nutty kids & fruit wheats

We had a busy weekend, or at least some of us did... the little buggers never stopped. Saturday mornings generally offer a rare period of calm, or at least the now-routine visit to the library, this time making bunny shaped Easter cards, seem to promise as much. It was quiet this Saturday, so Oscar made one too, although it wasn't long before he got back to playing "guest librarian". Elly borrowed an idea that a little boy there had, creating a card where the poor old Easter bunny had a left eye made up of around 8 of those goggly eyes things, with just the one goggle eye on the right. She gave that one to her cousin Daniel, I do hope it hasn't given him nightmares! Straight after the library was her trial dance class with the Lilian Aubrey School of Dancing, which sounds very grand but is actually held in the local community center. Very sweet though. I was allowed to stay and watch as it was her first time, it was fab watching her skip around and try out 'first position', bless. There are no classes until the middle of April because of the holidays, but the form is filled in and she's keen to go again. Time to shop for blue leotard and tutu, little pink ballet shoes, and of course red tap shoes. She'll be all poise and and pointy toes in no time.

We had a lovely lunchtime as usual at Anne and Sid's, and afterwards went to the Brighton for Asian spices - cheap and plentiful! Mick, needless to say, was in his element. Most of his spice collection was chucked out before we moved and this was the first chance we've had to re-stock. We've been inventing spicy dishes and eating yummy stir fries ever since. My mouth's still zinging following tonight's Aberdeen Angus sausages (a co-incidence, honestly, that whenever I mention food it involves sausages) with stir-fried sugarsnap peas, baby sweetcorn, field mushrooms and peppers, all with lashings of garlic, chili and ginger, of course.

On Sunday, Elly was invited to a birthday party at a Leisure centre in Durham. There was a bouncy castle & soft play stuff, princess cups, plates and napkins, and she was truly en su salsa. I'm so relieved really. She has adapted really well, they both have, but there have been moments when I've thought that it's all been a bit much for her in particular. And then she bounces off the bouncy castle, bounces over to me and exclaims, " I'm sooooo happy!!!!" before bouncing off to bounce some more. We headed off to my Mam's for lunch – very yummy – so nice to have had lots of food cooked for us this weekend! It was Sunday papers and a very laid-back, post-prandial Sunday afternoon for us, while the kids buzzed around like flies and generally messed the place up. That's their handywork on the windows in the photo.

The week began as a mish-mash of banking and posting stuff off here & there and outrage at the news (take your pick: the Shannon saga, plans to catch them young, or the realisation that our local council refuses to recycle plastics) and realising that I'm beginning to get a bit twitchy, so I offered to do some volunteer work at the school where my auntie teaches. I had a great day today in Year 3 (bit weird resisting the urge to translate everything into Spanish) and I'm going back tomorrow for more! Y3 are off to Penshaw Hill to roll Easter eggs, weather permitting. Should be fun.

Aside from that, I'm definitely getting more used to the scary amount of choice in the supermarkets. We tried Sainsbury's today. Hypermarket-scale grocery shopping is finally becoming less confusing; at least when confronted by an entire kilometer of cereals I don't suffer a breakdown and flee from the supermarket muttering "I knew where I was in Esclat!" Striking muesli alone from the shopping list narrows the options down considerably. No hardship, we're all addicted to fruit-filled shreddies anyway. This weeks new flavour sensation is apricot, made even more yummy with the Jersey Gold Top organic milk that accidentally fell into our trolley.

Ok, that's it for now, apart from mentioning the lovely emails we've recieved over the last few days. It's just fab hearing from friends back in Spain. We think about you all lots and talk about you and tell stories about Spain and miss you. Keep on keeping in touch!