Create Every Week #4 - Blow Fish Party

I admit it, I have been slacking off on the creativity side but I did have a play around the other day with this.

I am hoping to up my "kawaii illustrations" game so I decided to combine different expressions with blowfish (fugu as it is known in Japan).

I'll probably paint it with water colours but upload and clean it up a bit so I can play around with digital painting too.

I have been using this book: Kawaii: How to draw really cute stuff and a reference book. Which I'm really enjoying, Ebi-kun too. It has step by step for drawing all kinds of things from people to transport to buildings and how to kawaiify them.

Obviously in Japan everything is kawaii, they have a knack of making everything cute - which other nation would come up with a cute poop emoji? I rest my case.
All the prefectures have their own cute mascots, we have a pigeon, I know right, of all the creatures they pick a bloody pigeon!

But it doesn't stop there, supermarkets, hospitals, schools, even prisions have mascots too - it's a HUGE business. One thing that surprised me when I first came over to Japan was seeing full grown men with cute mascot pens, key-chains and the such like. After being here so long it all seems perfectly normal.

So... what have you been creating this week?

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Cooking Corner - English Teacakes

Ebi-kun is off school at the moment so I am putting him to work in the kitchen, he loves making mac and cheese from scratch but I want him to expand his repertoire. He is starting with bread!

Many people think that making bread is difficult, it's not, it just takes a bit of patience and it's a great recipe for kids. 

This recipe is from Paul Hollywoods 100 Great Breads, which has become one of our most used cookbooks, we haven't tried them all yet but we have tried quite a few! No disasters so far, and the recipes are easy to follow, so if you are looking for a good bread book I can highly recommend it.

This is the first time we have tried the teacakes though, slightly adapted recipe:

400g strong flour
1.5 tsp salt
40g caster sugar (he used brown)
20g yeast
1tsp cinnamon
200ml water
50g softened butter
140g mixed dried fruit
1 egg beaten for eggwash

Put the flour, salt, sugar, cinnamon, butter, yeast and water into a large bowl and mix together for 2 minutes. Tip the dough onto a slightly floured surface and knead for 5 minutes. Return to the bowl and let rest for 1 hour.

Line a baking tray or use a silicon tray. Add the mixed dried fruit to the dough and divide into 75g pieces. It doesn't matter how well you measure everything, the last piece will always be under the correct weight.

Shape into a ball (I should have shown him how to pull the dough to make it smooth here but he didn't want any help! Use a rolling pin, flatten using a rolling pin until they are about 2.5cm thick.

Place on the baking tray and leave to rise for an hour.

Preheat the oven to 190C. Brush the top of the teacakes with beaten egg wash and bake for 15-20 minutes.

Try the teacake fresh from the oven, smothered in butter.

Also delicious toasted and yes, smothered in butter! These were really good and although he doesn't know it yet, he will be making these again next week!

Read Your World - Multicultural Children's Book Day

Today's  Book Bag book is part of Multicultural Children's Book Day. There are some great reviews of some brilliant books coming up and a whole host of amazing books to win!

The book we got assigned is called Obstacles by Gregory E Ransom Published by Lulu Publishing Services.

Now I have to be totally honest here, we haven't quite finished it yet, it's a chapter book and we decided to read out loud, together. So,  it's taking a bit longer than usual to get through it. That and the fact that now Ebi-kun is in the 5th grade we get very little downtime together.

Obstacles is a giant but he has a problem, he is little, which if you are supposed to be a giant, it's huge problem. Needless to say the other giants don't think he's up to much. He gets bullied by the local giant kids and ends up getting sent to a school up in the mountains but to get there is has to go through places like the Forests Of Future Regret and The Lake Of Lost Souls.

As soon as we started reading and discovered that Obstacles was being bullied I noticed Ebi-kun getting drawn in and giving advice on how Obstacles could handle the situation, for new readers here, we went through our own bullying incident when he started school so it is very much something he relates to. Plus he is mixed race, somewhat a minority in this neck of the woods, he understood what Obstacles was going through.

Obstacles character shines, the courageous talk and the self doubt, the stubbornness that won't let him quit, his empathy and love and his quiet determination to get through the problem no matter what makes him a lovable and relatable character even if he is a giant.

I think this would make a great book to read in class as well as one to read at home, it brings up some great topics for discussion and makes it easier to broach subjects that kids might not want to talk about.

We are looking forward to seeing where the tale takes us, both of us are enjoying the book and Ebi-kun asks each day to read it.

