"You've got to go out on a limb sometimes because that's where the fruit is."

Over the past few weeks we have become a family of scrumpers, foraging for food wherever we can find it. It all started when Mrs M took us to an apple tree not far from where she used to live, turns out though that there are literally apple trees everywhere, I've just never paid much attention until now.

So armed with our supermarket hessian bags or apple sacks as they have now become we have been Investigating all over and have been lucky enough to have picked around 10 large bags of various kinds of the juicy treat (three of those this morning).

The boys have really been getting involved and our foraging exploits have been teaching them a valuable lesson in sustainability. It's also great for teaching them to respect the food that they eat (plus it always tastes that little bit better when you know you have picked it yourself).

It's not just apples that have been getting all our attention though. We've found plums and pears in a derelict monastery orchard which was a great find, elderberries, hazelnuts and buckets of blackberries (which you can find everywhere this time of year). We've definitely taken full advantage of our surrounding area and had lots of fun in the process. If people could see Mrs M riding around on my shoulders, us giggling like teenagers while she reaches for apples they would think we were hilarious.

Recently Mrs M has gone into her usual preparation for hibernation mode, which she does every year for winter, so our new found love of foraging means that there are plenty of pies in the freezer ready for thoring out, bags of peeled and cored apples for winter cooking, not to mention a lovely selection of chutneys and jams. Mrs M's squirrel like tendencies are adorable and she really looks after me and the boys, we will always be eternally greatful for what she does for us. We're a great team and doing everything as a family is so important, it keeps us close. We will continue to forage while the fruit is available and will definitely be more prepared for next years harvest.

'To inebriation... And beyond'

Just a quick post for Em over at snowingindoors.com. On our recent post for Thetoadstool.co.uk about our Haba picnic we were having, Em pointed out that when Buzz lightyear came over to 'chez snowingindoors' for a picnic he had a bit of bad behaviour. I didn't want to Include this picture in the post as i was ashamed but actually Mr Lightyear did act quite inappropriately. Turns out on both occasions he made it clear that alcohol is bad and should not be brought to these kind of get togethers. Tut tut!

Anyway for you Em, the picture i didn't include...

"There is an innocence in admiration; it is found in those to whom it has never yet occurred that they, too, might be admired some day."

When your a grown up it can be easy to forget just how fun life can be, how once upon a time just running about on a large piece of open land could be the most fun you've ever have. One of the things I love about being with Opeie all the time is that I'm reminded of this everyday and it will never get old. He is such a happy child, pretty much always smiling, always excited about every little thing and is one of the most loving and caring children I've ever seen. I really couldn't ask for a greater little boy and I'm so proud of the way he's turning out.

Being a father has given be such a better outlook on life and I will be forever grateful for what that little boy of ours has done for me.

"At a dinner party one should eat wisely but not too well, and talkwell but not too wisely."

If you're anything like me, you kind of dread the words 'can my friends come round for tea?' Loads of over excited children running about and generally making a racket. Are they going to destroy the house, What am i going to cook, most people don't eat like us. Luckily our first experience of Opeie's friends coming round for dinner was effortless and relaxing. A nice bunch of friendly characters who were happy to eat whatever they were given no questions asked.

Together me and Opeie lay down a blanket, sat everyone at their places and set out the plates and cutlery. It was a casual affair so no need to break out the silverware (if we even owned any) and on the menu was a selection of fine cooked meats a smorgasbord of tasty cheese, pasta, vegetables, potatoes and a grilled meat selection for the meat eaters amongst them. For dessert, freshly picked Pears, Oranges and Bananas, Our food had been carefully prepared by the culinary genius Haba using only the finest Ingredients and materials. Food that was suitable and safe to be served up by a 2 year old and he loved every moment of being the party host/chef (we're definitely going to have to buy that kitchen for christmas)

Opeie spent time lovingly slicing a loaf for his guests...

There were plenty of greens and veg for the herbivores in the party...

Everyone was having a great time, the food was enjoyed by all and the great company and surprisingly Intelligent conversation made it a perfect afternoon with friends. Buzz and woody kept us entertained with their witty humour which kept us all struggling to keep our food in our mouths due to uncontrollable laughing.

Opeie had lots of fun with his friends at lunch time and I'm sure they will be joining us again soon, everyone left with full tummies and a glow in their cheeks from all the smiling.

The Haba play food has been a fantastic addition to our play times and these role playing activities are great for Opeie's development. The soft materials used my Haba are great as it gives younger children the confidence to play how they want with it without the possibility of hurting themselves (like with some of the heavier wooden foods aimed at slightly older children).

All the food mentioned can be brought from thetoadstool.co.uk and they have a fantastic selection, I'm sure our friends will be round for tea again so we'll have to get looking what culinary delights we can serve for next time.

No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.

