A photo only blog post

United Airlines Bangladesh - complete with dead cockroaches inside the windows...but we took off and landed and are home safe.

A passenger boat crossing the Padma

At the start of the great Bangla run....13 miles in 30 degree heat.  Only 1 toenail lost

And the winners - clearly managed it far faster than me!

A birthday cake for a 3 year old boy - guess what is was meant to be (and name the book!)

Sorting rubbish by the side of the outflow from the Dhaka water pumping station - designed to help keep Dhaka dry(ish) during the monsoon.

Want to vote?  Pineapples, inkwells, swans - all for elections and all to support people who can't read or write

Thai 'hot wheels'.  Brilliant.

Poo sticks.  Literally.  For fuelwood.

And back to United Airlines.  

A slight interlude – gulping the cake down!

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The Gulper!

I’ve been in Tanzania.  ‘How glamorous’ people say.

If only they knew.

This time I was looking at sanitation programmes.  In case I haven’t said before (and I know I have), 2.5 billion people don’t have access to adequate sanitation.  Poor sanitation, hygiene and dirty water contributes not only to diarrhoea, respiratory infections and so on but has also been shown to be linked to stunting in children under 5.

So, anyway, there I was in Tanzania when I came across the Gulper for the first time.  The Gulper.  What a brilliant name.  It’s up there with the arsenator (well, ok, not quite).  The arsenator being a tool to help monitor arsenic levels in water (arsenic is a massive issue in the Desh).  The Gulper is, I think, a WaterAid innovation and in this case we met a bunch of women who had set up a group to try to help improve sanitation provision including by supporting better emptying of the pits!

Moving swiftly on from such a serious note (albeit a very important one), I’ve been contemplating airport cakes.  Contemplating them in terms of their diversity, colour and also my ability to stop my children wanting to eat them all!  It started earlier in the year in Yangon when I saw some delightful bright green cake.  If only I’d taken a picture!

Well, time has passed and my visit to Tanzania has introduced to me to some new delicious looking items.  So, I’m going to start documenting airport cakes!  And then perhaps I can focus down on Isobel and Arty’s favourites – after all, they are about to come widely travelled, so why not widely test the cake varieties!

Below we have some examples:

(a)  Not strictly airport as it was take in a restaurant in Dar Es Salaam.   I think this cake looks OK and quite edible.  No scary colours.  But then again, no pink icing and sparkles!  Not sure it would get the kids vote:

 

(b)  Dar Es Salaam Airport.  It was hard to find cake here.  However, I eventually found a few pieces….not especially appetising it has to be said:

(c)  Addis ‘Bole’ Airport.  Cake was proving hard to find.  At first I thought we would have to make do with a picture of the cake menu but then there it was – cakes, pastries, more cakes.  In fact, a very good selection and one which I thought the kids would enjoy!

The return of the night

I hoped never to have to write about it but here it is. The return of insomnia. One week so far, most nights, last night particularly bad. The valerian tea didn't seem to work but then again I have no idea how long it takes! It's really getting to me. I know you have to break the cycle but I just have this memory of the insomnia that went on for months after Isobel was born. I'm scared its some form of PND returning whilst also wondering if my thyroid levels blip they picked up a while ago bit then said was fine is really to blame. Mmmh.

I was going to write this last night bit its a bit tricky as we have our nephew staying at the moment. So not really anywhere to go as the young, they like to watch tv till late and then he's in our spare room. I've wondered whether the trigger is that there is someone else about. Someone else making noises that my annoying mothers ears pick up on. Why is that? Why do you hear everything once you have children, even through industrial strength earplugs?

I know I am not alone in not sleeping but I feel very alone and very trapped in the middle of the night when everyone else is zonko. I need to find a new routine which works without having a spare bed to go to. The advice is contradictory. Stay in bed and deep breath. Get up and go somewhere else to deep breath. Read a book. Don't read a book. Watch tv. Don't watch tv. And so on.

