now, i really enjoyed today.

Maybe because the lurgy is mostly gone, and the pre-migraine brought on by the artificial citron perfume to the soaps appears to have been chased by plenty of food, carbs and ibuprofen = phew!!

today was mostly a baking day, AND we used up 2[!!!!] packets of icing sugar – and i stayed resolutely calm! We started off with lots of game playing and having fun with nanny and grandad as well, and then we decided to bake. SB wanted to make a fruity wreath like last year, and BB wanted to make mr tumbles face! luckilly i flickred the page of the wreath making last year [as it was a library book] all apart from how long in the oven. the mr tumble thing was from cbeebies, and on talking to BB, she wanted to do exactly that face,, but make it round instead of square, have chocolate instead of plain, and make it a snowman instead of mr tumble!! i printed off her recipe [a sponge cake with added pictures of mr tumble] she wrote on it the changes we needed to make [in BB code] and i reconfirmed her desires and hoped i was going to get it write [as she doesn't make any allowances for stupidity of grown ps not actually being able to read minds]

SB was nearly entirely self sufficient, so i got BB going with making the sponge, and apart from our usual within 2 SD’s of mean quantities we were fine and in oven, so she went off to play with Nanny, whilst SB and i did some of her wreath together, just because we enjoyed doing it together rather than being strictly necessary. SB’s needed a warm place [as it contains yeast] and BB’s was in oven whilst we had lunch.

Actually, i will gloss over lunch as BB and I on own in kitchen for most of it, and i completed several episode worth of guardian quiz things whilst she ate 2 sausages [prob eating all the lickings!].

SB’s cake then went in the oven, BB’s came out, rested and then was iced. I cannot believe the amount of icing! in the end, for the full snowman effect as determined by BB, I have made a 6″ and 8″ round chocolate cake – so a fair amount of cakeage to cover anyway. but def covered! SHe v carefully put a proper snowman face on. she is a girl of details, so even put the black stripes on the carrot nose. I am not sure, however, how many snowmen are liberally covered in sprinklies…

SB as fairly green with envy at all the icing, so i went and bought some more icing sugar [i had 3 across road trips today for baking ingredients ] and so when i just caught her wreath in time before brown became burnt [only just mind - for next year, check at 10 minutes!] and it had cooled, she used copious quantities of icing sugar on hers. could only get the expensive fondant icing sugar as well. then also decorated. SO both girls v happy with their days baking. it only took 4 hours all told!

More games playing. SB then recreated the tower of london in bricks – pretty well actually, and I had no idea she knew what it looked like! BB got a bit tired, so we had a book break, and I read a number of the Just So Stories
stories. I find they always help both my girls settle down, and i love the edition i have linked too. Somewhere in the day, SB found time to practice carols on the piano and do some music theory.

BB nearly fell asleep, but got going enough to do some more rampaging around and playing before dinner. she fell asleep pretty quickly at bedtime. however, i am hoping it is not related to her near electrocution. an argh moment as we were playing chase before bedtime [i am not really one for settling down!] and she switched on my bedside light and it didn’t come on, and pointed her finger in it saying no bulb as i realised what she was doing and said no. i think there must have been an arcing current, so raced her to bathroom tap as she sobbed that the light was trying to grab her. chris had taken bulb out as blown, but not put anything in its place. now remedied, but bB and i both a bit shaken. TBH, i supposed that there would be some safety feature or other.

SInce the girls bedtime, I have made 2 lots of cheese scones. the first lot accidently with strong white bread flour so they are cheesy biscuits – my dad did a taste test and liked them! and the second were made properly. mum made mince pies with me – nice to spend the day baking first with children and then with mum.