A Rainy Afternoon

Yesterday, I was on after-school and after-kindergarten duty. All I had planned was to provide the boys with much-diluted apple cider drinks and the wholewheat raisin scones I'd baked for them, late morning. After that, I thought I'd read from 'Stories for Six Year-Olds', six being the mid point between the Blue-Eyed Boy who's seven now, and Curly-Locks, who's five.

"Let's make an apple pie," suggests the Blue-Eyed Boy, who loves to bake and cook.

Hmm. Nana's pastry-making skills? Not brilliant.

"How about apple crumble?"

"Fine."

So we set to. He measures out the flour. Spills some on the table by mistake. Looks to see my reaction. When I chuckle, he does too, and looks relieved.

He rubs the butter into the flour, adds a small amount of sugar and then manages to spice it up with a sprinkling of ground cloves and cinnamon.

I prepare and cook the apples; he retrieves an organic lemon from the fridge, picks up the peeler and adds a little to give flavour to the apples. And into the oven it goes. Later, his dad phones to say the dessert was delicious.

But me, I remember one of the first times the Blue-eyed Boy and I baked together. After I'd shown him how to crack an egg and he'd dropped it into the mixture, he turned to me and said, "I love you, Nana."

And Curly-Locks? He enjoyed hearing 'The Old Woman Who Lived in a Vinegar Bottle' and 'The Gingerbread Boy'.

About birthing: two links

Inspiring!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-500430/Doctors-gave-20oz-baby-dead---I-saved-life-cuddle.html

and

http://www.mothering.com/community/t/1388640/reducing-fear-of-birth-in-u-s-culture-inspiring-ted-talk-by-ina-may-gaskin

Kids drinks

Recently I've seen and read on line quite a bit about drinks for children, and juice in particular. So I've been mulling this over. Here are my thoughts...

Back in South Africa when my kids were small we used to get juice from the dairy: apple, orange and guava. These were kept refrigerated and were made from fresh fruits. They contained sugar for sweetening. As far as the sugar was concerned, not too bad because it was cane sugar rather than beet. Then came the juices made from concentrated and deflavoured apples that had fruit flavouring added, but no sugar.

Choices... choices...

The thing is, children enjoy drinking juice and sugar is not always a bad thing. Moderation is always good! But if you're worried about giving commercial fruit juices and causing a possible sugar rush, here's a simple solution: get your child to make lemonade.

All you need is an old-fashioned simple lemon squeezer, some maple syrup and a lemon or two, depending on how many glasses you want to fill... or half fill. Cut the lemons in half and your small child will probably be able to squeeze them him or herself. Then all you have to do is add syrup, filtered water and stir. Voila!