So, the summer holidays are upon us again.

For people with no children this means everywhere is much more annoyingly busier. For us with children, we have to find lots of things to do to keep those immortal words ‘I’m bored’ at bay.

Working from home I can afford to take not quite so much work on over the next six weeks, so my children will be visiting holiday clubs just two days every week. Leaving me with another five to fill.

A holiday planner is already up on the wall with all the big booked-in events written in: the week at their Nan’s caravan in Berwick-Upon-Tweed, the morning going to look after and ride a pony, the cinema trip, the visit to The Deep aquarium and the play centre visit with cousin Emma.

However, there are still a lot of days when I need to think of something to enable us to turn the television off for a few hours: that’s the curse of having too many children’s channels!

Hidden away upstairs I have a few craft kits from the very child friendly Buttonbag company.
If I can keep my patience perhaps we can make knight peg people and put on a show one day? Perhaps we can sew a little felt mouse each without too many pricked fingers? Perhaps I can bear the mess of making my own papier mache again and make some balloon masks?

And most definitely we should get out some of their old-fashioned board games to play.

Just this weekend we were housebound due to the rain so the ‘Junior Monopoly’ came out. And do you know what? It was really great. Better than playing on the Wii. It had been so long since we’d last played it that I was surprised to find my six year old Finley could read the instructions himself, and my four year old daughter Elena could recognise the numbers on the money. Fun and educational!

Then, of course, there is always some baking that can be done.
Two chairs squeezed in side by side into my tiny kitchen as we all take turns to weigh and mix. The great thing about the recipes in the Dairy Diary is that they aren’t too long or complicated, so with my young helpers to hand I may well give the Tomato Scones from the 2011 Dairy Diary, page 87 a go.

There’s nothing they like more than getting messy hands and being able to use a rolling pin. And of course the results are bound to beat ‘boring’ old sandwiches.

Good luck.

Karen Perry
Dairy Diary Team

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