The Boy Cave

I've been suffering from a migraine the last few days, so the poor boy has had to try and play as quietly as possible. That's not an easy task for the boy at all, especially when he has all his tools out and is 'fixing' things. So in the effort to get a few minutes of quiet yesterday, I decided that I would build the boy a 'cave'.

We tidied the floor of his closet out, put in some old pillows, blankets, and found a touch light for him. He then took in a whole bunch of his books, some of his 'friends' (his doll Reese and one of his plush bunnies), a water bottle and a little snack. He promptly pulled the door mostly shut, said "I know where you are if I need you Mummy" and started reading his books. It was great, I managed to get nearly 15 minutes by myself, which was amazing. What's even more amazing is that he asked to go back in it this morning, and again this afternoon! It's fantastic, now I just wish I'd thought of it sooner!

B-a-n-a-n-a-s

The boy loves to help in kitchen, so we try and do some baking at least once a week. Normally that means muffins or granola bars, something simple that he can help contribute to. This week I had a few over ripe bananas hanging around, and before I chucked them in the freezer (what, you don't have bunches of too ripe bananas in your freezer waiting for you to make smoothies or banana bread?) I decided that we would make some banana bread with them.

I love trying new recipes, and when I came across this one for chocolate chip banana bread, I was sold. It's from the blog notwithoutsalt.com and it's one of many (very yummy) recipes. The boy loved it because he could peel and squeeze the bananas out into a bowl and then mash to his hearts content. It was great because I could get everything else assembled while he took care of the bananas. He is great at mashing, anything that involves lots of smashing and mushing he seems to be a pro at. After the bananas are mashed up, it's just simple mixing by hand, which the boy is good at too, so really all he needs me for is the measuring!

The first time we baked this, I cut the recipe in half and just made one loaf, what a mistake! We had it devoured in no time at all - so from now on it, it's 2 loaves every time. The boy thinks that's great because he gets to mash up twice the amount of bananas,  plus he gets to eat the bread, which is absolutely delicious. And since it's got bananas in it, I've convinced myself it's healthy, which means that I can have an extra slice now!

Chocolate Chip Banana Bread (from notwithoutsalt.com)

6 ripe bananas, mashed
1/2 cup melted butter
1/2 cup canola oil (or coconut oil)
1 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 eggs beaten
1 tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda
4 cups flour
1 bag dark chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350
Mix in order.
Fill two greased loaf pans 3/4 full. Bake for about an hour (mine took 50 minutes)
You can also bake these as cupcakes. Fill the pan 3/4 full and bake about 20 minutes.
For both the cupcakes and the loaves you want a knife or a toothpick to come out clean

Laundry fun!

Apparently running through damp sheets is lots of fun! And needs to get done over and over and over again. On a positive note, that means that my laundry line spins even without any wind!

Checking to see if they're dry or if he can keep going.

Crafty Thanksgiving

I've mentioned before how I'm not all that crafty, in fact, my craft skills probably stopped at the age of 6! But the boy loves doing crafts, and at his age I can just about keep up.  In honour of Canadian Thanksgiving this weekend, I decided we would make a  turkey themed craft today, and so we made Happy Thanksgiving/I'm thankful cards. So easy and the boy loved it! Plus it meant we could talk about being thankful, which was a good reminder of how fortunate we are.

The boy is really into tracing his hands lately, in fact many of his crafts that come home from his playgroup have his hand traced on them somewhere! I decided that we'd make turkeys with his hand print (who doesn't remember doing that at some point in public school?) and then put them on cards for the grandparents. We traced his hand, cut it out, he coloured them, glued them onto the cards that he'd folded and then we wrote on the inside that we were thankful for his grandparents. 

Then of course he had to write his name (a long process that takes up most of the length of the paper), and decorate the inside. And voila, a cute home made craft that helped to keep him busy for a little bit, and I'm sure will be treasured by the recipients!

Turkey (Lurkey) Cards!

My little story teller

Occasionally I'll write a blog post with the boy around, and then he asks me to read it to him. He likes hearing the stories about him and will ask for them repeated to him a number of times (which can be a bit tricky while I'm trying to do any kind of editing!) He also likes telling stories himself. Normally they're about things that he has done, or variations of things that have happened to him. But now he's really started to make stories up and it's amazing what he comes up with it.

He told me one the other day and said I could share it "where you tell the stories about me Mummy". So here it is, the story of the Daddy and the Kitty Cat. 

There was a Daddy and a kitty cat. They were playing catch with some string. When the kitty cat hit it, she hit it so hard it went up and up and over the fence. The next time she hit it, it went up and up and into a tree. The third time she hit it, it went up and up and hit some glass.

That's it, a real cliff hanger I know. I think he has more to say about the Daddy and the kitty cat, so I'm sure I'll have an ending for you soon. He's young, but I'm thinking future Giller Prize winner perhaps?