
me - of course we can, gingerbread person?
Dino - Can I have a man?
Mimi - They’re all women silly, just some are wearing trousers!

Reckon that covers the lesson in equality then…