I’m not renown for my house keeping skills. I’m not renown for my cooking. In fact, when I suggested the other day that we’d bring cake to the Beans house for our Bonfire Night get together, there was some apparent consternation while various members of the gathering tried to work out whether they had all slipped into an alternate universe where Merry bakes.
Obviously, what I meant when I said “I’ll bring cake” was “I shall deputise cake baking to my husband and daughters and THEY will bake and I will bask I the glory which is their talents when we get to the party”.
This had a the dual effect of us turning up with cake I had had a *cough* hand in and it not being remotely my fault that the cake didn’t really rise 😆 Delia has taken the blame for this; the jury is out – I think they’ll have to cook up a few more cakes before I’m convinced it as her recipe to blame 😉
I do like having daughters, and husbands, who know their way around the whisk and cooker although I have yet to train the other female members on how to do the washing up. Max might say he has yet to adequately train me in the proper use of a dishwasher. Personally, I say that if you’ve reached a point where you wash plates before you load them into the kitchen slave replacements, then you’ve reached a point of white goods worship that is a step away from madness, but there you go… what would I know?
One thing for certain though, our small but perfectly formed fridge is more than adequate for the amount of cake the house possesses, because the 6 of us here can consume our body weight in the stuff inside of about 30 seconds. The thing that makes me yearn for the olden days when we had a bigger refrigerator is the total lack of room to attach magnetised garbage to the front of it. When we moved to this house, we dumped our tall fridge-freezer and pledged to bow to the inevitable truth that in a house full of children, the amount of food purchased is entirely irrelevant – you will, regardless of the length of the Tesco receipt, still be out of fruit, biscuits and cheese two and a half days before it is time to go shopping again. We came to the conclusion that we’d live with regular consumables purchasing in return for the single extra flat surface in our otherwise apparently entirely ‘planned without thought’ kitchen that a low level fridge would provide.
In short (very short, waist height!) we downsized.
And that’s been okay. It’s okay until this kind of thing happens.
First Europe moves on to the side of the fridge – I don’t mind that, it’s educational and we like maps and hey, while I’m not all that convinced that they really will learn to match the European capitals and flags and countries just from this one single piece of magnetised learning opportunity, but you never know. (Last I heard, they were playing a game where the flags were teachers and the words were school kids and the map was the classrooms… they are their mothers children, it seems!)
However.
Today, just as we were about to leave the house, one of them looked at the book I was clutching and asked who Bill Bryson was and what exactly was his book about? I was (being a home educator who can still grab an opportunity by the neck and wring it to death!) only too happy to explain about his trip around Europe and the books he writes. I expected them to do the usual sidling away and begging me to stop talking at them routine…. but oh no! THIS time they wanted more. This time they wanted a project. This time, may the gods save us all, they thought collecting artefacts from around the house and grouping them around the magnetic classroom of Europe might be a good idea.
The polar bear (don’t ask!) is just the tip of the iceberg. Forget needing larger white goods, I think I just kissed my kitchen floor goodbye for good 😆
Michelle says
Liking this post.
Debbie Ellard says
(being a home educator who can still grab an opportunity by the neck and wring it to death!)
I love it. Jonny actually tells me when he is losing focus now when I go on.
JillM says
Sounds fun. More kitchen’s should have a polar bear, I feel.
Ruth says
Rofl at this. Isn’t it always the way, the stuff you think is a no hoper becomes the next big thing LOL. At least it isn’t the British Empire, like here . Swap you 🙂
Rich says
haha, i totally approve of the bear placement. Incidentally BB is also the chancellor of my alma mater!
Pippa says
Bill Bryson? Love him, shook hands with him at my graduation. I always run out of ham within a day of buying it…..it’s one of my fridge weaknesses. i.e. if I know it’s in the fridge I have to nibble!
Sarah says
“the usual sidling away and begging me to stop talking at them routine….”
Oh that is soooo familiar.
Leslie says
Love Bill Bryson!