Day 1 of phase 1 of Harcombe hell.

In desperation I’ve turned to a far out diet, the Harcombe diet. When you read the book it seems to makes sense but anything that takes me away from diet coke seems extreme to me!

I decided to start on a Monday as I didn’t want the long Easter weekend to be overshadowed by me sobbing while the rest of the family scoffed hot cross buns and Easter eggs and as my week would quieten down after Tuesday evening. Sadly I decided pretty much on the spur of the moment and hadn’t exactly stocked my kitchen up in advance.

Breakfast – 2 egg omelette with rocket, spinach and watercress.
Snack: tub of M&S olives (super yum)
Lunch – M&S side salad and tub of prawns.
Tea: 2 egg ham omelette, rocket, spinach, watercress and beetroot
Supper: two pieces of salmon in a warmed up easiyo mayo that had for wrong!

After Brownies I decided to make my own mayo using some natural live yoghurt which the easiyo site claimed was easy. It wasn’t easy and didn’t thicken so I decided to warm it up and serve as a freaky warm hollandaise with my salmon, bizarrely it was quite nice.

Exhausted by a day with no hot cross buns or diet Pepsi, running around at work, running around after the kids and then supervising brownies making chocolate nests I couldn’t stay up and was in bed by 9.

Triple Choc monster cookies for monsters

I have recently tried to encourage Ben to behave at school by promising we’ll bake something yummy (or if I feel lazy buy him a hot wheel) every weekend if he has kept his golden time safe at school. At the end of the week year one gets 1/2 hour free play (golden time) but can have time removed as a punishment, I’m not sold on the advantage of punishing a child on Friday for something he did on Monday but am doing my bit to support the teachers through bribery.

An unexpected advantage has been that my periodic baking of muffins has resulted in the freezer being stocked with treats I can defrost in the microwave or bung in Ben’s lunchbox avoiding the hysteria when I discover there are no treats in the house to put in the box. Initially Ben had asked for smarties cookies and as my freezer was stripped of treats I agreed we’d try to bake cookies.

In the past my cookies have not so much expanded as much as exploded into a solid baking sheet of cookie so I agreed with some trepidation. I looked at various recipes and decided kitchen monsters recipe looked both child friendly and idiot proof. I didn’t have smarties but had a couple of bags of cheapo chocolate chips (if I cook for adults I use green and blacks, the kids are interested in quantity not quality so they get what ever is cheapest in the shops!) and some cheapo cocoa powder so I adapted the recipe to make triple chocolate monster cookies.

Normally my rule for cocoa is that you can substitute cocoa for up to half the flour but need to throw in baking powder if it was self raising flour, given my previous disasters I ignored my own rule.

Ingredients:

175g butter
2 eggs
225g caster sugar
100g cocoa
250g self raising flour
Handful of chocolate chips
Handful of white chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 180 and line 2 baking trays.

2. Throw everything apart from the chips in the bowl (letting the kids try cocoa powder off my finger was a good learning experience for what “bitter” means and both boys practiced numbers and mental arithmetic with the digital scales).

3. Mix, my proper whisk was MIA so I put the whisk attachment onto the hand held soup / blending stick. Nothing happened. It’s been a while but I had never seen such a stiff mixture, maybe the flour was too cold but all the stick did was sweet Fanny Adams so it was back to elbow grease. When I’d done the bulk of the work the kids tried to move the spoon in the mixture – learning what “too bloody stiff” meant.

4. Add the chips, stir as best as you can.

5. Use a tablespoon to fling large wodges onto the sheet. Given my paranoia of spreading, I just made 12 over the two trays. Apply children’s faces to the leftover batter in the bowl and on the spoon.

6. Bake for 14 minutes. They didn’t spread much (maybe because I hadn’t flattened them, maybe because I didn’t add baking soda or maybe the flour was acting up) but they didn’t seem any the worse for it. If you want the half cooked American style cookies you could cut the cooking time a few minutes.

