Chilly, no?

Oh these boys.

Good mates. --Finally. It's taken a while to blossom, but brotherly comaradarie has hit.
Monty is seeming to keep up with the full bore of a 5 year old.

Doesnt matter it its mud, trucks, drawing, reading, building, bouncing, wrestling.
Half pint will always give it a red hot go. And now... Mr 5 will tolerate the inexperience, and have a good belly laugh to see him thru.

Be still my heart.

Thursday.

don't you love it when a pile of fluff get's a few stitches and becomes a treasured possession?

This little ballerina sure does. 

She's having a rest in it before taking her daddy to his first ballet practice this arvo.

I told him he'll be in fits of giggles while he watches the little girls do their practice with all the seriousness of a judge.  They are truly too cute. 

But as for this morning - it needed a good workout first...

and we have a very happy little miss fluffing about today...

Bax loves climbing this tree to collect the apples.  

Monty is far too busy to strike a pose. 

Making sure his daddy doesn't get more than earshot away to hear his constant calling of "Daaa"

Made my Grandmother's delicious apple sauce today. Well - not exactly.... These apples need no added sugar, and very little else than a cinnamon stick thrown in for the boil and the zest of a lemon. And of course - the bit that really makes applesauce perfect - a tablespoon of butter at the end - to gloss it up and make it just right.  

Have a happy day. xx

a gruffalo party

after some hard work making some super spectacular birthday party invites...

and opening some super special birthday presents - mainly the most coveted of all - Lego...

We had ourselves a Gruffalo party for my biggest boy's 5th birthday.

He came equipped with purple prickles all over his back!

how delicious is my Montyzooma? I mean, come on!

After a Gruffalo reading, lots of Gruffalo food ie: Roasted Fox, Scrambled Snake Crackles, Gruffalo Punch, and Strawberry Mice, playing pin the wart on the Gruffalo, yummy Gruffalo cake, bubbles and playing.... we had the Gruffalo screening with Organic Lolypops.

..Other than that, March has been business as usual. We got a dehydrator and have done a LARGE batch of bananas before the prices went thru the roof, and ooodles and oooodles of apples.  I have preserved apples today and there is a rather large and scrumptious smelling apple and blackberry crumble in the over for after dinner.  Feeling a bit flat - what with the horrendous natural disasters around the globe, gloomy cool weather, and that whacky ol' moon. I hope this funky flat time passes soon. Are you feeling it too?

xx

superb auction & 7 things 'bout me

Hello there! 
First things first - I'm holding a raffle for my yellow pillow! Hooray!
I think it might miss it's mate, yellow pillow #2, but I think someone else will love it and give it a good home.
100% handmade by moi.

Here's the deal:
-open to the entire universe - I'll post it anywhere.
-online auction starting at $5 winning bidder to donate to the Grantham Flood appeal. This is a town that had it's guts and people ripped apart during the flood, and will go directly to that community.
-leave a comment with your bid.
-bid as many times as you like.
-Auction closes on Australia Day at 4 p.m. Winner to be notified by email.
-GET IN IT TO WIN IT.
-handsome big boy is not included in the raffle. (sorry.)
-any questions - email me.


And...
Sophie over at Red Dust Love has given me an award!

awww. how sweet! In order to receive this award I must release 7 secrets about myself that you may or may not know, but I am presuming that most of of you will not know these tiny details!.....


right. here goes...


1. I'm 6'3". That's right. I wear VERY long jeans.


2. I'm a bit obsessed with making food with what we have. Eggs, Milk, veg, fruit. Actually, I'm quite obsessed.


3. I sing really really well. Especially Laura Marling. However, I was not allowed to sing solo  "Away in a Manger" for my church Christmas Concert when I was little. I think I butchered it.


4. I've never been to New York, but I'd love to go for Christmas - I don't know why.


5. I think I'm done having babies.


6. I am an awful sleeper. If a frog farts, I'm up and looking to see if it's okay.


7. I could spend a day nibbling and loving on my baby. I would require no food or drink. Just nibbling and smooching. Unfortunately I have a business to run and children to feed and laundry to do and schedules to keep and bills to pay and EVERYONE elses's needs to be met - therefore I do not spend the day smooching on my baby(s). (I could choose any one of the three, but the little blond haired fellow just MELTS my heart at the moment.)


There you have it.


So, now I'm passing it on... to a blog I've only just stumbled into - This lady makes the most best hairclips for girls. Kelly has her blog.. Messy Freckle (whose name I lourve.) and it is truly stylish! 