Activity

As bullying is one of the topics of the book and it is something that is close to my heart. I would love for you to show your kids this short video. I demonstarted this to my sons headmaster and was so happy that he showed the whole school in assembly, it was something that he hadn't come across before and there are almost 1400 kids at Ebi-kuns elementary school so that is a lot of kids to be touching by this simple gesture.

So take 10 minutes, show this to your kids and then talk about it.

Ready to join the fun? 

Use the #readyourworld to share your multicultural children's book day finds and to find what others are sharing!

More About Multicultural Children's Book Day

Multicultural Children’s Book Day 2017 (1/27/17) is its fourth year and was founded by Valarie Budayr from Jump Into A Book and Mia Wenjen from PragmaticMom. Our mission is to raise awareness on the ongoing need to include kid’s books that celebrate diversity in home and school bookshelves while also working diligently to get more of these types of books into the hands of young readers, parents and educators.  

Despite census data that shows 37% of the US population consists of people of colour, only 10% of children’s books published have diversity content. Using the Multicultural Children’s Book Day holiday, the MCBD Team are on a mission to change all of that.

We’d like to also give a shout-out to MCBD’s impressive CoHost Team who not only hosts the book review link-up on celebration day, but who also work tirelessly to spread the word of this event. View our CoHosts HERE.

MCBD Links to remember:

MCBD site: http://multiculturalchildrensbookday.com/

Free Multicultural Books for Teachers: http://bit.ly/1kGZrta

Free Kindness Classroom Kit for Homeschoolers, Organizations, Librarians and Educators:
http://multiculturalchildrensbookday.com/teachers-classroom-kindness-kit/

Free Diversity Book Lists and Activities for Teachers and Parents: http://bit.ly/1sZ5s8i

And info on the Twitter party and giveaways are HERE

Current Sponsors:  MCBD 2017 is honoured to have some amazing Sponsors on board. Platinum Sponsors include Scholastic, Barefoot Books and Broccoli. Other Medallion Level Sponsors include heavy-hitters like Author Carole P. Roman, Audrey Press, Candlewick Press,  Fathers Incorporated, KidLitTV, Capstone Young Readers, ChildsPlayUsa, Author Gayle Swift, Wisdom Tales Press, Lee& Low Books, The Pack-n-Go Girls, Live Oak Media, Author Charlotte Riggle, Chronicle Books and Pomelo Books

Author Sponsor include: Karen Leggett Abouraya, Veronica Appleton, Susan Bernardo, Kathleen Burkinshaw, Delores Connors, Maria Dismondy, D.G. Driver, Geoff Griffin,  Savannah Hendricks, Stephen Hodges, Carmen Bernier-Grand,Vahid Imani, Gwen Jackson,  Hena, Kahn, David Kelly, Mariana Llanos, Natasha Moulton-Levy, Teddy O'Malley, Stacy McAnulty,  Cerece Murphy, Miranda Paul, Annette Pimentel, Greg Ransom, Sandra Richards, Elsa Takaoka, Graciela Tiscareño-Sato,  Sarah Stevenson, Monica Mathis-Stowe SmartChoiceNation, Andrea Y. Wang

In The Book Bag - Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children

My best mate Di bought the box set of Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children for me for Christmas and I demolished the first book in just over 2 days, taking time off from work really frees up reading time!

I didn't know much about the book before I got it, just that it revolved around some old photographs, the whole concept is amazing and I love the intrigue of it all.

The book, written by Ransom Riggs is about a boy, his relationship with his grandfather, time travel and some peculiar children. I have to admit I didn't know about the time travel element before I started reading and it might have put me off, not my usual cup of tea but as it turned out it was fascinating.

I found myself not wanting to cook dinner because I needed to know what happened next.

My box set came with a set of photos, apparently these are all real photos that the author found from collectors and from the pictures he wove the tale.

The book is fascinating, a little bit weird and little bit romantic and very addictive. The first couple of chapters I thought it was going to be psychologically deep and scary, not suitable for kids but as I read on it didn't go as I expected. I would have LOVED this book as a kid, maybe age 10 and up and I'm sure Ebi-kun will enjoy it too.

The film is out here but not anywhere near us so I doubt I'll get to see it on the big screen, which is a shame, I would have liked to have seen it. Hopefully Ebi-kun will have read it by the time it comes out on the small screen!

Do I recommend this? Absolutely!

I'll do an update when I get round to reading the other two books in the set, I haven't started them yet because I have a sneaky suspicion that I won't be able to put them down!

