Set the table. Prepare for war.

Feature creep 

A management term describing how new products can become overcomplicated.

From Wikipedia - "Viewed over a longer time period, extra or unnecessary features 
seem to "creep into" the system, beyond the initial goals." That would be my life, then.

If you are a child with physical disabilities, it is necessary to find your own way in which to rebel. You may still be able to march (or crawl) off in a strop, but pretty soon you are going to need someone to help you with a basic task and the effect is lost.

Early on, the Eldest Latte chose her battlefield - the meal table. Breakfast time particularly combined the stress of a time deadline along with the early-morning grumpiness of her parents. It was the perfect time for blood - and milk - to be spilt.

I've tried some things I didn't think I'd ever try. Sweet syrup in milk. Sugary cereals. I've pared it down now to a few more-or-less healthy choices, like Rice Krispies or porridge drenched in demerara sugar. But I'd no longer turn my nose up at anyone's choice of breakfast like I may have done when she was a baby and I had my naive ideas about how healthy things were going to be.

It's easy to judge as a parent. But let me tell you, the parents who would rather die than let their child drink a Fruit Shoot are not the parents who have measured their child's fluid intake over a normal week and found it to be less than a litre.

The other week I went to Kelloggs for a parent blogging event and realised that I'm more than happy with my compromises. Especially when you consider that one in six children under sixteen don't even eat breakfast - and the proportion gets higher in the 11-16 age bracket which Eldest is rapidly approaching. Instead, £646m a year is spent by children buying sweets, snacks and fizzy drinks on the way to school.

The Grandmother has always said that any breakfast is better than no breakfast, and of course she's right. Chocolate cereal at weekends? I can live with that.

In the interests of integrity, I should let you know that Kelloggs gave me presents including an apron, a box of chocolate cereal that doesn't make your teeth immediately fall out, and another box of cereal with my picture on the front. And they allowed me to make my own cereal - the rather lovely box of Feature Creep at the top of this post. It's meant to be a scary mutant appearing around the box. The similarity to a frog prince is entirely due to lack of talent.

Ten lights

Jen tagged a handful of bloggers to come up with ten things which make them happy. Judging from everyone else's posts, animals feature quite highly so far.

Okay.

1) Let's start with wine. White. I'm honest, at least. And I haven't got any pets.

2) Standing on one leg. This is a picture taken from a Clarice Bean book - I have a scan of the picture in a frame on the living room wall. I've been doing yoga since I was ill with ME a few years ago, and nothing feels better than a good tree. I really ought to thank you for the yoga, since I've done a couple of sponsored blog posts here recently which have paid for a few of my classes.

3) The backs of the Littlest Latte's knees. Really. You have never seen anything quite so spindly, so cute, and so powerful all at the same time. I get to watch them a lot, because she's always running off.

4) Eye candy. You can keep your Johnny Depps and your George Clooneys. This is my pin-up of choice - the lovely J K Simmons.

When Mr Coffee and I started going out in our early 20s, I saw all the actresses in which he had expressed an interest collected together in a magazine article called something like Fabulous Over Forty. I knew at this point that he was the man for the long haul.  J K Simmons is a similar call out to Mr Coffee - go bald! Develop deep and expressive lines!

5) Candles. I love candles. My first real job was as a reporter on a local newspaper: Mr Coffee and I lived in a couple of bedrooms in my mother's house, and I spent practically all my tiny income in an even tinier shop down the street from my office, which sold candles and a load of other stuff I never even looked at.  Come Spring, we noticed that the corners of our living room were completely black with soot.

I don't burn quite as many candles now, but the love has not left me. I do like a flicker in the corner of my eye.

6) My weekly date with Whispering Bob.

7) King Arthur. I love the Arthurian legends. Soon I shall tell you all about my big library book on the Holy Grail, and you can yawn behind your hands and pretend to be interested.

8) I'm going to say 'I love riding my bike', because I know that the power of positive thinking will cause me to make extra time to ride it this week because I said that. It will. I'm sure of it.

9) (Actually I'm in a bit of a read-anything phase. I'm happy with a book, a duvet, wine and a candle. But we're still trying to trick my subconscious with regard to number 8, so we're keeping this really quiet, okay?)

