The one and only Tearoom, to be sure , it is.

[UniS]

To pinch an intro from the very first one and only tea room thread. in 2009.

The tea room is now officially open, serving hot chocolate, tea, freshly-squeezed orange juice and a range of home-baked muffins. Tablecloths and crockery are charmingly mismatched antiques (no Cath Kidston here). We overlook an attractive although somewhat overgrown garden, with a distant view of rolling countryside.

Everyone is welcome but house rules dictate that anyone indulging in fisticuffs will be ejected.

Please come in.

2011
We seem to have fetched up in Ireland, this place looks remarkably like a pub,There is even a guiness barrel over there. The NMBs are all sporting shamrocks. The mirror ball is here, but I leave teh rest of the unpacking to someone else.

He's still awake! He is so wakeful I let him get out of bed!

Hello, all. Just rushing through again. Most impressed by all your creativity in design matters.

Mini quiches sounds a good possibility; I had never heard of maki rolls and google makes them look really complicated. They do sound nice, though.

We asked Wriggle what kind of party she wanted and I thought she said 'pirates'. Actually she said parrots ... so we are combining them .... pirates and parrots. Sadly, one of the problems of a summer birthday and a mother who can't get organised is that most people seem to be doing something already, so her party will be very small exclusive.

Serp, at least you're having a party. I have a mid-August birthday, which is prime "down the shore" time at home. We never bothered having a party. Mom would sometimes organize an end-of-school or Halloween type thing.

Toddler's done that this week, Tee. Put him down at 6:20 and he was up until nearly 10! I could have cried.

Reason 4,891 to have a single child -- you get invited places/events/days out.

maki rolls are actually pretty easy - just cook the rice with the right amount of water so it absorbs, put some rice vinegar in, and spread out on foil to cool. I then put a sheet of nori on clingfilm, spread rice out, put a filling on, and roll up. Twist ends of clingfilm, chuck in fridge, then slice later. You can do them with long grain rice if you just want to try the idea.

I'm headed for California tomorrow for a few days - ds is trying football camp for the first time, so that should be interesting for dh while I'm away

Perhaps you just have a particularly lovely child, Scout?

That actually sounds a lot easier than the recipe I googled ... could be very good for a vegetarian with a tiny appetite .... where do you buy nori?

Ha! I wish, Serp. I'm referring to a family wedding this weekend. That branch of the family isn't huge so tend to invite ALL family (all generations, etc) to weddings and significant event parties. My PiL were invited to said wedding but not any of their kids (MrScout and my SsiL). Turns out, indirectly said, it was because of S'siL and her brood -- "there's too many of them." All the rest of the family was there with their children (mostly families of one and two) and loads of family were upset we weren't there as they wanted to meet/play with Toddler (family scattered so really only see them at parties though we keep in touch via email/letters/cards). So it wasn't a matter of a "no children" wedding. And they couldn't very well invite some of the MrScout sibling circle/their children and not all of them so they didn't invite any.

I wasn't that bothered by the lack-of-invite, to be honest, and assumed it was because of S'siL family but MiL was upset until Mother-of-the-Bride apologized. Another family member who's getting married in December (and we've been given the date months ago) kept reassuring my MiL that we're all invited and she can't wait to have us all there to celebrate with her. I'm looking forward to that wedding -- I get on really well with that shoot of the family AND there's talk of having Santa (and maybe a reindeer!) at that reception with presents for the kids.

For a group of over 20 girls do I really need to have a pass-the-parcel level for each girl?

CMOT -- that sounds really yummy. What sort of things to do you fill it with?

I went to this meet-up - it was much fun, the people were lovely (although GetOrfMoiLand didn't turn up, which was a shame) and I drank lots. I shan't go into any more detail in case the computer eats this again.

what about the tried and tested stuff onna stick, Serpent? olives and cheese, pineapple and cheese, gherkins and cheese? then there's curried eggs (where you cut the eggs in half, remove the yolks, bash 'em up with mayo and curry powder and then put them back into the half-whites), cream cheese and paprika in bits of celery, blini with things on etc.

Although if the child is full vegetarian then presumably cheese and eggs are off the menu, which makes it harder - might have to do more crudités and dips.

I like CMOTD's idea too though. I'd put things like tuna mayonnaise plus cucumber in thin strips in some, avocado in others, probably wouldn't do raw fish for a party (chilling issues), fresh buffalo mozarella might work (talk about mixed cultures!)

DCMB - am of your meet up. I was due to go to one yesterday and had to sack it because of miniThumb being ill - two of the ladies have very new babies and I didn't want to pass anything on, especially as I'm starting to show symptoms now too.

