Lara test drive ...

the new trampoline - her Christmas and Birthday present.

Birthday party

We went to Andre's birthday party on Saturday. It was a very hot day and perfect to spend in the swimming pool. We got there at around 4pm and spent nearly 2 hours in the water! Lara didn't want to get out even though the water was still a little on the cool side, at least I felt cold. Jenny prepared lots of bbq food and I eventually got Lara out of the pool by luring her with some honey soy chicken wings. We were very full by the time we finished the chocolate birthday cake and headed home.

Lara and Jenny's boys posed and made faces while I took several photos. Here's one.

Surprises in the garden

This weekend was very very warm so we stayed indoor mostly. We managed to spend about an hour in the garden late afternoon before the sun set. FIL continued putting up the trampoline while MIL and I watered the garden. Simon went back to the fences around the vege patch, and did some general weeding.
While walking around in the garden, MIL found a few plants we didn't know we had- passionfruit, blueberry, apple, almond and raspberry. The garden is also full of strawberries. Unfortunately, Zebadee eats them before they have a chance to grow big. Nowadays, Zeb spent a lot of time having her nose on the strawberry patches looking for strawberries!

Apple.


Blueberry.

Dinner and swim

We visited Sarah and Mitch at their new house last weekend. They moved in just before we did, and they've done quite a lot renovations already. We helped christened their swiming pool. The water was a little on the cool side, both Milo and Lara were trembling and saying 'cooooooold" but they had lots of fun and didn't want to get out. Simon watched us with Jude on the side and Sarah only had time to take some pictures before rushing back to the kitchen.

We had a beautiful melt-in-your mouth roast pork (belly) and a lovely Skye Gyngell salad for dinner. Simon, not a salad person, found the salad very delicious. Desert was a heavenly lemon cheese cake with thin & crispy pastry, and surprisingly light. Lara finished her dinner without help and started licking her plate! She also finished the biggest piece of cheese cake. Here are some pictures of Lara and Milo.

Christmas tree is in!

Our Christmas tree is now sitting in the corner of the lounge and it's only the 15th of November!

This is our first real tree, not counting the small fibre optic one MIL gave us a couple of years ago. It was very exciting putting it up - took several attempts of re-arranging furniture to get there. The flickering lights are mesmerising to watch! The decorations are mainly blue because blue is Lara's favourite colour. Not all the decorations are in yet, hooks need to be purchased for more silver, white and blue balls.

This year is the first year we will be hosting Christmas lunch for the family, and we have 15 people coming! I don't think we even have enough forks, spoons or glasses for everyone. I have started making lists of things we need to buy and things we should borrow. I can't image feeding people food on paper plates, but deserts are fine to be served on paper plates I think. I hope there will be enough food so nobody gets too hungry on the day!

First thing first, we just had our new oven delivered and installed, that's a good start.

Different attitudes

In our last house, the neighbour on the left side complained to me over the fence about Zeb barking. She said Zeb barked everytime they hung their clothes outside(their clothes line was right near the side fence) or used their toilet near the side fence. Her son couldn't study becaue of Zeb so the son (not her) would complain to the council if Zeb kept barking. She suggested I buy an expensive collar to stop Zeb from barking. Zeb is friendly and not a barky dog by nature but I can't say Zeb never bark(dogs by nature would bark at strangers near the house!) so I said we would keep an eye on things. We found the dog on our right side barked a lot more than Zeb and didn't find the barking excessive at all. Luckily we didn't stay in that house for very long. I bumped into this ex-neighbour a couple of weeks ago and now she complained to me about her 'new' neighbour's birds!

In our new house, the backdoor neighbour told us over the back fence that Zeb sometimes barks when she's near the fence. She asked if she could give Zeb a bone. She thought Zeb barked becaue Zeb didn't know her and she wanted to give Zeb a bone to make friends with her.

How different are the two attitudes under very similar situations? I know which neighbour I want to make friends with and which attitude I would like to possess myself. Granted that the previous neighbour probably doesn't like dogs and this new neighbour does, but this make me think about our attitudes towards things in general. How do we handle situations we want to change? Do we complain and threaten or do we think of ways we can help improving things?

Surprise sashimi

I picked up some seafood after work from the local vegetable man last week. He went to the fish market earlier that day and brought salmon fillets, flathead fillets and some tiger prawns for me. I was told that the salmon was of sashimi quality so I decided to try part of it raw. I added sushi vinegar mix to cooked rice to have with our raw fish. The salmon was beautiful - buttery and melt in our mouths. The raw king fish was of a lesser quality. My (lack of) knife skill and the blunt knife didn't help either. It was a real surprise for Simon to come home to a sashimi meal! A light but satisfying meal with minimum cooking, just how I liked it as a week-day meal.

