Mazey Day

Fleece Washing

With the promise of a heatwave I thought it would be the perfect weekend to make a start on washing the fleece I've had waiting in the wings for it to be the right time....unknown and a BFL...they were minging!

Is this all ?

Am I unfulfilled as a mother because I have been educated to believe that mothering is a low level 'job' and if you have any brains you will be off having a career creating money or building/creating/completing some 'thing'.
OR
Am I unfulfilled because as a path it truly is not for me.
Are there any Western cultures that value motherhood? Where girls and boys respect and look forward to becoming parents and helping shape the next generation, to correct the errors our parents made (and no doubt make some of our own) striving to provide children with a better childhood and life than the one experienced.
Does Western culture automatically devalue motherhood in the collective subconcious because of the things it values that do not sit easily alongside mothering being a valuable job?
Too many questions and not room in amongst the cooking, cleaning and washing to find the answers.....

Easy LIke Sunday Morning

then all hell broke loose trying to get small chidlren into the car at a certain time..........
Anyway it all worked out OK in the end, a Solstice ritual in the rain, yay good old Cornish weather strikes again (what is up with the extended winter?) . Part of the ritual was here http://www.megalithic.co.uk/article.php?sid=39  but we went back afterwards with the boys to have a proper clamber around

Then  off to The Bucket of Blood to watch friends in Boekka http://www.boekka.co.uk/

I am going for a practice session to see if I'm up for it !

Squishy Basket

While it's looking pretty in a basket I thought I'd post up a couple of pictures.
I have done the chain of doom (nice and loose and it made that first row much easier), and the first couple of rows next one is on a colour change hence the colours in a basket to work out if I'm going with random or repeating patterns.
Not finding the acrylic too bad but definately prefer the real thing. Not really my colours but I just went for the easy option and they do have a lovely vintage look about them when crocheted up together. There's another one I want to do and I want to use earthy browns and greens for that one.

Friday

HOME ED GROUP......has been a day of trains, electric, wind up and narrow guage..........meccano in every colour made up into a wealth of gadgets with turny handles for the boys to play with.
The mine in a shed was quite frankly weird, why would you do that when Cornwall has various real mines you can visit? That aside the volunteers at the museum/collection had buckets of enthusiasm and obviously lived and breathed trains. http://www.moseleymuseum.com/home.html

We then attempted to make Fathers day cards which had varying degrees of success and a number of ripped up cards and an increasingly impatient mother. Daddy won't mind if you have gone 2mm out of the line you meant to, he will appreciate the effort you put in to drawing an amazingly detailed picture blah blah blah was met with whiny, shouting and big dramatic stomps to put the card in the bin. Seriously, I can go so far and then turn into the parent I don't actually aspire to be..... I think going to school was even mentioned in there somewhere....... ooops!

On a lighter note with the rumbling of the 3 boys snoring I started on my swatch of this http://attic24.typepad.com/weblog/granny-stripe.html crochet has beaten me every time I've tried to crack it. I make small things, forget how to do it and start all over again. My theory is I do a big thing and I'll never forget again, plus the American and UK terms being different really throws me! Someone was selling off the yarn for this project cheap and it seemed too much of a bargain to refuse. The swatch worked out well (after I realised where I had made a mistake!) now I am just facing a starting chain of 240 stitches and the buggering first row of which not one crochet instruction has described as anything other than a pain in the arse.
Oh well stripy loveliness here we go.

Pond Dipping

Dragonfly Larvae and Palmate Newt (not my pictures I forgot the camera) 

Boys Feet!

Real boys do wear nail varnish and they panic that it might wash off if they have a bath.











I think we saw a lesser spotted woodpecker today at least we think it's a lesser not a greater. I'm going to go back this week (in the dry) with the zoom lens and figure it out. The weird thing is it was feeding young who were poking out of holes in a wooden electric pole, signs reading 'Danger of Death', 'Danger' were accompanied by a cute fluffy head poking out of the hole asking for food.
There were 2 chicks and they were poking out of different holes?! How on earth does that work!
Our planned Open Farm Sunday visit has gone by the wayside as the weather has been winter like and it was all we could do to get out to take the dog for a walk.

Sugary jammy jammy jam

I like sugar. Ahh that's better :) I know sometimes it's like saying you like cocaine but I do truly like it, I love the taste it gives cakes and iced pastries and cordial and a discreeet pinch magically adds a little something to a tomato based sauce.

I like savoury (could never live without my cheese) but I also like sweet, not too sweet but I confess I most definately have a 'sweet tooth' and a correspondingly sized backside to go with it.

I've been reading up on sugar free over the last few months but I've tried sugar free cakes, most definately not the same, and now agave has been shoved onto the red list of stuff not to buy I'm floundering over what to use as a substitute? I used some Fruisana (low GI) the other day and it seems it was OK in the jam (with sugar though as it was a last minute thing and didn't have enough).
What of my elderflower cordial? Sugar as well as the sweetness it provides preserves it for me to use deep in the cold days of winter when I need a little help remembering summer will come round again eventually!

So I guess what I am asking is what substitutes work to give the closest likeness to sugar in preserving and sweetness (oh and no artificial sweetners either) OR is it better to stick with sugar but have less of it and less frequently? A matter of willpower?

Volcano time!

With the recent news stories about an Icelandic volcano erupting again I've been meaning to do this project with the boys.
We built a dinosaur land (on a tray - very important!) and made the volcano in dino land erupt many, many, many times and they squealed with joy every single time.

Arts/crafts tray

Home made green play doh for the volcano covering

Volcano body was an old Whole Earth glass ketchup bottle - nice wide mouth :)

Ferns and bits of twig, trees, cow parsley and dried grass from the field

Old manky play doh to stick the flora in

Wooden dinosaurs and wooden play blocks to act as tree trunks lying on the ground

 Close up of Mr T-Rex, Kailen's favourite dinosaur.

but what's that rumbling.........oh no it's going to blow............run dinos run........

We used up lots of white vinegar, red food dye and bicarb :) It was so funny watching their faces in utter delight EVERY time it went, they are going to do it all again the morning to show Daddy how to do it.
It looks a little less scenic now though as we left it outside and came in to get snacks and the chickens got up on the table and trashed it! Knocked trees over, ate the play doh and subsequently left red footprints everywhere!