10) Anticipation. At some point I'm going to tell Eldest that I've booked her such a treat in summer that I know she will squeal for at least 20 minutes. I'm not kidding. I'm so looking forward to telling her, I'm saving it up like glee in the bank. Ssssh. I'm good for a few weeks yet.

Let's hear it for the Hearing Aids!

Wow! I am completely bowled over by the amount of comments I got on my last post about delurking. Aren't you all fantastic?

So many nice people! And lots with very good blogs to nose around. But above all, I was just so delighted with the comment from Hearing Aids, who called it a 'Superb blog post' and actually took the time to bookmark my blog in order to see "much more on this subject in the foreseeable future!"

Who knew that delurking was so close to Hearing Aids' heart? I did not see that coming.

Anyway, you may have to wait a bit for my next post, because Knitters Knitters tagged me with a meme about 10 things that make me happy. She must have known how miserable I naturally am. Ten things? And they can't all be wine?

Come out of the woodwork

I happened to come across this in the last few days, though I don't know from where it originates. I remember something similar last year - a call for people who read a blog and didn't comment just to check in.

It's a strange thing. Over the last year I've had more visits than ever to my blog, but just a few less comments. I wasn't expecting that. I love comments. I try to respond to them all, either by email or in my commentbox. I love to pop over to commenters' blogs to have a nosey round, too.

I manage it 80% of the time, I reckon. And even though I try to comment on blogs as often as I can as I know how important comments are to bloggers, sometimes I read blogs when I have a pan of something boiling on the hob and it is no time to be composing thoughtful responses.

Also, no-one got any Christmas cards from the Coffee House this year and this is entirely because they sat on the end of the radiator for three weeks and I never got round to buying them any stamps.

What I'm saying is, if I don't respond, it's not because I don't like you. It's just ineptitude.

So, if you're there, why not delurk. I don't need you to say anything meaningful. Just a wave would do.

Those crazy Magi. Don't you just adore them?

Tell you what, this week, I wish I lived in Spain. Not that our own Epiphany celebrations haven't rocked, by the way.

Alice advised me that the done thing was to put a hard bean in a cake. But why stop at a bean when you already have a surplus of plastic babies?

Then we Fimoed some presents in the oven for the Magi to bring the infant Jesus. Accidentally, four were made. The Lattes decided that the additional gift would definitely contain chocolate.

Crowns were created from the Coffee House's seemingly endless supply of sequins (I don't even know where they come from). I offer these gifts of second-rate photographs to the Queen of Colour herself, Miss Silverpebble.

Then, with a heavy heart and large quantities of sherry, I took down the Christmas tree and packed the ornaments away. With them I placed the first Christmas present of 2011: new decorations, which I buy each year in the January sales.

See you on the other side, my shiny little men.

An epiphany

There will come a Christmas when my carefully arranged wooden Father Christmas set will not be jostled out of place by an array of characters including a pony in a plastic car, a cardboard cat, a flowered sea serpent and a Christmas card written to a stuffed bear which was found at a second hand toy sale.

And when that day comes, I may find myself less pleased than I might have imagined.

I have no resolutions about a tidier house. Instead, I need to remember that this house isn't a space that I own. It's a space that I presently share, and all the more wonderful for that.

The lull

I've always loved the days after Christmas more than Christmas itself. A quick google reveals the term Twixtmas - there's even a website which encourages you to do worthy things with this time, like saving insects and giving thanks for things.

But for me, the point is to do nothing. In the Coffee House, Twixtmas is a time of relaxation - a pyjama day or two - and of subtle shifts in gear.

It's a time of new friendships...

... new skills 

... new games to play

... a few fights

... and uneasy truces.

The Christmas tree is still up, and will be for some time - in fact new decorations have made their way in, bought for a song in the January sales. I've got half a mind to sort out a nativity scene even at this late stage, which is something I'm feeling the lack of this year.

You'll find no 2010 round-up here - I'm more for looking forward, however unsuccessful this proves to be. This morning I've been swearing my head off over a monkey wrench and a rusty bike. Fancy playing a game of Guess the Resolution? It isn't hard.