Only time will tell

I have this idea of living in a nice hosuse and a huge garden with vegetables growing. We are still working on the nice house bit but we do have a big garden. Now I'm working towards the vegetable dream. I ordered some heirloom seeds a few weeks ago, convinced myself that ordinary veges are too boring, and planted the seeds 2 weeks ago. The previous owner left lots of seedling pots in the shed, but none of the seeds in the seedling pots came out. However, those seeds I tried in the used egg carton (Gina's suggestion) were all out. They are 5 colour silverbeet, tri-colour zucchini and radish (from left to right).

The plan was to prepare the ground at the same time so the veges have somewhere to grow once the seedlings come out. The ground is no where near ready as I got too squremish about the wood lice and some other namless insects on the ground. Can a person like me successfully grow vegetables? Only time will tell!

Swimming class

After 2 terms of Kingergym, Lara started to do her own thing and not follow instructions. We even had to leave early in one class because Lara would not listen. A change was needed so I signed Lara up for swimming this term instead.

Lara did her first swimming class on Monday. She's over 2 and a half so I don't have to get into the water with her.

It was great fun watching the class behind the glass door. At one point, the kids took turns jumping into the pool from the side. Lara was impatient and wanted to jump first, not realising she would get her head wet, and she didn't like that! She was a little apprehensive, this being her first proper class after a trial 3 weeks ago, but I am sure she'll improve over time.

Chicken update

We were very disappointed to learn that the chickens left by the previous owner are 6 years old and don't lay any more. We thought we would keep them as pets initially, but didn't name them in case we changed our mind (they were sometimes referred to as C1 and C2). They became company to Zebadee, but Lara never warmed to them. Zeb must think she is also a chicken - how else do you explain the fact that she prefers the chicken house than her own dog kennel?

The chickens acted like they owned the house, but they started to grow on us. It was nice seeing them walking around in the garden every morning but it was time-consuming to get them back into their coop. Simon thought there was some intelligence in those little brains, but they were basically food-driven. It was nice to get rid of our kitchen scraps but we usually didn't have enough to feed them. And the food attracted wild turkeys, some morning we saw a couple of turkeys in the garden with the chickens. We heard they can be a breeding ground for lice (pooh hanging from their bottoms was a telling sign we were told). We didn't like Zeb supplement her diet with chicken poohs either. At the end, we decided to 'give them away'. But who wants some old hens? No one! The vet offered to put them down (for a price), but I couldn't bring myself to do it.

At the end, the local vegetable man came and took them. Whether they are being used as soup stock, or live in a farm (as we were told), we would never know. They are very handsome-looking so hopefully they now live in their 'retirement' farm as breeding stock.

We won't see this outside Lara's bedroom window any more. The chicken coop feels empty without them...

Koala park

It was mostly rainy this Labour long weekend. On Monday, we were all restless and needed to get out of the house. It was clear and a little sunshine came out in the morning, we decided to go to the Koala park (Lara says "kolala park").
Our first stop was to see emus, peacocks and sheeps, just as a shearing show was about to start. After that, we walked to the Kangaroo feeding enclosure, passing some enormous animals made of concrete. Lara liked the fake animals but was a little apprehensive about the real ones. We didn't have any food to feed them, but the kangaroos were very friendly and came to say hi, one even opened up Simon's hand to check if there was food in it!
We walked around and saw a cassowary (bad tempered bird), a wombat, koalas, cockatooes, dingoes, and chicknes. It started to rain, luckily it was not heavy. Lara was very interested in all the puddles, she had raincoat and rainboots on so we let her explpore as she wish. We went back at the advertised time to 'pat' the koalas. Lara only got 'one small pat' as there were quite a lot of people there. Th park is not huge, and a little run-down. But I heard it was one of the few places you can pat kangaroos and koalas these days. We all enjoyed this short, relaxing outing.

Books April- September 09

Blue shoes and happiness
The good husband of Zebra drive
In the company of cheerful ladies
by Alexander McCall Smith

I get my hands on any 'No 1 Ladies Detective Agency' books I find in the library. Why? Becaue I really enjoy reading them. It's the simple things in life that matters and these books serve well to remind me that.

One child by Torey L. Hayden
It's shocking, heart-warming, and sadly it's a true story!
Torey Hayden is very good story-teller and seems to be an excellent teacher too. I had to stop reading it on the train one morning, because of one horrible scence in the middle of the book. I still couldn't make myself finishing it. I would recommend the book to anyone who has the stomach to read it.

