an extra long weekend

Today brings to an end a lovely little four day break I've had with my girls, thanks to a pupil free day and the Queen's Birthday holiday on either side of the weekend.

We spent our time enjoying the sunshine and the great outdoors,

Middle Head, Sydney Harbour National Park

Aimee and Bethany with their Great Grandmother, BuzNanna Mary

 visiting family,

and keeping cosy by the fire while it poured with rain outside. 

Sewing has become a near impossibility for me over the last few months. 

I have lived with chronic pain all of my adult life due to hyper-mobility in my joints. 

Tracing and cutting patterns and fabric, and even sitting at the sewing machine cause me a lot of pain but I loved it too much to give it away. 

Well this year it has finally got the better of me, to the point where I can no longer even walk the girls to school.

So in a little over a week I will be having hip surgery.

As a result, there has only been minimal sewing going on. 

When I want to be a bit crafty or creative I've had to resort to baking or handcrafts for the most part.

So today we made this to die for Buttermilk Blueberry Cake,

except ours is a Buttermilk Mixed Berry/Sultana Cake. 

There was no way I was going anywhere in this weather (it has been bucketing down here in Sydney for more then 24 hours) and I only had a cup of frozen berries in the freezer so I made up the difference with the last of my sultanas.  I also used the cheats Buttermilk - a tablespoon of lemon juice in a 1 cup measuring jug, then fill up to one cup with full cream milk.  Let sit for five minutes and away you go!

All I can say is YUM!

I found this recipe via Pinterest a couple of days ago, and couldn't stop thinking about it. 

Will definitely be making this again.

I also did something I've been meaning and wanting to do for quite some time. Some sewing with my girls. 

They have been begging me for way too long to help them make some felt toys. 

Today was the day. 

 Bethany wanted a robot,

while Aimee wanted a doll from the book "Sewing for Children",

which is a favourite in this house. 

They both absolutely thrilled and amazed me with their ability and enthusiasm!

We still have a little way to go to finish them off, but both girls are very keen to finish them off so I will be posting about them here very soon!

Hope you've enjoyed your weekend, whatever the weather, wherever you are :)

Valentines Day

For most of my life I have seen Valentines Day as nothing more than a commercial beat up. 

Another day on the calendar, a day like any other.  

But over the past few years it has started to take on some meaning for me.  Rather then a day of romance between giggly teenagers gifting fluffy white teddies, I now see it as a day to celebrate all those around us who we love

 and it is a special chance to show them in some little way. 

I think this way of thinking was prompted when Aimee was in Kindergarten and she brought home a little picture which she had made in class that day, especially for me. 

This year was no exception, both the girls brought home sweet little cards which they had worked on at school yesterday.  They had both let slip in the morning that they would be making me something for Valentines Day so I decided to surprise them with a Valentines Day afternoon tea treat.

I used this recipe for the biscuits (I read the comments and added a 1/4 tsp vanilla extract), with a dollop of simple butter frosting tinted with pink food colouring in between.

It made me so happy to see my girls faces light up when they walked into the kitchen after school and found the table set with a plate each of these.

 

How about you?  What does Valentines Day mean to you?

♥

♥

hot cross buns

Yesterday I stopped in at our local bakery to pick up an afternoon snack for Miss A to eat on the walk home from school.  After quizzing the lovely lady who works there about the ingredients, I established that the yummy looking hot cross buns I had just purchased would not be suitable for Miss B due to the fact they contained egg.

Miss B has always been very accepting of her food limitations due to mulitple food allergies. 

But over the last twelve months, on the advise of Miss B's Immunologist, we have slowly, ever so slowly introduced dairy into her diet!!!! 

Miss B has grown out of the dairy allergy. 

This is so exciting.  So super.  So liberating.  So life changing for the whole family.

 

Miss B has recently tasted many foods for the first time in her life.  It has been interesting to observe her varying attitudes towards trying foods with dairy.  Avoiding these foods has been a lifetime habit for her - to suddenly be told you can go ahead and eat them is, I think, confusing for her. 

Some foods she still turns her nose up at, others she has taken to with great relish.  Her new favourite food (chocolate is a food isn't it!) would have to be, hands down, Smarties.  When I was a child, my Nanna would give us kids a box of Smarties every time we saw her.  It was so sweet the other day when we were with my mum and she gave Miss B a box of Smarties...................

Anyway, I digress.  Due to her new found ability to eat various foods, she is now struggling a little with still being restricted by other allergens (being egg and nuts).  Hence the mini meltdown she had when I told her she couldn't have a hot cross bun.