'I don't like people!' is a phrase i tend to use a lot, not because I'm some strange hermit man that shuts himself off from the rest of the world, but any of us only have to leave the house and walk down the street and chances are you will come across some moron that is doing something that really gets up your nose, a parent being verbally abusive to their child, people walking down the street in their PJs because they cant be bothered to get dressed, young kids smoking and being aggressive (i could go on). Because of this and the fact that i have been let down so many times by family and previous friendships i can be a bit of a grump and it takes a lot for me to trust people. Generally 'people are horrible'.

Every now and again though my faith in humanity is restored and today was one of those days. Myself and Mrs M have been eyeing up an apple tree from over our back fence, the apples are a beautiful red colour and because we go through so many in a week we wanted to see if we could get some. Over the past few weeks we have noticed that they hadn't seemed to be being picked so earlier today i popped round and knocked on the door to politely ask if we could fill a bag. I knocked the door and i saw someone behind the net curtains look out but they wouldn't come to the door (be honest how many of you would open the door to me?). So i headed home, Mrs M, the younger and clearly more attractive one of the two of us popped round instead thinking that maybe she would be more approachable, but sadly the same outcome, so we dropped a note through the door (i wouldnt want anyone worrying or thinking we were dodgy and up to no good).

While we were putting the boys to bed earlier the door went and Mrs M went and found an envelope on the floor...

It blew me away that this gentleman had taken the time to type out what i thought was an unbelievably sweet letter. Its very rare that you come across people that are this thoughtful and honestly receiving this unexpected letter put me in a great mood. I'm safe in the knowledge once more that there are kind and thoughtful people all around us. Thanks Bobby x

"Love is the master key that opens the gates of happiness."

Yesterday marked the day of our friends Gareth and Vikki's wedding. Although I don't know them both that well, I get the feeling they are big kids like me. Gareth is a big fan of the Aquaman phone cover I made a few months back so I decided to make them a Lego themed wedding gift. I love a challenge and it was something to keep me occupied. Like anything we build together the first step is to find an empty container and look for pieces that 'may' come in handy...

I had an idea for a decorative box that opened up with the bride and groom inside. I picked white and pink as a colour scheme and started building but it looked overly femanine. I then changed the pink to red but a bow we made crossing the box looked like the st George's cross (not great for a wedding). I was getting stressed out at this point but then Seth suggested I change the red to yellow as he said he liked it on my original phone cover (always good to have Seths opinion on these things). I should probably point out at this point that before we had even begun building together Seth had made a Lego wedding piece of his own a few weeks before, which we all thought was really cute and very well thought out.

We started out building a plain white box to encase the minifigures that we were going to make. The plan was to make a bow going across the box from each side but as we carried on building we added little bits of detail in like the white and yellow corner pillars. The box seemed far to dark so we opened up the sides with archways letting light in from every direction.

   I wanted the box to open up wide so we added a tooth hinge (which are probably my favourite Lego pieces, sad I know). Because of the angle of the bricks on this part I couldn't have matching arches. So I sat for quite sometime working out a door with a heart shape cut out, it was a pain but I got there in the end. It ended up looking so good that that I made a matching one for the top.

We built a circular platform (Seth's idea) for them to stand on and kept Seth's original table he had made as I thought it was great. A bottle of wine, glasses and flowers set the scene and it was starting to look pretty great.

Then it was my favourite part of any of our builds, minifigure time. I ordered the bride online as we didn't have one in our collection. Vikki has red hair though so I had to change the hair and rummage through our box looking for a face with matching eyebrows etc, Gareth was easy apart from the hair (his is short dark and curly, a style I've not seen on a minifigure so he got a hat instead (more about Gareth's hair later though).

Although the piece was really coming on we wanted to make it a little more personal, the problem is with a minifigure bride and groom is they can kind of look a little samey so we needed to accessorise. We raised the base of the box and added in a draw at the rear, inside we added a costume change for them both. Vikki is a fitness instructor, so sweatbands and a boombox were a definite, black and red gym attire is his colour scheme at the gym. Apparently he's always talking about how much meat he eats so having a leg of meat in our collection worked out well and then it's back to Gareth's hair. And Gareth if your reading, my apologies. I was told your minifigure NEEDED Afro hair so I ordered the disco dancer minifigure for the look. (after meeting his brother last night I realised the hair would have suited a minifigure for him perfectly).

The gift was finished...

Next was packaging and we wanted to keep it simple. A plain vintage looking brown wrapping but we made a Lego gift tag that ribbon could be threaded through

Obviously we had to make a card to compliment the gift too, simple yet elegant (I love Lego).

I started this post a couple of days ago, the wedding yesterday was amazing and it was so nice to be a part of it, I will write about in another post, our Lego gift went down really well and apparently will take pride of place in their home, which is always good to hear. Although I got stressed at the start, this build was a lot of fun and myself and the boys enjoyed being able to use our creative flair to create something that brings a smile to someone else's face for once. 

