Well, we’ve survived a week of fulltime school. Maggie has settled easily and well, if secretively. If she is to be believed she has been having some very peculiar school dinners (yet coming home with a daily sticker for eating it all, so I tend to think her accounts of just lettuce and tomato sauce, or just a biscuit, are slightly fictional) and she has grazes on knees and elbows. PE was fun and she is making friends. Even I was found standing in a chatting circle of mums at the school gate on Friday: I felt very included. In a nice way. She’s tired, with bedtime tears, but so far not as bad as I had expected. And so looks just gorgeous in her little uniform.

I was prepared to struggle with the early starts – but that has, so far, been easier than anticipated. Once I got my head round having to be out of bed by 7.30 (it is early for us) then we’ve just done it. I was unprepared for suddenly finding myself with a toddler to entertain:  I hadn’t appreciated just how much the girls play together and all of a sudden Tamsin wants me to play with her. She is delighted when Maggie gets home (she holds her arms up and says yay! when I say it is time to go and collect her). I have a few toddler activities lined up – mostly on a Wednesday which is just manic with swimming (T), rhythm time (T) and ballet (M) one after the other. We tried storytime at the library but I was a bit unimpressed (one story then they got out the instruments and bunged on a CD of children’s songs). I very much want to incorporate allotment visits into our week too: I just need to do it for a bit and it will (probably) fall into place.

We had a lovely anniversary night out in Liverpool: the streets were shut for la machine and we were half an hour early for the restaurant (actually half an hour late into town – we had intended having a drink first – because the roads were flooded) so we walked down and had a look at it, then had a gorgeous meal at Etsu. After a bit of to- and fro-ing they even made me an off-menu lemon sour (shochu, soda and freshly squeezed lemon). Most of the restaurant was occupied by the Japanese FA so it felt really nostalgic with Japanese banter going on behind us. Tamsin, little sod that she is, slept through the entire night 8-7 without a peep for her aunty Sara, then did the same for us on Saturday. (To put this into context: she has done this twice before in her entire little life, at 3 months old. So that’s, what, 19 months of broken sleep.) Back to normal since, with 2.30 the favoured time to summons me (yawn).

It rained 10 years ago, too! (I was a child bride.)

First (half) day at school seemed to go very well. Special pancake breakfast, as requested, then we walked up the road. Hordes of parents (and children of course) but we found M her little gang from preschool and left her to it. She tells me they played outside, where she ran around with her preschool friend and also, most excitingly, H, who was her bessy mate at preschool before starting school last year. They had a story, drew a picture, answered the register, and she managed to tell them she should be Maggie not Margaret. They had a snack (at snacktime. Which is different from playtime) and I picked her up before lunch. We came home and she watched Mary Poppins. Does it get much better than that?

Fell over and grazed her knee on her way there this morning.

and when did she get so grown up?

She finally has enough words to warrant a list for the record, though we are still mostly at animal noises and made-up (yet consistent) words. It’s quite interesting to compare with M’s list, which was much longer at much younger and did not contain television characters or junk food:

baa – sheep
dawdaw – dora (the explorer)
ssh – fish
(dog noise)
dog
(pig noise)
(monkey noise)
no!
bi – (scuit)
gokgok – chocolate
toast
js – drink
cake
mummy
daddy
car
key
whee
clip clop (horse or high heeled shoes)
rarat – rabbit
boo – nappy (“poo”)
dododo – hen (cockadoodledoo)
moo
spoon
buzz
bee
bear
teddy
cot
clock
rah – (lion noise)
beebies
baby
gok (sock)
duck
owl
ba – marmite
sss – snake
book
uh-oh
hiya
allgone
ball
moon
tea
up
there

It’s green, but if you can get past that it is good (I suppose if it bothered you you could peel the courgettes. But I kind of like green cake.) Recipe ripped off from somewhere, obviously, but I can’t remember where to give credit.

200g butter
200g caster sugar
2 eggs
150g courgettes
200g plain flour
pinch salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
large pinch cinnamon
100g sultanas

Set oven to 180C and line a loaf tin.
Cream the butter and sugar; mix in the beaten eggs. Grate the courgettes, squeeze to remove any excess juice then stir into the mixture. Add the flour, salt, baking powder and cinnamon and mix well. Add sultanas; put in tin and bake for about an hour*. Cool in the tin before turning out.