Isobel came into our bed last night at 4 am apparently. I heard her on the stairs whilst sleeping on the spare matress in artys room.  She doesn't normally but she has a bad cough. Funnily enough though I worry about precedent and habit. Will she start wanting to come to bed with us all the time etc. I found myself thinking about sleeping pills, herbal remedies and the like and my concerns with taking them, addiction, habit forming etc. I think maybe I am over analysing? I have now found the sleeping pills, ready for tonight if needed.

On a happier note, it was like something out of a scary film this morning when Peter woke me up whilst deep in slumber and dreams. I forgot where I was and turned round to find arty standing up in his cot looking at me! I was momentarily scared.

So my battle for better sleep will start anew. And in the meantime I will keep baking! We made a Danni fine Jamie Oliver chocolate tart last weelend, you could eat the mixture raw from the bowl in massive mouthfuls although health and safety would no doubt have a cow with all that raw egg! And we made Jamie bread which was great and the best bread I've made for agrs as it was basically a brick.

Isobel and I made malt loaf (health health) this weekend and, inspired by the bake-off also made some fondant fancies. We ran out of delicate pink rose water flavoured icing though. Instead we mixed the old blue and yellow and developed a whole new Halloween treat - the incredible hulk fancy!

Rain rain go away....

The current inclement weather is reminding me of October rather than June! Not helped by the howling wind.  I felt sorry for the poor Queen last week on her boat - out there in the rain and then the sun came out for the concert and all that hula hooping by Grace Jones (did she have some sort of magnetic belt to help keep it up?).

Isobel and Arthur had a lovely Jubilee weekend.  Isobel was obsessed by the Aldi Facepaints (£1.50 - bargain....luckily it didn't peel her skin off either which was a slight concern!).  She even painted mummy and daddy with some red white and blue!  We were in Preston for the Jubilee - and it rained and was cold.  But then again it was cold and wet everywhere!  We dragged the kids to some Jubilee event which was moved indoors and had a particularly depressing band playing - not an upbeat song was played which didn't help the weather!  Isobel went to watch the dogs doing some form of dog show but they were frankly hating the wind and rain as much as everyone else and refused to jump over their jumps!

But, stiff upper lip and all that, we weren't to be put off!  A hog roast sarnie was had (good crackling) and Isobel jumped about on a very wet trampoline and then promptly came home and made some bunting - very Blue Peter!  Pretty good don't you think!

All in all a good weekend, lots of cake, lots of dancing, lots of bunting and balloons.  Oh and a trip out to the pub without any kids! God bless the long weekend.

A to Z of North Norfolk.....

Now our holiday is over, I thought I would try to capture all the highlights in an A to Z. What isn't in here is the agricultural bits and bobs auction we went to on the way home (to come.....very bizarre) and the wonders of the maclaren buggy. North Norfolk - recommended for all I think, couples, families and everyone.

Here goes:
A is for apples which were of the exciting varieties; and austerity measures which were in full swing with homemade picnic every day and eating it outside whatever the weather even if quite cold and really windy;
B is for beaches of which there are many, including Holkham beach which is apparently voted the no. 1 beach by readers of Coast magazine (led to many a discussion in the car on the virtues of a more interesting beach with cliffs and wild shorelines and memories of the photographer we met in Wales who declared pictures of sunny beaches were sp boring and it was much more interesting to tie yourself to a rock in a storm and snap away....); and Blobs; and Burnham Market; oh and birdlife which is really quite apparent here in Norfolk

Norfolk Blob and some sticky date cake!

C is for cake of which we have eaten quite a bit of, our favourite being sticky date cake from grooms bakery; and for Cley on Sea which was lovely and home to some smoked fish as well as a long walk out to the beach; and churches - never seen so many in such a small space
D is for dunes which have tested the maclaren; and for dinosaur as there were lots of toy ones in our cottage which isobel had great entertainment with; and Deepdale Cafe which gave arthhur and Isobel their first experience of a full English (ok so arty had weetabix and isobel porridge....with blackpudding and sausage as you do)
E is for the eerie noise with wind made at Brancaster beach;
F is for farmie (aka farm shop) as there are loads, though some of them cheat a bit and have nothing that local to speak of; and for fish which we ate and which was yummy;
G is for Gun Hill which is apparently a very high sand dune though we couldn't find it; and for gifty which we looked in nut didn't find anything to buy....Norfolk living requires you to buy a bit of driftwood for £500 by the looks of things
H is for Holkham which has a lovely long beach and a country park with deer and lions (!) and massive scones;  Hunstanton where kites were purchased and the Hoste Arms which was not worth the money.

