More rain..

Yes the rain is still about. Gympie (about an hour's drive north of us) is completely cut off again and if it stays like that for another day then hubby won't be able to get home from work.  Actually there's plenty of roads between here and Blackwater that are cut off so here's hoping the creeks go down so he can get home.

 

While the kidlettes are at school I've been getting a little bit more of the house in order, not much though.  I've found that I'm very easily sidetracked and more so when I'm supposed to be doing housework.

 

On a bright note, my blanket is all joined together and I'm just working on the border so NEARLY THERE!!!!!  Woohoo!

 

 

Rainy days are just right for soup.  I've been eating plenty of it lately from either out of a can or homemade.

 

Yesterday I made the yummiest chicken and vege soup with some potatoes, carrots, zucchini, garlic, onion, red lentils, chicken stock and of course some left over roast chicken.  There wasn't much left so I picked the carcass clean and bunged it in the pot with the veges and it is certainly DELICIOUS. 

 

Just perfect for a cooler, rainy day.  Plus I also have plenty left over for today and have frozen some too.  Bonus.

 

 

Of course on rainy days it just happens to completely bucket down when you have to pick the kids up from school.  Even with umbrellas we got pretty wet so once we got home and dry, I decided to make some pikelets for afternoon tea.

 



 

I remember my Mum used to make pikelets for us on rainy days after school.  The kids decided they want it every day but that certainly won't be happening!

 

 

Unfortunately I started to get a bit of a sore throat and leaky nose during the day so all I wanted was a good night's sleep to hopefully stop the dreaded lurgy getting to me.

 

Did that happen? 

 

NO!!!

 

The bloody dog whinged and cried all night keeping me awake and then my girl spent half the night being sick. 

 

She's home from school today so I think we both might crash in the lounge in front of the box and a few good movies.  We might watch girly movies that we don't get to watch when Master M and Daddy are here so I can see The Secret Garden and The Inn of the Sixth Happiness on the horizon.

 

Yes, my girl absolutely loves The Inn of the Sixth Happiness with Ingrid Bergman which is wonderful because it's one of my all time favourite movies.

 

Hope you are all having a great week, I'm going to consult the boss about what to watch then make a little nest for myself.

 

Chicken soup for lunch anyone?

 

xx Susan

Devilled Lamb Chops

This is one of my favourite summer meals because it's so quick and easy and on a disgustingly hot day, it takes no time to make and it doesn't heat the house up (or me!).

 

Devilled lamb chops

 

4 or 5 lamb chops

 

2 tablespoons tomato paste

1 teaspoon curry powder

1 tablespoon brown sugar

2 teaspoons soy sauce

1 teaspoon vinegar

 

Mix the marinade ingredients together and spread over lamb chops which you place in a microwave safe dish.

 

 

 

Place chops in microwave (make sure it's covered otherwise there's a hell of a mess....not that I would have ever made this mistake!)

 

Cook on high for 5 minutes.

 

That's it!

 

Let sit for a couple of minutes and serve with salad or vege.

 

I usually serve this with a salad as I can toss it together while the chops are cooking and in less than 10 minutes of starting dinner, it's on the table.  That's why I love it on a really hot summer's day.

 

We had vege tonight though as I really didn't feel like a salad.  Got to have all those colours on there!

 

xx Susan

Decluttering

It's been a very slow week here.

 

Lots of rain about has meant we haven't done much at all except potter around the house.

 

Usually I love those kind of days but as it was the second weekend in a row with hubby away at work, I didn't find it as enjoyable as usual.  I struggled with my cherubs but we won't go into that here. 

 

I've also been decluttering a little.

 

We have a HUGE tv cabinet with shelves on either side that have glass doors.  This means while watching tv you see the shelves on either side as well as the open ones above the tv.

 

I have two shelves full of my recipe books and both shelves were looking very much like this....

 

 

 

It was really beginning to drive me nuts so I've slowly been going through my books and getting a nice pile of ones I don't use.  If there was only a couple of recipes in a book that I would like to try then I photocopied the recipe and put the book in the pile.

 

I now have a small pile of photocopies that I can put into one little folder which takes up so much less room than the 14 books they came from!

 

So now my shelves look like this...

 

Much happier!

 

Unfortunately now the other side of the cabinet is now calling to me for the same treatment.

 

 

It's full of photo albums and travel books and maps so I'll be slowly going through this over the next day or so too.

 

While sorting through things I noticed another thing that really needs rectifying.

 

The top shelf has baby photos on it.  One of me as a baby and one of Little Miss R when she was one.

 

 

I have no baby photo of Master M up there.  Looks like that's something I'll have to change and as three photos won't fit, I'd say I'll be booting myself out of there.  I'd much rather look at my boy...

 

 

Wouldn't you!

 

xx Susan



It's quiet

Hubby has gone back to work.

 

The kidlettes are at school.

 

I'm sitting in my very quiet house listening to the rain on the roof.

 

 

 

It's truly lovely and I don't want to move from this spot all day.  (Lucky it's in front of my sewing machine.)

 

My sister has 4 teenagers from Denmark staying at her place at the moment.  The rain is hampering their touristy plans I think but they seem happy to have a quiet day too.

 

xx Susan

Edited to add:  Oops sorry, they're not really teenagers.  My sister has 4 young adults from Denmark staying with her ranging from 19 to 21.  They still seem like kids to me!

Another weekend without Daddy

I often find these the most difficult weekends to deal with and with the way hubby's shifts are set up at work, he's away all to often over the weekends.