Taste testers have given this the thumbs up. In theory cookies can freeze so hopefully I’ll be restocking my treat bag in the freezer if they don’t eat them all! They’re quite firm (proper chocolate cookies rather than soggy ones) so I think they’ll freeze well.

Bittersweet symphony

My three and half year old ‘baby’ has been our of nappies for over eighteen months, is dry at night if he is bribed and now is starting to read.

He’s just finished the last lesson on the first reading eggs map and took the quiz at the end.

While I am proud of my determined baby Im not ready for him to be so grown up so quickly.

Going through the trauma of a fast growing toddler without any anaesthetic (chocolate) is not easy.

Back to the Ws

After two weeks at home (mainly under a duvet trying to cure my cold with chocolate and wine) this morning was back to reality with a bump. I was carrying around a stone more than Id like to and half a stone more than normal before I caught the lurgy from hell a few weeks before Christmas. With chest infections, irritable airways, spiking temperatures and finally a secondary ear infection I decided to give the gym a rest.

While Ive not quite been brave enough to weigh myself (yet) the return to work heralded the return to the other big W in my life – weightwatchers. In the post Christmas misery of going back to real life I decided my diet needed to return to normal too, no more medicinal chocolates.

I am a serial diet flirt. I’ve had more diets than boyfriend. While the twin Ws have been there most of my adult life I can’t stop myself flirting with other diets; there was the one where I had to eat a grapefruit a day to do something with my insulin levels, the awful three night stand with Atkins, calorie counting with My Fitness Pal, some food combining one where fruit and veg MUST be consumed before meat and veg (there was a table of food digestion times appealing to the pseudo scientist in me), the 5:2 diet was dumped when we hit a crisis and he couldn’t help me with two poorly kids and slimming world (great for a quick weight loss but too high maintenance for me with my lazy cooking in the longer term).

I know WW may not give me the same exhilarating weight loss and the thrill of doing something illicit behind my long term diet partner’s back (sorry WW I love you but I can’t commit to a monogamous relationship).

A day in and I think I’ve coped, Boots had a pathetic lack of food at lunchtime but M&S had some excitingly yummy food which my long term partner told me I could eat (love the iPad app) and as I had skipped breakfast due to a domestic crisis involving a temperamental downstairs cloakroom I got a salad on top of my sarnie (Fuller for Longer beef and cheese wrap, highly recommended).

I was a good girl I committed to what we’d eat for tea (healthy version of a mushroom stroganoff) and nodded encouragingly at my partner’s new clothes (WW now helps you develop good habits).

I am hoping that I can commit to stick with WW this time as we’re off to the Riviera in May.

Reading eggs a review 8 months in.

At Easter last year I signed both kids up for a free trial of the reading eggs website, initially for my kids (who grew up with iPhones and iPads around the house and owned a mobigo each) the art of using a mouse was a hurdle. We persevered and with me initially helping them to move the mouse (and hubby slowing down the mouse speed on the laptop) Ben started doing lessons, starting at the start with the letter m. Ciaran got to grips with mouse control in the playroom and quickly demanded the right to start lessons, so he played around with the letter m as well.

I was impressed that the pronunciation and spelling of words was the UK English version as my iPad was full of apps that used American-English.

Each lesson is made up of several parts, the first being an introduction to a new letter, sound or word where the child is rewarded by Sam the ant (or later a different friend) singing them a cheery song. They move into writing the letter on screen, finding it in a grid, identifying words that start with that letter etc.. And end with a book, initially just a letter book, later stories and non fiction books.

By the end of the 2 week trial Ben was almost ready to finish the first map (10 lessons) so I bought a six month subscription and chucked in a half price subscription for Ciaran who by either luck or 2 year old intuition had ploughed through a couple of lessons. When Ben came to the revision lesson on the map it all seemed so hard, he’d gone from recognising letters (which he could already do) to recognising simple 3 letter words like cat, the speed seemed so challenging for my little boy but some how he managed to hit the right letters and words in time. He then managed to pass the test and graduate onto the next map.

