I’ve mentioned the marvellous multi-talented Merry on this blog a few times before, and if you haven’t discovered the Merrily empire yet you definitely should.  I’ve always considered Merry to be my main source of home ed inspiration and encouragement (and though her big girls now go to school, it seems to me that she still home educates but just in less time!)  Then there’s the fab businesses she runs – Play Merrily, the place to go for quality toys online, and Craft Merrily, for all the Hama beads, Fimo and Loom Bands you will ever need, among many other lovely things.  And I’m continually impressed by Merry’s own crafting – her Instagram feed is full of beautiful pictures of the knitting and crochet projects that she always has on the go.  Frankly it’s enough to make me feel a little inadequate, but Merry is so lovely that I’ll have to let her off.  And now, if all the above wasn’t enough, she has recently got the baking bug, and has moved remarkably quickly from “I don’t do baking” to “I invent my own recipes.  Move over Nigella…

So when I saw this recipe for banana muffins, I knew it would be good and I couldn’t wait to try it.  With my usual forward planning I decided about 20 minutes before supper that it would be a good idea to make them for pudding.  They were so quick and easy that Monkey and I managed to make them in the time it took for Owl to make pesto (with a little help from daddy) and cook spaghetti.  They were very popular (as was the pesto, which probably deserves a blog post of its own) and the children have asked when we can make them again.  I think they’ll be able to make them without much help from me, so the answer is probably once a week at least!