I'm Back

in the land of blog again at last. I don't like my blog staying the same for longer than a week but I have been too busy with other tasks. One of which is helping the children to make their Easter hats for day care and school parades. I only have a photo of Nick so far as his parade was last week. Auntie Trudie sent us some great chicken and eggshell cut outs which were great. We then cut out some shapes on the Cricut using my new Easter cartridge and Nick coloured them in and stuck them on. Unfortunately I haven't been able to attend the parades this year as they're on my work days.

Craig and I celebrated our 12th wedding anniversary on the Sunday before last. I bought him a Wii Bass fishing game which is great fun and the way I like to go fishing - no smell, no clean up and best of all no sea sickness!!! I had to have a rest from it last week as I was getting blisters on my thumb. I received a beautiful bunch of roses.

I attended a friend's Stampin' Up party a couple of weeks ago and so have enjoyed trying out all of the new stamps that I have bought. For those non scrappers, Stampin' Up is a party plan company like Tupperware but they sell stamps and associated products. As you can imagine I really can't help myself as their products are beautiful!

Nick got his first goal at soccer on Saturday - hooray. It was the only one for his team for the game and he was most pleased.

I flew down to join Craig in Brisbane on Saturday evening so that we could attend my first rugby league game on Sunday. Craig's company has a corporate box so we were treated to food and drinks whilst we watched the great spectacle unfold before us. We stayed with Richard (my brother) and Trudie and their gorgeous children, Alexandra and Lachlan. It was great to catch up with them although unfortunately our time was all too short as Craig needed to return to work after we drove back on Monday. Nevertheless it was a lovely break and our children had a great time being spoilt by Grandma at home.

Well off to complete the teacher's Easter present boxes and then I need to start preparing for my scrapbooking retreat which is only 2.5 wks away - can't wait!! We are looking forward to a quiet, restful Easter at home perhaps with a spot of fishing on the river (not the Wii kind).

I'll be back soon with a photo of Penny's Easter hat.

Rach xx

What A Shiner!

Poor Nicholas was hit in the side of the eye with a tennis racquet today. I had to go across to the school to make sure I was happy for him to return to class. He was lucky that he didn't have a head ache! He is sporting some very nice blue, pink and purple eyeshadow, a swollen eyelid and a blue/purple lump with a red stripe through it at the corner of his eyebrow. He went onto swimming and soccer this afternoon without any trouble. As you can see he was really impressed about having his photo taken.

More bad news today, in that my Canon 18-55mm lens has decided to give up the ghost and won't auto focus anymore. Pretty disappointing seeing as the lens is only 2yrs old exactly! I knew I kept my trusty Canon film SLR for a reason. I am able to use the lens from it for the time being until I decide which new lens to purchase.

I finished another LO today - happy scrapping Wednesday today as my monthly ultrasound newsletter is done! Next project is to design some Easter bonnets for the kids to wear to their Easter hat parades at school and daycare next Friday.

Double Dream Slice

Here is the slice recipe that I promised. I made a half batch and it worked well.

375g butter
1.5 cups soft brown sugar
4.5 cups plain flour
3tsp baking powder
TOPPING
4 eggs
2 cups soft brown sugar
3tabs cornflour
1tsp baking powder
3cups coconut
2 cups chocolate chips

Place butter and brown sugar in saucepan. Heat until butter melts and then remove from heat. Mix in sifted flour and baking powder until combined. Divide the mixture between 2 baking paper lined 20x30cm sponge roll tins (I used a slice tin) and press in firmly. Bake at 190 degrees Celsius for 10 mins. Pour topping over base and bake at 160deg Celsius for 40mins or until golden brown. Cool in tin. Cut into squares or fingers. (The topping on mine cracked as I don't think I left it long enough to cool)
TOPPING
Beat eggs and brown sugar together until thick. Mix sifted cornflour and baking powder, coconut and choc chips into eggs until combined.
(The recipe is from the same book as last month)
ENJOY!!!

Birthday Wishes

I had another birthday on Saturday but had very little time to commiserate about getting older as we had the usual tennis and dancing. Saturday afternoon was spent adjusting the children's costumes before attending the school fancy dress ball on Saturday evening. Nicholas went as a knight of Camelot and Penny, as Cinderella. The children had a good time. Nick had fun playing tiggy on the dance floor and Penny just went and stood with a big group of girls and danced.

On Sunday, we went to a restaurant at the beach for breakfast followed by a play on the turtle playground. I spent a lovely afternoon scrapbooking with my scrapbooking group and achieved 2 simple LO's. The slice I took for afternoon tea was devoured and I have promised to put the recipe up on the blog - tomorrow, I promise!

Thai Fish Cakes

I made the best Thai fish cakes I have ever tasted tonight and thought I should share the recipe. Unfortunately I forgot to take a photo of them. The recipe is adapted from a few recipes from Super Food Ideas and Taste magazines.
Blend together 8 green beans, 2 shallots, 400g white fish, 6 green prawns (Craig reckons he couldn't taste these but I could), 1tsp green curry paste (more if you like but this is all my little ones can handle), zest and juice of a lime, coriander, an egg, 2 tabs fish sauce and a tsp of sugar. Mould into 10-12, 2cm thick cakes and put in fridge for 1 hr. Shallow fry in peanut oil. Serve with salad. Just delicious!!!!
BTW the rain has stopped this afternoon. Yeah!!! For a couple of days at least. I had a busy day at the gym, grocery shopping and then cleaning out my laundry cupboard which was frightening. I cannot believe how many packets of pegs I am harbouring in there - 5!!!! Another super spelling award came Nick's way again today, so I'm up for another lunch order on Friday-so glad and proud of him.

Webbed Feet...

is what we will have if this rain continues. It rained all last week with a break yesterday allowing me to get all of the washing for the week done. Back to same old same old last night and today with steady rain most of the day. Pity we can't send some to WA and SA. We bought a Wii game console about a month ago and it has received a good work out today!

Penny had a visit to the doctor last week with infected eczema on her ankle. She ended up with antibiotics and cortisone cream which both worked like magic and very quickly much to my relief. Nick continues with his weekly super spelling awards which is most pleasing and his incentive is a lunch order on the following Friday, proving to be more frequent than I expected.

Craig was away for three days at the beginning of last week so I managed to do a bit of scrapping and was able to do the bike LO of Nick today. The Santa photo is from Christmas. On the LO with Penny and Nicholas from daycare, there is a crochet flower and leaf that my mother-in-law, Pam made for me. I have her on the job to make me some more small flowers as they are lovely and so intricate. I need to put it all away and churn out another ultrasound newsletter but I haven't had any article contributions for the month so my enthusiasm has waned somewhat.

Have a good week.

Rach xx