Holkham beach

I is for intrepid Isobel who wasn't afraid to run into th sea on her own and wants to climb on the big girls and boys climbing frame; and for 'I don't want that/to' which seemed to be the new phrase for our toddler
J is for Joules shop which sells tweed coats for children at £75 a pop
K is for kite and kite flying (not sure if this was for Isobel or for dad.....)
L is for local beer and topples which we tried, including Nelsons Blood bitter (dark, flat, slightly spicy) and Nelsons blood spiced rum from the Lord Nelson pub which to be honest tasted like a cross between benilym and mouth rinse.

On the left is the famous blood rum!

M is for the marvellous maclaren; the mad woman who wanted to look after arthur and of course, those Peppa Pig favourites, muddy puddles
N is for narrow gauge railway from wells to Walsingham which was great fun and highly recommended (as are the bacon sarnies which you can get from christine's van at the start); and for nelson, admiral of the high seas, who was born at Burnham Thorpe just round the corner

O is for orange sky which we saw a lot of in the evenings as we had good weather and it really showed the birds up as they flew en masse
P is for pink footed geese which is apparently what we saw flying each night to their roosting grounds; and for pavlovs dog as Arty seemed to demonstrate a real understanding that if you wipe his face after food it means there is no more and queue the crying 'I want more'
Q is for Queen who wasn't in at sandringham; and the q of cars trying to park at holkham beach when we had our heatwave
S is for sandringham and scones (with cream and jam of course); and sea lavender cottage which is where we stayed and would be recommended; and snail as in snails pace which was the average speed of Isobels walking (until we discovered bribery with muddy puddles)

Part of adventure playground at Sandringham

T is for Titchwell where there were lots of twitchers who didn't look top kindly on our descriptions of dicky birds; and time off thanks to Dawn who looked after the little ones to let us go out one night
U is for umbrella whch wasn't needed until the last few days
V is for VW campervan at sandringham which was called PeppA and HMS Victory of course.
W is for Windmill - there were lots, although much to Isobel's disappointment they weren't pink (Cley windmill is particularly nice); and wind which almost blew Isobel away
X is for eXicted which is how we all were almost every day
Y is for yacht and Yurt which was the name of a restaurant we wanted to try but it was closed
Z is for Zoe zebra from Peppa pig......and nothing to do with Norfolk!

Body Shop at home (with 10 toddlers)

Yes, so I hosted a Body Shop at Home party today. Was chaos but fun. 10 toddlers in total. Isobel (who seems to have dropped her sleep at midday - she just lies in her cot singing twinkle twinkle really loudly!) was a little tired and slightly overwhelmed by all the visitors. There were products to test, tea and cake. Peppa pig went down well. As did the vic sponge (can't beat a vic sponge with buttercream and jam) and some raisin and carrot muffins (from Annabel Karmel and vaguely healthy as they have wholemeal flour and carrots!) and the yummy scones Mrs Wonky Pocket made.

So what did I learn about having a party with toddlers:

•  toddlers (well, Isobel) like to stick their hands in the body shop creams and wipe them all over the floor 
• Peppa Pig biscuits lead to a sugar high..... 
• you have to be very careful with the cups of tea....I made myself a few and didn't drink any of them!
• the house looks like a bomb has hit it 

In summary it is ideally better to have an evening one with no children and lots of wine!

Been making a pudding for tomorrow night when we are having Mr and Mrs Wonky Pocket round for some Sichuan heat! Thought I would make something cooling. Will post something on this after the meal as the pudding so far tastes yummy! In fact I've eaten so much of it whilst making it that a) I feel sick and b) am not sure how much will be left. Definitely not one for small fry.

