belgianwaffle

Winter Wonderland


Posted in: Dublin, Family, Ireland

It’s been a very exciting week here, I can tell you.

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My phone started pinging about 6.30 on Wednesday morning with news that the “Beast from the East” (cold air) was coming, the country was to be blanketed in snow and the emergency planning group were issuing a “code red” (it’s far from code reds we were reared etc). From a work point of view, we were somewhat more prepared than when Storm Ophelia struck last year and able to cascade out to people reasonably readily that they were only to come in to work, if safe to do so. I went in myself and it was eerily quiet. Another colleague and I were the last to leave at the not incredibly late hour of 3 o’clock in the afternoon. Mr. Waffle and the children were at home as school was closed as well. About midday on Wednesday we were able to confirm to everyone at work that offices would be closed for Thursday and Friday also – it was a bit of a weight off my mind as I had a hideous vision of last minute calls Thursday and Friday morning.

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We had a lot of snow. Herself is still recovering from a cold and hasn’t left the house since it started. Michael did venture into the back garden and out onto the road and today, with some prodding, to the park around the corner. Daniel went (somewhat) further afield and was rewarded by an opportunity to throw snowballs at the neighbours’ children.

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Mr. Waffle and I walked in to town which was full of bewildered tourists but otherwise, pretty closed and empty.

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We have managed reasonably well. We had sufficient food including strategic bread stocks. We did run out of briquettes but Mr. Waffle chopped up some wood that was in the shed and that’s got us through today, along with the central heating.

Yesterday we watched “The Big Short” and now we all know what a synthetic CDO is so we certainly haven’t been wasting our time. We also tidied bookshelves, shelves in the kitchen, baked, worked a bit, finished homework and put away laundry. It’s all passed off very peacefully. The cat hates the snow though.

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Was there snow where you are? How was it?

Updated to add: Mr. Waffle trekked across the city on foot last night to attend a party. At the top of the road, he was hailed by our butcher. The butcher and two of the lads in the shop had been unable to go home due to the snow and they were staying in the B&B at the top of the road (he has some kind of contract to deliver nursing home food apparently and when they got back from doing the delivery, there was a queue of 20 people outside the shop and he felt obliged to open up and this was his undoing). When Mr. Waffle met them, they were venturing out in search of amusement having exhausted the limited entertainment offered by the B&B – apparently they had been reduced to playing chess on a Friday night and were mildly hoping for something better.

Seen and Not Heard


Posted in: Family

When I was a child, my parents would regularly say to me, “Children should be seen and not heard.” It did not seem odd to me and it was standard that children would have to be silent to allow grown-ups converse although, children could, of course, leave (I found out the hard way that swinging silently but thrillingly from the curtains in the room until eventually bringing down the pelmet was not an approved activity). It didn’t seem harsh or inhuman or anything other than completely normal. My husband was astonished when he heard this and it feeds further into his belief that I had the last Victorian childhood in Ireland. He, of course, was raised by hippies (well, relative hippies,I mean his father was a captain of industry but a very right-on one), so I was unsurprised. I checked with my bookclub and while I was not alone in hearing this expression brandished about, I was a definite minority. I feel that it was reasonably widespread but the unscientific evidence seems to be against me on this point. Gentle readers, did your parents say it to you?

Only Child


Posted in: Middle Child, Princess, Twins, Youngest Child

It’s mid-term. Herself and Daniel are off in Munich on a school tour. They left at 4 yesterday morning and seem to be still alive. A tribute to their teachers.

We strongly encouraged Michael to go but he even more strongly resisted so he is home alone for the week. Boy is he loving it, my little home bird. We signed him up for a sports course between 9.30 and 4 (advertised as “for the sporty child” – “I’m not a sporty child,” he pointed out. I said that it would be fine, it is fine). I knocked off work early today and picked him up. I offered all manner of treats but he just wanted to go home and sit in front of the fire where, even now, he is sitting happily. It’s all very peaceful.

