Today we brought our rescued ex-battery hens home from the farm on which they spent the first few intensive-laying months of their lives. We found them through the wonderful work of the British Hen Welfare Trust. These are their first few moments being settled into their new house Akira assembled for them a couple of […]
Read More Our GirlsAfter Christmas came the birthday…and this year Kazuo had it all figured out. Birthdays involved a party which consisted of friends (thankfully we could finally muster up a couple of lovely ones with whom we have recently had the joy of becoming acquainted), balloons, his birthday banner and a cake with candles: I decided to […]
Read More How We Celebrated Two Great Years…Our wee guy is two today. Two lovely long years of learning (in a very ad hoc manner at times) how to be parents…and watching him go from being a bit rubbish and gurgly and endearing and sometimes a little terrifyingly needy and so so cuddly and incredible to really quite entertaining and capable and […]
Read More Two YearsOn the weekend we had our friends Tom and Claire, who live in Manchester, come and stay. The December weather was an initial deterrent to their pre-Christmas visit plans, so it was wonderful that they could finally join us. Though of course we would love them to be able to pop in every weekend! However, […]
Read More TomandclaireNew Year Happiness everyone! It seemed that once we hung the decorations on the tree, the holidays simply overwhelmed us. I am not one for spending too much time online when there is a house full of people…so I have taken a little hiatus. But here is another wonderful new year full of possibility, so […]
Read More Welcome to A New YearOur driveway – like many others in these parts – has turned into an ice rink, and so the treacherous journey to the road is perhaps the worst part of any outing at the moment. This did slow our efforts to bring Christmas to the house this year…we set out and abandoned the tree-purchasing venture […]
Read More It’s beginning to look a lot like…It took me a couple of weeks to get around to checking if the Japanese step-down transformer Akira’s mother had sent me would work on my sewing machine after it arrived from the States last month…and then until this week for the postie to finally get through the snow to deliver the replacement transformer we […]
Read More Christmas StockingIn younger days, when I contemplated parenthood, I had this idyllic dream of raising my children in community – surrounded by family and friends who loved and helped to nurture them. My children, I mused, would be confident and relaxed and outgoing…and happy to spend time with any caring adults who came their way. They would […]
Read More Mama Came BackWhen we began introducing the wee guy to food and flavours, he was a little reluctant to wholeheartedly consume some of my un-favourites like peas…but he tried everything and generally ate rather heartily for a little person. Somewhere around the 9mth mark he kinda slipped into being a mainly-eats-sweet-potatoes-and-a-few-other-things kinda guy, though he was still […]
Read More Feeding the Wee OneI began writing here a couple of years ago when we landed in the USA and I suddenly had no paid employment prospects on the near horizon. At the time I was searching for a new sense of worth…convincing myself that being at home/unemployable (for reasons of immigration policy, not a sudden lack of competence, […]
Read More Working…or not…
50 things for 50 