OUR NEW KITCHEN

When we went out looking for a new kitchen 6 months ago I was looking for a white one, and Thomas seemed to be looking for a wooden one but when we saw IKEA's high gloss red we decided it was time to be daring rather than boring. Having ordered it all we took colour samples for the walls and nothing seemed to go except the most boring of whites. Somehow in a moment of madness we convinced each other green would be unusual. After we started building it, I really really wasn't sure, and lay awake trying to work out how to paint white between the units. Last night I took this photo of Charlotte who had baked a Halloween cake all by herself. And do you know what? When I saw her against the green wall with the dark red in the background, I finally decided I actually like our wacky kitchen!

PANIC SELLING???

One Ring to find them
Originally uploaded by Kyrion

I get the feeling we've reached the panic stages of this credit crunch where people are acting without thinking... I was out shopping today - Thomas and I needed fangs as we are Mr and Mrs Vampire at a Halloween party for 3 year olds tomorrow. Wandering around East Kilbride shopping centre, a sign in the jeweller's window caught my eye. Buy one get a second one half price! I looked down... diamond engagement rings. Sure, during a recession there are probably fewer people getting engaged or married as it is quite an expense so you probably need to do something to draw in the customers. I do think 20% off or suchlike might have been more useful however. I mean - what is the bloke meant to do with the second one? Keep it for a future mistress if the marriage doesn't work out? Give it to the current girlfriend to wear every second day? Maybe sell it on ebay - It's unused, honest! Maybe he could take 2 girlfriends along together, to save him time ring shopping... I think someone hasn't quite thought this selling policy through to the end point! It made me smile though.

PORRIDGE WITH SYRUP

Porridge with maple syrup
Originally uploaded by LondonBrad

I had porridge when I was a primary school kid - Ready Brek (remember the ad with the kids going to school with a glowing red line around them?) to be precise - but I hadn't had it since. I was traumatized by my old Gramps once asking if I wanted some one Saturday morning and delving in to the bowl unsuspecting and gulping down a revolting salty spoonful. He didn't realize youngsters ate it with sugar, I didn't realize oldies ate it with salt - yeuch. So for 28 or 29 years I avoided porridge till last year.
One morning I got into the office and was hungry. I mailed Thomas to ask if he had any fruit or anything and he replied he only had syrup porridge sachets. I was revolted but starving. I poured it into a mug and covered it in milk. I microwaved it. The texture made me queasy. The sweetness reminded me of the salty experience. Yeuch. I avoided it for another year.
Last week I was freezing one morning when I got up and what did I see on to of the fridge but syrup porridge sachets. I gingerly attempted a spoonful. It was warm and the texture was less alien this time.
Every morning since I have come down in the cold and reached for the porridge rather than the cornflakes. Porridge is actually quite nice, when Gramps is no longer likely to sabotage it with salt (but don't tell Thomas - I slagged him off for weeks for buying such a revolting snack). My kids of course have never tasted porridge because I never bought it so when I offered them a taste of the gloopy oats they wandered off muttering that looks sick under their breath. I wonder how long it will take me to convert them to warm winter cereal.

THE MEMORY SPAN OF A TEN MONTH OLD

Scrambled eggs + hash brown + bacon
Originally uploaded by lynac

I first made Anna some very delicious cheesy scrambled eggs when she was about 6 months old. She loved it. After that she had it fairly often, maybe once or twice a week. One day she had a bad cold so I gave her it as it was easy to digest. She projectile vomited for the only time in her life ten minutes later because of excess catarrh. Since that day she has stared out every plate of scrambled egg I have offered her in a vaguely offended or even defiant manner, without even licking the spoon. Coincidence or memory?

THE ADVANTAGE TO SLEEPING WITH FOREIGN NERDS

Two oclock
Originally uploaded by rodneylibraries

Thomas and I were lying hugging in bed on Saturday night in the dark. We have a very cool (if nerdy) radio controlled digital projection alarm clock. As if by telepathy, as often happens between Thomas and I, we had the same thought at the same time: given Anna gets us up a few times some nights and at least once every night, then there was a chance we'd be up at the point in time when the clock reset itself automatically for British Winter time. That would mean we would see whether it counted backwards, or simply changed back one hour. Simultaneously, as I said Wouldn't it be cool if we were awake at 2am? Thomas said Wouldn't it be cool if we were awake at 3am? Weird! Who was right? We checked wikipedia - we both were - the UK changes to winter time at 2am, Denmark at 3am. I had always assumed everyone did it at 2am, he had assumed the same of 3am, but of course we have to all shift at the same time for the time difference to stay the same - it is so obvious, but I wouldn't have learned it from hugging a fellow Scot. Even more interesting in wikipedia is the fact that despite this being seemingly the only obvious way to do it in retrospect, the States does it differently - with everywhere switching at 2am locally, thus completely knocking out time zones all over the country temporarily, and in Australia they don't even change on the same day. Suddenly Europe seems to be the only sane place to live... did I say suddenly???

