Resolutions 2012

Welcome to Week Two of my new little blog.

I’ve been debating with myself this week about what my main post each week should be about.  There are so many issues that are important to me and I’d love to share my opinions with you and hear some of yours too, if ever anyone reads this. Lol.  I have decided to make notes on some of those issues till I’m a little more accustomed to writing my thoughts & instead get back to something I touched on last week.  New Year Resolutions!

In January 2011 I made a few resolutions.

1.     To have a NON camping style family only holiday at least once every 18 months.

2.    Focus on getting fit, losing weight would come with this & is much needed.

3.    To have coffee somewhere different at least once per month.

So, how did I go with those resolutions you ask...  BADLY!! 

To be fair we will be having non camping style holiday this June but it isn’t just our immediate family.  We’ll be sharing a holiday rental house with my husband’s family in Cairns.  We are all SUPER excited about it in this house, even though we are driving there & back.  With respect to Point two, I discovered during the first week of April that we were expecting our fourth child and although I continued walking and jogging for a short while I soon ran into problems with morning sickness & tiredness, and stopped doing it as often as I’d have liked to, thereby quickly losing any fitness I had built up from the previous year & those first few months of 2011, then from 32 weeks I was hospitalised and pretty much bed ridden till the birth.  And Point three just didn’t happen.

This year my resolutions have changed only slightly.

1.    Lose 10 – 15kg’s by late June (note, in time for the trip to Cairns.) This means losing ½ to ¾ kilo per week.  That means 1.1 – 1.6 pounds per week, or 22-33 pounds by June. That’s what the converter on my phone says anyway.  Now, I’m well aware that I could benefit from loosing DOUBLE that and perhaps then some, but I’m looking at this in smaller more achievable chunks for the time being.  Slow and Steady...

2.    To get myself to a hair salon at least once every two months.

3.    To have coffee somewhere different each month.

Thus far, this late in January I’m doing GREAT!! 

My initial weigh in was 2 & a bit weeks ago.  I’m weighing in fortnightly.  In my first week & a half I lost 1.4kg’s. (3 pounds)  It was only a week and a half because I have changed from a Wednesday to a Monday because it is easier for me to get there.  Hopefully I can keep this rate up.  At the moment we are focussing on the food and not so much on the exercise which is great because I’m a little scared to exercise my butt off.  I’m breast feeding (ALL THE TIME), and I seem to be one of those Mum’s that has trouble keeping up milk supply if I exercise too much.  That is one of my excuses for being a lard arse, oompa loompa, fatty boomba (etc etc) and, for now, I’m sticking with it! I have several excuses mind you, and probably several I’m not really aware of.  I intend to tackle some of these excuses this year.  Who wants me to dig out a BEFORE PHOTO for my next resolution update on this??

Moving on to the hair...  I like my hair when it is longer.  It tends to look scraggly though.  It can get a bit of a wave in it that I LOVE but I never really DO anything with it.  It’s always in a pony tail, never “pretty”, always just boring pony tail.  I had a cut in June 2010 & didn’t have one again until this month. Yes you read that correctly.  It is now January 2012.  My hair gets awfully dry & yucky when I let it get so long without looking after it. Funny that!!

The before, fresh out of the shower and just brushed straight look & the after, much shorter, much healthier looking & not at all dry & nasty look!! 

That is all just my natural colour there now too. The hair dresser said I didn’t have to be so strict with myself and that every three months would be fine.  Still, you better hound me in April if there’s been no mention of another visit.

Mmmmm COFFEE...  Two weekends ago, Hubby & I walked with the kids to a nearby cafe, Graze Brasserie, on Sunday morning for coffee.  The two older boys had hot chocolates & Miss Pants had a baby cino, which came home in the drink holder of the pram & got poured down the sink.  Honestly, I don’t know why we bother getting her things sometimes...  It was lovely, sitting reading the newspaper with a nice coffee.  Not too strong, not too weak, and not too bitter!  A little breezy outside, but we chose to sit outside so that we wouldn’t disrupt too many people. YES, middle of Summer and we could have done with long sleeves.

