Wednesday 16 December 2009

Mischief

Right. Suddenly you are a parent. It's something you've been expecting for nine months, but it's an enormous shock for at least the first two years.

Then the shock wears off a little and you have (in my case) two perfectly formed little human beings, wide-eyed, innocent in the ways of the world and thirsty for knowledge like a parent is thirsty for wine on a Friday night.

This is where the mischief creeps in.

How is honey made? They innocently ask and you explain about bees and hives and beeswax and the miracle of nectar and pollen and they are fascinated, but they don't believe you because, really, it's totally ridiculous. But then you take them to Newquay Honey Farm and Prove It. Ah ha!

Chutney, of course, is made by earwigs. They absorb this fact. 'Earwigs' is a great word, as is 'chutney' and the juxtaposition of them in a sentance is pure joy (and something we must be thankful to Eddie Izzard for).

From then on every time you find an earwig in the garden it's: "Oooh look! It's going shopping for chutney ingredients."

Wasps, by the way, make jam. This is a logical thing because you often encounter wasps in jam jars or in those wasp catching pots which are baited with jam and are known in our house as "jam factories".

I didn't think I could expand on those two, but tonight I was handed a perfect opportunity by R6.

"Mummy," she said, "how is yoghurt made?"

"Well," I said, thinking quickly. "To get yoghurt the cows do special yoga which makes the milk thick and then you get yoghurt."

Bovine yoga --> yoghurt. Simples.

Again this has logic in the animal kingdom because Mido the dog does yoga before he eats his breakfast. He gets out of his bed, does Up Dog, Down Dog, says 'woof' and then eats. So it's not such a huge leap from the dog doing yoga to cows doing yoga.

I'm going to get into such trouble one day. Oops.

9 comments:

  1. Cows doing yoga? Have you been on the Christmas sherry?

    Mark

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  2. Eldest's Australian Godmother and I ( both very well qualified teachers with a good grounding in early learning I ought to add) had a spiffing plan to teach her sons all ther wong words and see what would happen for instance tell them a dog was a cat and visa versa, a car an elephant.. we had great hopes of it being a hoot for many years until her partner got very serious with us about messing with young minds!! We alwasy htought it was a great lsot opportunity to educational research so am glad you are following a simular scheme!

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  3. Perhaps I should add that my children know when I'm kidding and now go along with such idiotics for a bit of a larf!

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  4. Oh the tales I could tell: ex-teacher, mother of three (now aged 48, 46 and 38) and nine beautiful grandchildren ged from 5 to 16. Ann (72-year old, still-working grandma). Enjoy your lovely girls; they will grow up all too fast.

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  5. Whatever you are on Mags can I have the recipe?

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  6. Love the idea of cows doing yoga - of course! How else would it be made? Mind you, I've gone right off chutney, now.

    (Love the look of your oaty bread down below - am definitely going to check that recipe out. )

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  7. These larking-about childhood explanations are what delightful memories are made of. My mother had a great store of them, concerning her own father, who could make everything special. I can't see tramlines without thinking of his story of seeing a woman fall on them, trapping her large nose, and having to be pushed back to the terminus like a wheelbarrow.... No one believed them, but they were fun!

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  8. Dog yoga. I think there's a business opportunity there! Brilliant.

    I have a really really ghastly story about wasps and jam. I won't write it here though.

    I am ALWAYS thankful for Eddie Izzard. The secret me wants to commit bigamy and MARRY HIM!!!!!

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  9. It's not that I don't have time to comment, it's more that although I enjoyed this post and chuckled at it, I don't have anything useful to say in response. Well, except now I'm leaving one anyway because of the checkbox. >.>

    (I came in by clicking on "next blog" from my blog.)

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I am sorry to have to add word verification thing again but I keep getting spammed.