Fantastic Beasts

Fantastic Beasts & Where To Find Them

If you haven't seen this yet then go and watch it!

The film is set in New York in the 1920's . Newt Scamander (the main character) is a Brit visiting New York and some of his magically beasts escape his suitcase.

The story isn't really about the book of the same name but the book does get a mention.

The book is an encyclopedia of sorts that Newt is still writing in the film. A lots of the beast in the book make an appearance, and I think everyone comes out wanting a pet niffler (myself included!)

There is also the muggles vs wizards and good vs evil twisted into the storyline and of course no mention of Harry Potter but Hogwarts and Dumbledore are brought up in conversation as with a few more names which is really setting everything up for the next film.

Which, I can't wait to see!

I don't want to share too much but do look out for the surprise appearance at the end, I had NO idea and nearly chocked on my popcorn!

Is it suitable for little kids?

I think it very much depends on the child. We watched it in 3D, which makes it more exciting and more scary. Like the HP films there is far more to be read into the story than what is shown on the surface.

It is quite violent in places and I can imagine the black magical force could upset some kids. Ebi-Kun wouldn't have enjoyed this film when he was 5 or 6. And I doubt kids that age really grasp the main story.

I'm sure 4D would have been brilliant but they were only showing it in Japanese - boo!

We can't wait for the next one and Ebi-kun is pestering to see this one in 4D, it would be fun!

Have you seen it?

What did you think?

Thank And Grow Rich by Pam Grout - In The Book Bag

Last weekend was a three day holiday here so we went down to visit the in-laws. The downside was that a typhoon was heading in so we had nothing but rain! The upside was I had lots of time to sit and read, an unknown luxury these days!

I saw that Pam Grout had released a new book, I loved her book E-squared so I eagerly downloaded the kindle version of Thank and Grow Rich (yes, the title is a play on words!)

Her work is all about connecting with the universe and manifesting what you want but she does it with a serious of games. in E-squared, Ebi-kun and I worked through the experiments together, it was a lot of fun and I keep thinking we should crack open the book and try it again.

This book is centrered more on the idea of gratitude, something that pretty much all the great manifestors say is important and this time there are 30 days of experiments or party games as she likes to call them.

Thank and Grow Rich

The other thing I like about her books is that she adds lots of fun stories and anecdotes,  some of her own tales and some of her readers, she manages to find just the right story to get her point across.

I just managed to finish the book, made notes of the different games and we will be playing along this month to see what happens! The one thing I love about the kindle is that I can mark various pages and highlight important bits - something I'd never do in a paper book!

If you have read the book, I'd love to know what you think, either leave a comment or hit me up the the Moms That Rock group. It would be fun to be doing the party games along with others at the same time!

If you are looking for a bit of fun woo-woo then this book is ideal, I do recommend reading E-squared first and then moving onto this, purely because she refers back to E-squared quite a bit and it would be useful to know what she is talking about.

In The Book Bag - Business For Punks

As soon as I saw this book, I knew I had to read it! Written by one of the co-founders of BrewDog Brewery, he talks about how being a punk helped him create a successful business.

Business For Punks

Brewdog turns over GBP50 million a year and sells in 55 countries, not bad for a pair of Scottish punks doing things their way! The book has a few 'rants' about their entrepreneurial journey, times when they came up against the establishment for not towing the line and doing everything the way you are "supposed" to do it.

He also talks about the tough times and how quitting was never an option, no matter how dire the situation got.

Many (non) punks think that punk is to do with the music and the hair, the fashion and anarchy but I don't think that is it at all. Punk is something you are at birth, it is the attitude and drive, the way you look at the world. The stubbornness not to be pigeon-holed and the feeling in your gut when you know you are right and screw what everyone else thinks!

Punks often look at the world differently which is why being an entrepreneur suits us, we don't have to do it anyway but our own way, we are not afraid to try something new, that with the added f* you attitude can make for a powerful combination!

Back to the book, for me, it was as if a good mate was sat chatting to me in the pub over a few beers. Someone who really got me, knew how I ticked and shared my frustrations.

As a business book, if you are starting your own business, it's not going to give you the structure, the biz plans, and all that jazz, it will give you the confidence that you don't have to do everything by the book and that you can still make a success of it.

If you are a fellow punk with an urge to work for yourself, you will probably find it a good read. If you are into reading business books that are all about doing things the right way, then read it anyway, it might give you a different angle to look at things by!

Available on Amazon and all good book stores! (aff link)

If you have read it, let me know what you thought!