Have a happy day and put a bid in. I'd love it to be a smashing success.
xx

its beginning to look a lot like...

CHRISTMAS!

Okay, I think I'm finally feeling a wee bit organized for the Chrissy Day next weekend. 

Baxter, Nina & Monty have been baking our most very favourite chocolate chip bikkies today.
You'll notice the absence of a little girl named Gretta here. Yes, she went to bed after refusing to eat her nourishing soup for lunch. She's had a good sleep now, and that soup is waiting for her on the bench before she can have a skerrick of a cookie. Do you think it'll work. I have my doubts. She's more stubborn than her bull headed mother. Which is saying a lot.

Ghiradelli Sierra Nuggets.

1 1/2 cups flour

1 1/4 t bicarb

1t salt

1/2 t mace

1 1/2 t cinnamon

1/4 t nutmeg

1/8 t gr. cloves

stir together and set aside 

1 cup soft butter

1c raw sugar

1c brown sugar (we use coconut palm sugar)

1T milk

1 1/2 t vanilla

2 eggs (we use 3 eggs when we use spelt flour)

combine till a little fluffy.

mix wet and dry then add

2c cornflakes

3c oats

1c coconut

2c dark chocolate chips

1c nuts (optional)

bake in medium oven for 10-12 minutes.

makes A LOT. about 6 or 7 dozen.

Do you have any traditional recipes that you make during Christmas?

xx Amy

chalk it up

My big boy is quite obsessed with writing his name. 

He loves to practice and is getting quite clever about it.

We are contemplating staying at home, doing some friendly baking.. Sierra Nugget Chocolate Chip Cookies, brownies, etc.. and being a bit festive while taming tantrums from ALL 3 now.  

Yep - that's right. Baxter is not quite stepped out of the howling tanty, Gretta still throws some clangers, and Monty is right on the cusp of  the nail biting, ear shattering wobbly chuckers.  Lucky me.

My other option is to head to Melbourne with my babe, leave the two big kids to dad and swimming lessons this arvo to order our properly smoked ham for Christmas. We say "no" to the nitrate laden, MSG pumped, factory farmed hams from most all supermarkets and we need our ham from our gorgeous little deli in the guts of the Queen Victoria Market that has some values and integrity behind their products.

Hmm. Decisions Decisions. What are you up to today? What is on your Christmas menu?

delicious loganberries

Our first harvest off the loganberry bushes.  Our friend Erica helped search for the purple ones.  She's headed home to make a special dessert and we are into the kitchen to make our loganberry crumble. 

Do you have a favourite crumble/crisp/cobbler recipe? 

I'd love to hear about it as we haven't got one that we  particularly love.

Have a happy day.

xx

lessons

My biggest of my smalls are finally getting some swimming lessons.  When we lived in Gundy - our options were very far away (70 K), and with a baby thrown in for good measure - just didn't happen.  I'm not sure that it has been such a bad thing that we've waited until age 4 & 3 and a half's as they seem to be doing really well - they've both had little frights, but are still excited and are keen to get the oh so fancy and super special goggles.  Seeing as we live 10 minutes to the beach, we thought it might be nice if Santa brought a life jacket for each of them.  Gretta was hoping for something more like lippy and tutu, but ... we'll see...

How's the gearing up for Chrissy going?  We've got our tree up and subsequently are constantly putting ornaments back up and saying - "NO" to Monty as he parades around the house with his new treasure.  As you can guess, about 90% of the ornaments are now at the TOP of the tree.....

We are having a joint garage sale tomorrow with our neighbours from around the way.  I've done some baking for the morning so that I can wake kids, chuck in car, and toss a muffin to them while I unpack the goods. The muffins are really good! 

Here's what they are...  

they use olive oil - which makes me balk - firstly for cooking with Olive oil - it shouldn't go above 170 C otherwise it goes off.  But secondly - baking with the flavour of Olive oil?? Hmm.  But these are little rippers! (Well - not so little - it made 12 regular and 6 large muffins!)   Give em' a go - if you can't read the recipe above, let me know.  

Of course I added something - as I always do - chopped macadamias on the top.  And I used Organic Spelt flour. And decreased the sugar by 1/4 cup.  

Serve warm with a large lashing of butter.  I better go put them away before I help myself again.

Off to organize garage sale, pay bills and process eggs on my day off from the kids.

Have a happy day.

xx