Culinary Challenges

The rest of the week has been quieter, just!

Thursday Roarke had a hospital appointment, and a business appointment.

I had to dash around getting stuff ready, having remembered that we had guests for dinner.

Being gluten, dairy and egg free meant that I had to really think about what to cook. In the end, I used the slow cooker for chicken and then did roasted vegetables and potatoes. Pudding was fruit crumble, made with Pure sunflower spread and Doves gluten free flour. I'm planning to update our family cookbook with my favourite slow cooker recipes soon (in my spare time..)

The evening was really nice, and I felt more relaxed than I usually do with guests, which was good.

This week I've found a great way to keep kids/aspies/boys quiet: give them all a new phone!

Roarke upgraded his phone, so the old one (a pda type thing) got passed onto Joshua for his birthday. It has a radio, phone, camera, and mp3 player, so he is very happy! He also got a DAB radio (much to Roarke's annoyance as he doesn't have one!) and has instantly become a teenager; staying in his room all the time just listening to music.

Another old phone was found, and given to Samuel. This also has a camera, as well as a video facility. He has spent the whole day taking photos of everything. And I mean everything. Life through the lens, from the point of view of an aspie. This includes photos of the tv when his favourite programme was on (and is now his wallpaper); a photo of his pepperami (his favourite thing); and lots of photos of his brothers and us taken without them knowing.

As for the videos, I had a look earlier. There are video clips of William being mad, a film that they watched, his favourite pop video on The Hits, his baby brother, him giving a running commentary going up and down the garden, him eating his dinner (and with me in the background coming into the room yelling at him to put the darn phone down!).

This has meant that Samuel's old phone (mine from 5 years ago!) has been given to Will. So now everyone has a phone. Will does not have credit on his, I hasten to add. That would be too much! Its hard enough stopping Samuel from phoning and texting everyone every five minutes!

I'm the only one without a "new" phone :O(

Samuel got to level 9 today on his Maths Upgrade. Josh earnt himself some money by agreeing to sit with William on Education City - in my defense it was when I was rushing around cooking yesterday and realised I hadn't sat down with him as promised. I don't intend to pay him to teach his brother - I can't afford his rates for one thing ;O)

Apparently William did really well.

Both the older boys have written their blogs, as well as posting more book reviews on Joshua's book blog. Samuel now wants another blog. This is triggered by seeing that Josh has Amazon adverts on his blog for all the books. As a self styled entrepreneur, Samuel doesn't like to think he's missing out on a business opportunity, so he is currently deciding what he can blog about, and put adverts on for!

Talking of money, Roarke had more sales today for Where2Eat In Kent, which he has also found has made it to no 4 in Google (that's my part of the business), which is cool.

Shopping today was hard. How do vegans manage?!

Yet another challenge to my cooking skills. Well, we've done vegetarian, gluten free, we were yeast free for a while, low purine, low acid, dairy free for a while, and now its cooking without eggs.
Good job I *like* fruit and vegetables....