A SIDE-EFFECT OF THE ICELANDIC PROBLEM

Sunset in Iceland
Originally uploaded by Deivis

I hear today that Icelandair is cancelling its regular Glasgow to Reykjavik route for the duration of the winter because of the decline in value of the Icelandic krona. Big deal, I hear you say. But, what you might not be aware of, unless you, like me, have worked in a Glasgow jewellery shop over the Christmas period, is the enormous amounts of money Icelanders pour into the Glasgow Christmas economy.
As a student I worked in the not very interesting H Samuel over Christmas. Tall vaguely foreign people who spoke an almost accentless English would come in by the planeload on a daily basis throughout November and December and bulk buy gold chains and bracelets in particular. You could rest assured that if the woman in the furry hat wanted 12 or even 24 expensive gold chains, the credit card she would tender would have a strange surname ending in dóttir. I think this latest problem will cause a bit of a shock ripple around Glasgow this festive season.

SIX DAYS WITHOUT A WASHING MACHINE!

We just had six days with no washing machine - a combination of changing washing machine, changing kitchen and changing water pipes. I tried to make the kids eat breakfast in their underwear so pyjamas were wearable for more than one night, even in the under 5s. I tried to ban all muddy outdoor sports in the rain all week and still this was the pile that amassed. Approximately 10 washing machine loads! We've had the new one installed now since Saturday afternoon and I'm still washing! How exciting is my life? (Thank god they invented the washing machine by the way - can you imagine 100 years ago with 10 kids and no washing machine (and no tumble drier) on a dreary Scottish October day!?)

DELIVERIES

Nancy (France)
Originally uploaded by michellefouineur

What is it about delivery people? First of all that nonsense about we can't pin it down to less than a 12 hour window... bullshit! Someone is drawing up a schedule of when the truck is leaving Comet or Ikea or whatever and if they have an ounce of common sense they'd draw up a route serving the places nearest followed by the others in the vicinity.
Yesterday we ordered a washing machine from Kitchen Science and they said it would come between 7am and 7pm today. Ho hum. But this bunch took the biscuit - they rang us on our mobile phone at 7am and told us This is Kitchen Science, just to let you know we will pin your delivery down to this afternoon between 1pm and 5pm, thought you'd like to know in case you wanted a lie in! A lie in??? - you just bloody phoned us at 7am on a Saturday morning!

EATING ÆBLESKIVER

Danes can be a wee bit eccentric at times. Thomas made pudding the other night: æbleskiver: literally apple slices. Apple slices turn out to be ball-shaped sweet pancake dough with no apple in. Lovely... but an odd name if you ask me!

THE WORLD FROM CHARLOTTE'S PERSPECTIVE

drawing
Originally uploaded by PhylB

The other week Charlotte drew me and her siblings freehand. I thought it was interesting from a perspective point of view. She knows Marcel is nearly my height - I'm 160cm, he's 148cm. She has always seen herself as the same in age and capability as Marcel so she drew herself the same size, more or less, despite the 29 month age gap and 24cm height difference. She plays a lot with Léon at the moment because he can walk and talk so she's also drawn him more or less the same size, despite the 5 years and 8 months age gap, and the 24cm difference in height. Anna, on the other hand has been drawn tiny as Lots hasn't realized how big she is as she crawls to get around and doesn't speak yet.
Knowing Lots is a real nerd, Thomas wrote down our respective heights (180, 160, 148, 124, 100, 75cm) and asked Charlotte to do a scale drawing. She was very surprised by the outcome.

UNBEATABLE BANZUKE

I live in a madhouse. Marcel and Thomas are sitting on the couch together clapping, whooping with excitement at the biggest piece of Japanese nonsense I have ever seen on TV. I have seen people from 13 to 59 (so far) running across a bridge made of sponge dominoes and falling on their heads. This was followed by people who seem to have volunteered to complete an assault course on pogo sticks, though it has not occurred to them that practising, or indeed even trying a pogo stick before going on air would have been a reasonable course of action. I knew I was right last week when I said John Logie Baird should have spent his spare time inventing something quite different... (It's on Challenge TV - Sky channel 125 - for those of you who haven't got a life)

A WET BOTTOM

Sorry, I have no photo to upload with this plumbing update.
Come through and sit at the sink, he said, while I turn back on the water. Be prepared to shout very loudly if there are any leaks.
So I sat at the new sink and the water was duly turned back on, no leaks - how clever...
I'll just try the new tap, he said.
Does the water filter need to be attached before you use the tap? I asked
No, I doubt it, he said, turning it on.
The freezing water in the tube where the filter is still to be inserted of course shot straight out in between my legs soaking my not very dignified Little Miss Naughty pyjama bottoms in the process. It is a good job I only use the pyjama bottoms for sitting around the house and not for sleeping in because there is no way I could wear these tonight!

