Becoming Domestic

Our friend Janet popped in to see us yesterday which was lovely as we hadn’t seen her since before the Christmas holidays. As usual she passed on all manner of fabulous gardening and cooking knowledge and before long had the children outside ‘helping her’ take down a wire fence from our vegetable garden to use next door (Janet is the reason we have the veg patch as it was her very dear friend Emmie’s until she passed away last summer and Janet had gardened it for many years) and to find the box of beetroot I’ve stored in the shed so she could make some more beetroot chutney.

This visit we learnt how to chit potatoes properly. Thankfully I had opened the two enormous bags of seed potatoes and had laid them out on trays on top of the piano in the unheated front room just the night before her unexpected visit. What I didn’t know was that there is more to just plonking them out on a tray, why some varieties are called ‘earlies’ and others are ‘main crop’ and when to plant them into the ground… Janet told me everything I needed to know & here almost word-for-word is handy description from the Royal Horticultural Society:

Choosing and chitting seed potatoes

Choosing

After dry summers seed potatoes supplies may be shorter than usual. You might not be able to get the cultivars (varieties) you want if you wait too long before buying. Seed potatoes tend to be available from garden centres and from mail order suppliers from January.

Avoid using ware or eating potatoes as there is a risk that you will be planting virus-infected tubers that will give a disappointing crop. Tubers you have grown yourself are also likely to carry disease.

Certified seed sold by seed suppliers, garden centres and DIY superstores is guaranteed to be virtually free of pests and diseases.

Chitting

Once home, seed tubers are best ‘chitted’ or sprouted. Unpack and lay the tubers out in a single layer in a tray with the ‘rose’ end uppermost. This end has the most eyes or buds and sprouts will arise from these. Some suppliers offer ‘pre-chitted’ seed.

Keep the trays of tubers in a cool but frost-free place with at least moderate light, such as in an unheated room. Direct sunlight is best avoided. Sprouts will form within a few weeks. The tuber is therefore ready to grow away as soon as planted. Tubers can be laid out to chit from January onwards, but planting should be delayed until March in sheltered and southern areas or April in less favoured districts. Earlier plantings can rot in the ground or the shoots can be frosted off on sharp nights. By this time the sprouts should be about 5cm (2in) long and dark coloured. Longer thinner sprouts are caused by excess heat or too little light or both, and tiny sprouts suggest conditions are too cold. Chitting takes about six weeks.

If the weather is unsuitable for planting, tubers can be left to chit further, even into May, without too much loss of crop.

What a great start to the day - Bealers got up before me and got the kids breakfasted (rare which makes it even more special when it happens!) while I snoozed on unaware that the day had begun. He brought me a nice cup of coffee about 20 minutes before he had to leave for work (he is a lucky man as has 10 minute picturesque stroll to his offices in Upton) and he opened the curtains of the window directly opposite our bed. We call it ‘the t.v.’ (as in ’shall I put the t.v. on?’) as is a great view which changes with the weather, seasons, time of day.

Today I was greeted by the lovely sight of our neighbourly buzzard (at least we think its a buzzard) with a couple of pleasant pheasant friends ambling around beneath him. I was pleased I happened to have my camera in the room with me but alas the zoom feature isn’t great so what I captured isn’t what I saw…

Our little ones celebrated their 4th birthday this weekend. On the big day itself we all had a great time and marvelled at how they have grown so much in four short years. They had a huge stash of cards and presents to open (thank you, thank you so much to all of you reading who sent them something it was really fab watching them open beautiful cards and great gifts), we had Grandma and Grandad Bob come up for the day from Bristol, had “very very very special treat fish n chips” for lunch and then attempted to feed the not very hungry ducks at at the nearby village pond (this is what the kids said they really wanted to do for a birthday treat lord love ‘em). Grandma bless her had brought along a cake so we did candle blowing (twice of course) and generally had a rip roaring time with a load of balloons all round the house.

Bealers mysteriously took Morris ‘Out, to do something nice for Eden’ halfway through the morning. When they came back Mo was carrying a big bunch of lovely tulips / daffodils for his sister and Bealers had bought a huge bouquet for me. Good Beale Boys (and especially lovely Bealers for bringing your boy up to know that us girls kinda like that sort of thing)!

