Oysters

There comes a time in every school holiday when the kids have finally tired of Olympic-level bickering, eating playdough, and watching wall-to-wall cartoons (okay, maybe not the last one). That’s when they turn to the tower of stuff hidden at the back of the cupboard, which can be loosely termed ‘craft kits.’
These are all birthday gifts from schoolfriends, whose mothers enjoy the warm glow associated with giving a present that is both educational and creative. What these mothers have always failed to do is enclose their Filipina maid for half a day to help make the wretched thing.
My daughter has a vast collection of these unopened kits, ranging from plate-painting, T-shirt tie-dying, crystal growing, snow-dome creating, and various knitting and sewing packs. Using my finely-honed procrastination skills, I have always convinced her that she needs to do these kits on a day that ‘we’ have more free time.
Today I was finally forced to stop running. She produced a kit (where you create little fabric toys which attach to a keychain), and set about it with gusto. Less that two minutes in, she was, understandably, having trouble threading the needle. Ten minutes later, despite heaps of encouragement, she was seething with frustration. We eventually spent all morning stitching together a shiny green ‘oyster keychain buddy.’
Now, I am not the world’s greatest needlewoman, and the resultant oyster looks like it owes its heritage to Dr Frankenstein, rather than the shores of Brittany, but she seems delighted with it.
I think my (very domestic) mother-in-law realised I was going to be a huge disappointment to her, when her masterclass on ‘how to put a duvet into its cover correctly’ failed to elicit the expected grateful response from me. Although I am rather scathing of Grandma’s obsession with domestic trivia, I have to agree that her sewing skills would have come in very handy today.
In a futile attempt to avoid gender-stereotyping the boys, I invited them to make an oyster too. Thankfully they preferred to run up and down the garden non-stop, which required no parental involvement whatsoever. They also managed to produce their very own 'Dockyard oysters' as a result.
Given that it is Friday night, I should be popping open the prosecco. However, courtesy of a recommendation from Stay At Home Dad I have a glass of Waitrose Pfalz Riesling (£4.99) in front of me. It is, as he describes, both fruity and dry, and it will go extremely well with tonight’s curry. However, I’m not at all convinced by his argument that its intensity means that you drink less of it. Thanks SAHD! If anyone else wants to recommend their favourite wine for under a tenner, I would be delighted to give it a go.