This allowed him access to his own house which he could decorate using the eggs he’d won or he could dress his avatar up in new clothes. Having an incentive to use the lessons rather than playroom (Ben likes retail therapy!) we carried on.

Ciaran spent most of his reading eggs time in the nursery, enjoying listening to the nursery rhymes and short stories. When he did fancy doing ‘big boy’ reading eggs he often repeated a lesson, reinforcing his knowledge of a letter or short word. By using the odd free code I extended their subscription to the new year and today had to decide whether to extend their subscription. Ben is on lesson 61 and has unlocked a castle where he does reading comprehension lessons, he has been taking driving tests for a while (practicing letters and sight words). Ciaran is insanely jealous of the content Ben has unlocked and is now on lesson 10.

Obviously I’ve re-subscribed both boys, Ciaran is recognising letters and little words like cat and Sam, Ben’s spelling of words and reading abilities have improved and I’m sure that having another way to practice than just reading with Mum has helped him. I used to print off free worksheets for the kids to practice writing the letters or words after a lesson but have decided not only to renew my subscription but to buy book sets for the kids to save me printing out activity sheets.

The only downsides is that reading eggs is a flash site so not iPad friendly, while you can get it in rover (a flash friendly browser) trying to play it in rover is a PITA and it won’t work on the Nabi 2 tablets the kids got for Christmas as they block pop-ups (to avoid children getting dodgy adverts) and the site runs via pop ups. A new maths site is being developed which apparently will run on the iPad or PC so maybe at some point reading eggs will be re-programmed in a similar way (or better still will be made compatible with the Nabi 2 system leaving my iPad in my hands!).

George Osbourne it’s your choice: flexible working rights or zombie army of Mums.

George Osbourne’s latest good idea is to offer women (and men too I suppose) the chance to own shares in their company at the expense of their right to flexible working and other hard-won rights, I can see him suggesting next that parents can give up the rights to have their child educated in return for the kid having a marvellous time as chimney sweep and a few shillings a year if they don’t die in an industrial accident.

Now in this marvellous PC and equal opps world men and women have equal rights to parental leave and to request flexible working but only one person in the relationship tends to use these rights – the Mum. I’ve worked hard to get a fairly good career and a nice home (and a long suffering husband) – I now have my own office and a separate dryer (two sign of proper grown-up success) but I do the drop off & pick up and the nursery or school prefer to call me to tell me that one of the kids has been over inspired by Van Gough and the resulting injury traumatised 29 five-year olds.

The reality of being a working Mum is that you carry two huge burdens, childcare and a career. But when the Mum is in a low paid part-time job as opposed to earning big bucks working 60 hours a week surely this is fair you cry? Maybe, if it cut both ways but it doesn’t. In my experience even where the Mum is the main wage earner there is a social expectation that she will still handle the kids.

Before having kids I imagined myself as a competent super Mum, helping neighbours, having a pristine house and calmly managing a career to the envy of everyone else. Ha!

When I woke up this morning I’d spent the night failing to sleep next to a vomiting three-year old; in a late night emergency division of labour we’d agreed that I’d take the night shift, in return I wouldn’t have to stay at home (helpful as I had an important meeting that went on until 8pm). When I woke up the upstairs of our house smelled of sick and fish fingers (kids never get sick when the nursery feeds then inoffensive food) I’d overslept in my exhaustion and had to cut my shower very short, I then spent ten minutes frantically banging on my neighbours door (I was walking her daughter to school today) to find that they had succumbed to the vomiting bug too. Once my oldest was at breakfast club, glaring at me as he was finally being fed, I ran around the supermarket getting pukey-child-friendly food as I knew my husband probably wouldn’t have a clue what to feed sick kids (FYI – same as my Mum gave me, start with crackers, work up to rich tea, toast, tomato soup with bread and finally fruit cocktail) and probably wouldn’t want to leave the house with a projectile vomiting toddler.

