OMG! I forgot it was Mother’s Day!

Well not that it was Mother’s Day. Of course I remembered it was Mother’s Day and was looking forward to breakfast in bed and a day when the kids slaved after me. And I was planning to pop over to Mum’s with a bunch of flowers and have a cup of tea.

This is my extreme Mum, sledding at Goshen, USA, earlier this year.

I was still feeling rather sorry for myself in bed nursing my cold when the call came.

“So we’ll see you at 12 for lunch?” says Dad.
“What?”
“Lunch at the club - your whole family - remember? I booked it ages ago?”
“… um… yes… okay we’ll be there.”
“Oh and don’t forget Groover’s mum.”
“Sure…” I say weakly falling back against the pillow.

“Is there something you want to tell me?” asks Groover.

Dad had booked us in to his club for lunch weeks ago. I’d forgotten. Hugamuga and Groover were going to football at 11.30am and we hadn’t told his mother that she was invited along too.

I swung into action. Rang the coach - turned out Hugamuga wasn’t on the list for this weekend anyway - warned him that Groover wouldn’t be there to be a runner (the coach was okay with that). Groover rang his mum and told her to get her glad rags on - he was taking her to lunch.

And we were ready. Drugged up to the eyeballs in cold and flu tablets but dressed, made up, in the car.

It was a very pleasant lunch and thank goodness it all came together.

In the afternoon I was a “proper” mother and ironed my kids’ shirts for school. (Usually I make them do it themselves)

And it’s FYO dinner night at the Redsultana house tonight!

Because frankly my dears, while I could give a damn, I need to put my feet up. After all, it is mother’s day, remember?

PS: Is it Mother’s Day or Mothers’ Day? Some apostrophe help would be greatly appreciated. I originally wrote Mothers’ Day as it is a day for all Mothers right? But then it looked wrong and I thought well really you only have one mother (or two maybe if you’re a surrogate or adopted) so maybe it should be Mother’s Day… What do you think?

PPS: FYO = Find Your Own

Are laptops for school children a good idea?

I’m sitting here with my daughter’s school laptop in bed (feeling crapola with a cold) as I write this so I’m aware that I’m being a bit hypocritical…

Here’s the thing. My daughter has gone to a new school this year. A school that insists that every child should use a laptop from Grade 5. Their argument is that we live in an age where computers and digital devices are a part of our lives and that we should make use of every tool we can to educate our children. And yes, I get that.

But since we’ve had this third computer in the house we barely see our 11 year old. It’s Youtube 24/7 - or until Groover goes mental because we’ve been shaped again. She doesn’t seem to read books anymore - it’s chapter after chapter of fan fiction.

We insist that she uses the computer in public and we’ve learned that you take the laptop away from her at bedtime - what I’m not seeing is a whole lot of homework done on the computer and given that, I wonder why the school doesn’t store the wretched things in the classroom. Do they really need to take them home?

The only good thing is that at least she’s not fighting with my son now over the second computer.

So here I am enjoying her MacBook interface on our wireless system (which doesn’t seem to work for my work laptop) and whinging.

Partly it’s the lazy parent in me that finds it hard to cope - I get tired of continually taking it away from her and telling her off for exceeding our bandwidth quota again.

And part of it is my old fashioned sense of media. I want my child to enjoy books as books! Not fan fiction. Although, having said that if she was writing her own stories… well now, that would be different. And maybe endless reading of it will lead to writing her own…

In the meantime my darling Dipp has earned a merit award at school. So maybe the laptop isn’t the monster I make it out to be.

Oh, you ask, why do I have precious time on the new toy? Ah, she’s out on her brother’s bike getting some fresh air.

I asked her first!

Some parenting tips please! How do you manage computer time in your home?

photo credit: Apollo-Jack

Sleeping bag cover up!

Dippity is going camping. Her first camp with her new school. She’s pretty excited but a little worried that she won’t be able to get her sleeping bag into its bag. And I don’t blame her.

What is it with sleeping bag makers!

Why can’t they design a bag that makes it easy for a kid use?

Now sure, I could have TMATP* and bought a down filled stuff-in sleeping bag. I have one of those myself and they are great. Warm, compact and best of all easy to store in its little bag. Instead I decided to cut the price tag by more than half and buy a very warm, good quality bag that you need to roll up and put in its bag. IMPOSSIBLE.

It’s hard enough for me, let alone a 11 year old.

Am I alone?

Tell me about your sleeping bag woes…

*TMATP = Thrown Money At The Problem

Rice cooker Organic Beef Dark Ale Casserole

Let me share with you Groover’s delicious recipe for beef casserole that he made up himself taking inspiration from several recipes.

It is perfect for a wet wintry day and very rich.

The idea is to get it started in the morning and then go away and leave it. Come back for an evening meal and in the meantime enjoy the beautiful aromas of comfort food.

Rice cooker organic beef and dark ale casserole.

