Look in my letterbox #5

Well, with one thing and another I haven't managed to blog for a while. I even missed last week's Look in my letterbox which I'm annoyed at myself for.

I'm back to normal this week though so here is what's arrived at the Monkey House this week. As always I'm linking up with the lovely Alice Megan.

It's been a very quiet week here. Just two letters for me, and none for Monkey. My letters both came from pals in England who share my love of cute writing sets. I love seeing such bright and colourful envelopes come through my letterbox. So much nicer than boring old bills!

The only other thing that's arrived is an envelope full of envelopes! It sounds strange but it's a way of raising funds for our Baby Book Club. We're registered with a website who buy used stamps from fundraisers. It's ideal for somebody like me who gets a lot of post but it's something that all of the members can get involved in. They sent me pre-paid envelopes to give out at our next book club on Monday. I'm hoping it will be successful. It's really important to me to keep book club free but it's grown faster than expected and we don't get any funding. If you have any used stamps, I'll gladly take them off your hands!

The Tiger Who Came to Tea

When I was a little girl The Tiger Who Came to Tea by Judith Kerr was one of my favourite books. I'm not quite sure why I loved it so much. It's quite a simple story but it's always made me smile.



When Monkey was born I knew I wanted to do lots of reading with her. The Tiger Who Came to Tea was one of the first books I bought her. We've read it loads and it's become a firm favourite with her just as it was with me.

So I suppose it was only a matter of time until we read it at baby book club. And today was the day.

It was a busy book club today. We've been at the children's centre a while now but this was the first one that had been properly advertised and open to everyone. We had five babies who were joining us for the first time which was great to see. It's amazing how quickly it's grown from just a few friends in my front room.

As always we started by reading the story out loud. We then had a pretend tea party. The children played with tea sets and ate biscuits. We've found some Monkey safe biscuits lately so she was very pleased with that activity.

The craft activity this week was a tiger collage. We had a black sugar paper tiger and an assortment of orange things to make the stripes. We had patterned paper, lentils, foam, netting, tissue paper and ribbon. The lentils ended up everywhere but some did make it onto the tigers.

I've got very happy memories of this book and I hope that after this afternoon the baby book club members will have too.

Look in my letterbox #4

It's been a busy week for my letterbox this week. Here's my weekly round up, linking up with Alice Megan as usual.

Monday was a Bank Holiday so no post here. It did give me a chance to catch up with some of my replies though.

I got my favourite piece of post on Tuesday. Last week I wrote about a christmas card for Regina. Regina is a little girl who lives in Uganda. I sponsor her through the charity World Vision and they sent me an update of their work in her community. It's always amazing to see what a difference a small amount can make. What I really liked about this update though was that I got an up to date photo of Regina.

There was no post at the Monkey House on Wednesday but then on Thursday there were four penpal letters for me and one for Monkey.

A bumper parcel arrived on Friday jam-packed with charity goodies. There were also penpal letters in there for both me and Monkey. Monkey's was written in this beautiful hand made card. These tiny penpals are certainly talented!

There were no penpal letters this morning but there was still post. We got the latest newsletter from Allergy UK. They've really helped me and Monkey (I blogged about it here) so we like to keep updated and support them with fundraising when we can.

Adventures with Alice

When on holiday in Llandudno last week I noticed lots of references to a book I loved as a child - Alice in Wonderland. I wasn't aware of any link between the two but a quick google told me that Llandudno is the home of Alice in Wonderland.

Alice Liddell was the real life Alice in Wonderland. She spent her holidays in Llandudno with her family and her adventures there are believed to be the inspiration for the book.

Llandudno is proud of it's connection to Alice in Wonderland. There is an Alice trail you can do. It's only £2.99 and can be a nice walk but be warned it's not buggy friendly! After walking round the Orme and managing to get the buggy down some steps we were faced with a gate we couldn't get through. Luckily Daddy Monkey was there to lift the pram over.

If you ignore the pram disasters, we enjoyed the trail. It was a nice walk in the sunshine, we found new places to explore and Monkey seemed to like the statues.

Once we were back there was really only one bedtime story we could have. Monkey is still too young for the original book but in a strange coincidence we had borrowed the Ladybird First Favourite Tales version from the library before we went.

