Raising Amelie: Home

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23 Jan 2012

Lego. Stand Back

I had the joy and frustration yesterday in that I spent some time playing with my 'Architect' with those most famous of activity implements... Lego.

Oh the joy in having your little one so enthused in creating something special from these blocks of plastic, oh the frustration when Papa tries to assemble the different parts she has created to make a whole construction.

Yes, frustration. Why?

Well, through no fault of my 'labourer' I had what can only be described as "butter fingers" or the inability to realise that certain areas just may be overlapping a little too much thereby being somewhat heavy causing our structure to tip and collapse into a broken mess of tiny tiles. When this happened I was met by screams from my 'foreman' that I won't be getting paid anytime soon. After explaining that this Lego may be inferior to others of the same ilk I was allowed to continue assisting. Needless to say also destroying what was turning into some behemoth of a design.

You see, I think the last time I touched Lego was when I was in my very early youth and I seem to recall I wasn't much good at it then either. Must be the quality of the pieces as it certainly can't be my lack of understanding in the laws of physics and construction.

Ahh Lego, Lego, Lego, I suggest you get a professional or stand back! Now... where can I hide the bloody thing? At least my head honcho was delighted with my efforts or was it the peanuts?

30 Nov 2010

Scone anyone?

Today was my little chefs and her rather not so young apprentices' first attempt at making scones. How hard could it be anyway?

Some self-raising flour.. check
Plain flour... check
Milk... haha got that covered!
Butter... umm, will margarine do?

Well once all the ingredients were lined up we were ready to go, following a recipe from the internet.

Put the oven at 200ºC, easy. I had the head Chef lightly dust a flat baking tray with some flour or was that supposed to be the self-raising? No, no, plain flour ok... why not both?

Then sift, sift? 3 cups of Self-raising flour into a large bowl then add 80grams of butter, cubed. This is where there is a halt in production as the now confused Apprentice firstly needs to find out how many cups of margarine would be equivalent to 80 grams of butter, cubed no less, whatever that may be.

OK success after scouring the net for an approximation I discovered that 2/3 of a cup should suffice, me thinks. So in goes the margarine, low in salt in fact, and the fun begins as both the self-raising and faux butter have to be mixed with what will be, tiny fingers.

It said to mix these until it resembles breadcrumbs unfortunately after about 10 minutes it still resembled flour and margarine in bits, here and there. Not a problem! I'll add more 'butter' and flour as obviously they got it wrong, I know better.

Now with a little help from longer fingers we were getting the desired consistency. As I said, I know better! Phew!

I hadn't noticed at first but then, I saw that my child had changed colour. What was a fair child yet with slightly olive complexion seated before me, was now something resembling a Yeti. No wonder we had to add more 'butter' and flour as a majority of the flour had migrated on to la pâtissière's arms, hands, face and clothes.

Now, once I had had a laugh, we continued. It was time to make a well at the centre of the breadcrumb looking mixture and to that add 1 cup of milk. The only thing was every time I made a so called well my little dump truck refilled my hole. After the fourth attempt the apprentice mutinied. I took control of the bowl until I had the indent completed. It was then that I handed back the helm and Amelie added the milk and the fun started again, with hands at the ready we mixed until I realised there was a side note which was, to mix with a flat bladed knife, ( aren't all knives, flat bladed?). Well no wonder it was extremely difficult to blend as it was like glue sticking to our fingers and hands.

All under control again. It was getting there and we transferred our dough onto the flat tray. We commenced kneading and then we argued as to who would knead. I lost.

2cm thick the dough should be, Great! Where's a ruler? Ah found one. Cm not inches! I turn it around.
Next we had to use a 5cm (diameter) round cutter, cut out 12 rounds. Couldn't find one, will a fried egg holder thingy work? Of course, it's so obviously round and so what if it's 8cm in diameters. So what if it's 8cm.. oh! We got 6 scones out of our mixture instead of the 12 we were supposed to.

Oh well into the oven they went and the result...

I reckon they were Delicious, home-made Scones... and twice the size for the same price.

What do you think?

13 Aug 2010

Music

I heard a strange noise...

It was coming from my girl's bedroom...
I got closer, it got louder...
I peered into the gloomy room...

First to hit me was an odour...
Then the noise came again loud and clear.... it was my flatulent offspring.

"Wow, are you ok? That's quite a loud pootpoot."

Amelie responds as only she can, "My bottom's making Music!."

It sure was! It was so loud and going for so long it was like a Bach or Mozart Crescendo.

I let my Musician continue as I headed outside for intermission and some fresh air.

21 Jul 2010

It's my choice

Seated today at the kitchen table is my good self and my partner for this luncheon, a connoisseur of the finer foods.

I'm having today an excellent vegetable stew from the night before menu and my sous chef has a choice of either pasta with spinach and herbs or a plain pasta. And, I mean plain!

My restaurateur goes for the, you guessed it! the plain pasta but decides it's appropriate to have lashings of shredded cheese positioned delicately on top as it is more appreciative to the palette to have a dairy product enter your mouth first.

It goes without question that having the two ingredients together just doesn't work as my food critic not happy with the presentation has decided to remove the penne from her dish and place them one by one outside of her plate onto the table, thereby just consuming the cheddar.

Myself, being very aware at everything going on at a lunch after almost all of the penne has been removed from her dish, politely and casually ask,

" Why are you doing that? "
My arbiter of taste replies, " Because, it is my choice !"

Now? How would you respond?

As, the logic presented to me from a two and a half year old did catch me by surprise...

I, just kept eating.

Bon Appetite !

7 Mar 2010

Security

Children with dads who are involved and interested in their lives are more likely to feel secure, confident and happy. Spend quality time with them and as much as you can no matter how you feel about something else.

Enjoy what you have for it goes past so quickly.

3 Dec 2009

Apples

Amelie has had an obsession these last weeks.

I have been finding nibblings of an apple around the house; under the couch, under the TV stand, under her bed, in the clothes basket and in the dogs bowl. At first I thought it was the dog, but he couldn't be bothered quite frankly. Then my thoughts led me to think we had a mouse infestation.

Until I saw one day, these little pudgy hands reaching for the fruit bowl on our dining table. Grabbing a juicy fresh apple and casually walking away taking small bites, was my Amelie.

I followed. She walked to her bedroom, sat on her Dora couch, took two more small bites and proceeded to place the apple in the folds of the seat.

When that's accomplished, my omnivore headed back to the dining table to grab herself another Red Delicious, thats where I confronted her in my most authoritarian and all knowing voice,

"What do you think you're doing? Do you really think Apples just grow on trees? !!!"

A few days later... I'm still picking scraps up from around the house.

2 Dec 2009

stress relief

For me, having a child who hated being in the car, buying a portable DVD player has been a whole world of less stressful driving. Not everyone would agree especially when one forgets to purchase headphones. Doh!