So, today we baked.

Soft, scrumptious, egg free, hot cross buns.

And you know what?

They were even better than the store bought ones!  So worth the effort. 

Next up - chocolate chip hot cross buns.

my current obsession

Totally scrumptious and oh so easy Breadsticks.

Now that we're back into the school routine I wanted to make something to put in Miss A's lunchbox.

Topped with black olives, semi-dried tomato and tasty cheese for Miss A

and an allergy friendly version, soy cheese and vegemite for Miss B.

From this many..................

to this many

in seconds flat!

Wanna make some?

Combine 1/3 cup of warm water, 2 tsp instant dried yeast, pinch of salt, 1/4 tsp caster sugar and 1 1/2 tbsp olive oil in a bowl.  Sift 1 cup plain flour over bowl and stir to form a soft dough.

Turn out dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead for 6-8 minutes or until elastic.  Put dough into a clean bowl, cover and place in a warm place for about 15 minutes until it increases in size by about one third. 

Roll out dough to form a rectangle afew millimetres thick and brush with some olive oil.

Sprinkle dough with toppings of your choice - the possibilities are endless, cheese, herbs, chilli, diced ham etc.  If you are using largish pieces such as chopped olives or diced ham, once you've sprinkled them over the dough use the palm of your hand to press them into the dough abit to stop them from falling off.

Now cut the dough into strips, I prefer my breadsticks smallish so they fit into lunchboxes, so about 1.5cm x 10cm.  Twist each strip and place on a lined oven tray.  Set aside for 10-15 minutes until increased in size slightly.

Bake breadsticks in oven preheated to 200C (fanforced) and bake for 12-15 minutes or until breadsticks are golden.

Done!

We also made these yummy egg-free choc-chip cookies. 

As always soooo good to eat even for those of us who can tolerate egg. 

For the recipe and lot's more inspiration visit Bubala's lovely blog.

handmade gifts part 1

This has been some big year.

Life has been so full this year.

I've been so busy.  Busy adjusting to life with one child at school, and all that entails.

Busy making things.  Lot's and lot's of things.  Way more than I ever post about here.  Sewing, crocheting, baking, other crafty persuits....................

But the whole school thing has definately been the biggest defining factor when it comes to what 2010 was about for me.

Miss A settled in well, and over all has enjoyed her first year at school.  It took me much longer than her to adjust I think.  So often I have pined for those days, now lost to me forever, where I could just say "let's not go anywhere today".  We could just hang out, doing our own thing, whatever that was, on any particular day.

Everyday now seems to be a rush.  Rushing to get ready, rushing out the door, rushing to squeeze this, that and the other into those seemingly very short six hours.................

So now that the summer holidays have finally arrived I am planning to enjoy kicking back, taking our time, just spending time together.

Before the school year ended though, a special present for a special teacher needed to be made and given.  After being unhappy with my first attempt at a bag for Miss A's teacher, I settled on another bag pattern.  This time I used the bag pattern that came with Simplicity 4116 .  The dress will get made at some stage.  I just decided to face reality and accept it won't be before Christmas.

The bag though is done, and was very well received!

For the outside of the bag I used some lovely midweight olive coloured poly/cotton I found in my stash.  Beautiful fabric, and perfectly matched to the fabric I chose for the lining and detail of the bag.  I chose this fabric because Miss A's teacher often wears bold, floral prints in oranges and greens!  This fabric was also from my stash, left over from this dress.

I did add a few details to the basic pattern. 

I added the button and loop closure. 

And the fabric rosette, using this great tutorial from Little Birdie Secrets blog - what a great blog it is too!

And some pockets to the inside of the bag, which just make the bag a little more user friendly.

Would you check out these two doing a spot of hand bag modelling.

If nothing else, my blogging has taught these two how to strike a pose! 

One of the really great things about this year was meeting and getting to know some of the wonderful mums with children at Miss A's school.  Having their help, understanding and friendship has been a definate high light of this year. 

As a little thank you, my girls and I spent some time last weekend making a very Christmassy batch of Gingerbread cookies.  Just a small token of my appreciation. 

I also made a whole lot of these hair ties/clips/headbands to give to Miss A's friends.  Of course I forgot to take photo's of them all together before gifting them- they all looked so good too!  Oh well.

With only afew days left before Christmas I still have some gifts to make. 

I'll get there, I alway do!

Somewhere over the rainbow

Well..........what a fun filled weekend we've just had in the little sweetpeas household.  Miss A is turning six next week, and months ago announced she wanted a "rainbow birthday party" - at home, with twelve of her favourite school friends to help celebrate.

