Sunday, July 27, 2014

Season's End


Life has been good for the past couple of weeks. This has everything to do with happy boys enjoying a jam-packed summer, working in an air-conditioned office and a busy bakery. The past year has been fraught with all kinds of challenges for us and most days we have just had to roll with it. I'm always grateful when we have a few weeks of respite and can just be normal mensch again.

Which I can't say for the rest of the world which has seemingly gone completely insane.

Tyler and I realised that - unlike our own childhoods - the boys are not growing up surrounded by news in the house. We stream TV and pick programmes as opposed to watching a channel and we both download newspapers online because of the lack of international newspapers on the island. We therefore consume news individually and although we chat about it to each other, the boys have remained oblivious to world events. So we felt we needed to rectify this and all sat down together on Monday to watch the BBC News before supper.

Of course the two main leads were MH17 and Gaza.The children were horrified. Amongst many other questions over dinner, William asked "if you are killed in a war does this mean you are actually dead?" To anyone over about 30 years old this would seem like a ridiculous question, but in video war games being killed dosn't necessarily mean that you cease to exist, you can come back from the dead. The boys were also bewildered why children their own age were being blown up in Gaza. It literally made no sense to them at all.

I immediately felt that maybe we hadn't done the right thing by exposing the children to such rawness. The BBC is always careful in its reporting and provides factual news as well as opinion, so nothing that they had seen was lurid or sensationalist.

Nevertheless, they were all visibly shaken by what they had seen and heard. It was hard to watch the children trying to compute such insanity. We couldn't even give them semi-coherent explanations in the face of such incomprehensible events.

On reflection however we believe that we have  done the right thing. The children are a part of this world and are about to re-enter the mainstream again, so to speak. Backwaters, whilst quiet are also murky - so we have our fair share of issues here albeit in a more parochial way. The boys also do not live in an idyllic island bubble. They've had to deal with bullying and racism and see first hand the desecration of the reefs and the near extinction of their beloved frogs. They've also seen how hard it has been to build our new lives here and so they do understand that it's not all roses the whole time.

We don't have Gaza or MH17 or hijackings though. In some ways it makes us appreciate our little backwater even more (until we have to get on a plane again, that is) but it is The World, and not a video game and William hopefully understands that now. We're also getting back to our TED evenings, which the boys loved and which focuses more on the positive and the rational.

In other news......James's team won the Premiers Cup last weekend and our 8 year old was baptised in a lovely island ceremony last Saturday. We also entertained for the first time in 18 months and enjoyed a fabulous surprise 50th birthday party.

We have ONE MORE WEEK until we close the bakery shop and take a little break ourselves. We are planning on sailing to Anegada for a few days, weather permitting and doing some hiking in the St John's National Park. Then we have to knuckle down to fixing things and sorting stuff out and get going on our new premises.

So we're stepping off the world for a week and I'm going to take a short break from the blog and we'll see you on the other side of Summer.

Hasta la vista x




Wednesday, July 16, 2014

The Fireproof Building on Main Street, Road Town

Fireproof Building can be seen with a little red arrow, bottom right
Our new premises - the Fireproof Building, is one of the oldest buildings in Road Town and a National Monument. It has variously been the Governor's office, a warehouse and the government archives and gets its name from having survived the riots and subsequent fire in 1853, hence the 'Fireproof Building'.

The view from the adjacent car park

It's a beautiful 'industrial' space with breezy open windows, high ceilings and stone floor. We'd like to keep this 'look and fee'l for the new cafe and bakery shop. 



We are planning both a new cafe and food store, with an expanded range of Family bread (think rye, onion, spelt and campagne...) baked goods, traiteur and regional produce -  not forgetting Christmas! We're planning a really fun 'Christmas Pop Up Shop' along the lines of some exciting places we saw in New York early this year.



Even though this kind of expansion is terrifying we believe in our product and have built up a loyal customer community over the past two years. 

We're finally going to have room for our patisserie and cakes. As the space is so much cooler than the bakery, we'll also be able to make puff pastry (think croissants!) and meringues......(think macaroons!). 

