Bacon and Black Pudding

Would you look at all that yoghurt???

I can't believe it's 2014! Where has the time gone?  So I've been back to the UK twice in the last month - not good for my carbon footprint but very good for catching up with friends and family.  And it was my friends who pointed out that the blog has been a bit quiet of late.....





So, I thought I would rectify this whilst sitting in Dubai airport where I have about 6 hours to wait for the flight to Dhaka.  With 6 hours in Dubai airport, what to do to keep busy?  Well -

(a) I've been on the phone to the kids:

"mummy, where are you?"

"mummy, are you on the plane yet?"

"mummy, where are you?"

"mummy, when are you home?"

and so on.

Peter has been in sole charge of the kids for the past 10 days.  I say sole charge, I mean overall charge, afterall we have help from the lovely Anjouna who is our 'ayah' and who, entertainingly for all (including Anjouna!) is about 5 inches taller than Isobel.  Will Isobel catch up her before we leave that is the question??

Anyway, it appears Peter (and his 'team' as he calls them) has done well, the kids are still alive and clearly, judging by the noise, very well!

(b) I've drunk some coffee

Quite a lot of coffee actually.  I'm on a mission to try to stay awake so that when I arrive in Dhaka I can fall into blissful slumber for the whole night through....I wish.

(c) I've pondered going shopping

And then decided against it.  I've decided to stay still, sitting quietly in my little corner.  Dubai is a funny airport, it's all modern and swishy but it's also one massive shopping centre and it's rammed full of people - at 3 am, 6 am, 9 am - basically all the time, all milling about the shopping lane!

(d) I've pondered my visits to the UK

We came back to the UK for Christmas - back to the storms and the rain.  The kids woke up at about 4.30 am for the first week.  It's pitch black outside, kids TV hasn't started and you're in someone else's house trying to keep the kids vaguely quiet.  Ah, what fun it was. They muttered it was cold, they wanted to go back to Bangladesh where it was warm (and then were most disappointed when we got back to Bangladesh and it was noticeably colder than it had been!).  We kept them very busy (I've added some links in case anyone is wondering what or where on earth these places are!):

• The Blue Bell Railway to see Santa - http://www.bluebell-railway.co.uk/
• The Mayfield Village Church fete, also to see Santa (he is a very busy man!) - http://sussex.villagenet.co.uk/mayfield.php
• The Panto - Jack and the Beanstork - Isobel was slightly overwhelmed by it all, Arty was just screaming 'he's behind you'
• Ashdown Forest to find Piglet (who was hiding due to inclement weather) - http://www.ashdownforest.org/home/index.php
• The South Downs and Beachy Head - to be blown away by the wind and watch the brave (or mad) surfing
• Emmetts Garden and Knole - to see our lovely friends and sample the joys of the National Trust teashop only to find they were shut - http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/emmetts-garden/
• The Windmill at Lytham St Annes - http://www.visitlythamstannes.co.uk/
• The Circus at BlackPool Tower - Isobel was transfixed by the acrobatics- http://www.theblackpooltower.com/
• The crazy dancing snowman display at Barton Grange - this time it was Arthur who was petrified (see below)
• Beacon Fell - to find the giant snake in the mud....- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Beacon_Fell_235-35.jpg

And of course, seeing family, eating too much and generally having a good time.

And now we are back in the Desh.  We stayed up till the wee hours on New Years Eve for the first time in 5 years!  No more sitting in our PJs and recording the fireworks for us, it's party time!  I have been back to the UK again and am now looking forward to getting back to the crazy kids (and the crazy dad!).  But being back in the UK gives you time to contemplate things, including things you miss and things you don't.  So here goes:

Things I miss when I'm in the Desh (apart from friends and family!):

• Frost.  OK, there hasn't been a lot of frost this winter by all accounts, but when I saw the frost one morning this week I was so happy. I love it.  Cold, crisp and frosty.  Perfect day for a walk.
• Walking.  Obviously I can walk in Dhaka - I walk to work, we walk out in the peri-urban space, but to really walk - walk along pavements or along the river in London, walk up a big hill, walk walk walk.
• Bacon and Black Pudding - oh, I do.  I really do.  I hadn't thought about it but then I had some at the fabulous Regency Cafe (http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurant_Review-g186338-d1986778-Reviews-Regency_Cafe-London_England.html).  Thank you Maggie for taking me there and thank you to the lovely woman running the joint and her '2 toasts for the lady.....tomato and black pudding for the lady' (we were the only ladies in there at 8am!).
• Oxygen.  There is oxygen in the air in London - it's amazing how you notice how much cleaner the air is, despite being a big city itself.  London should be proud - the air is pretty clean and the rivers have fish in them!
• Supermarkets.  I know, sad I know.  I did get so much joy from wandering around Waitrose though....just wandering, gazing at the ridiculous choice in yoghurts!

And things I love about the Desh:



7 Sisters Country Park - beautiful

• The lack of requirement to wear 50 layers in winter - and then get too hot when you go into a shop or onto a bus and have to take them all off! Not having to bundle the kids up in so many clothes to go outside.  Lovely.
• Attempting to speak Bangla and seeing such smiles on peoples faces - and they have time for you to help you learn!
• Cycling to work in 5 minutes
• Not having to get on the Tube or a Train or a Bus to get to work....
• The help and support we have which means we can spend so much more time focused on the kids when we're not at work - it just wouldn't be possible in the UK
• .....and finally, the ever so slightly dodgy DVDs which enable us to keep vaguely up to date with the HBO hit series....and the Disney Princesses!

