Beans and Ballerinas

"Mmmmm, sex without strings" is not something you expect your four year old to exclaim with delight. I have to confess the name of these delicious butter beans from Diggers lured me in, but now my sense of humour is coming back to bite me. The little Bowerbird planted these seeds and is particularly proud of eating them, as she has patiently watched them grow (even nibbling on the flowers before they started producing). She is also proud of knowing the name of her beans and will tell anyone she meets what they are, which usually requires some repetition as no one can quite believe what they are hearing.

I love a bush bean, so much abundance for so little space, they are also helping to feed nitrogen to the corn they are growing near. We will have bucket loads before long, as we seem to have had 100% germination, must be the little Bowerbirds expert planting technique. She loves gardening and has been creating a succulent garden in a vintage dolls pram that was looking a little worse for wear, succulents are so forgiving for little kids, just whack a bit in and away they go. Just need to get some rain to fire them along.

The little Bowerbird is modelling one of her sore fingers in the bean photo, two got jammed in the car door last week, poor possum, I felt terrible. There was an almighty scream as I tried to hurry her away from a Ute that was backing into the parking space next to our car, darn aggressive drivers. I had to open the door to get those poor little fingers out and carried her screaming into  Gisborne Pharmacy, which was nearby. They were so kind and helpful, taking us out the back to run her hand under cold water, finding her a chocolate, and getting an ice pack, they all gathered around to cheer her up, asking questions about her birthday and kinder.  Amazingly the pharmacy assistant's 20 year old daughter had the same kinder teacher that the little Bowerbird has this year. All is well with the fingers, just some bruising, and a generous dose of mother guilt for me. She was much more stoic than her brother who also has had a nasty car door moment around the same age, he screamed for hours.

 Just to add to my hotch potch of thoughts, does this jewellery box take you back? Like all good things, I found it at the op shop. It works perfectly. I tried to purchase it without the little one noticing, asking the nice old lady serving if she could hide it (and a pretty little watch) whilst I looked around, explaining it would be a birthday present. She kept mum until we came to pay. She picked up the box and held it high, winding the mechanism fully, and begun smiling and singing with glee. It was totally worth letting the cat out of the bag to see her joy, clearly the little ballerina was evoking a moment of nostalgia. The box sang intermittently in our boot the whole way home, the big Bowerbird and I smiling at each other every time it started up again. The little Bowerbird is very gracious, and knows when to look the other way for the sake of a good surprise, by the time her birthday came around she received the gift as if it had never been revealed.

Expect more random posts as I go back through pictures from a month without blogging.