On Sunday we had further celebrations with our first ever proper party which was held at our house. I had put quite a lot of thought into which games would be fun for seven children ranging from 2 years to four and had a scribbled list with potential timings to include musical cushions, musical bumps, pass the parcel and a nice quiet memory game with lots of small objects placed on a tray and covered with a pillow case. We only managed one round of pass the parcel as it soon became obvious the party posse was much keener on mild anarchy & mayhem based around the contents of our playroom. In the end I put the stereo in the playroom with ‘Pop Party 3‘ playing & left them all to it while all the mummies and daddies enjoyed grown up nibbles in the kitchen.

The kids did however enjoy the birthday tea and cake.

Now this is exactly the sort of thing I hoped to see more of when we left London 7 months ago to start our new green, thrifty and environmentally aware life here in the West Midlands - a heron on the local duck pond at Hanley Swan (so is it officially a swan pond?).

According to my new chum who lives opposite the pond the handsome heron chap in the picture is actually a bit of a nuisance to anyone with garden ponds (she has two) but I like him and was happy to see him as I came out of the post office.

Annoyingly he was much closer to me than this picture BUT I was so excited about the fact that I actually had a camera with me (thanks Bealers for my lovely handbag sized Xmas present) that I dropped my purse and shopping and scared him off to the other side of the pond!

Incidently Hanley Swan is the setting of my favourite book of last year ‘Black Swan Green‘ by David Mitchell. I’ve lent it to all and sundry and they all agree it is a top top read. Get a copy from your local library for a slightly dark yet slightly lovely coming of age tale set in 1980’s middle England.

Our kids were taken to Bristol Zoo Gardens by their daddy’s relatives. I wasn’t mad on the idea of looking at caged animals but I had no idea what a wonderful place the zoo is for families a huge oasis of amazing gardens in the centre of Bristol.
We got to learn about all sorts of animals, very often from inside the many warm, dry areas built under sea lions tanks or in the dusk-dawn section. They really have spent a lot of time and cash making sure there are loads of things to do even on the wettest coldest day of the year.

We all had a great time and vowed to become members as it is so near to Nanna’s house we could just pop in for an hour or two whenever we fancied (*and* there are no cow pats or doggy doo-doo to worry about!).

I now love the way we can learn about all kinds of amazing animals at such close proximity - we spent a very long time gazing at the aquarium full of coral reef fishies with all our favourite Finding Nemo characters represented and reading about what species they are and what they like to do…

I’m putting this list together as a reference tool as I often forget the things the whole family likes to eat. The girls in this house will eat anything put in front of them (especially salads and things made from chick peas) but the Beale boys are a little more discerning…

At some point I’ll type the recipes that we use out.

• Pork and cider casserole
• Crudites, crackers, dips, cheese and ham
• Curries
• Roast dinner
• Meatloaf, mash, broccoli/cauliflower cheese and peas (any left over mash, caul cheese and peas can be made into cauli-cheese burgers when mixed together and coated in breadcrumbs)
• Sausages
• Spaghetti & meatballs
• Hungarian goulash
• Home made pizza using the breadmachine for the dough
• Poached chicken and vegetables
• Lamb stew/Lancashire hotpot
• Veggie sausages in a roll with fried onions
• Noodles with clear chicken broth and thinly sliced veggies (pepper, chilli, onion, mushroom, brocolli)
• Falafels
• Baked potatoes with houmous; cheese and homemade coleslaw, cheese and baked beans
• Potato wedges
• Risottos (actually that’s a lie as its only us girls who love rice)
• Omlette with ham, onion, tomatoes, mushrooms and cheese
• Chilli con carne
• Tomato, bacon and cheese pasta
• Tortillas with cheese, pepper, onion etc inside heated on a frying pan

We started messing around with our new vegetable plot this last weekend by digging overa couple of square metres and planting a couple of different varieties (artichoke for roasting and silverskin for general cooking) of garlic in the patch where potatoes were grown last year by Miss Dennly. We planted about 30 cloves each about 10cm deep and approx. 10-15cm apart.