Now I am far from being a party planner extraordinaire and generally do not "entertain" but, BUT as this little girl is in her first year of school, and par-tays seem to be the thing to do, I decided I could put my fear of being the hostess with the leastest aside for a day and throw her the best darn rainbow party I knew how.

I let my fingers do the walking so to speak and began perusing blogland for tips and how-to's on putting together all things rainbow.

The first gold I discovered came from a blog I follow and thoroughly enjoy, Red Gingham. 

Inspiration on two fronts here, rainbow jelly and rainbow marble cake.................................

I followed Julie's link to this blog and found what I thought would be a life saving recipe for a mother (ie. ME) of a child who is allergic to both egg and dairy.

 

Eager as a beaver I gave the recipe a go. 

Unfortunately I made the mistake of using the only can of softdrink in the house, which was a lemon Lift, therefore giving the cake a distinct lemony softdrinky taste. 

Hmmmmmmmmmm.  Might try the recipe again though, using just soda water. 

I do hold hopes that it may yet turn out to be a winner.

But for the sake of not looking like a complete fool to all our esteemed guests I opted to use a standard Butter Cake recipe, and then baked a batch of allergy friendly Chocolate cupcakes for Miss B to chow down on.

In my search for the perfect rainbow cake, one evening I Googled "rainbow cake" and found this. 

Now I knew I had hit the mother load.  It became my mission to make not a marbled rainbow cake

but a

L

A

Y

E

R

E

D

 rainbow cake!

Of course what would a rainbow party be without some sort of rainbow decorations.  With only afew nights to go before Miss A's birthday party I was browsing around blogland, hopping from one link to another then another as you do, when I came across this fabo tutorial for crochet butterflies.

 

Then and there I started up my rainbow butterfly collection and a few nights later had these to hang as decorations. 

I had to have a bit of handmade in there somewhere amongst the crepe paper streamers and coloured balloons!

Pretty, no?

Overall the party went smashingly;

my only compaint would be that I, in true slack blogger fashion, failed to take photo's of my rainbow masterpieces until after all was said and done and I was clearing up.

As I was about to disgard the only remaining, half eaten piece of six tier rainbow layer cake, it dawned on me that my hard work could not be proven in all it's glory as I had failed to capture it's beauty in digital format (which hardly does it justice anyway).

Same too goes for my fifteen cups of rainbow jelly.  Slaved over for a whole day, as two pairs of desperate eyes watched layer upon layer make their way back and forwards in and out of our fridge six times.

We did face painting, played musical statues, pin the bowtie on Cat in a Hat, we had a rainbow pinata, we blew bubbles and the favourite activity of the day would have to have been the "make your own party crown", which went over extremely well with both children and adults alike. 

Deep down I think we all enjoy a good bit of crafting, don't you?

So I hope you enjoyed it Miss A because it won't be repeated for a very. long. time.....................

A big thank you has to go out to all the wonderful, creative and inspirational bloggers, who freely share their ideas and knowledge.

CHEERS!

The Good Life

Miss A has had a tremendous start to Term 2, this week bringing home the school "Star Student" trophy.  She was so very chuffed!

This long weekend for me is all about spending some quality time with my family.

Yesterday was spent greening their thumbs, planting Spring bulbs

and picking a posy of flowers from the garden.

Today was spent at Nanna's place baking and baking with a little more baking thrown in. 

And what would Anzac Day be without some Anzac Biscuits.  The first batch dissapeared so quickly a second batch was called for!  And the best bit?  They're allergy friendly!!

We all love them and I like to put a couple in their lunchboxes occasionally as a treat.

Anzac Biscuits 

125g margarine

1 tablespoon golden syrup or treacle

1 teaspoon bi-carb soda

2 tablespoons boiling water

1 cup rolled oats

1cup disiccated coconut

1 cup plain flour

3/4 cup brown sugar

Pre-heat oven to 150 degrees Celcius.  Line two baking trays with baking paper.  Melt marg and golden syrup in a saucepan.  Add bi-carb soda mixed with boiling water.  Combine all remaining dry ingredients in a bowl then add melted mixture.  Mix to a moist but firm consistency.  Drop teaspoonfuls of the mixture onto tray and flatten slightly with a fork.  Bake until golden brown, approx. 15 minutes.  Cool for afew minutes before placing onto a cooling tray.

Lest We Forget

I wonder what adventures tommorrow will bring?

Things that make you go m.m.m.m.mmmmmm

I'm always on the look out for yummy recipes which are suitable for (or can be modified to accomodate) the various food allergies we have to contend with in this household.