 

Saturday was a bit of a rainy day which meant indoor pursuits.  The kidlettes got out the puzzles, games, movies etc and proceeded to make a complete mess of the house in a very short time.

 

For lunch we indulged in hot chips and gravy.  Much better than boring old sandwiches which I had intended but the rain and cooler day made me crave hot chippies.

 

I ended up starting another project which is what you do when you've got a heap of unfinished ones waiting patiently for you to get to. 

 

While I was walking Patch the other morning I decided that I needed a little bag that I could keep my phone and house keys in.  I wanted it to go across my body and not be too big so it wouldn't annoy me too much while walking.

 

I checked out my stash of fabric and ended up cutting up a pair of old and VERY WORN jeans I had.  This is the result....

 



 

I used one of the back pockets for an outside pocket so my phone can easily slip in there.  I also added a bit of ribbon trim because it looked a bit too plain otherwise.

 

I used some other spotty ribbon for the shoulder strap and continuing on with the red theme, I lined it in some red and white fabric too.  I'm sure you noticed that I've had another go at putting a zip in too!!

 



 

 

So now I have a cute little bag for when I walk the dog although I'm sure I'll use it other times as well.  That's only if I can get it off Little Miss R though as she keeps running off with it.

 

 



 

It wasn't a quick project either even though it has the potential to be.  With no hubby at home it was just me dealing with fighting kids (waking me up well before 6am), who then continued to fight throughout the day. 

 

So my sewing was interspersed with some refereeing, counselling, cuddling, story reading, more refereeing, losing the plot and of course the constant act of feeding two continually hungry children.

 

 

It's been fun most of the time though. 

 

Of course hubby is due home late tonight, just in time for the school week to start again.

 

I think he's away next weekend too so if the weather's good the kidlettes and I may have to go on a picnic.  We haven't been on one for awhile and we love them so much.

 

Hope you've all had a great weekend.

 

xx Susan

My January

The beginning of a fresh new year started off a bit slow for us.   I'm not big on resolutions (mainly because I rarely stick to them) and as school was out for basically the whole month, we sort of eased into the year.

 

Aunty Rob's

 

Yes we went to visit Aunty Rob again for a couple of days.  It's only a 3 hour drive to get there so it's a perfect getaway for a weekend and the kidlettes and the dog especially love being able to get out and RUN around the farm.

 

 

 

 

 

Sewing

I continued to get into the sewing spirit with bags, clothes and other bits made.

 

 



 

 

...and the rest

 

Master M turned 5 early on in the month. 

 

My wedding and engagement rings got cut off my chubby little fingers (sniff, sniff)

 

Plenty of hot days and yummy salads.

 

Lots and lots of rain towards the end of the month resulting in flooding and hubby not being able to go to work for a week.

 

Then late in the month it's off to school for a new year.  Little Miss R is now a big grade 2 girl and Master M has started school in Prep. 

 

 



 

It was a pretty good month really.  Lets hope they all continue to be great this year.

 

xx Susan

A lazy weekend

It has certainly been the laziest of weekends around here.

 

Nobody was in a mood to do anything much at all, even the kidlettes which was a bit of a miracle.

 

Being lazy doesn't mean being idle and as I didn't feel like doing any sewing, I got my crochet hooks out and started.

 

I knew I had a lot of cochet hooks but what I'm surprised about is the amount of knitting needles I've inherited over the past year.  I think it's a pretty good achievement for someone who doesn't really knit!

 

 

So my lazy weekend saw me make a lovely ribbed scarf.  It was so super easy that I was able to whip it up in quick time.  Unfortunately I only had two balls of this particular yarn so it's a bit shorter and not as wide as I would like. 

 



 

 

I also made a very pretty scarf in cream.

 



 

It's a lovely primrose stitch in such is so soft and beautiful.

 

 

..and considering we live in Queensland and you would only wear scarves and woolly things in Warwick or Stanthorpe, I continued with my hooky weekend by starting on a shawl.  As you do.

 

 

I'm really enjoying making this and right now I'm only about a quarter of the way through it.  I'll definately show you more when it's finished.

 

So the lovely lazy, hooky weekend is now over and it's back to school today.  Hubby is still home and I've been getting back on track after our interrupted week last week. 

 

Things are getting done around here I can tell you and once hubby goes back to work tomorrow a few more things will really get DONE. 

 

Hope you all have a great week.

 

xx Susan

School

My baby has started school.

 

He was so happy to go and has had a wonderful week.  In fact he's been getting dressed two hours before it's time to leave and then asks me every 5 minutes whether it's time to go yet!

 

(Lets hope this keeps up for another 12 years but I'm not sure if I like my chances)

 

His big sister is taking on her role of responsibility and looking after her brother.  She's also been organising all the other little preppies of a morning when we get there as well.

 

 



 

I now have so much uninteruppted time to myself during the days and have so many PLANS!!!!!

 

Unfortunately all my plans for this first week have gone awry with no power at the start of the week and all the rain we had last weekend.  I've spent most of the week trying to get the house in order (not very successfully) and catching up on the washing. 

 

Just call me Dame Washalot from the Faraway Tree.

 

Having hubby home this week because he couldn't get back to work has been a slight problem too.  It's so lovely having him here for some extra time as I love having help with the kids but he does get in the way of my plans sometimes.  I'm sure you all understand!

 

Hope you all have a fantastic weekend.

 

xx Susan