Warren Buffet: An Illustrated Biography of the World's Most Successful Investor
by Ayano Morio
Contains interesting facts about Warren Buffet. A fast, interesting read for Warren Buffet fans. The drawings are very entertaining, it makes Warren Buffet look like a real superhero. Maybe he is in his own way?

Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
Jane Austen's first book but it was published last. It is not as famous as the others, and after reading it, I think I know why. The usual hero-heroine misunderstanding but less convicing. Definitely not my favorite.

Julia Child's lamb stew and strawberry jam

I made Julia Child's lamb stew last week, recipe from her book 'Mastering the art of French cooking'. I didn't follow the recipe exactly - I cooked everying in one pot on the stovetop (who needs the extra washing up and our oven is broken) and I used a can of tomatoes rather than fresh ones. I think the main difference comes from using various cuts of meat -I used a mixture of lamb chops and lamb forequarters. I also browned the meat with sugar and flour as the recipe said. It was delicious! I am keen to try other recipes from the book.



I couldn't walk away from these strawberries on sale, and they became jars of jam using my trusted bread-maker. I made 4 batches in two days, each with a slightly different sugar content. I meant to write it all down straight away but didn't. Luckily they didn't taste that different. After giving away 3 jars, I still have 5 left in the fridge. The jam can be improved upon but it tastes a lot 'fresher' than your average supermarket varieties. Lara and parents-in-law like them on toasts for breakfast. I can't wait to try other summer fruit (eg plum)!

Where food comes from

The book 'Animal, vegetable and miracle" I am reading now is very interesting and informative. I learned a lot about the food industry, food history and certain farm animals and plants as well as being entertained as one would expect while reading a book in her leisure time. I learned sadly about how the majority of fruit and vegetables travel hundreds of kilometers to get to the supermarkets and how thousands of plants species and many animal species are extinct because farmers only grow food that travels well or yeilds well because that's what the big supermarkets buy.

As the author of the book suggested, I now take more notice of where the fresh food comes from. For example, I can't find garlic from Australia a month ago (Harris Farm signs showed all garlics were from China or Peru). I tried not to use much garlic but ended up buying a small bulb from Peru. I also know there is no Australian grapes at the moment. I saw grapes in the local vegetable shop last week, hoping the new season's started, I asked the owner wherer it was from. He confirmed grapes are not in season and his grapes came from USA by air - transport time around 5 days. He further addded those grapes that cost less than $6 all came via the sea (took 2 months to come) and he thought they shouldn't be eaten by humans. I totally agree and do not want to eat anything that sits in a refrigerated container for that long and still looks good!

As a general rule, I try to buy ingredients coming from NSW, otherwise Australia. I order organic vegetables from time to time, and I know which state and farm they are from, but not all shops list where their food is from. I also try to buy seasonal produce then find recipes to use them rather than choose a recipe first then unable to find the ingredients or the ingredients not in season, therefore very expensive. Of course, I still buy lots of packet and canned stuff and I don't have time to read each label. But I feel that I'm taking a small first step towards having more control over what we put in our mouths.

Snaps around the house (2)

There are many very tall (and probably very old) trees in our garden. The three tall ones in the front garden are our favorite. Lara calls this "Totoro tree" - it looks similar to the tree where Totoro lives (from the movie 'My neighbour Totoro').


I like the branches of this nameless tree. These lovely trees make the front garden very serene and provoide great shade to the outdoor area where we spend most of our weekend.


This is a magnolia tree (I love magnolia flowers!) It has quite a few low-hanging branches and it is great for kids to climb. Lara often hangs off it like a koala. Jenny warned me not to trim this tree too much - 'flowering tree represents love' she told me.


We had lots of help from family, especially parents-in-law who come over, over an hour drive each way, every weekend and help with many things that need doing in this house (FIL is wokring on the pergola at the moment and MIL and I are going to recover the dinning chairs). Lara enjoyed joining in with the sweeping in this picture.


The front garden is tidier and a better place to play in, backyard is a little messy at the moment. Lara and her cousins played with the golf set outside before they moved on to the trike and scooter. They happily did a golf-pose for us when the cameras were out.

Blue oh blue

Some time ago, I said to Lara "I love you very very much", and Lara said "five very much". We started playing the "number very much" game after that. Lara insisted that I love her "ten very much" now, but she usually loves me only "six very much" or sometimes "seven very much", never "ten very much". I was curious as to what else could be more important to a 2-year-old than her Mummy so I asked Lara what she liked "ten very much" one day. She only thought for a brief second before replying "I love blue ten very much". I have no unrealistic expectation about what my place is in the future, I already lost to 'blue'!