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Things are the Sons of Heaven


Posted in: Cork, Dublin, Family, Ireland

My parents and my grandparents had lots of mahogany furniture. My grandmother gave my mother some of her furniture including an enormous solid bookcase and my mother spent a great deal of her own time scouring auctions from where much of our furniture was sourced (I used to sit beside her quiet as a mouse because she told me if I moved at all, items would be knocked down to me and I was terrified). This was great when my parents lived in a big house but not so fantastic when they moved to a smaller Edwardian semi-detached house which basically had to be organised and extended around the furniture. I remember one of my friends commenting when he came to my parents house first what a curiously old-fashioned house it was.

Anyway, doubtless due to my peculiar upbringing, I love dark furniture. I think mahogany is a lovely, lovely wood. And it is out of fashion so truly beautiful pieces are going for a song. I want to cry every time I see a big house auction and fantasise about bringing all these items home to my terraced Victorian house. Although, frankly, with the items we have already imported from my parents house and the sofas of doom, there isn’t a great deal of space. Furthermore, I am not at all handy and so the round mahogany table which should tilt sideways, is permanently slightly askew, let us not even speak of the piano, the wardrobe door will not close (my grandmother gave me the wardrobe and I love it but it is inconvenient to have to wedge one door shut with a child’s old sock) and one leg is collapsing and there seem to be no carpenters who are at all interested in mending these beautiful things. It is all a bit depressing. I saw in the Irish Times design supplement one Saturday (which I find curiously appealing, I know what you’re thinking, stop it) an exhortation to readers to go out and buy mahogany furniture cheap at auction and then paint it over with pretty pastel shades. I think I nearly did cry when I saw that.

Am I entirely alone in my love for cluttered living with dark furniture? A whole generation of Victorians can’t be wrong.

Independent Lives of Infinite Variety* or Weekly Round-Up


Posted in: Middle Child, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Twins, Youngest Child

Last Monday night, Daniel had hurling training, there was a talk in the school about Transition Year and I was hosting bookclub. Something had to give. It was Daniel’s training. He took it manfully, particularly since the weather was freezing.

On Tuesday night it was parents’ council in the school at 7, Michael in scouts at 7.30 and Mr. Waffle at soccer at 8. We made everything but one of us had to cycle home from the school at 8.30 in the evening in positively Baltic conditions.

On Wednesday morning, the Princess and I left the house at the same time. As we arrived at the top of the road in the freezing cold, she said, “I’ve forgotten my gloves but I’m not going back”. She had “mocks” this week, a venerable Irish rite of passage where you do a whole set of practice exams for a week before you do your actual State examinations in the summer. Since you have half a year of the course left to cover, results are invariably hair-raising. They are taking these with immense seriousness in the school and she was particularly anxious not be late. I was wearing gloves. It was very chilly, my fingers were frozen inside my gloves. I half-heartedly said, “You can have mine.” “No,” she said, “you have further to cycle” and she pedaled off like a demon in the other direction. I felt like a heel all day.

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On Wednesday night there were no activities. This encouraged me to spread my culinary wings. Other nights I get home at 6.30 and there is some activity which means that dinner has to be on the table and eaten by 7 which doesn’t really allow for flights of fancy. On Wednesday night we had salmon (sadly still raw when brought out of the oven), cheesy potatoes from the butcher (slightly out of date but ingredients were described as “potatoes, cheese, sauce” so a bit difficult to gauge how bad out of date might be, sauce, it turned out, included cream so that meant out of date corresponded to “completely inedible”) and green beans (do you find that these always take longer to cook than you might think?). The whole was an unmitigated disaster. Thursday saw me returning to “fun with pasta” (say what you like, pasta and pesto, hard to go wrong) and last night Mr. Waffle had to go out to his parents’ house so the children and I had take away which was undoubtedly the highlight of the culinary week although, doubtless, very bad for all of us.

How was your own culinary/activity filled week?

*Title is Hilaire Belloc, if you’re wondering