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Here comes the sun! 

by with 4 Comments PersonalPhotographyUncategorized
After a rainy few days the sun decided to show his face at the end of this week, so we headed out to the park to meet up with friends and have a run around.  And Rhys hit a big milestone while we were there – he worked up the courage to go down the fireman’s pole!  He’d been building up to it for ages, and so badly wanted to do it, so he was really proud of himself when he managed it.  He must’ve done it about 20 times in a row once he’d mastered it!
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Nerys is so keen to keep up with the bigger kids, she gives me mini heart attacks now and again trying to do things she’s not quite ready to do!  I’m much more relaxed when she’s safe on the swings!
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Luckily for me she’ll sit quite happily on the swings for quite a while, before she gets bored of it and wants to get out and run around again.

I do love our local park and we spend a fair bit of time there when it’s dry.  The children have a good play at the playground, then we tend to wander over to the other side of the park where the duck pond is.  It’s a nice little routine that I think we’ll repeat many times this summer!

 

TWTWC
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Oy with the poodles already

The alphabet project – U is for Up (too early!)

by with 6 Comments PhotographyUncategorized
Nerys is going through a really fun phase at the moment.  It’s the ‘it’s 5.30am and I’m wide awake and ready to start my day’ phase.

Fun.

So my mornings have been fuelled by multiple cups of coffee and made easier by watching taped episodes of the Gilmore Girls.  Early starts are definitely more bearable with the Gilmore Girls.  I’ve seen all the episodes so many times now it’s just really comforting and familiar to watch.  And it’s provided me with some great quotes, including the classic on my mug.

Oy with the poodles already 

There’s just something so right about watching the girls while drinking tons of coffee!

I’m not the only one still watching this show am I?!

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Encouraging children to be themselves

by with 14 Comments ParentingPersonalUncategorized

I’m a strong believer in allowing my children to be themselves.  Hell, not just allowing them to be, but actively encouraging them.  If my son wants to play with the dolls house then that’s great.  My daughter wants to push cars around and crash them into things?  More power to her!

As my son moves towards starting full time school I’m acutely aware of all the new pressures he’s being exposed to.  In the last few months he’s started talking about boys toys and girls toys.  We’ll see an advert for a toy and he’ll say to me “That’s for girls, isn’t it Mummy?”.  I do wonder where this has come from and find it slightly unnerving that he’s able to determine that a toy is for a girl, presumably just from the way it’s marketed.  My normal response is to tell him that anyone can play with the toy if they want to.  I would hate for him to miss out on discovering talents or interests just because the related toy or activity is ‘for girls’.

The thing is, since he’s started half days at nursery school he does seem to be learning about what is socially acceptable and may well already be feeling a bit of pressure from his classmates to play with certain toys.  I don’t want him to get teased or left out because he wants to play with a different toy, but, even more so, I don’t want him to hide his true interests just to fit in.

I want him to have the self-confidence to own his interests and his choices.  I’m hoping that by encouraging him to be himself at home, this confidence will grow.  I want him to trust that he is safe at home to play with whatever interests him, to watch the tv programs that he finds enjoyable, to wear whatever clothes he feels comfortable is, to express his feelings openly and to just be his true self.

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I really hope that providing this sort of ‘safe’ environment at home he’ll learn that it’s ok to be himself and I think this will have several benefits for him as he goes through life:

  • He’ll find friends, and later partners, who like him for who he really is.  Yes he can act differently to fit in with the ‘in crowd’, but he’ll never feel fully comfortable with them.  If he’s just himself he’ll attract people who he genuinely fits in with, who’ll understand him and love him quirks and all!

 

  • His self-esteem will grow even more.  It’s like a self-esteem circle – the higher his self-esteem, the more likely he is to be himself and attract friends who like him for who he is and knowing his real self is liked and appreciated will raise his self-esteem even more!  On the other hand, if he pretends to be something he’s not to try and fit in, he’ll feel like the true him isn’t worthy of knowing and so his self-esteem could potentially plummet.

 

  • He’ll be generally happier.  If he lives his life authentically, being true to himself, he’ll feel a sense of peace and happiness that will just elude him if he spends his days trying to be something he’s not.

I really feel that you have to spend the time to get to know the child you’ve been given.  They really are born with their own unique set of interests and their own personality.  It’s not up to us as parents to try and mould them into what we want; it’s our responsibility to embrace who they are at their core.  We have to let go of our own desires for them and realise that they are their own people with their own desires for their lives.

On a side note, my son isn’t gender non-conformist, but this article still spoke to me on so many levels about allowing our children to be themselves – 12 things every gender nonconforming child wants you to know.  Well worth a read.

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Masks

by with 14 Comments QuotesUncategorized
Last week I wrote a post about the things I want my children to say ‘yes’ to as they grow up.  One of the big ones for me is that they say ‘yes’ to being true to  who they are, to embracing all their quirks and really just being themselves.