Ingredients:
1 kg of oyster blade beef (or any cheap cut of organic beef)
100g pancetta cut into cm cubes
250 mL of beef stock
1 bottle (330mL) dark ale or stout (eg Guinness)
1 can of crushed tomatoes
500g small brown onions
one bunch of baby carrots
300g mushrooms
2 cloves garlic
handful fresh rosemary, finely chopped
50g plain flour
2 anchovies (the secret ingredient)
2 tablespoons of Worcester Sauce
1 teaspoon Marmite (the other secret ingredient)
handful of flat leaf Italian parsley, chopped
zest of one lemon
splash of sherry
1 tablespoon Olive Oil
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:
Put olive oil in pan and fry off the pancetta. Remove pancetta and place in bottom of rice (or slow) cooker. Mix the flour salt and pepper and chopped rosemary and cut the beef into three or four centimetre chunks and coat liberally in the seasoned flour.

Brown the beef in the pan to seal and caramelise the beef quickly - you don’t want to cook it through - feel free to do this in batches. Place beef on top of the pancetta in the rice cooker.

Finally, peel the onions and garlic and quickly pan fry in the remaining oil and throw on top of beef.

The onions are meant to be whole and not cooked, just lightly glazed with the oil. Deglaze the pan with the sherry and pour juice over the ingredients in the rice cooker.

Add the stout and stock, chopped mushrooms, anchovies, tomatoes, marmite and Worcester Sauce and close the rice cooker. Put the cooker on cook and then let it simmer on “warm” for the next 6-7 hours (the rest of the day).

The house will fill with delicious comfort foody smells.

About two hours before serving throw in the washed baby carrots.

Just prior to serving add the chopped parsley and zest of a lemon.

Serve with mashed potato and green salad.

Yummy.

My youngest child is 11

There have been a couple of things lately that have made me feel old. Trying to buy something hip hap’nin and groovy today… sigh. Being asked if my 18 year old daughter also had her hair done at my salon (I look old enough to have an 18 year old daughter now?!!!) and now little Dippity - The Pigeon - turning 11.

But it’s not about me. Here are seven photographs of my girl.

Yeah. That’s my baby.

Happy Birthday gorgeous one.

Journey to the Mid-West

Last weekend I drove up to Geraldton with my dad and two small people, Hugamuga and Dippity. Dad wanted to visit his step-mother, the kids were on holidays, and it was a good chance for me to visit our Geraldton office as well as seeing my step-Grandmother. Now 86.

I thought I’d tell this story in pictures.

We drove up on Saturday. First stop was lunch at a little picnic spot just north of Badgingarra.

We stopped at the old convict bridge, washed away in a recentish flood. I lost my akubra (well Groover’s hat) but luckily had written our name and phone number inside it and the lovely gentleman at the Hampton Arms Inn rescued it for me.

After rescuing my hat, the kids and I decided to visit Greenough’s historic village which was quite well preserved, if a bit dusty. The new cafe is very swish. This is the jail.

A classic Greenough tree. A river gum bent double by the strong winds off the coast.

It is still very dry at Greenough.

My step-grandmother and father in her crowded kitchen. She has two stoves and four fridges, although she only uses two at the moment. I’m making a video of her house - it has to be seen to be believed - so if I get permission - stand by. And yes, you picked it, she is Japanese.

Hers is an interesting story which I will tell when I show you her house.

A sunset view from the house.

The next day the kids discovered the Merry-Go-Round by the Sea, inspired by Randolph Stow’s famous autobiographical novel.

And we visited the memorial to the crew of HMAS Sydney, especially poignant since the discovery of the wrecks and the fact today is after all, ANZAC Day. Now they can, rest in peace.

Ever wondered who lived at the end of the rainbow?

Yes it rained. But the earth seemed so dry as to reject the water. We were a little worried about our night camping but the weather bureau’s radar looked promising so we headed to Cliff Head, via Dongara.

We had to go to Dongara because that’s where my dad built his first solo construction. Aged 13.

Dad went on to become Engineer of the Year and was involved in a great many projects. My favourite is still The Stirling Bridge in Fremantle which was his first project as project manager. I remember going to the opening… ah but that’s yet another story.

So we made it to Cliff Head. Camping to my kids means marshmellows:

And to my dad, means fishing:

He used to fish here with his mum and dad.

We slept on the beach which wasn’t as successful as we hoped given the bright moonlight and my Dippity falling ill and the next day mooched our way home, stopping on the way at the Pinnacles Desert near Cervantes.

It was my dad’s first ever visit to this famous West Australian tourist destination.

And it was my first visit too. I’m not sure why they are such a popular tourist destination…

PS: I didn’t break a nail til I came home and did the washing. Meh.

PPS: Here’s where all the photos live.

When to let your teenager off the leash

Today is Hugamuga’s Independence Day.

This is Hugamuga in 2002, a somewhat younger version - aged 8, I wouldn’t have let him go alone at this age. :)

Today, he met his friends on the train, travelled to Adventure World (two trains and a bus), enjoyed the day with his mates and returned home. He was responsible for organising himself, his money and his lunch. I did ask that he ring me when he left home so I knew he was on the road (and could begin worrying). He’s 13.

It was a scheme dreamed up by his friends at school. This one mate worked out the plan and invited his classmates and then whoever showed up showed up. Four showed up.

