Japanese Dinner Party

WE FINALLY DID IT! We finally had our Japanese Dinner! This dinner has been a long time coming, and I was starting to believe that it wasn't going to happen. But we persevered and made it happen and it was soooo worth it! All of the food was so delicious! I have so missed having The Wrights and The Higgins over for our international food nights! 

Food on the menu:

* Miso Soup

* Dumplings in traditional rice vinegar dipping sauce!

* Fried rice and marinated chicken wings

* Japanese Teriyaki Chicken Salad (Recipe below)

Oh YUM!

JAPANESE YUMMIES!

Next international food night... ITALIAN! Possibly one of my fav's!

Japanese Teriyaki Chicken Salad Recipe:

*Cooked short grain rice

*Salads: Red cabbage, green cabbage, lettuce, red onion, mushrooms, apples, mung beans, carrot, cucumber. (You can pretty much put anything on there that you like in a salad.)

* Marinated Teriyaki chicken strips

* Sesame Seed Dressing (you can buy this in most supermarkets)

* Ginger Dressing (click on this link for the recipe)

(You basically layer it up in this order in a big bowl and then dig in! You can have lots of different sauces too, like Sweet Chili or BBQ Sauce too.)

Book Review - Handas Surprise

One of Ashton's favourite books to read at the moment is "Handa's Surprise". He just discovered it sitting on his shelf the other day and I had totally forgotten we had it, and it was like finding a lost gem.

It is a very simple story, that kind of has a silent story (via the illustrations) running along side the written story. So, while we are reading the story, the illustrations are opening up lots of different points of conversations and questions for me to have with Ashton.

A brief synopsis of the story is that Handa has decided to surprise her good friend Akeyo with a basic of yummy fruit. She wonders while fruit Akeyo will like best. On Handa's journey to see Akeyo in her village different animals sneak up and steal the various pieces of fruit, leaving none left. But an unexpected event happens to make the surprise not only for Akeyo, but for Handa as well.

Ashton loves to point out the different animals sneaking up on Handa, and loves to name the fruit each animal takes, and he loves pretending to eat some of the fruit too.

This story is obviously set in Africa somewhere and has that lovely cultural flavour to it, with its colours and representation of the village, their cultural clothing and even the way that the women would carry the fruit in the head baskets. Its a beautiful, vibrant and simple story! Love it!

Whats your favourite children's book? I'm always looking for great new books to read.

Our Big City Adventure

One 6 year old, one 3 year old, one 2 year old, two 1 year olds, two adults, 2 push chairs, and 3 bags. . . CHECK!

We were all ready for our big adventure into the city, via bus, to go to the Aotea Centre Pick and Mix Broadway Theatre event/workshop for children. These events are put on weekly throughout the winter and are free to the public. Each weekend a different organisation would put on a different kind of workshop for children to learn about.

I must say the actual show and workshop wasn't that fabulous. It could have been done so much better. But that didn't stop Ashton and the girls from getting up and having a boogie. They really wanted to enjoy it, so they made the effort and had a good time anyways.

The children really loved being able to run around and explore the big bustling city. I think this would have been a good enough adventure in itself! (maybe another day.) They loved watching all of the people, some were even interesting enough to make them stop and stare! ha ha. They loved pressing the pedestrian crossing buttons and then crossing the big busy streets as quickly as they could. We played Eye Spy a few times and this made them even more aware of everything around them.

It was a handful at times, trying to keep all 5 children going in the same direction, and we did get quite a few good stares ourselves!!!

One our way home the kids all opened up in their own theatrical rendition of "The Wheels on the bus" keeping everyone on the bus well entertained. When we asked them all what their favourite part of the adventure was they all agreed the bus ride was the best! We were all pretty tired by the end of our big city adventure, but it was lots of fun!

Our bus ride into town on the jam packed bus!

Waiting to cross the street.

Ashton just chilling and enjoying the music!

Cheeky Monkeys waiting for the bus.

Weeding is FUN!

I have been meaning to get round to weeding our garden for quite some time now, but with it being a bit on the colder side and with so much else (thats more exciting) to do, it just wasn't on my high priorities list. But, while I was out hanging the laundry today Ashton asked me, "I dig?" I was delighted that he was asking to do a messy play activity, (since he never does) and quickly set him up with some tools and a hole to dig in and we were away!

While sitting digging with him though, the sight of weeds kept popping into vision and distracting me. While contemplating when I would actually get round to pulling them, as if on cue, Ashton jumped up and pulled some weeds from the retaining wall and put them in his mud mix!!! Fabulous! From this point on Ashton and I shuttled backwards and forwards taking turns pulling the weeds and then adding them to our mud pie mixes! He thought it was great fun and I ended up with a reasonably weed free garden while playing with my boy!

Row Row Row Your Boat

Who would have thought that a baby bath would create so many hours of fun! Ashton has used his old baby bath for everything you could imagine lately. But his favourite activity is to turn it into a boat and sing the classic "Row Row Row your boat." So I though I would just share some of the extra verses we have found on our travels and now sing to make the adventure last longer! He loves each verse for its unique sounds and actions. . . he knows them all so well know he is already doing the actions or the sounds before I get to them!

1. Row, row, row your boat

Gently down the stream.

Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,

Life is but a dream.

2. Row, row, row your boat

Gently down the stream.

If you see a crocodile,

Don't forget to scream! Ahh!

3. Rock, rock, rock your boat

Gently to the shore.

If you see a lion,

Don't forget to roar! Rrrr!

4. Row, row, row your boat

Gently down the river.

If you see a polar bear,

Don't forget to shiver! Brrr!

5. Row row row your boat

To the other side

If you see a tiger there

Don't forget to hide!

6. Row row row your boat

carefully through the mist

if you pass a slithery snake

don't forget to hiss! Hisssss!

Ashton and his buddy Darcy going for a row in their boat!

Just taking my ball for a walk!

Ashton's world is rather female! He has A LOT of fabulous male role models around him that he thinks the world of. But when it comes to the people he spends most time with playing etc. It's pretty much girls! The other night we were over playing at Grandma and Papa's house and he found Grandma's pram that she was pushed around in as a baby. (Its very cool). Next thing, we have Ashton walk out into the lounge, very blasé, pushing his soccer ball in the pram.

This is how my little man deals with life surrounded by women! Awesome!

A Polkadotty Party

So I just got to experience another joy of being a Polkadotty Mum! We were invited up to our old play group as one of the boys was going to be celebrating his 3rd birthday. We have been meaning to go back and visit so we happily accepted the invite.

To our surprise. . . (mainly mine), it turned out to be a full blown Polkadots Party! All the songs they sung were Polkadots songs, all the decorations were pictures of The Polkadots, and after nibbles everyone continued to watch The Polkadots on DVD!

I was a little taken back with the whole situation. Blown away that someone had thought to have this as a theme for a party, and also that my picture was on the wall! bahahaha! To everyone else it was nothing. . . There are still a lot of things I am getting used to with all this show biz stuff! Ashton thought nothing of it! Ha ha.