Wild Wisley and herbaceous borders

So the Great Bake Off was all about pies - I was quite excited by some of this meringue pies, especially the swirly ones with raspberry or whatever it was.

Anyway, took Arty to Wisley to meet a friend the other day. My mum would laugh - what next? First there was sewing and now there is the RHS! According to my health visitor, gardening is apparently being prescribed to women with postnatal depression. The garden itself is lovely - quite inspiring and relaxing too.  If only my herbaceous borders looked as lovely as theirs - unfortunately I don't think the people who work there would be willing to come and sort out our garden for free!  They also had some sculptures on display - I think the ones of the birds were about £2,000 if you have some spare cash to buy them!

They have a kids play area in one of the caves and an outdoor play area with wooden sculptures and a place to build wigwams (see below)! The cake isn't too bad either - try the coffee and walnut.

However, the challenge was the journey to Wisley which was anything but relaxing - what is it with lorries on the M25? It's like they come out of the Clackett Lane services and crash or topple over! Then they put up those flashing '40' signs....but what they should really say is '2' given that that is about the speed you go! Luckily Arty was quite happy sleeping. Isobel took great delight I feeding arty last night - she was particulary good at trying to get him to eat the spoon.

The neighbours dropped off some pears early yesterday morning, said they needed cooking. So as we're due to spend quite a while in the car this afternoon and Isobel and I went out for lunch (very nice quiche we had too!), I made some pear muffins. Last time I made muffins they ended up like bits of flapjack - this lot seem better!  I found the recipe on this website and adapted it slightly - it's apparently a healthy muffin recipe.....

Baking with toddlers - attempting the pistachio cake

Today, given it's a day of rest, Isobel and I decided to do some baking. We tried to recreate the pistachio cake from the other day. Found a few recipes online which varied quite a lot but we decided to use polenta in addition to flour and used two sites as the main basis (for info, the two main sites which used polenta were this Australian one and this Franco-Irish kitchen one).

The whole process was another lesson learning opportunity for things to watch for when baking with toddlers (although it might just be baking with Isobel!).  I will share these but here goes the recipe and some photos of the process:

1. Mix 50g plain flour, 50g polenta, 1tsp baking powder with 200g of ground pistachios (this gave me a great opportunity to use a new bit of my lovely Kenwood - the multimill - Isobel however found the noise 'scary mummy')

2.     Melt 100g of butter and add 120 ml olive oil.

3.     Whisk together 3 medium eggs and 200g caster sugar until fluffy (and if a toddler, stick your fingers in and eat as much as possible while mummy isn't looking!)

4.     Then add the olive oil/butter mix and whisk, and finally the pistachio/flour etc mix.  Whisk it all together.  Eat a bit more.  Then add zest and juice of one large lemon (we used a lemon that was too small so the flavour could be a bit stronger) and some orange if you like.

5.     Pour into a greased and floured tin (23 cm diameter gives a good depth cake) and bake in 160 degrees for 40 - 45 minutes until it comes away from the side but is still moist in the middle.

6.     Let it cool and dust with icing sugar.  Eat.

We all had a slice when Peter got home - and it was yummy so would strongly recommend it even if you have to watch for toddler fingers!  Don't you think it looks just like the one in the pub picture?

So what further lessons did I learn about baking with Isobel apart from the obvious things like not letting her near the oven and keeping sharp objects out of reach? Well, firstly she likes raw egg, and raw flour, raw sugar, raw polenta, raw anything really.  She should probably be quite ill! Secondly, she loves pressing the button on the electric scales - so you move rapidly from g to oz and back again and then all of a sudden all weights disappear and you're back to zero! So no accurate measuring.  Thirdly, the accurate measuring is made even harder as she goes on to 'test' the recipe straight from the bowl, especially lumps of butter.  And my last lesson learning from this baking session is that she tries very hard to fall off the chair she is balanced on by jumping up and down with excitement shouting 'ready, it's ready' when the beeper goes off on the oven!

All in all a good day.  Topped off with my first run in ages - slow but steady.  Role on the 10k next year (!>!)