We are also currently sourcing local produce to continue our commitment to small-batch and locally produced food: It tastes better, it's carbon foot print is heroic compared to what we are used to and it contributes towards the future sustainability of the islands. As we are a family-owned business, we'd really like to see the boys and their children be able to build the business in years to come. 

Work is just about to begin and soon the building will be painted with a new bathroom and other improvements. We are aiming to open in October to have a 'soft start' before we plunge into Christmas!




Tuesday, July 15, 2014

Last Week Was Epic



Happy Days.

Last week the boys had a complete blast at Josiah's Bay at the Beach & Bush Camp. They were falling asleep in the car on the way home, always a good sign of a day well spent. This week it's Tennis Camp and then they're back at Josiah's Bay next week for more Boy Heaven, machettes and some surfing. Plus James & Georgie are both sailing in the Premier's Cup this weekend, which means they are staying at Nanny Cay in tents and get to hang out with teams and friends from all over the Caribbean and race. A charmed life, for sure.

Mine's not so bad either: I'm now back sitting in an office all day, at a desk, with air conditioning, wearing a dress. This is all a bit of a novelty and I'm quite enjoying it actually. I'm particularly enjoying the sitting down bit, not to mention the air conditioning.

I do have to fit in a few hours before sunrise to keep up with the family business and then run around like a sweaty lunatic at lunchtime. It's alright really - especially when it leads to such great outcomes namely our new premises - the historic Fireproof Building in Main Street, signed on Friday. We've been coveting it for years and it is by far one of the most beautiful buildings in Road Town. All 1400 sq feet of it.

Opening October. That's soon - 2 months!




Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.

You're looking at our Summer!







Sunday, July 6, 2014

Trials in motherhood

Boys In A Boat 
The boys have spent their first week of summer holidays in the adjoining boatyard to the bakery with Richard and his chaps happily fixing up 'Wasabi'. They drilled and banged away, learning how to fix the mast and the rigging. We are lucky to be surrounded by workshops with willing (and patient) friends to help out and it really has been Boy Heaven.  I worked upstairs in the Osiris's AC'ed offices and Tyler baked in the downstairs inferno.

You'd think that after 13 years of this, I'd be finding motherhood a breeze. Not a bit of it: When it's school term I think it's all going to be easier when the boys are on holiday and when it's holiday I definitely think life is easier when they are back at school (apart from the relentless morning ritual of the dreaded lunch boxes).

I find myself constantly waging an inward battle between the joys of being a mother alongside feeling bitter and twisted about the sheer everyday mayham of too many Y chromosomes. I usually lose the noisy war in my head and skulk off to mutter darkly in a corner. Then I feel guilty and attack the breakfast dishes and pack the tumble dryer, after which I feel so resentful that I have to pour a large, lunchtime G & T to cheer myself up and so it goes on and on.

Last weekend we decided to move our bedroom downstairs and William & George to move into our old upstairs bedroom.  Why did we do this? It has literally turned the whole house upside down - all four storey's of it. We never seem to have the time and energy to start and finish a job completely, so we're going to have to live with this transitional disorder for weeks now. In amongst all the under-bed-crap and cupboard entrails is the weekly laundry mixed up with damp swimming towels, tattered books, nerf gun bullets, plastic cups and sleeping cats. I feel weak just looking at it all.

Yesterday I made a fairly valiant effort trying to sort things out. This morning when I came upstairs the children had decided to pull their dress-up trunk apart, so now we have bashed-up pirate hats and knights cloaks strewn all over the soggy towels and lego blocks, along with ice cream wrappers from last nights movie and scattered board games. I just want to scream my head off and run away.

This mother is definitely on tranquilizers
After the rage has subsided I usually channel my annoyance and attack it all with sullen resignation.  "Why me?" I wail at the boys when they have driven me completely over the edge (most days) not that it makes the slightest bit of difference. The emotional cycles of motherhood are even more exhausting than the actual work.

I know that I'll soon be looking back on all of this with rose-tinted remorse when they are away at boarding school and all I'll have to do is the company accounts. But until then, I sincerely hope I'm not the only mother out there who seems to walk the fine line between sanity and being a gibbering wreck.

This poor mother has clearly lost the plot. What is she doing ?