*The hour was definitely from the recipe – it takes about 40 minutes in my oven.

Pittenweem art festival last weekend. Mixed weather; Tamsin dislikes sand; most of the art the same as usual (in a good way) though I was enormously disappointed that Susan McGill‘s gorgeous black and white ceramics sold so quickly – mostly at her preview – and had to settle for a necklace instead of a candlestick. Hope she is there again next year. Saw Aunties Irene, Catherine and Rachel, and took the children to a ceilidh – it took M a while to want to join in but she enjoyed it once she did. Auntie Irene managed to charm Yoshihito Kawabata, one of the invited artists, who had made a stone circle on the pier, into presenting her with one of his pebbles but we failed to see him at all.

Back to the to-do list again once we got home, then on Friday I went into Liverpool with some friends to see the Klimt exhibition. It was not quite as I expected – my expectations being based almost entirely on this picture, which adorned the wall of nearly every student flat I ever lived in. It wasn’t there (but others were, which were similar and lovely, alongside some of his landscapes, which were lovely too, and a load of random articles by other members of the Viennese Secession, some of which were lovely and some not so lovely and none of which really seemed to have anything to do with Klimt apart from being made by people who knew him. And some other paintings by him, some of which were interesting and some not so interesting). Afterwards, dinner at Etsu, which has got all sorts of people talking. (The restaurant, not us having gone to it.) The word on the street, which I can back up now I have been myself, if that it is not posh but it is very authentic. We eschewed the Brit-friendly starter and main course set up and ordered plate after plate of starters; stuffed ourselves silly with gorgeous Japanese food and came home very happy indeed. Though I make better gyoza myself.

Japanese food again on Saturday as we went to the Hanyuda-sans’ leaving party. I feel very spoilt. And very full.

• Laundry, ironing
• Pack for long weekend away
• Book tickets for Klimt
• Finish and return manuscript
• Child-wrangle (10 am: one child on sofa with tummyache so bad she thinks she is going to burst, requiring cuddles. Other child with bleeding nose, cause unknown, requiring cuddles.) (11.30: both playing happily and quietly, hoorah) (1.30 driving me nuts clinging to my leg) (2.45 washing kitchen floor???)
  
• Plant lily bulbs and last two tatton plants
• Tidy so we don’t come home to a tip (and I no longer have a cleaner, gah)
• Order detergent
• Sow veg seeds for autumn
• Find book, which I have irritatingly lost with 50 pages left to read
• Go and look at freecycle slide
• Make dinner
• Drive to Scotland

Back Tuesday

We had 5 people to stay this weekend. Maxton has drafted my post about it for me: “My humdrum groundhog-day existence (I can hardly call it a life) washing nappies and cutting tuna fish into tiny bits  was temporararly transformed this weekend by the arrival of those monstrously testosterone laden young bucks (lock up your daughters!), Phil and Max.”

I needn’t add more.

East Fife Observer, 13 July 1916

An interesting account given by Mr Alex Watson, Abbey Road, skipper of the motor fishing boat “Andrewina” on to which the German U boat transferred the crews of the Lowestoft steam drifter “Peep o’ Day” and the North Shields motor fishing boat “Annie Anderson”, which were submarined in the North Sea early last Wednesday evening. When lying almost becalmed, 18 miles from Shields, Skipper Watson stated all hands on board the Andrewina were turned out by the man on watch, who sighted a submarine and a small boat with a crew of eight men coming towards them. On reaching the Andrewina, the German in charge of the small boat stood with a revolver in hand and demanded the flag. He then turned to the submarined crew and inquired what type of craft the Andrewina was. The men replied she was a small fishing boat of between 45 and 50 feet, with no motor, although in reality she is one of Pittenweem’s largest, and measures 70 ft. He then asked if she would hold them all, and the men readily responded, “We’ll do if we get aboard her..” The submarine, Skipper Watson stated, one of the latest type, and carried three light quick-firing guns and one five or six inch gun on her deck. She lay only a distance of 100 yards from the Andrewina when the men were being transferred. When the German in the small boat set off to transfer from the submarine the crew of the Peep o’ Day, Skipper Watson said, “I grasped the situation, and as he had not previously boarded our boat, I ordered the crew to prepare the mast and set the sail ready, there being very little wind blowing at the time, and thus we duped the Huns that the Andrewina was a sail boat. Our small boat,” he added, “was hidden from their view, being covered by the mizzen sail on the port side.