Congratulations Gareth and Vikki you look so happy together and it meant a lot to us to be able to share your magical day with you xxx

"I find the key is to think of a day as units of time, each unit consisting of no more than thirty minutes."

Many of my posts are written about a single event, somewhere we've been, something we've built and sometimes something we are reviewing. Throughout the day though there are a whole bunch of things that we do aside from the boring housework to keep us entertained. Sometimes I feel a little like Hugh Grant's character from 'about a boy' thinking of the day as units of time, each unit lasting no longer than 30 minutes. "Full hours can be a little intimidating and most activities take about half an hour" (before Opeie starts losing interest anyway).

Today was one of those days crammed with mini activities, each as I said lasting no longer than 30 minutes...

Activity 1: a good old fashioned wrestle, all that pent up aggression and anger that builds up as a 2 year old unleashed on to a poor unsuspecting dad.

Activity 2: learning our alphabet. I'm quite sure I've got it down to a T but there's no harm in practising.

Activity 3: working on our creativity, Opeie informed me as soon as we had dropped Seth off that today he wanted to do some painting, which is great. Today's masterpiece was 'the cat in the hat! and the thingamajigger. Which spurred on activity 4.

Activity 4: watching an episode of 'the cat in the hat knows a lot about that', which gave us an idea for a craft activity that we will be doing tomorrow as disorganised daddy doesn't have any glue in the house (oops).

Activity 5: still feeling in a Dr Seuss mood and being quite excited about me finding one of his favourite books that had been missing for a while, Opeie asked if we could read 'Gerald Mcboing boing', while fetching his book though he spotted another of his favourite books, the one I wrote for Mrs M as part of my proposal. This then became half an hour of reading.

Activity 6: bath time, a little paint was spilled and Opeie was sweaty from the wrestling so we had a bath. The super heroes joined us and took it in turns to have their faces and bottoms washed (Opeie is a funny thing).

And all of this before lunch time, just goes to show how much you can do in a few hours. After lunch it was time to pick up Mrs M and then Seth and that brings me to now, sitting in the car waiting to walk up to the playground before starting our 30 minute units of time for this afternoon which so far looks like it is going to consist of blackberry picking, tea, possibly Lego (because we fit it in where we can) and cuddles before bed.

'You don't have to be sad to be feeling a little Blue'

After an in depth sit down talk with Opeie he has informed us that his favourite colour is blue! May seem trivial to most but I see this as quite the milestone. He's getting more grown up and independent by the day and he knows what he likes. So in honour of this new found love and your first favourite colour (which I'm sure will change soon), here's some blue things that daddy loves...

Just kidding...

 

And this one, that we're watching at the moment (and watch together pretty much every day).

I'm looking forward to hearing what your next favourite thing is, I find everything you say and do fascinating, I'm an extremely smitten daddy.

"The score never interested me, only the game."

When we are given a product to write about my mind is flooded with ideas of what I want to do, it usually tends to be a little eccentric but then that pretty much sums me up. The problem I have is that no matter how great my directional skills are,my cast of actors being 6 and 2 have more of a spontaneous approach to the job in hand (I'd be lying if I said sometimes this doesn't turn out better though). Because of this I generally have to work with whatever I have to pull together.

The Janod animal domino's from thetoadstool.co.uk are a great little set perfect for teaching the classic game (which at 2 Opeie really doesn't understand), with the added bonus of animal domino's on the reverse, which was actually a lot better for Opeie as he loved the fact he had to keep checking to see if he had the animals bum (much easier for younger players). Although I'm not going to bore you with the script and big plans for the post, which instantly went out the window when fake mustaches were applied to the boys (never under estimate the level of excitement caused by a mustache). Anyway, The Janod animal domino's...

Available at thetoadstool.co.uk

'Instructions? where were going we don't need instructions'

Seth is a Lego genius, I'm not sure that everyone see's it and maybe that's because i pay so much attention to what he is doing, being a little brick obsessed myself. But he blows me away with every little build he does and the way he is so creative no matter how small and insignificant to most people these thing are. Seth has become a huge fan of the 'Back to the future' movies over the last year but it wasn't until yesterday that he watched the third movie through. While watching the film he disappeared briefly and returned with his big box of minifigures.

I continued to clean the house while he sat and played with Opeie and within five minutes he came in to me looking very proud of himself. He proceeded to show me his custom Marty Mcfly (riding a hoverboard, of course) and Dr Emmett Brown. Its little things like this that put a smile on my face continuously through the day. Seth can make something of nothing and a lot of thought goes in to everything he does. Keep up the good work Seth I'm so proud of the mini builder you are becoming.