Lara's family day care closed in July. Now if I need respite on a Monday for work or other reasons, Lara goes to Gilda's house. Gilda only looks after a little boy Robbie on Mondays so she's happy that Lara is there to keep Robbie company from time to time. Gilda told me how Lara loves blue and she wants everyting in blue. And how she found it funny that Robbie is a great fan of 'pink' and he wants everything in pink (his mum's not very impressed with that!). Gilda makes sure she has blue and pink stuff (blue for Lara and pink for Robbie) to make them both happy. Two-year-olds do not know pink is for girls and blue for boys!

Lara's favorites

Hairy Maclary Hat tricks by Lynn Todd
A library book. I read it to Lara many times. Every time I asked Lara to choose a book for me to read, she seemed always go for this one. Other Hairy Maclary books don't hold as much facination as this book does.

Hand hand fingers thumb (Dr Sesus books)
Nice pictures and easy words and rhymes. Lara likes this too.

Owl babies by Martin Waddell
This is a daycare book. Lara asks for it when I'm late to get her or sometimes when I leave in the morning. I was very surprised the other morning that Lara wanted 'owl babies' rather than her blanket. I have not read it myself except learning from Amazon reviews that this book addresses kids' fear about separating from parents. I think it gives Lara a lot of comfort to know that mummy always comes back.

Lulu by Caroline Uff
This was Lara's favorite from daycare a few months ago. I was told that Lara chased other kids away if they got this book because she thought it was her book. It was out of print when I checked it ealier this year. I heard this is a bicultural book maybe that is why Lara warms to this book.

My neighbour Totoro (dvd)
This is the first moive Lara watched and loved. She loved it so much that I had to buy it urgently after returning the dvd to library. We enjoy watching this too. The story is warm and very charming and the animation beautifully done. Lara was not well with an ear infection and a huge bruise on her face (fell out of bed) two weeks before our move. Coupled with the stress of moving, this movie offered great comfort to all of us during that difficult time.

Lara helps

Lara helps me hang clothes outside ...

Cooking day

I had last Wednesday off and had a relaxing cooking day.
Pictured from left: chocolate cookies with ginger, curry powder, almond cake with coffee icing and white bread.



The cookies were made with chocolate buttons and crystallized ginger(recipe by Louise Pickford 'Fresh Baked'). The butter & sugar were creamed first therefore they are resonably 'light'.

The curry powder was made from scratch (my first) and it was delicious (Simon didn't want to get any curry paste from any jars any more!) I improvised a Delicious magazine recipe and dry-fried coriander seeds, cumin seeds, mustard seeds, cardamom seeds, cinnamon and dried chillies before grinding them in a mortar and pestle (my hands were sore!) Garlic, ginger, turmeric, nutmeg and curry leaves were added before cooking. The beef chuck steak was cooked in the curry sauce for about an hour the day before. I added milk and continued the cooking process the following day. The result was a very tender and tasty dish. Even though the spices/seeds I used are very 'old' (bought them a few years ago!) but the curry dish still tasted 'fresher' than supermarket-bought packets.

I've also been making bread ... I made a bread roll loaf (with an egg), banana walnut bread, and 3 loaves of white bread. They are frozen after cooking and can be used slowly later. I now use the breadmaker to make dough only but do all my baking in the oven. I found the breadmaker often under-bake the bread. I have more control over the cooking time when baking in the oven and the bread tastes better.

ps The oven stopped working again....
It looks like we will need a new oven after all :(

After our move ...

The first weekend after we moved in, the hot water system stopped working.
Lukily we found out on a Saturday and could easily get a plumber in. The hot water system turned out to be working, only the pilot light went out. It cost $150 to light the pilot light. To his credit, the plumber did help calling Energy Australia and got what he thought was the problem,gas regulator, changed. It took Simon 5 calls and being transferred from one person to antoher in Energy Australia to get this done. Nobody knows anything about gas regulator. Finally someone requsted the plumber to call them. They organised to replace(?) the regulator after talking to our plumber. The fact is, we are not sure if everythign's working properly. The pilot light had gone out again twice since then and we still have the problem that if we have the gas heating on, the flames on the gas cooktops diminish by almost half. This is something that still needs fixing.

The second weekend after we moved in, our oven stopped working.
The oven was working fine for a week and a half and I even did 2 roasts and baked a bread in it. To cut a long story short, we nearly chucked it out but luckily double-checked-it to make sure it was not the fuse and it was the fuse! So after a week with no oven, this old oven decides to stay with us in the mean time.

And yesterday, our fridge stopped working. This fridge is over 10 years old, and I was hoping it would go soon becaue I want a bigger fridge(be careful what you wish for!!). Being moved 3 times in less than a year proved to be too much for a hard-working fridge and it decided to go silently sometime yesterday. A new fridge and washing machine are being delivered today.

Hopefully this is the last of the appliances not working!