Wednesday, March 30, 2011

A little girl

When people meet my little girl and she's sitting in her buggy or on a chair, they think she's at least four years old. It's the lustrous hair, I think, perhaps also her expressive face, her lean torso and the fact that she speaks in clear, complex sentences. Yet when she stands up there's no mistaking she's two years and nine months. Look, she still fits nicely into her dolly's buggy. Of course, when she's twelve years and nine months, or twenty years and nine months, or thirty years and nine months (oh my!) she'll still be my little girl.

Click photo for larger.

Friday, March 25, 2011

A spring day

Mr Planet had the day off work today. Together, we dropped Little Planet off at daycare then returned home. He prepared us both a simple and delicious breakfast of egg with guacamole.

We inspected our garden as it bursts into Spring. Here are our tulips budding to life.

Mr Planet enjoyed his coffee and magazine in the sunshine.

He decided to freshen up one of our outside walls with white paint. He'll cover a portion of this wall with blackboard paint so Little Planet can chalk on it to her heart's content.

Meanwhile, I got on with revising my second draft. Goodness, I've found loads of holes in the manuscript that need plugging.


Thursday, March 17, 2011

Little things

I don't have a lot of weight to lose, but I do want to shift a few pounds. So I have started to eat more intuitively - that is to eat only when hungry, to eat slowly, to stop eating when I'm satisfied or full (even if this means leaving food on my plate) and to eat anything I want. Basically, it's eating like a toddler but without the fussiness and tantrums! I lost 7lbs in the first two weeks of eating like this. I don't weigh myself again until another week or so but feel so much lighter, more energetic, less bloated.

Recent meals we've cooked have included a curry of paneer, tomatoes and peas - a chickpea and chorizo stew with spinach - linguine with crab, rocket leaves, capers and red chilli flakes - lightly seared tuna steaks with a salad of rocket leaves, oranges and toasted pine nuts - a tagine of chicken with saffron, green olives and lemons served with brown rice - sausages in a sauce of Marsala wine, Dijon mustard, onions, fennel seeds and served with, of course, buttery mash - tofu marinated in soy sauce and red chilli flakes and served with an okra and oyster mushroom stir-fry. I'm eating anything I want, even chocolate and ice cream, but my portion sizes have gone down by half or, in some cases, by more than half.

We tend to go out on Saturdays and on Sunday mornings or else entertain friends and family, but Sunday afternoons are reserved exclusively for Mr Planet and Little Planet to bake bread, biscuits or cakes. Little Planet loves pouring in the ingredients, mixing them in the bowl and eating them raw!

The coming of Spring means washing hung out to dry on the line. There is no better sight, for me, than white cotton sheets hanging out to dry.

I have two knitting projects on the go: an orange merino wool scarf for me and a charcoal grey wool scarf for Mr Planet. One day I will progress to something more challenging, like a cardigan for Little Planet or some gloves for me. For now I am enjoying the hour of easy knitting I do when Little Planet is in bed and Mr Planet has yet to return home from work - after a day of writing (or trying to write, see previous post), there is nothing better than to knit and contemplate. I get a lot of ideas when knitting, so my laptop is always on.

Television programmes I've been enjoying have included Marchlands, South Riding, The Big C and Great British Food Revival.

Easter is coming up and I am planning an Easter Egg Hunt for Little Planet. I'll buy lots of smaller chocolate eggs and hide them inside her toy cooker, her doll's house, her doll's buggy, her Lego box, her toy garage, the toy box in her bedroom, behind the books on one of her book shelves, inside empty flower pots in the garden, inside the shed... Oh, it's going to be so much fun!

I haven't given up anything for Lent, but I have reduced the time I spend on the Internet. On that note, cheerio!

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Daily rhythm

Writing, writing, stalling, stalling, stalling, stalling, writing, stalling, stalling, stalling, stalling, stalling.... Argh!

Sunday, March 13, 2011

Christening

My Little Planet was Christened on Saturday and what a party we had with friends and family! Doesn't she look older than 2 years and 8 months here?

Wednesday, March 09, 2011

Wanting to be a good girl

Little Planet loves being a good girl and one of her triggers into hot tears is if I or her childminders reprimand her for actions she knows or quickly realises is not "good girl behaviour".

So she says things like, "I can stand on the bed but I cannot jump", "I can roll a ball inside the house but I can't throw it". She'll also use the second person you. So, "You mustn't run inside the house but you can in the garden or the park", "You mustn't touch the mirror, you mustn't touch the glass, but you can touch the frame", and yesterday coming back from daycare, "You can shout in the park but you can't shout in the shop".

Of course, she's a toddler and so she does all these things some of the time. But wanting to be a good girl is certainly keeping her better behaved than any other form of discipline exacted by myself and her carers.

For now.

Thursday, March 03, 2011

Wees and poos

Just a quick update to say that Little Planet is potty-trained - at least for wees and at least during the day. She saves her poos for when she comes home from daycare each night and she always asks my permission to do a poo in her pull-ups. This is a good sign so I think she'll manage doing them in the potty soon. No rush, though. I think she's brilliant for taking just a month to get the hang of weeing in the potty and want her to bask in that accomplishment for now.