Apparently it is best to plant garlic in the autumn but we missed that. I also read that the winter solstice is tradtionally the day for planting garlic.

The garlic will hopefully be ready for harvesting in Autum when the leaves have turned yellow.

I’ve just been given a long list of top tips from my friend Pip who is the hostess with the mostess (thanks Pip!) and I thought I’d jot them all down before I forget them to use for our twins’ 4th birthday next weekend when we’ll have eight 2-4 year olds to entertain. I’ve managed to get away with not hosting a kids party so far but it’s time to do one.

1. Have lots of balloons blown up & music playing when the kids arrive so they can all get partying as soon as they arrive.
2. See if local toy library has any disco lights to hire as they’ll love that and use music which isn’t too babyish - 4 year old kids really love pop music
3. Play games such as musical bumps, pass the parcel and musical cushions
4. Have hot food as the kids enjoy hot party food (she suggests homemade chicken nuggets & smiley potato faces)
5. Balance out the fast food by having crudities (carrots, celery, cucumber and tomatoes) on hand with seedless grapes dips and bread sticks
6. Have the table lookng really nice with some grown up plates and a pretty tablecloth as they’ll all appreciate being treated like Big Boys and Girls
7. Hang a pinta outside - apparently these can be bought from Woolworths and filled with packs of sweets and other treats (I’ll remember Libby’s top tip of making sure the sweets are portioned into bags so there is not candy war)
8. Have the birthday cake half an hour or so after birthday tea as they’ll be bored of sitting down and full of food.
9. No need to do take home party bags (says Pip) but I’ve already stocked up from the Birmingham pound shop on big packs of dinosaur toothbrushes, sparkly pencils and the like and am quite keen to distribute large chunks of both the birthday cakes to our guests houses!

I wish I’d taken a picture of the Thames Water advert I saw on the London Underground yesterday. It told all the bored travellers that if they and everyone else washed their vegetables in a shallow bowl of water instead of under the running tap it would stop an astronomical amount of water from being wasted each year (unfortunately I can’t recall the exact figure but it was many thousands of litres).

I’m really glad I read it as the veg we use from our garden is of course covered in lovely mud which I used to bring back to the kitchen as it clinged onto the carrots, potatoes etc.

Today I installed a little plunge pool bucket for the carrots as they come out - it’s only an old washing up bowl with some water in. The veg will also be thoroughly brushed off just after being harvested.

Yet another housewifely revelation for this one who is very slowly becoming domestic. I only found out last week that the reason accomplished homemakers do regular dusting is because they had secret knowledge which has been kept from me for 34 years…
Apparently the trick is to do the dusting *before* you can see it. Makes a lot of sense when you think about it. A regular & quick dust in each room will ensure that you never have to tackle the embarassment of unsightly layers of fluffy grey dust on your surfaces especially when an unanticpiated visitor is in your house! How marvellous. Imagine not having the monthly horrors that I have when I realise that every shelf, windowsill and chest of drawers needs to be urgently tackled before a guest writes ‘Clean Me!’ in a prominent place.
According to the very lovely cleaner I USED TO employ the best way for tackling dust is with a barely damp duster cloth.

Squeeze it out so hard that it is practically dry. This then acts like a magnet to all the naughty tiny little particles of (its a bit yucky actually) hair and skin flakes, insect parts, pollen, mold, fungi, lichen, tiny particles of wood, paint, fibers from fabrics such as wool, nylon, rayon, acrylic , plant and vegetable matter, car emissions, heavy hydrocarbon waste from your oil or gas heater, even tiny bits of metal debris from door hinges or any place where metal and friction meet, lots of food waste, and loads of paper fibres instead of just whipping it up back into the air as a dry cloth would.

Absolutely no spray polish is required at all, ever, but occasionally I lovingly rub some old fashioned creamy waxy stuff into the dark wooden furniture we bought back from our Bali honeymoon. It feeds the wood or so I’m told and makes it really shiny.