I then got into work; parked illegally as all the parking spaces had gone and scrambled across to my office, burdened by Pepsi cans to keep me going until tonight’s meeting finishes. I had no make-up on and I had a worrying suspicion that there might be a small piece of sick still in my hair. But I thanked God I worked flexi-hours and could swan in after 9am on the grounds that 1. I would be working bloody late and 2. my youngest son had turned into a fish finger, norovirus and baked beans volcano. Glamorous, no – but managing to strike something of a balance and making it possible for me to have a career and kids, yes

If I was offered shares in place of flexible working there would almost certainly come a time when I’d snap and say “sod trying to cut the weekly shopping back lets embrace Mammon and give up my flexible working”. Once that offer is on the table people will make judgements about who is really committed to the company and who is just clock watching until they can finger paint. Even if I held out on wanting a small annual dividend I’d panic about my visible commitment to the employer and would be signing away my flexible working rights before you can say womens’ lib.

If I lost the right to say to employers (as I’ve done in the past) I’ll be flexible and I’ll be here for meetings etc.. but I need have a day at home each week or I want to average 7 hours flexibly a day instead of 7 ½ to avoid having a nervous breakdown trying to squeeze 37 work hours inside the nursery drop off and pick up, or lost the right to be there with my son when he needed different medicines to be given to him on an hourly basis I would have to give up work completely.

Unless you want a zombie like army of former career Mums staggering down the high street singing the theme tune to Charlie and Lola, glazed eyed and defined solely by their child, and want to lose the massive output that working Mums like me make to the country then lets not be silly – save our flexible working rights.

Rethymno, travel sickness, fortresses and pottery (Wednesday)

We got up and after breakfast (still the odd mix of smoked sausage, fruit cocktail and scrambled egg for Ciaran) got into the ca heading for Rethymno. I’d originally wanted to travel to Hania but realised it was ambitious enough to head to Rethymno let alone the extra distance to Hania. Ciaran woke up as we passed Bali and announced he felt sick, my suggestion that he go to sleep led to tears. We pulled into a taverna in the middle of nowhere rushing him into the loo.

We headed inside for diet cokes and water. Chris practiced his Greek on the owner while the boys were entranced by a green parakeet. All feeling slightly more stable we got back into the car for the final stretch of our journey. Sadly by the time I’d navigated us to the Venetian fortress and we’d found. Parking space it was nearly twelve and very hot.

We took the kids on a whirlwind tour of the fortress, having explained that it been built by Venetians to stop pirates stealing their things and to stop the Turks stealing the town (history needs to be distilled slightly for kids). The boys peered inside the old church (boarded up) and ran around the old mosque.

Years of visiting Warwick castle paid off as I pointed out to the boys that the narrow windows on the wall allowed people inside to shoot at pirates or enemies coming near the fort but that it would every hard to shoot at the people inside as the window was smaller inside than out. We started looking down a cave but Ciaran was concerned that this was the ‘Bear Hunt’ cave so we didn’t go too far. Chris went off to satisfy his inner archeologist while me and the boys sheltered in the shade with Toy Story figures (never leave the house without some toys in your bag!). We hopped from shady patch to shady patch and answer came out of the fortress turned right into the first Taverna we found.

The owner agreed to cook half size portions for the kids of burger and chips (Ben), spaghetti bolognase (Ciaran) along with our dinners. Having pretty much missed lunch the day before Ciaran attacked his food with great relish before turning his attention to my potatoes and Chris’ chips. Amazingly the delicious meal came to under 30 euros including drinks! We headed back into the car and I suggested heading home through the mountains.

It all started well, we found the gorgeous village of Margarites and enjoyed cold drink looking down a mountainside as swallows dived in the trees, window shopped the gorgeous pottery and got back into the car; my map showed a straight drive through one of the towns but when the road forked I guessed wrong and we had. Nerve wracking drive through the mountains lost and off the map! After an hour, road signs riddled with bullet holes and lots of goats we found a road that was on my map again! Hallelujah!