I’m going to try my hardest to drag a friend or two along for coffee every month somewhere new.  Well, new to me at least.  There is a place I’ve been before, about 6 years ago.  I wonder if that counts as new???

Bye for now, K

Coconut Ice

Here we are on Friday with this weeks Food Find.

Yes I know, I know...  Who could believe I haven't made Coconut Ice before.

Sooo RIDICULOUSLY simple, yet I'd never done it.

I used a recipe from here

INGREDIENTS

5¼ cups (840g) icing sugar
2½ cups (200g) desiccated coconut
395g can sweetened
condensed milk
1 egg white, beaten lightly
pink food colouring

METHOD

Line deep 19cm-square cake pan with strips of baking paper.

Sift icing sugar into large bowl (but I didn't); stir in coconut, then condensed milk and egg white.

Divide mixture in half; tint half with pink colouring. Press pink mixture into pan then top with white mixture. Cover; refrigerate about 3 hours or until set before cutting into squares. (Again I didn't... I just put the white in the bottom first, then added the food colouring to what was in the bowl & put it on top of the white)

Makes 64


Master H didn't like it, but the other two did.  He doesn't like coconut & although he didn't see me make it I guess he just knew.
 

Bye for now, K

HAPPY AUSTRALIA DAY

I saw this on Ben Marden Photography facebook page this morning & wanted to share it with as many people as possible.

You know you're Australian if ...
• You believe that stubbies can be either drunk or worn.
• You're liable to burst out laughing whenever you hear of Americans "rooting" for something.
• You pronounce Melbourne as 'Mel-bin'. You believe the 'L' in the word 'Australia' is optional.
• You abbreviate our countries towns and cities, 'BRISSY', 'NEWY', 'COFFS', 'SURFERS', 'ROCKY' and 'THE GONG'
• You can translate: 'Dazza and Shazza played Acca Dacca on the way to Maccas.'
• You believe it makes perfect sense for a nation to decorate its highways with large fibreglass bananas, prawns and sheep.
• You call your best friend 'a total bastard' but someone you really, truly despise is just 'a bit of a bastard'.
• You think 'Woolloomooloo' is a perfectly reasonable name for a place.
• You're secretly proud of our killer wildlife.
• You believe it makes sense for a country to have a $1 coin that's twice as big as its $2 coin.
• You understand that 'Wagga Wagga' can be abbreviated to 'Wagga' but 'Woy Woy' can't be called 'Woy'.
• You believe that cooked-down axle grease makes a good breakfast spread. You've also squeezed it through Vita Wheats to make little Vegemite worms.
• You believe all famous Kiwis are actually Australian, until they stuff up, at which point they again become Kiwis.
• Beetroot with your Hamburger... Of course.
• You know that certain words must, by law, be shouted out during any rendition of the ANGELS' song 'Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again' And "Living next door to Alice".
• You believe that the confectionery known as the Wagon Wheel has become smaller with every passing year.
• You believe that every important discovery in the world was made by an Australian but then sold off to the Yanks for a pittance.
• You believe that the more you shorten someone's name the more you like them.
• Whatever your linguistic skills, you find yourself able to order takeaway fluently in every Asian language.
• You understand that 'excuse me' can sound rude, While 'scuse me' is always polite.
• You know what it's like to swallow a fly, on occasion via your nose.
• You know it's not summer until the steering wheel is too hot to handle and a seat belt buckle becomes a pretty good branding iron.
• Your biggest family argument over the summer concerned the rules for beach cricket.
• You shake your head in horror when companies try to market what they call 'ANZAC BISCUITS'.
• You still think of Kylie as 'that girl off Neighbours'.
• When working on a bar, you understand male customers will feel the need to offer an excuse whenever they order low-alcohol beer.
• You know how to abbreviate every word, all of which usually end in -o: arvo, combo, garbo, kero, metho, milko, muso, rego, servo, smoko, speedo, righto, goodo etc.
• You know that there is a universal place called "WHOOP-WHOOP" located in the middle of nowhere...no matter where you actually are.
• You know that none of us actually drink Fosters beer, because it tastes like shit. But we let the world think we do. Because we can.
• You have some time in your life slept with Aeroguard on in the summer. Maybe even as perfume.
• You've only ever used the words - tops, ripper, sick, mad, rad, sweet - to mean good. And then you place 'bloody' in front of it when you REALLY mean it.
• You know that the barbecue is a political arena; the person holding the tongs is always the boss and usually a man. And the women make the Salad.
• You say 'no worries' quite often, whether you realise it or not.
• You understand what no wucking furries means.
• You've drank your tea/coffee/milo through a Tim Tam.
• You own a Bond's chesty. In several different colours.
• You know that roo meat tastes pretty good, But not as good as barra. Or a meat pie.
• You know that some people pronounce Australia like "Straya" and that's ok.
• And you will forward this list to other Australians, here and overseas, realising that only they will understand!!!