Boo to non-sleeping toddlers - miniThumb has had 3 shocking nights now because of his chest - he sleeps for a while then coughs, wakes up, needs water, goes back to sleep until the next coughing fit. We're both knackered.

Had Oxboy's birthday party yesterday
it was exhausting wonderful

I don't mind if you think Amber is the Queen.... I know I am

::hands out to all exhausted or under-the-weather residents of the tea room::

Oxeye, Happy Birthday for Oxboy!!!

::Dons small party hat and resumes hoovering round the Palace::

Happy birthday Oxboy!

Please, Amber, lots and lots of . Have tons to do and no motivation!

12th July holiday fortnight starts more or less today here in NI. Anyone want to go see a parade tomorrow?

Hello!
I've been a bit busy lately - is my hay pile still in the corner?
I could do with a bucket of tea - like Tee, I am procrastinating.

Happy birthday to oxboy
Amber - I hope that you are feeling better after your medically supervised poisoning.
The YD was really difficult to get to sleep too last night. Do you think there is something in the water? Caffeine maybe?
Here's hoping that they all sleep better tonight.....

Serpent - the YD also tends to have select parties due to his birthday's proximity to Christmas... everyone is always too busy/away visiting relatives.
We tried having his party the weekend before, or even two weeks before, but it just happens that there are other boys in his class with birthdays near the beginning of December and it didn't really work. :(

I even suggested that he have his birthday (a la francais), on his Namesake Saints day - but that is DH's birthday and DH refused to share ...

Of course Amber is Queen!

Happy birthday, Oxboy! Maybe we will have a joint celebration one day.

Curried eggs, great idea - we have a serious over-supply of eggs. Wriggle is not a 'full vegetarian' as I have totally banned anyone, ever, from telling her what exactly 'fish' is .... although it won't be long, especially since we have fish. Likewise realising that eating eggs means no chicks out of those eggs, since we hatch our own. I think I will just order her to eat them, if that arises.

I like the nori idea more and more.

I am also off to look up Wriggle's saint's day.

Amber is jolly well not Queen!

Yes, hay pile is still in place (albeit a little reduced in height since I found it goes nicely with Thousand Island Dressing).

Curried eggs??! Eeek!

Then why have the NMBs decorated your party hat to look like a crown?

(and geroff my hay! I wondered why I was getting covered in pink gloop...)

I can assure you that if you look closely at the design of the hat, it reads 'Disneyland Princess' and has a sparkly line of plastic gold stars round it, with a Donald Duck en passant...

But, but, but!!! Vegetarians DO eat eggs and cheese. We don't eat fish. But eggs and cheese are fine. You get to be a vegan if you take eggs, cheese and honey out of the equation too. One good 'sushi' combination is advocado, tomato and basil. I also like a pot of humous on a picnic with various things to dip - often do homemade, sometimes with lime instead of lemon, sometimes with herbs too.

My parents have been up for the weekend - spent almost all of it in the garden whilst they dealt with Mistlechick. He then behaved perfectly in the restaurant we went to where he ate most of an adult portion of whitebait, half a portion of meatballs and quite a bit of icecream. He is DEFINITELY not vegetarian

MT - then you are a lacto-ovo-vegetarian. Wriggle is a pescetarian (or a fishetarian). There are vegetarians who do not eat eggs or dairy. And yet they're not quite vegans because they still use animal products. Vegans use no animal products. I have the whole list - the one that "amused" me most was the chicky-fishetarians ("I'm a vegetarian but I still eat chicken and fish" - yes, all right then )

Not all vegetarians are created equal...

Amber for queen Disneyland Princess!

And happy birthday to Oxboy.

Don't know why I'm telling you that - nothing like trying to teach your grandmother to suck eggs, hey! except that you seemed to suggest that all veggies eat cheese and eggs, which they don't. Sorry!

I know, but if you look at the vegetarian society stuff, the lacto-vegetarian diet is what you 'expect' if you say vegetarian, and I do know vegans in terms of diet that are not quite so fanatic in their general approach to life - they will, for instance, play a violin, use furniture polish or even, on occasions, wear shoes that have some leather elements. However, I probably have more soya than some lacto veges due to my lactose intollerance....

I know quite a few chicky-fishetarians (who also eat beef occasionally, when it is somehow more ethically acceptable). Chicken was first to go on Wriggle's elimination diet, so she'll not be one of those. I had a friend who became vegan for ethical reasons and she stopped eventually because she couldn't stop losing weight and was tired all the time. While I love the idea of something that might slow WRiggle down a bit, she doesn't need to lose weight. (I reaslise - I think - that millions of Hindus are vegans, but they must know what they are doing better than my friend did. On the other hand, they do eat paneer and ghee, so maybe they are just vegetarians??)