We got back to the hotel around six and had a pre dinner drink (a Blue Aegean for me), after dinner we pretty much all collapsed into sleep apart from me. I tossed and turned but the combined snoring of three men in a room was too much for me and I knew that the next days trip to Knossos was going to be a challenge.

Heraklion – a baptism of fire (Tuesday)

Today after a nice breakfast in the restaurant overlooking the beach Chris collected our car for the next week. He’d shopped around before we left and had a good deal with fully comprehensive insurance and two car seats. Like the car seats in every foreign hire car they were basic compared to the British ones but were good enough. While he handled the paperwork I got the kids an ice cream each to keep them happy. Once Chris had carefully tested the car and filled it with petrol (and I’d filled the kids with icecreams) we all piled in for a drive.

Sadly rental companies don’t tell tourists the customs for driving in Crete so here they are as far as I can tell

1. If there’s a hard shoulder or space on your right then pull in to let faster cars overtake / allow room for the lorry over taking a coach on the opposite side.
2. If here is any doubt who has priority at a junction then it’s a free for all – you can play safe and give priority to everyone else or force your way through depending on your own driving style.
3. Hard shoulders disappear suddenly at bridges so don’t over take on approach to a bridge.
4. Stay close to the right when going round sharp bends – you never know what’s coming round in the middle of the road!
5. Even a good map (like the AA one) won’t list every village or show every junction. If you are lucky enough to see a road sign follow it and keep heading straight ahead until you find another sign, be prepared for the spelling on the maps and road signs to differ as well!

We passed Hersonissos (a bit like a small Benidorm) and decided to go past Heraklion on the new national road. The kids were quickly asleep and we decided to head back after a while, and wondered whether it was worth looking into the capital city. Coming off the national road into the chaos that is Heraklion was a brave and scary move. Scooters everywhere, no clear priority at junctions and a serious lack of road signs led to a half hour baptism of fire for Chris as driver andme as navigator before we got back to the new national road.

We got back in time for lunch which we ate at the pool side bar, Pergola, this was more snacky than the main restaurants but still had a good salad bar and feta for me. Ciaran hadn’t woken up happy and screamed the pool side bar down to the disgust of some German ladies who had either forgotten what toddlers are like or had brought up the only children never to work themselves into a state. Eventually Ciaran calmed down enough to manage a few chips, meatballs and chicken nuggets. After lunch the kids played angry birds in the bedroom with me while Chris swam and sunbathed.

We went into the main swimming pools when it was slightly cooler. I sat in the shallow kids pool with Ciaran while Ben had an orange juice with his Dad at the swim-up bar. After all showering and having dinner at the seaside each facing restaurant it was bed for the little ones and booze O’ clock for the adults.

Slainte!

First day – gluttony, heat and a poorly toe (Monday)

At around 3 am with a grand total of no hours sleep, 26 degree heat and aircon that just moved the hot air around the room I cracked. We’d already one a bed swap in the night, Ciaran had decided that in a strange room he wanted to sleep next to me and Chris had taken Ciaran’s bed. Before bed Chris had fiddled with the air con to no great effect so I decided it was time to see if I could do anything. Jackpot! Once the mode of the unit had been changed (after ten minutes of muttered swearing and punching buttons) the room started to cool, the aircon was idiot proof to operate unless you were exhausted. Chris and I finally feel asleep.

I was up at 6.30 and restless so I left my three men sleeping while I explored. The hotel grounds were immaculate, I passed several bars and found the kiddie pool (complete with clowns that looked very Stephen Kingesque). I got back to the room and once we were all washed and dressed we headed to the main restaurant Athina for breakfast, as well as the usual all inc breakfast (smoked sausages, croissants, bread, ham, cheese, eggs, omelettes, fruit) I tried a little Greek cheese pastry, I don’t normally eat feta for breakfast but it was good. Ciaran insisted on having a full english along with tinned fruit cocktail. I wouldn’t eat fruit in one mouthful and scrambled egg in the next but it worked for him!