This is one such recipe........watch out, they are addictive!  And I have it on good authority* they are very much like a rice bubble bar available at a supermarket near you (at an exorbitant price).

Saltana & Puffed Rice Crispies

Line a 20cm x 20cm cake tin with baking paper.  Place 375g of puffed rice cereal into a large mixing bowl.  Add 100g of sultanas and 1/2 teaspoon of ground cinnamon and stir to combine.  Place a 250g packet of white marshmallows, 60g copha, 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil and 2 tablespoons of water into a microwave safe bowl and cook in microwave on medium high until the marshmallows are melted and the mixture is smooth.  Add the melted marshmallow mixture to the puffed rice and stir to combine.  Spoon mixture into prepared tin and press mixture down with the back of a spoon.  Refrigerate for 1-2 hours.  Cut into squares and serve.

Great for the occasional lunch box treat or for children's birthday parties. 

Variations include substituting saltana's for 100's and 1000's or dairy free choc chips. 

*straight from the mouth of my nine year old nephew

I also baked this Chocolate and Banana Bread yesterday......................scrumptious!  Spread a slice with marg, pop it in the microwave for afew seconds and I'm in heaven! 

You can find the recipe in the March 2010 edition of Australian Better Homes and Gardens magazine.

So that Miss B could enjoy the fruits of my labour I substituted butter with margarine, used Orgran's "Egg Replacer" instead of well, eggs and made sure I used a chocolate that contained no dairy (Woolworths Home Brand dark cooking chocolate).  No one would ever know the difference - it truly is Scrumptious! 

In fact I'm enjoying a piece with a cup of tea right now..............

A post for Miss A - Gingerbread

This post is on behalf of Miss A, who while sitting around the table decorating some home baked gingerbread for our playgroup christmas party the other day, piped up and said, "Mum, you should take some photo's and put them on your blog with the recipe so everyone can see how fantastic they are."

So for you, my clever, very Switched On little girl, who constantly amazes me with your awareness, insight and thoughts, here is our Gingerbread..................

I have tried several different gingerbread recipes because I am always searching for treats I can bake for Miss B, who is allergic to dairy, egg and nuts and this one is by far the best. 

This gingerbread recipe called for butter, which I substituted for margarine. Miss B can tolerate the small amount of dairy in margarine thank God which gives me high hopes that like Sheridan's little one, Miss B just might grow out of at least the dairy allergy.

If you want to make your own here's how (please note this makes a LARGE batch of gingerbread.  I like to divide the batch into three and freeze two portions for later use):

Gingerbread

Put 1 1/2 cups of treacle, 1 cup packed brown sugar, 1/2 cup warm water and 200g melted margarine (butter) in a large bowl and stir until well combined.

Sift 7 cups of plain flour, 2 tsp bi-carb soda, 1 tsp salt, 1 tsp ground allspice, 1 tsp ground ginger, 1 tsp ground cloves and 1 tsp ground cinnamon over the treacle mixture, then mix to a soft dough. 

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth.

Divide dough into thirds.  Here is where I roll two portions into logs, wrap seperately in greaseproof paper and put them into labelled freezer bags for later use.

Press remaining portion into a disc shape, wrap in greaseproof paper and refrigerate for 2 hours or until firm enough to roll out.

Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius then line trays with baking paper.

Roll dough out on a floured surface until 5mm thick.  Cut into desired shapes and place on trays.

Bake for 10-15 minutes or until firm to the touch.  Stand trays for 10 minutes before removing to wire racks to cool.

To decorate add a little water at a time to a cup of icing mixture stirring until you get a nice smooth but thick paste.  If you add too much water just add a little more icing mixture to thicken.  Spoon mixture into a zip lock sandwich bag and snip off just a tiny corner to make your own piping bag.  Pipe icing onto gingerbread as desired and sprinkle with hundreds and thousands before icing sets.

Credit must be given to the Christmas 2009 edition of Family Circle for this recipe - out now, go get yourself a copy!

Now coming from someone who generally doesn't like anything with ginger in it, these are some tasty biscuits!!

more home-baking goodness - oh my goodness!

I'm on a roll! I can see my waistline expanding as I'm sitting here writing this.

While we're on the subject of food, I've been tagged by Sophie to play along in this recipe tag doing the rounds in blogland at the moment.

The rules are:-

-I post a recipe here which uses at least one of the ingredients from my taggers recipe, linking back to their blog

-I tag four people who then post a recipe using at least one of the ingredients I have used in my recipe, then they tag four more people

-To keep it exciting please post within a week of being tagged!