PLUMBING

Plumbing
Originally uploaded by PhylB

Thomas was showing me today how easy plumbing is. Anyone who knows me, knows I am a reasonably capable DIYer between my murals, my plastering and my tiling skills but plumbing is something I have never tried. Given my old Gramps was a plumber, I just used to invite him for a cup of tea if I had any plumbing requirements in my first flat. After he died I always used professional plumbers till I met Thomas. He explained to me that plumbing really is just lego for adults (that you eventually make water go through). I don't know why I was surprised it was easy, given my old Gramps wasn't the most sober of people and still managed his job fairly successfully!
So today we've been moving pipes from the old kitchen, soon to be TV room, into the new kitchen soon to be functioning kitchen. How exciting! Thomas has assembled a very fancy tap with built-in water filter, and moved the complete drainage system into the new room. I've been going around at his back with expandable foam filling in the old holes to the outside to stop the local mice from moving into our nice dry old kitchen. Expandable foam is fun!
Apart from it not being too difficult, I am quite alarmed at the time it is taking. At nearly 11pm on Sunday we now have all the drainage working in kitchen number two but no water coming into kitchen two. We also have water in kitchen one but no drain so we can't use the sink, the dishwasher or the washing machine. I have to conclude that we are likely to be starting the week with two kitchens but no water... how do I keep six people clean, and six sets of dishes per meal clean with no working water?

COFFEE TIME?

Karen and Phyllis
Originally uploaded by viralbus

I was reading yesterday that women who drink a lot of coffee should be aware that it could adversely affect their breast size... bloody hell - I wonder what my boobs would look like if I was a tea drinker? I'm away to make another double espresso!

ANYONE FOR WALKING?

Thomas and I were sitting on the couch watching the news when Anna crawled over. She pulled herself up to standing, then let go with one hand and bent down to her left to pick something up from the floor. She didn't fall. With her confidence boosted, she decided that tonight was going to be a night to learn to walk. She then proceeded to walk and then sprint from one end of the living room to the other over and over holding Thomas's hands and laughing wildly. Oh no!

WHAT NOT TO NAME YOUR BABY

When I was pregnant with Anna, Thomas bought this book. We had a great laugh wading through it in bed every night. It contained obvious no-nos like Adolf and Fanny but one I don't remember whether or not it contained was Brett. Brett isn't a name that would have crossed my mind as an obvious taboo but today I had a visit from a teacher friend (who shall remain anonymous). She has a child called Brett in her class. Apparently on no less than 5 occasions she has accidentally called him Brat when shouting at him to behave in front of his classmates! Oops... Freud would be proud of her!

IN A TUBE

Dad took this photo of Charlotte yesterday. Immediately I remembered I had taken exactly the same photo 4 years ago in the same park. I took a look at them side by side to see what changes half her lifetime has brought. The hair is more or less the same colour, though longer. I think the most striking difference is her face. Gone is the puppy fat, the cuddly chubby four year old face has become longer, thinner, and more grown up. My little girl is becoming a young lady.

SORE FACE UPDATED

Ice cream
Originally uploaded by PhylB

Léon had a follow-up appointment at Yorkhill today. He has been using an anti-inflammatory cream called crystacide now for about 6 weeks. I can still feel the little fatty lumps under his skin but it does seem slightly improved, if only in so much as he has stopped scratching it, which means he has stopped bursting the skin, and therefore stopped causing it to scab. The consultant says she feels the improvement is significant enough that she wants to continue the crystacide for 6 more months in the hope that it might clear completely, going on the assumption that it is an inflamed patch of infantile acne. She has however warned me that if the inflamed area has calcified, we may be looking at a permanent lump even if it is not visible on the skin's surface.

OOPS

Yesterday in the Botanics there was a display of approximately 50 types of apple. Given we are trying to grow apples at home we decided to have a look at the different varieties. Each plate had a card telling people the name of the type of apple. Léon was a good 20 steps ahead of us. Imagine our horror when we reached the head of the table and realized he'd collected in all the name cards for the right hand side of the table and stacked them up at the end. Arg! Thomas quietly put one card in front of each plate and we made a very hasty exit. I'm sure half of Glasgow is now down at Dobbies ordering the wrong tree, oops!

BAGPIPES

Bagpipes
Originally uploaded by Stimpdawg

I was in the West End today with Léon. As we passed Òran Mór, a wedding party was being piped out. What's that? Léon asked. It's bagpipes, I informed him. He thought quite seriously about it, looked up at me and said Bagpipes is too annoying a noise for me! God, Pudge, you hit the nail on the head there...