Sherlock Holmes is in the Book Bag

As you know, Ebi-kun is an avid reader and ever since he started stringing words together, he will pick up anything and attempt to read it! I have a number of books left over from my teaching days, they have been sat on the shelf and recently Ebi-kun has been dipping in!

He was totally hooked on this Sherlock book, with three short stories, his nose was stuck in and didn't come out again until he was done!

This is the version he was reading, it's an OUP bookworm 2 book (cassette tape available lol!) but I have just found the whole collection of short stories for free on kindle, you can get it HERE.

Ebi-kun can tell you himself how he felt about it...

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In The Book Bag - Let's Pretend This Never Happened

I made a pact with myself to start reading more. It's not that I don't read but I rarely sit down and read just for pleasure these days, good meaty books that you can get lost in. And that makes me sad because I have lost many an hour buried in a good book!

I picked out Let's Pretend It Never Happened on a whim, it sounded light and fun, just what the doctor ordered.

OMG - this book is hysterical. I went through an emotional roller coaster reading it, from Nooooo that can't happen to what the heck and almost wetting my knickers.

I haven't enjoyed a book as much as this in a long time. maybe because I could relate to the misfit incidents or maybe because it was written in a way that just hits my funny button. There are some serious under-lying issues in the humour, if you take it just as antidotal humour and don't go all PC brigade, you'll be fine with it.

To be honest I'm still not sure how much of this is true and how much is embellished but as entertainment goes it doesn't really matter, the book takes us through the life to date of the writer. from growing up with a taxidermist and slightly mad father to giving birth to her daughter and everything in between. 

DON'T even look at the cover of this book, let alone buy it if you are offended by cursing or just easily offended! 

I also don't recommend reading the book whilst eating or drinking (chance of snorting whatever you are consuming then spitting it everywhere are very high) or in public unless you don't mind people looking like you as if you are a crazed lunatic!

If that hasn't put you off you are probably hardcore enough to read it! And if you do, or you already have, let me know what you think in the comments.

Get your copy of Let's Pretend This Never Happened here (aff link)

I'm also on the look out for similar, LOL type books, if you have any recommendations, I'm all ears.

Taste Tests: Ebi-kun Eats Book Giving Day Special Recipes

This week is a little bit different. Ebi-kun wanted to do something special for book giving day so we decided on making recipes from Roald Dahls Revolting Recipes book. This meant cooking them before he could taste them!

This is also the episode where I apparently got the sack! More on that later...

He got busy making Boggis Chicken, he did most of the work himself, I just stood around taking photos! (My kind of kitchen work!)

Making the dumplings was fun, we have never made them before, I always assumed you needed suet, which we can't get but the recipe called for lard, which we can get...

A rather messy process, great for a sensory activity! The recipe made enough for 2 nights worth of dinners for the three of us.

I think we should have used the iron pan as it did stick to the bottom, I managed to clean it off thanks to a friend Lias's top stip - use a dishwasher tablet and some hot water and leave to soak over night, no scrubbing needed at all!

Looks good right? But how did it taste? You will have to check out the video below to find out...

Don't forget to enter the giveaway, it runs until the 21st Feb 2016. Click HERE to sign up (scroll to the bottom of the page)

In The Book Bag...

Ebi-kun has a new fad, thanks to his sensei. The books are called Deltora Quest by Emily Rodda, he has been reading them in Japanese but wants to read them in English too so he can compare the translation!

They are exciting fantasy books, I think 8 in the first series. He is ploughing through them, a book a day! Thankfully we joined the library a couple of weeks ago otherwise I might have to get a second job to keep the boy in books!

I know it seems odd that we have only just joined the local library but the reason is two-fold. Firstly, it's miles away! Secondly, it's all Japanese books and I have always encouraged him to read more English at home. They have a reading card for school where the kids are supposed to keep track of how many book they have read and how many pages. Ebi-kun has finally started using it! He was already 5 books down, 5 days into the month, all with 205 pages each.

We did discover that that there is a drop off point at school so he can just post the books there when he is done with them and the library truck comes round to school once a week so he can now borrow books from there too - he is like a kid in a candy store when it comes to books.

We have just finished Harry Potter and The Goblet Of Fire, it's fun reading them again, it is so long since I first read the series that I don't remember what half the story is about anyway! Ebi-kun wants to watch the film before we start on the next book, I think we might take a HP break over the summer and start again after we come back from the UK.

Now we are reading Beowolf by Micheal Morpurgo, illustrated by Michael Foreman and the illustrations are beautiful, fit perfectly with the text. Beowolf was one of my favourite books as a kid so I'm hoping Ebi-kun will fall in love with it too, might have to get him the old English version to read, then he can compare those two texts too!