They had a blast. Roaming Adventure World in a little pack. I asked Hugamuga:

“So is it more fun with there with his mates or his family” (we go every year for a work Christmas party)
“Oh with my family of course!”
“We’ll go anyway…” I say sagely.
“Definitely with my mates!”

Yeah right.

My heart was in my mouth. Sure it’s just a mum cutting another of the apron strings (guffaws of laughter from friends imagining me wearing an apron), another step towards independence… but it was a milestone.

Not that I wrap the kids in cotton wool. I’ve let them walk to the corner shop on their own for years. I encourage them to walk to school, to their friends houses. Hugamuga rides his bike to training on his own…

Two trains and a bus.

W00t.

The baby name wizard’s name voyager

Name Voyager is a fun web-gadget. You just type in your name and the wizard tells you how popular it’s been over the ages.

So my little family in order of number of times the name was used per million babies born today:

Cellobella!

Ranked in the top 25/1000 in 2006.

Then Hugamuga:

No 371 in 2006.

This is Groover:

Ranked 826 in 2006.

And finally Dippity:

Not in the top 1000 since the 1960s.

Emily is the most popular girls’ name in 2006, and for boys? Jacob. The lists.
Naming trends… did you know that hundreds of babies are named “Unique” in the US every year? Poor darlings.

Warning: This is a BIG timewaster!

The power of the itch

I’ve got an itchy foot. An actual itchy foot, not wanderlust. Or maybe it is wanderlust too? It’s just at the top of my left foot near where the leg starts but on the flat of the top of the foot… if that makes sense.

Have you ever noticed that if you start thinking about an itchy foot or somewhere else and you don’t scratch it immediately that all of a sudden other bits start getting itchy… like your right shoulder, the back of your left thigh where it’s against the chair, your head… And then you scratch your foot but it’s too late …your shoulder, thigh, damn now my chin niggles at you.

What’s going on?! It was just my foot one minute ago!

Does that ever happen to you?

It’s like when you hear someone talking about nits - that’s it! I’m scratching my head. Even if there is no, absolutely no chance of me having them, I’ve been living on my own in the desert for a month, no contact with children and my head is shaved anyway… suddenly it’s itchy.

Sorry. Are you scratching your head now?

That was just mean wasn’t it? But isn’t it true!!

It’s like our bodies are pre-programmed for suggestion… maybe it comes from when we were apes… I mean we’re still apes but when we were in the jungle picking lice off eachother… maybe it’s hard-wired into our DNA to scratch so that others will come over and groom us, pick the odd crawly out of our hair…

After all that saying “I’ll scratch your back, if you scratch mine” had to be based on something…

GROOVER! What are you doing? My back! Oooooooh darling that’s it… a bit to the left… ahhhhh.

What? You’ve got an itch where?

Isn’t it time for me to be putting on the dinner…

photo credit: belgianchocolate

Un-fayre

We’ve had 63 mm of rain in Perth today. The wettest start of April which more than doubles the previous record set in 1964. 90.6mm. W00t. Not good news for those promoting the second desalination plant in Binninup - always easier to get those things through when the dam levels are low, and not good news for those planning today’s Medieval Fayre.

Today I woke up at about 10am… I heard the sports guys on the radio going on about the rain and how it would probably clear by the afternoon in time for the clash between the Dockers and the Eagles and I rolled over and congratulated myself for taking the washing off the line.

I got up briefly. Made myself a coffee and crumpet and slothed back to bed and read a bit more of my (unexpectedly racy) novel.

A girlfried called and we chatted for awhile…

And as we were chatting, there was a knocking at my door…

Another friend had dropped by. I LOVE the drop in, although it was slightly inconvenient as I was as I say, on the phone and in my pjs. I made plans with my friend on the phone to catch up tomorrow, pulled on some jeans and went to see my visitor.

I had a lovely morning. We ended up going to Spotlight where I’m considering buying a sewing machine. Yes yes I know I’m not the world’s most obvious dressmaker and lets face it - do I really have the time - but oh those machines… I just love them. The fancy stitches which I’d never use, the LED lights, the bobbin racks and pull out accessories drawer.

I said to my friend… “Hmmm the NS10 only has a single needle. Do you really need the twin needle option?”

She said yes.

Sigh.

I got home eventually and as I logged online remembered that it was the day of the Medieval Fayre. Hey nonny nonny and all that stuff. Having watched Gladiator (isn’t that a surprisingly good movie?) the night before I was even ready to watch a couple of geeks in armour throwing a sword around. I was.

Pulling the kids in the car we headed off to the city. “Isn’t this exciting!” I enthused as we passed the statue in the river, today sporting a towel and beach spade… “Something new to do together!”

Yes, full of the joys of spring we drove until reaching Supreme Court gardens where we saw the remnants of the fayre packed up. Stacks of white plastic chairs (oh so medieval!). The odd scattered tent. Puddles.

It was only 3.15 and the Fayre was supposed to finish at 5pm. It was so unfayre!

We went to see The Spiderwick Chronicles instead. Which was fayrely entertaining movie.

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