Cold tea and beautiful cake

It's been a very busy week. I have lost count of the cups of tea and coffee I've half drunk and then been called away by a little voice wanting 'mummy help'....only to find cold tea waiting for me. One of the nicest things about having a bit of time to yourself on the rare occasion that it happens is that you can actually drink a hot cup!

I met my friend from the Messy Cake Company on Thursday at Clavering which happens to be in Essex - clearly I didn't bother to look at the map before leaving and just headed off following the signs and wondering what county I was in....mmh, should have laid more attention in geography.  Anyway, it appears that the pub we met at - The Cricketers - is owned by Jamie Oliver's parents. The give-away was in the number of Jamie related books and mags you could buy.

Had a beautiful pistachio and olive cake for pudding - was really really yummy.

Anyway, Arthur was being good as gold until the pudding came out - reckon he wanted a taste and was not happy that I wouldn't give him any! Clavering itself was quite pretty too - didn't realise there was so much thatching going on in Essex! Here is a picture of the cricket pavillion:

More manic mornings on Friday and Saturday trying to get both kids fed, watered, bags packed etc., in time to participate in some activities which included a visit to Ashford to see a friend, the designer outlet place and Wye Nature Reserve.  Clarkes have a great electronic foot measurement machine which Isobel was desparate to go on but she's still too small apparently! Tantrum followed. Being without Peter makes me wonder how single parents do it! But at least I don't have to cook in the evening - no man in the house means I can eat cheese on toast without a voice saying 'where's the meat?'.

Happy pills - reflections on post natal depression

First trip to London with both kids in tow - was much easier than I thought it would be. Isobel kept asking 'where we going mummy?' with a slight welsh accent which was a tad strange.....but she loved the train - maybe it was my attempt at talking about Ivor the Engine which got her welsh accent going?

Anyway, had some time last night to reflect on the past few months - I was diagnosed with PND about 2 months ago when the insomnia I had after Isobel was born returned with a vengeance. I feel that PND is still something which isn't really talked about - it's only now that I've been quite open about it that others have come out and said they had it too. I found the lack of people to talk to about it made me feel that I was going mad so it's a great relief to talk to others and I suppose one reason why I'm writing this as I hope that others might gain from my sharing of how it's impacted on me. The doctor eventually prescribed some happy pills (Peter says he wants some as he can't believe the difference!) after a really bad week whe. I just cried randomly for no reason in the cafe down the road (and was looked after by two lovely women) and then had a wobble in the car going home. I never thought it would happen to me. I thought insomnia was just a normal part of being a mum but my health visitor (who is great, unlike the one where we used to live who said I was starving Isobel cos I couldn't express much milk!) did the PND test and said I had it. The pills and just talking about it have really helped. That and the advice to garden or do things to give that sense of accomplishment (like bake.....and maybe some exercise to burn off the calories!)! I can't believe how awful I felt just 2 months ago and am thinking about how things like garde ing, sewing etc might help more people with depression. Some good PND resources can be found below:

• http://www.netmums.com/pnd/About_postnatal_depression.298/
• http://www.rcpsych.ac.uk/mentalhealthinfoforall/problems/postnatalmentalhealth/postnataldepression.aspx
• http://www.pni.org.uk/index.htm

Anyway, on a lighter note, had coffee with my friend at Canteen on the southbank and a yummy chocolate and beetroot cake (which is odd as I hate beetroot, but this was very yummy - all sorts of recipes I've now found - here is one found on a blog) which led to the first major toddler tantrum of the day as she wanted to basically eat every cake in the place and was most put out when I said no! Arty ate his baby rice with typical gusto and exciment (that stuff reminds me of wallpaper paste - bring on the organe mush of carrot, squash, sweet tatty and so on.....clothes will remain white no longer) and we had a lovely walk back to London Bridge. I thought Isobel might sleep in her pushchair - but no, it was obviously all too exciting and after I pointed out the cows on the roof at Borough Market, everyone on the train was treated to old McDonald sung by Isobel and on a loop for the journey home!

Meeting my friend from the Messy Cake Company on Thursday. Looking forward to it - wonder if I cam change te weaning process to involve a red velvet cupcake or something? Weaning, Great fun.