As I was writing that part of the post all I could think of was this poem by Shel Silverstein:

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I came across it ages ago and pinned it straight away.  I just love it so much, even though it actually makes me feel quite sad.  The idea of two people searching for each other, but missing out on finding one another because they were both hiding their true selves just breaks my heart!

I do think the poem has an important message though, and one that is ultimately uplifting – we might feel like we’re the only people who look a certain way or think a certain way, but unless we own it and show it to the world then we’ll never find the others out there that are like us or that are looking for someone just like us.  So whoever you are, just be YOU, be the most you that you can possibly be!

Cuddle Fairy
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A bank holiday outing 

by with 6 Comments PersonalUncategorized
Over the last year or so I’ve had various people telling me that they’d taken their kids to ride on a miniature train at a place in Derwen Fawr, Swansea.  It sounded like so much fun and I knew Rhys would love it, so on bank holiday Monday we finally paid it a visit.
It’s such a random place!  From what I could see, when trying to find information about it online, they don’t advertise the place at all, they don’t seem to have their own website yet the whole of Swansea seems to know about it!  We were there not long after 11 and there was already a queue to ride the train.  There was a lovely, community atmosphere though, with children and parents milling about, chatting and drinking coffee from the little kiosk.

Rhys was so excited when he spotted the train, he kept running around trying to get a closer look at it.  He was fab though, as soon as I explained that the people standing in a line were actually queuing to ride the train he ran over and waited so patiently until it was our turn.

When we did get to climb on board, well, I think I was as excited as he was!  You sit astride this little steam train and go round the track at a pretty decent speed!  It even goes through two tunnels – so much fun!

I’m a bit gutted that I didn’t manage to get any photos of us actually on the train, but we all went on together and I just didn’t get the chance (well, I didn’t want to risk dropping the camera as we whizzed around!).

We’ll definitely be heading there again on the next bank holiday weekend though, so I’m sure I’ll get my chance to get some action shots then!

I’m linking this post up with the ordinary moments.

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Slow cooker jacket potato recipe

by with 16 Comments RecipesUncategorized
I feel a bit cheeky calling this a recipe really, because it’s just so simple.  But, it does seem to be one of those things that people just don’t know about/haven’t thought about doing!
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I love using my slow cooker, even now that I’m at home with the children during the day I still prefer to have something cooking away in it and being able to relax a bit knowing that I’m not going to be rushing around in the evening trying to make something.

Now, I know that jacket potatoes aren’t particularly tricky or stressful to cook in the oven or the microwave, but I do still find those methods a bit of a faff!  I don’t think I’ve never actually done them in the oven and I always get annoyed when I microwave them because you get the nasty spot on the bottom that’s just hard and horrible.

So for me, being able to do them in the slow cooker is perfect.  I pop them in the in the morning, prepare toppings in the afternoon, then they’re all ready to serve at dinner time!

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So, how do you go about cooking jacket potatoes in the slow cooker?  Easy peasy!

  • Get some foil or baking parchment and scrunch a few pieces into balls and put them in the slow cooker.  You want enough to cover the base.

 

  • Rub a bit of oil, salt and pepper into the potato skins.

 

  • Wrap them in foil.

 

  • Put them in the slow cooker, on top of the scrunched up foil/baking parchment.

 

  • Cook on low for about 8 hours.

 

  • Remove and top with whatever you fancy – we normally go for tuna mayo, beans and cheese!

 

  • Enjoy!

That’s really all there is to it.  A few things to note though:

  • As is the way with slow cooking, the skins won’t be at all crispy, so if that’s important to you then you might want to either stick to oven cooking them, or cook them this way then pop them in a hot oven for 5 minutes to crisp them up.

 

  • You really don’t need to add any water to the slow cooker.

 

  • I’ve never pricked the potatoes and they come out great every time.

How do you like your potatoes?!

Cuddle Fairy
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The alphabet project – T is for Tiny

by with 2 Comments PersonalPhotographyUncategorized
I’m still quite new to this whole blogging malarkey, and one of the things I’ve been really enjoying is finding and joining in with various linkys and blog hops.  I’ve been finding them really useful for giving some structure to my blog and for giving me some inspiration if I’m not quite sure what to blog about next!

I’d been thinking that I wanted to join in with some photography-based linkys so was really happy the other day when I came across PODcast who hosts a couple of different photography linkys every week.

So I’m jumping in with the alphabet project and making my peace with the fact that I’m starting at the letter T rather than A (which the perfectionist in me would prefer!).  The first word that came to mind that starts with T?  Tiny!

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Nerys is 15 months old today and far from tiny – she’s right at the top of the height and weight charts in her red book.  Which makes me a little bit nostalgic for when she looked like she did in this photo!  She was a month old when I took it and time has taken on that strange quality where it feels like so long ago that she was this tiny, but at the same time if feels like the past 14 months have flown by.

She is so busy and so entertaining these days; I’m absolutely loving this stage.  But I do miss those tiny baby days!