Another book that is popular with him at the moment is Girls Who Rocked The World, this is a great book to dip in and out of since the stories are short. I also love the questions that they bring up, in fact when we were at the Magritte exhibition Ebi-kun asked why most of the famous artists were men. I'm happy that it's on his radar and he is noticing these things.

As for me, I have picked up E3 by Pam Grout. We had fun doing the experiments in E2 so I want to have a go with her next book. It's about abundance, manifesting money and woo-woo stuff, quite interesting when you start doing the experiments!

What's in your book bag at the moment? How about the kids?

Football, Coffee and a Good Book...

The boys had football on Saturday, it's lads and dads, more lads than dads to be honest!

Good excuse to have a play with my camera too. It was a lovely day, spring is on it's way, unfortunately that means the hay fever season is here too - my eyes were streaming after being outside for a few hours!

Daddy Ebi managed to twist his ankle when he was playing, which later swelled up like a tennis ball. He ended up going to get it x-rays but it's just a sprain, his football dad career isn't over yet...

They do make a good coffee at the Footpal place which I supped on as  I'm working my way through Tony Robbin's new book Money: Master The Game. It's a great read but I'm having to take it slowly as I have no knowledge when it comes to hedge funds, 401Ks and other financial jargon! Luckily it's written so even I can understand it. Might take me a while to finish it, hopefully before retirement! It's one BIG book!

I'm about half way through and have just started the part where he tells you how to invest your money, I'll do a proper review when I finish it...

Great New Book By Kristi Kremers

We have some book related posts this week for International Book Giving Day...

Yes,  I know you think February 14th is all about the romance, the roses and the chocolates but it should be about books too! Hands up if you'd prefer a good book rather than something that is going to add inches to your hips or die in a matter of days - see, not such a daft idea after all!

I have some good stuff lined up for you this week and I want to hear about your book giving escapades too!

So let's get things rolling, today we are reviewing Who Is A Leader by Kristi Kremers.

Who Is A Leader is like a traditional picture book, aimed at elementary aged children and filled with cute illustrations. It talks about 4 world leaders and the qualities that a leader has. Now, the clever part of this book is at the back where there are questions for teachers and parents so that you can expand on the conversation and dig deeper with the kids. I think this is especially useful for parents who, lets face it, most of which haven't done any kind of teacher training, so this kind of thing often doesn't come naturally. 

Who Is A leader will be free to download on Feb 10th & 11th (Amazon.com time, no idea which timezone that is!)

It would be a perfect book as a springboard for so many discussion or projects and I will be using it when we next study about a leader.

I also got to interview Kristi about the book and her fascinating story, pop over to My Organized Chaos to listen in.

PS - did you pop your name in the hat for the giveaway? It's over HERE

3 years of conversation

A new habit in the Ebi-house is filling in this book. Q & A a day for kids by Betsy Franco. It's a diary, each page has one question then three sections to fill in for year 1, 2 and 3, so as the child gets older you can see how their answers change. There are 5 lines per entry so I've been encouraging longer answers with a reason rather than a one word answer.

Some of the sample questions are:

What would you like more of?

Who is your hero?

What seems to be dangerous to you?

Describe a time you were angry...

Now, there are a couple of reasons I bought this. Firstly I want Ebi-kun to develop good morning habits, it's well documented that successful people have morning rituals and routines. As it happens Ebi-kun is already an early riser and is up before me and my husband, he is usually dressed with his nose in a book when we come down in a morning. And I LOVE this, even at the weekend when he is allowed to watch TV, he reads first, it's like the written word is his alarm clock. So adding a writing habit into the mix is a good step forward.

Secondly, as Ebi-kun is in Japanese school all day and as he gets older his free time gets shorter, I needed a way to sneak some fun writing in English in. the Montessorian in me doesn't believe in doing drill books or forcing a tired child to sit down and do more studying when they have been at school all day (Don't get me started on the whole juku/cram school rant!) BUT I still want to keep his English level appropriate to his age. Speaking and reading are no problem, writing is the area we need to work at.

And finally, morning are our family time, daddy Ebi gets back late most nights so it's good to spend some time in the morning to talk about what we've been doing and what we plan to do. Adding the daily question into the mix makes it more fun. We deliberatly get up earlier than we actually need to so that our mornings are relaxed and easy going, I hate starting the day stressed out and harried.

If you like this idea for yourself, there is an adults version too.