Blackberries

These blackberries have exploded this year. They're from the train tracks, we've guided them across to the fence and given them some trellis, having cut them right back at the end of last year. And they've loved it. And have fruited well beyond expectations! I already have a big bag full of berries in the freezer, and now I have another huge bowlful to freeze thanks to the efforts of mum and Bean, and Bear to some extent although I think he was just eating them rather than putting them in the bowl.

This evening we had cheesecake for pudding after a lovely roast dinner (with lots of veggies from the PYO farm, yum!), homemade - my first attempt at a baked cheesecake, with a load of blackberry puree swirled into the top. It was GORGEOUS. Every recipe I looked at gave different quantities for the various ingredients, so it seems a baked cheesecake is a fairly forgiving concoction so I mixed up the filling following guidelines rather than a recipe ;) and it worked pretty well!

This morning Bean was happy happy happy because some friends came round to play :) I'd not told him who was coming so his delight when Ede AND Rosie came round was sky high!

He was very sad at the end though. He creates his own little worlds, and invites others to join him - this does tend to mean though that those invited to enter his world have to play by his rules. So when two small people's created worlds collide, there's only so long they can play alongside each other before their paths digress again and while it may seem that they are playing together, they really are only playing alongside.... That's how it seems from this morning anyway. Bean was devastated when Ede decided he'd had enough of Bean telling him what to do, and went outside to play! Poor Bean. Was proud of Ede though, walking away instead of getting into an argument. Bean took a long time to come around after that, but he did eventually. We had lots and lots of cuddles. He didn't want a wrap cuddle though. I was kinda sad about that...