How many of you understand this?  (Wagon Wheels ARE getting smaller! I swear it!)

Bye for now, K

Crafty Beginnings - WIP Wednesday

Well I do LOVE making STUFF.  It could be Kid Stuff, Christmas stuff, general felt stuff, whatever really.  Admittedly I have a rather large stash of fabric & a much smaller stash of yarn.  I also have a small box of felt and a little bit of paper.

I knit badly & can not yet crochet but I'm hoping to do something about that this year.  No promises mind you.

My fabric stash is large because I just can't bare to part with it.  Hmmm, that's not entirely true.  I can't bare to CUT IT!  It is all so pretty.  Sometimes I spend HOURS perusing Facebook pages thinking to myself "Oh I could make that!".  Honeslty I could (or at least try with the help of a tutorial or two) but I just seem to spend sooo much time on facebook sticky beaking & being inspired that I don't ACTUALLY get anything done. THUS, I have decided that having some accountability (to myself), in the form of a special page for you to look at, will help ME to get my game on, so to speak.  I have NO idea what is involved with all these swaps that I read about on other crafty blogs & I really don't know whether I could commit to it BUT, maybe that's what I need.  Anyway, baby steps for now.  I'll be accountable to you & I for now, and no one else.

I have seen pages post this type of info on a Wednesday as "WIP Wednesday".  One that comes to mind is by Kat, here. OK, so perhaps mine won't be quite so FULL of wonderfully creative, busy, bright, beautiful stuff, but still, I think you get the picture.

I'm PLANNING to participate in a pillowcase challenge with Little Toot Creations, but more on that next week.

Today is however a Wednesday (though very late in the day & kinda past my bed time) but here we are... Two projects I've been working on!

This is something I'm working on for Miss Pants to take to pre school.  She needs a hand towel. Obviously it needs her name on it so I thought rather than write it with big black texta I'd stitch it to a piece of cloth I had in my scrap bag & then blanket stitch it to the hand towel.

Now this... This has certainly been a work in progress.  I began this 18point (is that right cross stitchers?? It's 18 something) counted cross stitch NINE years ago. Yep, nine years ago, when I was pregnant with my first boy, Mr Magoo, my Mother in law gave it to me as a gift.  It had the clock mechanism when she gave it to me but over time it disappeared.  I did a little more of it with my second pregnancy, Master H, but didn't touch it with the third, Miss Pants (must have known she was a girl).  Well I found it again whilst pregnant with Little H and I "hooked in" to get it finished!  I had a little extra time on my hands late in this pregnancy when I spent a few weeks in hospital.  It's amazing how much you can do when you are basically bed ridden in another city. Lol.  It's pretty late at night for me so the photo quality is BAD.  My Mum got me a new clock mechanism for Christmas but it STILL isn't in place.  I need to get a frame so I can get to it & put it all together.  Someday before Little H moves out of home would be good. Lol. 

Hopefully next week I'll have a couple of finished shots (taken in better light) to show you.

