There is a definite chill in the air, the tortoise is in at night and we have had our first few fires in a our newly refurbished fireplace. I've been feeling lovely and cosy and started to think its time to get the slow cooker out for stew and dumplings.
However in the meantime, I've been experimenting with making my own Chai tea. I have an addiction to the Chai tea Latte of a certain major coffee shop, but they are expensive and I don't like to give my money to the big shops, preferring local independent traders. I've tried various chai tea bags and powder mixes but none seem to be as good.
I was pondering this Chai today as I walked miles with babin in the sling, trying to encourage her to have a nap and trying to keep myself out of previously not mentioned coffee shop. I remembered my first taste of chai, it was at a music festival on the north york moors
Tuesday 20 October 2009
Tuesday 13 October 2009
Happier happy days
I love communicating with Babin, she has lots of ways of expressing herself - with giggles, cries, pointing and, for the last three months, with an increasing vocabulary of words.
Her favourite phrases at the moment are 'what's this?', 'read this?' and 'finish'. However, she also spends lots of the day chatting to me, very animatedly. but completely in words that I can't (yet!) recognise.
A couple of weeks ago she started saying what sounded like 'happy days'. A lovely sentiment, but it seemed to be a random phrase and not something I, her dad or anyone around us says. We spent a lot of time repeating it, trying to work out what she might be saying, trying it out with differnt inflections and tones but we were baffled. Babin also kept repeating it, seeming confident that she knew what she meant and that we'd get it eventually.
And we did. Inspiration, (and maybe improved annunciation on Babin's part) struck, she was was saying 'up we go', which is what I say when she climbs the stairs! Of course, happy days is now part of our everyday vocabulary, the first phrase we've picked up from our girl.
Round the same time that we worked out 'happy days', she started singing. This is just the cutest thing, (so cute I've been moved to tears at times, sappy mama that I am)! She mostly hums and sings la la but she sometimes sings 'happier, happier' to various little tunes of her own. It was during bathtime singing that we realised she was singing 'happy and' from 'if your happy and you know it'!
So, my beautiful little girl crawls around singing 'happier' and saying 'happy days', her joy is very infectious and certainly makes our days happier ones.
Her favourite phrases at the moment are 'what's this?', 'read this?' and 'finish'. However, she also spends lots of the day chatting to me, very animatedly. but completely in words that I can't (yet!) recognise.
A couple of weeks ago she started saying what sounded like 'happy days'. A lovely sentiment, but it seemed to be a random phrase and not something I, her dad or anyone around us says. We spent a lot of time repeating it, trying to work out what she might be saying, trying it out with differnt inflections and tones but we were baffled. Babin also kept repeating it, seeming confident that she knew what she meant and that we'd get it eventually.
And we did. Inspiration, (and maybe improved annunciation on Babin's part) struck, she was was saying 'up we go', which is what I say when she climbs the stairs! Of course, happy days is now part of our everyday vocabulary, the first phrase we've picked up from our girl.
Round the same time that we worked out 'happy days', she started singing. This is just the cutest thing, (so cute I've been moved to tears at times, sappy mama that I am)! She mostly hums and sings la la but she sometimes sings 'happier, happier' to various little tunes of her own. It was during bathtime singing that we realised she was singing 'happy and' from 'if your happy and you know it'!
So, my beautiful little girl crawls around singing 'happier' and saying 'happy days', her joy is very infectious and certainly makes our days happier ones.
Friday 9 October 2009
Roofs, rain and reasons
As you can see I have had a long absence from blogging, which is not brilliant considering I'm only a month in, however I'm back to pick up the baton and try again.
Urban Barefoot home has been more of urban barefoot hovel over the last few weeks as we have been subject to the mercy of roofers and floor-ers, neither of which have been particularly kind! To cut a long and painful subject short we now have a fixed flat roof but a leaking pitch roof, and beautiful carpet in the living room but bare hardboard in the rest of the house, which feels a little bleak!
While we wait for clear weather (and further funds), I have become a little overwhelmed by it all and hung up my cleaning gloves and lost any homely motivation. The guilt of such inaction was keeping me awake at night (as well as plotting creative ways to torture the roofer and stop it raining inside!) and making me a decidedly grouchy, unkempt and damp creature!
Yet, as always, there is a silver lining to every rain cloud (or multiple heavy rain clouds in this situation), in ignoring all my household chores I have spent a lot more time playing with Babin, and that is such an enormous pleasure! She initiates chasing games, reads me stories, plays peekaboo... not that we don't play together normally but often its fitted around the washing, hoovering, etc.
My inertia seems to be ending (hence returning to the blog), and the hovel is now more homely again but I'm definitely going to try to remember that the washing will wait.
But as she's in bed now, there's no excuse, so I'd better go put a wash on.
Urban Barefoot home has been more of urban barefoot hovel over the last few weeks as we have been subject to the mercy of roofers and floor-ers, neither of which have been particularly kind! To cut a long and painful subject short we now have a fixed flat roof but a leaking pitch roof, and beautiful carpet in the living room but bare hardboard in the rest of the house, which feels a little bleak!
While we wait for clear weather (and further funds), I have become a little overwhelmed by it all and hung up my cleaning gloves and lost any homely motivation. The guilt of such inaction was keeping me awake at night (as well as plotting creative ways to torture the roofer and stop it raining inside!) and making me a decidedly grouchy, unkempt and damp creature!
Yet, as always, there is a silver lining to every rain cloud (or multiple heavy rain clouds in this situation), in ignoring all my household chores I have spent a lot more time playing with Babin, and that is such an enormous pleasure! She initiates chasing games, reads me stories, plays peekaboo... not that we don't play together normally but often its fitted around the washing, hoovering, etc.
My inertia seems to be ending (hence returning to the blog), and the hovel is now more homely again but I'm definitely going to try to remember that the washing will wait.
But as she's in bed now, there's no excuse, so I'd better go put a wash on.
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