Starting Junior School - Lara's Bic Stationery Haul

In a few weeks time Lara will start junior school - this is where it all starts to get a bit serious, isn't it?! Lara is looking forward to needing school bag (aka a brightly coloured pinky purpley garish backpack) that is packed full of homework, books and stationery. Lara has been longing for the need for a pencil case!

This 32 piece back to school essentials set from Bic has everything Lara needs to fill her pencil case and school bag in preparation for big school.  Lara has most enjoyed using these stylised 4-colour pens which feature a skull design; she uses them for doodling in her "ideas book".

The Bic back to school stationery set contains

• 4 x Stick Ball Pens
• 2 x 4 Colour pens
• 10 x Colouring Felt Pens
• 6 x Graphite Pencils
• 2 x Sharpeners
• 2 x Mini Erasers
• 2 x Highlighters
• 1 x Correction Tape
• 2 x Glues
• 1 x Mini Correction Pen

Lara had never come across the concept of a correction pen before; but because she is likely to start using pens to write at school this term, I don't think it will be long before she realises their full value!

I think, from Lara's reaction to this Bic stationery set, she is likely to become a stationery lover at school this year.

Flying Lemurs :: Children's Book Review

Having spent several nights away from home over the past few months, we had got stuck in a bit of a bedtime story rut (there are only so many books you can pack in your suitcase) - it was nice to get home to a few new story books from Macmillan to inject a bit of fun back into bedtime.

Flying Lemurs by Zehra Hicks is definitely fun - lemurs by definition are fun in my eyes!  This is a picture book featuring a little lemur who is part of a family of amazing jumpers - from Dad who can jump on a trampoline, to Granny who can jump out of a cannon...everyone knows that lemurs can jump.  Except of course this tiny lemur who is just a little bit scared of jumping.

We enjoyed the first-person explanation from the little lemur of his worries about jumping - it struck a chord with both of my girls who often struggle a bit with nerves when they're asked to perform.  Flying Lemurs has a gentle message in it about practicing things about which you are a little nervous but I think there is also a strong message about exploring your own strengths - if you don't think you're very good at jumping, then how about looking at what you really are good?

Each page features lots of fun lemur sketches and the illustrations are enhanced with pictures of different fabrics and textures that really bring the images to life; did you ever expect to see a lemur in a frilly skirt made from tassels?

Lara and Holly both love lemurs so they enjoyed this book; I think they both understood the message in the story and were impressed with the little lemur. I found the story enjoyable to read to them - I liked the first person aspect because it really highlights the main character but there is one page with speech from other family members which took me by surprise!

Flying Lemurs is written and illustrated by Zehra Hicks and is available in paperback and hardback.

  

Creating our own Sushi with Yutaka #cookingwithkids

This weekend Lara and Holly made their own sushi using a wonderful set of Japanese ingredients that were supplied to us by Yutaka to demonstrate just how easy it is to make your own sushi at home.  Until July, none of us had ever tried sushi at all - most of us aren't keen fish eaters and sushi does often tend to feature fish and seafood but the word "sushi" means simply sweetened seasoned rice so, when you make it at home you have the freedom to add to it whatever you wish.

Yutaka sent us some sushi rice which we cooked and cooled and then Lara seasoned it with a mixture of rice vinegar, sugar and salt.  After that, both Holly and Lara got their sleeves rolled up and started to construct us a feast of vegetable and chicken sushi. 

Lara very quickly got the hang of using the Yatuka rolling mat with a sheet of nori seaweed to make sushi rolls filled with steamed carrots, beans, beansprouts and radish. The nori smells quite strong and looks really delicate but in fact it doesn't taste as strong as we had imagined; it's a superfood with lots of acknowledged health benefits - packed full of nutrients and dietary fibre, improves bone and dental health, is high in iron and rich in protein.

Holly got busy making nigri sushi which are little bricks of rice which you decorate with one or two pieces of protein or vegetable; you can hold the decoration in place with a strip of nori. Yutaka sell a special plastic device which makes it easy to mould the little rice blocks - you pat the rice into the mould, press it down and then gently press them out again (or bang them really hard like Holly chose to).  Holly enjoyed dipping these little rice parcels into roasted sesame seeds; watching her do this reminded me of watching her decorate cupcakes!

The sticky sweet rice was really hard to manage - it just got everywhere! When the girls had finished, it took me quite some time to clear up all the grains of rice, pieces of seaweed and rouge vegetables but the finished product looked really quite impressive.

To complete our dish, Lara created a homemade teryaki sauce using japanese soy sauce and mirin (a recipe on the back of one of the Yutaka bottles). We used this to marinade two chicken breasts which I think fried and sliced thinly.  To serve, we put the remaining vegetables in a bowl with some spring onion and boiled eggs and served our sushi with dipping vinegar, soy sauce and a japanese curry sauce that Mr. B. made.

The girls both very much enjoyed the sushi and teryaki chicken. Both girls even enjoyed trying out the pickled ginger which you use to cleanse your palette.  Lara, who is a big fan of spicy food, even tried out the hot wasabi paste - I think she was fascinated by it, but she chose not to go back for more!

We had great fun making sushi; it's a fun, healthy food that the kids can get really messy joining in with.