Bye for now, K

Moist Orange Cake

I'm thinking of posting my Food Finds on Fridays but I've got two this week so I'm doing one today too.  The recipe for Moist Orange Cake came from a book published from contributions to a primary school fundraiser. 

INGREDIENTS

CAKE
155g butter
2/3 cup sugar
1 1/4 cups SR flour
2 teaspoons grated orange rind
3 eggs
1/4 cup milk

ORANGE ICING
1 cup icing sugar
1 tablespoon orange juice, approx.


METHOD
Grease a 20cm round cake pan and line base with baking paper.  Combine all ingredients in large bowl, beat on low with electric mixer until all ingredients are combined.  Beat for 3 minutes or until mixture is smooth and changed in colour.  Spread into prepared pan. Bake in moderate oven for about 45 minutes.  Stand for 2 minutes before turning onto wire rack to cool.  spread with icing when cool.
ORANGE ICING - Sift icing sugar into small bowl, stir in butter and enough juice to mix to a spreadable consistency.  Sprinkle with coconut.


I was expecting a moister cake.  There was no coconut on the top of mine because Master H doesn't like it.  I didn't put the orange rind in because the rind on my oranges wasn't nice at all, so I put juice in the cake as well as the icing but neither had an overly orangey flavour.  I will probably make this again though because we all ate it regardless of the lack of orange flavour.

Food Resolution 2012

As part of this year's New Year Resolutions I have decided that I WILL make or cook something, every week, that I haven't tried before.  It might be a sweet treat (probably more of these than anything really), a main dish, a side or whatever else I come across.  I will endeavour to photograph my efforts but I'm not making any promises.

These are NOT my creations, but you can see why I'd love to learn to crochet.  They have instead been made by the wonderful Suzanne from Suzanne Houghton Designs.  Currently she has a facebook page but she's working on a web site too.  There are a few of these in our house.  I LOVE them!

I have two other resolutions this year too, but more about them another time.

Welcome and Hello

So, Welcome to my first blog post J

Blogging is something I’ve been thinking about doing now for well over 12 months.  There’s not really any one specific thing that has stopped me from doing it.  It’s more of a collection of several little things, the main one though has always been “what should I blog about.”

I even had the all-out-in-the-open blog VS anonymous-secret-squirrels blog personal debate.  Would I blog about the kids? Would I mention our actual names? Would I ask my husband how he feels about me blogging?  Would anyone read it? What would make my blog different from every other blog?  How often would I post?  What font will be easy to read & pleasing to the eye?  I don’t quite have all those answers yet...

I guess I’ll just see what happens as time goes on.  In the meantime I’m going to use my blog as a bit of a diary.  (I’m sure plenty of other people probably do the same thing).

I better tell you a bit about myself before I jump into it.

I am a thirty something stay at home Mum who is married to a wonderful man.  He is a very hard worker and a wonderful Dad to our four kids (and now that I think about it I don’t tell him that enough).  The four kids and my dear husband are the reason I get out of bed every day. They are my world!!

We’ve moved around a little.  Not like some people, but often enough that I’m getting itchy feet again after having only been here for just under eighteen months. To be fair though, we did live here for eight years before moving away for four years.  Employment brought us back.  The cold is partly what makes me want to leave again.  I’d forgotten about it. I mean it’s not Toronto cold, or even London cold, but it’s still cold.  The size of the house is a bigger problem now too.  Family grew, house shrank. What do ya do?!

Wow, I didn’t expect it to be quite so time consuming trying to write one little blog post.  I haven’t even contemplated the set up of the page yet. Goodness, at the ACTUAL time of writing this I haven’t even picked how it’ll be hosted.  I don’t even know if that’s the correct term to use in reference to a blog.  What I do know is that I better make a start on dinner while the littlest of the four is asleep.

Bye for now, K

P.S.  So when I did actually set up my blog using a template, I did it as a secret squirrel style but, when I went to bed I had a little freak-out & decided I’d better go with the honest-this-is-me open blog.  I decided I don’t have the skills necessary to keep up the facade (even for one night).