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"A portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2013."

Sofia: spotted a bird at the top of a tree while eating her muesli.
Otto: enjoying his own bowl.

The breakfast edition. I finally relented this week and allowed Otto access to his own bowl at breakfast. We follow BLW and he has been feeding himself from a pre-loaded spoon since he started solids at six months and he is very efficient.  But it was time to embrace the mess again and let him have a go at it bowl and all. He thoroughly enjoyed himself and I think I may have to dig out the long sleeved art smock/bib again.

I should add that Otto has been saying a whole lot of new words in the last week or so including: "Minke" (our cat), "cracker" (while proudly retrieving a box from the pantry) and today the all important and powerful "more!".

Linking with the 52 Project at Che & Fidel. 

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Artichokes - the first produce of the season

We recently made a netted veggie garden and planted some veggies but our garden is full of surprises and we already have our first produce of the summer. On the weekend we noticed that there were some globe artichokes ready to eat.

I'd never cooked or prepared artichokes before so there may be a more efficient way to do this. The first step is to remove some of the outside petals (if that's what they are called).

 

Then I chopped the top off.

This gives access to the choke which has to be removed with a spoon. The choke is the fluffy stuff in the middle.

 It's important to get all of it out so that it looks like this.

I then cleaned up the rest of the petals.

And was left with the heart. The hearts go brown quite quickly and need to be put in acidulated water to keep them looking good. I didn't bother with this as I only had the one and planned to cook it straight away.

Then the good bit - cooking them. I sliced them finely and fried them in olive oil. We all tried some and it was a big hit. 

There are lots more artichokes still on the plant so plenty more opportunities to experiment with other ways to prepare and cook them over the summer. 

46/52

"A portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2013."

Sofia: looking like she is about to take off on her rake.
Otto: also getting in on the rake action.

The weather has been lovely this weekend and the kids really enjoy 'helping out' in the garden. Although it has to be said that Sofia wasn't too pleased when Otto was allowed to use Ian's rake.

Linking with the 52 Project at Che & Fidel. 

You can click on the button (here or in the side bar) to see all my 52 posts.

45/52

"A portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2013."

Sofia: pulls books from the shelf one by one, 'reads' them and ends up with a carpet of books around her.
Otto: wearing a beautiful handknit from his Aunty Jenny, hat from the dress up box and evidence of some rough and tumble.

Bonus sibling photo - the backyard hose offered endless entertainment on a sunny afternoon this week.

Linking with the 52 Project at Che & Fidel. 

You can click on the button (here or in the side bar) to see all my 52 posts.

Simple pleasures #9 - wheelbarrow ride

Sofia always has a smile on her face when she sees me getting the wheelbarrow out to work in the yard - the requests for a ride start pretty soon after. You can hear for yourself how much she loves a wheelbarrow ride. Otto is new to the game and still needs to learn how to ride one of these things (I love the bit at the end) but seems to enjoy it just as much.  

(If you are viewing this post from an email you will have to click on the title to view the post in your browser to see the video).

44/52

"A portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2013."

Sofia: really gets in there when she smells a flower.
Otto: getting much more out of our playground visits now he can walk run around.

Linking with the 52 Project at Che & Fidel. 

You can click on the button (here or in the side bar) to see all my 52 posts.