After brekkie we went to the hotel’s beach, the boys dug channels in the sand for the sea and paddled happily with the occasional strawberry granita (slush puppy) from the beach bar to keep them cool. After a quick shower we all went to lunch.

At lunch I discovered my new favourite salad, salad leaves, cabbage, carrot, cucumber delicious feta (much smoother than the dry feta we get at home – I ate this feta by the slab) and tzaiki. The kids discovered the salad bar and chips, as long as they got some fruit and veg at each meal I decided I’d relax the normal rules about treats. By now the heat was exhausting so the kids and I went back to the room to play angry birds and with the toys I’d packed. Chris headed back to the beach to swim and sunbathe, once he got back the children were back into their UV swimwear (a more up to date version of the old t-shirts my Mum used to make me swim in) and off to the children’s pool.

The water was about a foot deep so relatively hard for even Ciaran to sink in and had a little slide, shaded areas and lots of water being squirted around, this pool was a big hit with the kids. After a long splash we popped back to the beach for another quick paddle and hen back home. I realised a this point that the pretty sandals I’d bought were not working out. A few months ago I completely snapped my little toe bone and it has set sticking out to the side a little. No great hardship but it does affect what I can wear, despite going up a size and avoiding high heels my sandals were agonising and the pressure had bruised my toe. I reluctantly got my beige sensible ballet pumps back out and kissed goodbye to my pretty pink sandals.

At dinner I had more salad, chips and moussaka with a half bottle of white wine from the help yourself fridge. Once the kids were asleep in the bedroom Chris and I sat in our sea front patio, looking at the lights of Malia with a nice cold drink.

Travels with chopper and Bunny

Travelling with young children is stressful. As a childless couple arriving at the airport two and a half hours before a flight meant having some time to eat, drink and shop; with kids you just have time to get through security (both Ciaran and I were frisked this time – thank God I’d explained in advance that the ladies sometimes check you aren’t hiding anything in your clothes!) get the promised magazines from WHSmiths and feed them a snack before rushing to the gate. As a seasoned traveller with kids I had got preparation down to an art, essential items were at the top of my hand luggage, the kids had blankets and inflatable pillows and Chopper (Ben’s dog) and Bunny (Ciaran’s favourite) were to hand along with colouring in books and other treats. I’d also told the kids about the journey and what I expected them to do.

When we booked our holiday we’d chosen it partly for the flight times, we didn’t want to arrive anywhere with half asleep, sobbing children. Sadly First Choice changed the flight times so we would land in Crete around 10pm and back to Luton around 1am. Neither child slept on the plane but thanks to several days of brainwashing (I mean gentle reminders) Ciaran didnt insist on climbing out of his seat belt and understood the concept of sitting relatively still for most of the flight. The adrenaline rush of going on holiday kept them both in a reasonably good mood.

Our landing was bumpy which Ben and Ciaran loved (that was fun, lets do it again!) and the wait to get luggage the usual torture (although this time I was sat out of the way desperately trying to stop the kids running away or climbing on tables) but here we had an inspired moment; Tripadvisor had told us that the transfer to our hotel was a long slow one that would be finished by us joining a huge queue to check in at the hotel. Forewarned, we’d booked a taxi to meet us and got to the Nana Beach Resort around 11pm, an hour ahead of the rest of the flight.

We were driven to our bedroom (extremely basic) and then headed to the midnight snack bar where we all filled up on veg, chips and meatballs with a little drink for us all (lager and diet cokes for Chris and I and tropical juice and water for the kids). We went to bed at midnight with the air-conditioning on the fritz in a whitewashed grim bedroom in the middle of a very luxurious resort, promising that we’d see the rep in the morning to beg for an apartment where the kids could sleep in a seperate space to us and where the aircon and blinds worked and door handle didn’t fall off.