Family Activities

A Boxing Day Tradition: Gingerbread House (and Mini Cooper!)

Boxing Day is traditionally when the Actually Mummy household break into our gingerbread house. Lovingly crafted sometime during December, it takes pride of place on Mummy’s counter, suffering mini-burglaries, and minor structural damage until Boxing Day, when we are officially allowed to demolish it, and demolish it we do! Our gingerbread recipe comes from BBC Good Food, complete with template. It makes perfect gingerbread: firm enough to cope with the house structure and onslaught of decorating by young children; not so hard it breaks your teeth when you try to eat it! Use a template to lay on the rolled-out …

Read more

Germans On Holiday

I had the best day out with Mummy recently. Each summer holiday we make a trip to London, where I get to hang out in Hamleys toy shop for several hours as long as I show some enthusiasm for something cultural beforehand. Well, here was my cultural exposition for this year: Whilst I lived out my fantasy, the Bug indulged in his with Daddy at Duxford war museum. Daddy is obsessed with World War 2, and it follows that my brother must be indoctrinated accordingly. So he is now fascinated with old aircraft, mesmerised by his Airfix models, and obsessed with You Tube videos of …

Read more

Playday: Low-cost tips for playing outdoors!

The Bug and me love playing Moshi Monsters. We like playing outdoors, but we love playing Moshi Monsters. So when Mummy said that today is Playday, we were thrilled! Then she clarified that Playday is when everyone has to play outdoors, and we groaned. Add to this the fact that money is scarce, and we have to find low-cost things to do as well! Ok then. Apparently 42% of children have never made a daisy chain. Well that I can understand, fiddly little seedlings. But a similar number have never climbed a tree! That got me off my swivel-chair – …

Read more

A Gift for Father’s Day

Every year the Bug and I make something at school as a gift for Father’s Day. Usually colorful, sometimes edible, often unidentifiable, and always heartfelt. This year, in addition to the usual offerings, we gave Daddy a gift which, although inedible and unwearable, surpassed all expectations. We took him to watch Stock Car racing. In the rain. For the uninitiated, this is an event where beaten up cars compete in a series of races for the unenviable privilege of entering a final ‘demolition derby’ – a fight to the death for cars which sometimes only have 2 wheels to begin …

Read more

Top tip for picky eaters – do more cooking!

I am not what you might call a picky eater, safe yes, but not picky. Fish fingers, pizza, sausage, tick. I do vegetables and fruit to the extent that Mummy feels reassured that her healthy cooking has not gone to waste, and I may even be coerced into trying something like beetroot – so long as it comes in the form of a ‘red-velvet’ cupcake (read ‘chocolate with a faint whiff of beetroot’). Apart from that I am about as predictable as a 6-year-old can be. Imagine my predicament when my younger brother arrives on the scene. Milk, baby-mush, the odd bit of soggy toast; …

Read more