When the submarine’s small boat arrived the second time, a member of the crew of the Andrewina ventured to ask, “How is the war getting on in Germany now?” and for a reply received “I wish to H— it was over and me out of this. The German in charge admitted that the Germans knew they were beaten, and the war, he said, would be over in three months. He was almost ruined, and wished the war had never started. However, it would soon be over and the British would win. The Germans, he admitted, were too hard pressed on both fronts now, but “when you go ashore you can tell the people we are not yet starving in Germany.” He stated he was sent across to sink all the fishing fleet and, he added “We will do it. If we fail to do our duty we will be shot when we return to Germany”. Bags of flour were taken from the doomed vessels before they were sent below, and one fisherman who forgot his watch had it handed back to him by the Germans. The fishermen were suffering from cold owing to their clothes being drenched, and were taken below to the cabin of the submarine and were kindly treated. They were also entertained for about two hours to gramophone selections. Skipper Watson also stated the Germans were very anxious to gain information and inquired if the trawlers carried guns on board, but needless to say the Scotch fishermen were not being drawn, and acted “green” on this point, even although the Germans threatened to shoot them. They also referred to the loss they had sustained in the recent naval engagement off Jutland, and prior to leaving shook hands with several members of the three crews, wished them good luck, and at the same time were overheard to remark that the Andrewina would have been a good prize, too.

The submarine, Skipper Watson stated, appeared to be going in the direction of the fishing fleet, and after she was out of sight they started their motor and made for Shields. The thick weather prevailing saved the fishing fleet, otherwise, in Skipper Watson’s opinion, many more crafts would have been doomed by her. This is the second narrow escape Skipper Watson has experienced, having, while fishing off Yarmouth only a year ago, captured a live German torpedo, for which he received a reward of £24.

* Cameron’s great-grandfather

Went to the Tatton Park flower show on Thursday – yes, that’s right, two whole days off from being mummy in a week! Shocking. (Repercussions in the form of slightly clingy children are sometimes a price worth paying.) Despite getting halfway up the motorway before having Sara check my bag for the tickets, which necessitated a slight unscheduled visit home again, we were there bright and early and it was neither too busy nor too hot. First off we kind of fell into conversation with a woman who was hanging about by her own back-to-back garden; she looked vaguely familiar but as we tried to figure out what red flowers Sara might have spreading in her garden and then talked about her garden, I didn’t think much of it. Then I squinted at her name badge…hmm, lodge lane nursery sounds vaguely familiar; maybe it is near here. Eventually twigged that she was the nice lady from Bluebell Cottage who had shown Maggie her cat and tadpoles in May. Oops. Her garden was one of the nicest, anyway, inspired by Great Dixter and full of plants.

Coffee and doughnuts then onto the show gardens. Quite uninspired in general this year, I thought – there are usually a couple that make you think wow. Lots of nice plants (we scribbled notes and photographed) but most of the gardens just looked like somebody’s nice back garden. We did wonder if there was a dearth of plants to choose from with the iffy weather, but I don’t know. Even Chris Beardshaw’s, which won best in show, was just a couple of (well planted) borders and a lawn. A lawn! We watched some children doing a dance in wellies (briefly).

The floral marquee was very busy but we didn’t let that stop us filling the old-lady trolley with lovely plants. Favourite this year was “Disa“; a kind of fluorescent-bright cool orchid, which were displayed on a black background and looked absolutely stunning. I have two glowing in my front room now, which is not cool but hot at the moment and has no black background (they are still pretty). We spotted Joe Swift and Gordon Burns (he reads our local news) – who looked vaguely familiar but we did have to ask a random lady in a hat. Trendy plants included achillea, agapanthus, penstemons and lavender, while prairie planting at last seems to be on the wane. I fell madly in love with a wicker ball on a metal poley thing (I am not going to explain this very well – have a look at it here); you could sit, well almost lie, in it and I have fantasies of spending entire summers in there with a book (perhaps the nanny will bring one when she comes). It would look fabulous on our back patio if I only had a spare two grand.