Rainbow Friday

My daughter and one of my very best friends share a birthday. My daughter was 7 yesterday and my friend was blah blah blah years old. So big party yesterday for them both on what turned out to be a Very Good and Sunny Friday.

I asked everyone to bring a salad, I cooked a turkey and did the desserts. It all worked a treat. Easter egg hunts and egg and spoon race ensued and lots of chocolate consumed. Apologies to Mums and Dads who may well have been still trying to bring their children down from a chocolate high well into the evening.

I don't usually go in for fancy cakes but felt the need to make this one for my friend who was '21' of course:

Up a plane tree

There is a tree in the Midlands: a huge, old London Plane that is quite magnificent. We climbed it yesterday. My son, my daughter and my friend, we all climbed it and zip wired, zip-a-dee-doo-dah down.

It all started when my friend, D, decided that his partner should reclaim her childhood and climb a tree so he found a band of professional tree climbers who organise supervised climbing and booked for us all to have a go.

Off we went yesterday to Compton Verney, a beautiful old home which has been turned into an art gallery both inside and outside. It has grounds laid down by Capability Brown with lots of wonderful trees.

I am particularly proud of my soon-to-be 7 year old and my soon-to-be 9 year old for just getting on with it and climbing up there. My daughter had the most arduous route and had to negotiate a big big branch but she did it and has a tale to tell now. I did it too. It wasn't as scary as I thought it would be. I was concentrating too much!

Many thanks to Adam and Oliver of The Great Big Tree Climbing Company who made the whole experience possible. And thanks to David who when we decided to book it said "I've climbed enough trees in my time" and declined to book his place. He took all the photos but I think he did have a bit of a yen to do it himself. And thanks to D who gave us the idea and treated us to a lovely day out.

Have a go yourselves. Reclaim your childhood. You'll like it.

Stingless soup

Just made something I've wanted to do and been curious about for a long time: I made nettle soup at lunchtime. You need gloves to pick it, gloves on to wash it and cut it up but no gloves on to eat it. As soon as the nettles hit the hot stock the stings are no more.

A bit of seasoning and it is very tasty. So good, there is none left to take a photo of.

Nursery mania

You see far more on a walk than in a car. My friend and I did a new walk on Wednesday. We didn't drive anywhere. We just rambled from our houses. We picked up lots of rubber bands as we always do; found another plant nursery ( I have come to a conclusion that nurseries must be like buses - you wait ages for a local family run nursery to come along and then two pop up within a week of each other); stumbled across (not literally) a lovely wolf/dog mural and seen our local environment from a totally new perspective.

Get out there and walk.

Cardboard village

You think it's a cliché but it's true: give a child a cardboard box and they are in heaven. Yesterday we bought a new lampshade which came in a very big box.

The children came home from school, saw the empty box, commandeered it, redesigned it and had a new little home from home within ten minutes. There is a stern and all-knowing message on the outside instructing me, 'Do not shift this box'.

I will obey for a day or two at least.

Forty gaping winks

Oh dear a terrible faux pas befell me last Friday. I took C and H to see 'The Lego Movie' and I fell asleep twice. Well I like to say I snoozed. I think I got away with it the first time but was told loudly to wake up the second time by C. I think the whole auditorium heard him. I don't think I snored nor snoozed with gaping mouth but who knows? Well actually my son knows and he claims I was doing both.

C and H loved the film but I was a little bored until the last 20 minutes when a clever conceit was revealed at which point I took an interest and refrained from indulging in forty winks.

Ah embarrassing parents. I am one yet again.

Brush, tap, brush, tap

Over the years quite a few programmes on Radio 4 have done 'sound sculptures' : showcasing sounds that mean certain things to certain people. Noises are like smells and can provoke memories and evoke moods.

Brush forward, tap, brush forward, tap, brush forward, tap.......

I realised while clearing some debris from the front of the house the other day that this is one of my 'sound sculptures'. Brush forward and a tap and then a repeat. I was sweeping with a hard bristled brush. My technique being to clear the debris into a pile and then tap the brush on the ground to release any dirt that has got caught up in the bristles and then brush another pile and tap.

It took me back to mucking out time on my parent's farm. After the cows had been milked, the yard where they had congregated, waiting to be led into the parlour, had to be cleaned of cow muck. An orange bristled brush came out and brush forward, tap, brush forward, tap would ensue.

A sound made up of thousands of hard bristles rushing against the concrete to reveal a glistening floor and then a full stop to finish the sweep. A rhythmic sentence which was repeated and repeated. Part of this appealing picture was the wooden handled brush with a head of thousands of bright orange tensile hairs. To a little girl I guess it was slightly odd to see such a vibrant colour in an otherwise boring dull place.

It was a job well done. I might add it was a job I never did nor wanted to do but found it sort of fascinating. You started with a dirty yard and finished with a pristine glistening place, ready for the next milking time.

Brush, tap, brush, tap, brush, tap..............