Day 23: A Nature Walk

Monday, 13th April 2020

Weather: Cooler. Cloudy and windy to start with but turning nice and sunny again, even if still somewhat cooler.

Today we did some different things!

After poached eggs (and my first time making hollandaise sauce which turned out really good!) for breakfast, we had a chat via zoom with some friends. We played a game of 'Would you rather' together which was fun.

Then Isabella suggested we go on  a nature walk. Besides her  going for a run a couple times with Andre, she's not been out and haven't been asking even. She is very aware of the social distancing going on and always a stickler for the rules. She made sure to check with me that we really are allowed out for a walk and how long for and made sure to tell me to watch the time so we don't overstay our welcome outside our house!

A den which someone else built.

We had a lovely walk in the woods. She brought a bag to collect interesting bits in. And when we got home she created these lovely interesting pictures of imaginary animals.

A rare kungaberra

The rare gonga long tail

The rare gongo egg

The rare goat of Oonshee

A rare rabbiteen

All her own creations, I just handled the gluegun.

The rare lamerino

And we walked back through the allotments and admired the blossom trees.

We delivered a little surprise to one of her friends. No contact, we didn't even see them. Just dropped it by their door and Isabella sent a voice message to notify them.

Isabella and I watched a movie, The Greatest  Showman. We started watching it so long ago and never finished it so had to start from the beginning again, but again haven't finished it. We both love the music though.

We ended the day by having home made pasta for dinner. All Isabella and Andre's work.

Day 4: The sun is out to make us all feel happier

Day 4 of Coronavirus Stay at Home. This morning we even received an official text from government saying "New rules in force now: you must stay at home." No more just keeping your distance. Just stay at home.

So we joined Joe Wicks and the nearly 1 million other families at home to do today's PE session at 9am. It's a good workout that. Well for me at least! My legs were definitely aware of yesterday's session.

Then we did what we did after yesterday's PE session: had cake!

Late morning Andre played school with Isabella and they covered a lot of work. I was very impressed by his teaching skills! Big part of it is really also Isabella's eagerness to learn. While they were busy with school work, I did office work.

Andre gave Isabella a word each time to create a sentence with. Next we need to
practice joining ideas using 'and'.

In case you missed it, Isabella wrote the previous blog post all on her own. I just showed her how to add pictures, but
she did it herself. It took a while, so we need to work on speed.

Isabella and I spent the rest of the day in the garden- trampolining, blowing bubbles. AND we cleaned the greenhouse! I have been wanting to do that for YEARS! And it was so easy to clean actually. You can now see right through the (glass!) greenhouse to the other side! Seeds are getting more sunlight too. The glass was a yucky green before. I should have taken a before picture.

You can kind of still see the 'before' dirty glass to Isabella's right and the clean glass obviously to my left.

We're enjoying three meals a day TOGETHER now too which is lovely. Breakfasts aren't rushed, lunch we never had together before, and dinner we can start earlier, cooking together because we're less rushed to and from activities and Andre's commute is only a couple of steps now instead of 30 - 40 minutes drive!

I know this must be super hard for many people, especially those who had to close businesses and those getting really ill, but we are so thankful for all the good that is coming from this. Time to eat, play, learn and work together. And time to just be at home. It feels good not having to rush anywhere.

Toddler friendly banana bread

Isabella helped me bake a banana bread this morning. Usually I bake it in a muffin tray to have individual muffins for snacks but I made jelly in the muffin tray and not used it all yet. 

It's toddler friendly because it has no sugar. Not as sweet then obviously but even Andre declared it good enough. Here's the recipe from Jamie Oliver's website. 

And the best part of baking of course...

Coming home to a full veggie garden

The garden survived pretty well while we were away and with it being so hot. I picked eight courgettes yesterday evening and the biggest weighed well nearly 900g. The other seven aren't far behind in weight either. There are still plenty smaller sized ones which I've left on the plants as we've obviously already got more than we can eat!

I've been searching for all kinds of courgette recipes now. I've made these courgette cakes which were really good. Served them with a salad.

Last night I made a vegetable lasagne. Well, it had some meat in too in the end but lots and lots of that very big courgette you see in the picture on the scale.

Tonight I made chicken enchiladas with this courgette and corn salsa.

I've made courgette bread before, which is similar to banana bread, and I'm thinking of baking courgette muffins this weekend instead of the loaf and to then freeze them. I also found this recipe for courgette fries which I'm going to try.

I think Andre might not let me plant courgettes again next year after this season!

Christmas Eve & Day

Andre and I both still had to work Christmas Eve, me luckily only the morning, Andre had the late shift until 7pm. So we decided not to cook a big meal as we usually do for Christmas Eve but have canapés instead and cook on Christmas Day. Andre of course made us stay awake until midnight to open presents.

I bought him this t-shirt. I think it
matches his expression above!

Christmas Day we also spent at home. The girls cooking and the guys watching and giving instructions! Lots of good food and family time at home.

Checking on the roast potatoes and parsnips.

Made mulled cider for the first time and
it turned out so good!

Onion Goggles

My sister gave me these a few months ago. They're brilliant! At first I thought they just make me look silly, but they WORK! They have a spongy liner between the goggles and your skin so no onion eye stinging fumes can reach your eyes. I use them every time I need to slice onions now!

Quad biking & archery party

A couple of weekends ago we were invited to share in our friends' son's 11th birthday party. I baked the cake which we brought along on the day. The kids started off with an hour of quad biking followed by an hour of archery. 

After all the activities they were ready for snacks and cake.

The cake I made to look like the archery target.

And some chocolate and vanilla swirl cupcakes.

Chocolate cake as requested by the birthday boy.

What a fun party idea for boys. And the three girls who were invited did just as well as great!