 

 

The sun is shining!!!

Yes it really is! So much rain and now a day of sun...and apparently it's going to be sunny tomorrow!  It might just prevent the development of webbed feet but only just.

Isobel has been on good form this week - it's so lovely when she is like this.  It makes finishing the happy pills so much easier.  I am due to take my last one tomorrow! Can't believe it.  They have been a lifesaver I think.  I was so scared of taking them and now I suppose part of me is scared of coming off them completely - although I don't think they are needed any more.

So, why has she been on top form? Well, I don't know.  Maybe because it's not been quite as tediously wet (yes, I know 'we need the rain' - but why can't it come at night and then be sunny in the day? I mean, surely that couldn't be that hard?).  We went to the lovely Wisley on Wednesday - I've not been for ages and it didn't let us down, despite the rain.

On the way there, stuck in very slow traffic on the M25, she chirps 'I don't like this road Mummy.  Can we go on another one to Wisley?'.  If only I think.  But we keep going - helped by never ending rounds of 'eye spy'....which goes something like this:

Mummy: I spy with my little eye, something white
Isobel: No pink.  I spy with my little eye something pink.
Mummy: Your jumper
Isobel: My turn. I spy......something white.
Mummy: The lorry....my turn...
Isobel: No, me. I spy....

And so it goes on - we have green (grass or trees), black (steering wheel), blue (coat) and that's about it.  So we repeat.

The game was briefly interrupted by me getting over excited listening to Heart as someone finally guessed one of the voices and won £5000! I couldn't believe it.  It's been going on for months! How my life has changed - excited by listening to Heart FM.

At Wisley we had even more of a laugh - not only did Isobel ruin everything she was wearing jumping about in muddy puddles (let's be honest - there are lots of them!) she then declared that 'odd' was her new word....and so had lots of fun going up to people and telling them they were odd! Mmmh, not something to be encouraged perhaps but really quite entertaining.

Anyway, back to the happy pills.  Yes, I come off them tomorrow.  Last weekend I felt quite wretched.  Really tired, upset stomach, no appetite, grumpy and so on.  Peter was convinced I needed to go back on the pills.  I wasn't as convinced.  I think it might be PMS.  Anyway, I am now on a new regime - the running has died down a bit (partly because of the weather, partly because of long working days for Peter which limits my time to get out) and so I have been reading about PMS and what might help.  As a result I feel like a pill popper:

- Vitamin B complex (for B12)
- Iron
- Evening Primrose Oil
- Calcium and Magnesium (I've cut down on milky coffee in a vague attempt to cut the pounds - both the spent ones and the weight ones!)

Seems to have made a difference - but it's probably all a placebo effect.
 
The week has ended well - all the sunshine today, out on Box Hill (where the Olympic road cycling will take place) having a picnic in the sun which was lovely.   Let's see what happens when the pills stop!

I want to mix with mummy

Well, the bagels were a hit - relatively healthy too (until the butter and the jam!) - not sure about 'the crumb' though (I really must stop watching the Great British Bakeoff!). Isobel as per always wanted 'more please'. About a kilo of flour made 16 bagels all in all, so pretty good really and having purchased a little chest freezer they could join the pureed mush for Arty (who I reckon really wants steak and chips rather than never ending milk!).

Left the kids with Peter yesterday. He's off with work for a bit so I thought he would appreciate his first day in sole charge! Apparently he was complemented by many for being brave enough to venture out with two and no female supervision! No one seems to complement mums when they go out with two - and the toddler melts down, collapses in the middle of the car park and screams 'no car, no home, no mummy, no daddy'......

I headed up to Borough Market in the sunshine to examine the massive piles of brownies and meringues. The bloke at the meringue stall hadn't tasted the meringues - very disappointing as he couldn't really tell me how gooey they were inside. I mean he works on the stall. Seems rude not to have tasted the produce. On the train on the way up there was a guy in a kilt and I'm still wondering if he was baring all under it given the facial expression of the woman who sat down opposite as he propped his leg up! Wandered down the south bank past the beach huts which were randomly on display and headed to the lovely Charlotte Cave in Clapham Common for a wig chop - much to Peter's delight didn't come home with pink hair which is what Isobel wanted. Charlotte is great. One of a kind.

Very happy to see kids this morning. Arty rolled over a few weeks ago but since then has clearly thought 'well, been there, now what?' and we haven't seen any more rolling, despite the hours spent lying on the floor waving rattles and plastic giraffe at him to encourage some movement. Amazing how much time you can spend hiding, crawling about on the floor pretending to be a lion or a bear just to get this giggles over and over again. Did something to my back this morning entertaining Isobel jumping up from my hiding place to wave my hand in the air like we just don't care as she shouted 'again mummy, again'.

The particularly lovely weather we've been having this summer basically meant a day inside with kids and Peter. Kids going slightly nuts being stuck indoors, like mum really! So we got Isobel to help stick stickers on Arty's wall. Got some great stickers (this website is great for stickers and other stuff for kids) - Isobel didn't quite get the idea to stick them individually and not one on top of the other but never mind! When she woke up after her nap she declared she wanted to 'mix with mummy' so we spent the afternoon making jam sourced by hubby on a foraging trip (he reckons he was like Bear Grylls?) and then a twist on Jamie O's plum bakewell (from Jamie at Home) made with damsons which exploded all over the oven but tasted great! She particularly liked eating raw dough (kids are so strange!) and beating the eggs and telling mummy to 'just sit there mummy'. I think we have a bossy boots on our hands!

Off to London tomorrow to see the eye. Must get that double buggy off eBay.