This is a great version of the story to read with young children. There is lots of rhyme and the main parts of the story are told simply and clearly. It's a very colourful book with lots of bright pictures which Monkey enjoyed.

We'll be looking out for more in the series!

Allergy friendly ice cream

We had a little holiday with Monkey last week which is why the blog was quiet. We went to Llandudno and had a fab time. That's a whole other blog post though. For now I just want to talk about the highlight of the holiday for me....

ICE CREAM!!!!

It's just one of those things you do at the seaside isn't it? Or at least it is for most people. When you're dealing with multiple allergies it's not quite that simple.

There are certain foods it really upsets me that Monkey can't have. Ice-cream is one of them. Yes, I know it's hardly a staple and she doesn't actually need it but it's always been my number one comfort food and what kid doesn't love ice-cream?

So it was a lovely surprise when we stumbled across The Looking Glass, a gorgeous ice-cream parlour. They do home made ice cream in lots of lovely flavours. We were gazing longingly through the window thinking we might nip back when Monkey was asleep when I saw a sign saying they had dairy free, vegan and gluten free options.

I went in for a chat thinking surely it was too good to be true. It was bound to contain soya and once again I'd have a disappointed little girl. But nope - not only did they have something Monkey could eat but she actually had a choice! All the sorbets were suitable and there was a choice of about five.

I've bought sorbet from supermarkets in the past but it's never felt like ice-cream. The texture is all wrong. The Looking Glass' sorbets weren't like that at all though, they looked and tasted just like ice cream. Monkey has started to notice when we give her something different but she really felt like she was having the same as us.

It's hard sometimes as an allergy mum having to say no especially while Monkey is still too young to understand why. It's even harder whilst on holiday. I want her to be able to have treats but I'm less likely to take risks. At home we have a GP, health visitor, consultant and dietitian supporting us, away from home we're on our own. I felt confident at The Looking Glass though and seeing Monkey eat her first ever 'ice-cream' really was the highlight of my holiday.

Look in my letterbox #3

It's Saturday again and that means it's time to link up with Alice Megan for Look in my letterbox

It's been a very quiet mail week at the Monkey House with only two penpal letters for me and one for Monkey. Hers did come all the way from Dubai though and was written in a very cute home made card. I really love these tiny penpals. I hope it's something Monkey will continue as she gets older.

Monkey was very excited by another piece of post I received. She seems to have inherited my love of christmas. I've started my shopping already but I know a lot of people don't like thinking about it this early. I'm mentioning it for a good reason though because today we received our christmas card from World Vision.

It wasn't a card for us. It was a card for Regina, the little girl we sponsor through them. It might seem early but it's got a long journey to get to her village in Uganda so we need to get it on it's way. We enjoy writing to Regina and don't want to miss this chance to wish her Ssekukulu Ennugi & Omwaka Omugya ogwe'ssanyu (Merry Christmas & Happy New Year in Luganda).

What's been through your letterbox this week?

Stories, fruit and paint!

It's Monday and we're all messy. It can only mean one thing - baby book club!

We had our big scary meeting at the children's centre last week. It wasn't actually that scary! The manager was lovely and we're now all official. We've got the room and we're open to everyone.

Today we read one of my favourites from when I was younger - The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle.




As always we started by reading the story with the babies in a circle. We had lots of toy caterpillars out for them to play with as they were listening.

All the food in the story made us hungry so we had a tasting session. Apples for Monday, pears for Tuesday, plums for Wednesday, strawberries for Thursday and oranges for Friday. Monkey can't have apples and pears although we are working on reintroducing them so I had to distract her with banana. She enjoyed the rest of the fruit though and oranges seemed to be her favourite.

We didn't eat the weekend meals as they were so huge. I think Monkey was a bit disappointed as she does love her food.

The craft activity today was very messy but lots of fun. We used hand printing to make a caterpillar picture and made butterflies using footprints. There was paint everywhere! The babies were covered and I ended up wearing a lot of it too. We did manage to get some on the paper though and Monkey made this lovely picture.

Book club is fast becoming one of our favourite activities. We can't wait for the next one.