So Sophie posted a yummy looking Spaghetti Bolognaise recipe that included zucchini so my recipe is:

Zucchini and Haloumi Cakes - these are Scrumdiddillyumptious!!!!

Ingredients:

melted butter, for greasing

2 zucchini, grated

2 shallots, finely chopped

120g haloumi, grated

3 eggs, beaten

1/3 cup SR flour, sifted

1/4 cup olive oil

freshly ground black pepper

1 Preheat oven to 180C. Brush a 12 hole patty pan with melted butter and line the bases with rounds of baking paper (this is important). Put all ingredients in a bowl, season with pepper and mix until well combined.

2 Spoon mixture evenly into prepared patty pan. Bake for 25 - 30 mins until golden and puffed. Allow to cool for 10 mins before loosening from the pan.

Delicious warm or cold!

Not the kind of thing I usually cook due to the numerous food allergies my little sweetpeas have but I made these recently for Miss A's birthday party picnic and they went down a real treat.

I'm tagging four bloggers who regularly post about food -

Corrie from retromummy

Amelia from duyvken

Gemma from loz and dinny (again!)

ok, I'm having trouble coming up with a fourth blogger who regularly posts about food (who hasn't already been tagged anyway) so I tag

Nannette from Rummage just because I love her blog!

Afternoon Tea

It has dawned on my of late that I have barely six months more of this bliss I have been living for the past five years. You see next year my oldest will start Kindergarten and life as I have known it will change forever.

I am keen for her to go to school, I know there is nothing I can do to change it - but it makes me feel a little sad to know I wont have her around all day to do the things we do together. So in an effort to embrace these last six months I have decided to spend less time sewing just for the sake of sewing (I still have clothes that need making and quilts to be finished) and more time being with and enjoying my lovely lovely little sweetpeas....

Today we made mini cupcakes and had a proper afternoon tea together in the backyard.

The simple pleasures!

Hello sunshine....

I know the weather has been fine for about a week now but I have been decidedly under the weather if you know what I mean.... but sunshine always makes me feel more motivated so

today we made some 'new' crayons

and baked a really easy and scrumptious banana cake

here's how:

Banana Cake

Cream 2 tbs of margarine with 1 cup of sugar. Add 1 beaten egg (or "No Egg" equivalent). Add 3 mashed very ripe banana's, one at a time. Mix in 2 cups of SR flour and 1 tsp of Bi-carb soda. Then add 2 tbs of milk (soy in our case) and mix until well combined. Pour into greased and floured loaf tin and bake in a moderate oven for 35 - 40 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean!!! Still licking my lips.....

I have also been doing a number of things of the crafty variety and will post photo's in the next few days.

Hope you have been enjoying the sunshine too :)

Spoilt rotten

So it's the school holidays. The day of the promised sleepover loomed. Two nephews aged 9 and 11 together with my girls aged 3 and 4 - phew, I'm exhausted just thinking about it!


They arrived on Friday morning - me still in my dressing gown.

I spent the morning preparing a picnic lunch then we strolled down to our own little part of the bush known as Girrahween Park, only a 10 minute walk from our house. How lovely it was to sit and eat our sandwiches with the sounds and smells of the bush around us! After a short little bush walk we returned home and I finished of my fantastic new skirt that I've been working on, while my girls happily played with their cousins (yay - no constant interruptions).





I cannot tell you how much I am loving this skirt. I bought the beautiful corduroy back here finally picked up a pattern which was exactly what I wanted (A-line, pockets, zip at back) last week. It was a very easy pattern and I really love the finished product! I convinced my nephew to take afew shots of me, a little blurry but you get the picture.


Today we spent the morning making a scrumptious Apple and Strawberry Crumble. This is another of the recipe's in my repertoire which is delicious, easy and allergy friendly - mmmm. This is how to make it:




Heat in a saucepan 4 peeled, cored and chopped apples with 1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 cup water and 1 tsp cinnamon. Heat with lid on for 15 mins over low heat until the apple is soft. Stir in a punnet of chopped strawberries. In a mixer blend one cup of rolled oats with 1/2 cup brown sugar and 100g margarine. Fill the bottoms of individual ceramic pots or a single oven dish with the apple mixture and top with the oat mixture. Bake in a moderate oven for 15 mins. Serve with cream, ice-cream or custard.


Tonight, a complete change of pace, my darling husband and I are going out sans children (sleepover at Nanna's) for dinner and then a ghost tour of the Rocks. Can't wait. All in all this has shaped up to be a very satisfactory weekend so far......