'Tis the last day of NaBloPoMo and it was fun. Though I didn't actually blog every day this month (pesky travel and all) but I did what I wanted to do. I feel like I'm echoing Mary Lynn's thoughts here. I got a sense of accomplishment and renewed appreciation for writing with this commitment. It has also been wonderful to catch up on other awesome blogs on the block. There are some very talented writers out there and I love to explore the diverse community daily.
So, I will continue to write more often. I like it as a way to stay connected to people I know and those I get to meet through their writing. It's great to feel that this little blog has a place for me and I feel at home here. Thanks for reading and bye for now!
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
No Worries, Mate!
That would seem to be the national phrase and philosophy. How can you argue against that?! LOVED Australia. We even felt worry-free in the rain. The sun did decide to make an appearance for our days at the beach in Manly and for the wedding of wonderful friends. Gorgeous is an understatement. Even though it is a ridiculously long flight and we missed our little monkeys lots, it was well worth the speedy trip to Oz.
A taste of our pics. More to bore you with come later. Cheers Mate!
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Aussie post
This writing from the iPad thing is not working out as well as I'd hoped. I'm sure there is some awesome app that would make it work better but I'm too lazy too busy to figure it out right now.
So, the big trip to Australia is wonderful. Here are some random thoughts:
Apparently the sun doesn't always shine in Australaia. However a wine tour with Mic and a bus of fun tourists is a great way to ignore localized flooding. The wine still tastes yummy.
The best friends are those you can catch up with 15 years later and feel like it was yesterday. Our time with our mate Anthony and Pip has been awesome. Well worth the trek.
I could totally get used to living by the ocean. Gorgeous!
I could totally not get used to driving on the left and driving at all in Austalia.
Stupid rain!
It is now the 26th of November here. Today we celebrate Anthony and Pip's wedding. Today we remember our first son on what would have been his 12th birthday. It is strange but nice to have the date share with events with such different meaning and emotion. I am blessed to have both and pleased to have new memories for the date.
Alas, I am not able to complete NaBloPoMo posts daily as I'd hoped. This travelling thing is throwing me off. Well, as the locals say, No worries, mate! I look forward to catching up when I can.
So, the big trip to Australia is wonderful. Here are some random thoughts:
Apparently the sun doesn't always shine in Australaia. However a wine tour with Mic and a bus of fun tourists is a great way to ignore localized flooding. The wine still tastes yummy.
The best friends are those you can catch up with 15 years later and feel like it was yesterday. Our time with our mate Anthony and Pip has been awesome. Well worth the trek.
I could totally get used to living by the ocean. Gorgeous!
I could totally not get used to driving on the left and driving at all in Austalia.
Stupid rain!
It is now the 26th of November here. Today we celebrate Anthony and Pip's wedding. Today we remember our first son on what would have been his 12th birthday. It is strange but nice to have the date share with events with such different meaning and emotion. I am blessed to have both and pleased to have new memories for the date.
Alas, I am not able to complete NaBloPoMo posts daily as I'd hoped. This travelling thing is throwing me off. Well, as the locals say, No worries, mate! I look forward to catching up when I can.
Adoration
By the time this post is up, we will be in middle of our trip on the opposite side of the world from the kids and I know I will be aching for them. So I write this for my daughter today, appreciating the person she is, with or without me by her side.
Laura is a natural nurturer. She absolutely had to be snuggled from the day she was born. I wore her in a sling through most of those colicky months as a baby and squeeze her close as we read in the evenings now. She loves to pass on all her caring to her HUGE collection of stuffies, webkins and dolls. Parties are held for creature birthdays and everyone is included. There are a couple of friends who she is extra close to. This is one.
Her special doll is Taryn, a Maplelea Girl that we got for her last Christmas. It's an investment to have one of these dolls so you have to be pretty sure she will be valued for more than a week. Laura has definitely exceeded my expectations.
Taryn is like a little sister and Laura adores her. I hear them chatting in her room, making crafts together, getting dressed for outings or helping to cook in the kitchen. Laura made her friend her own epi-pen to wear for a shellfish allergy. She has her own cardboard box closet for her clothes (which is much neater than Laura's closet by far!) For the past week they have been camping at "Maplelea National Park", a created land that is like a summer camp. Owen has been in on this too as his room is their cabin where they all bunk out and sing campfire songs. It is such fun to watch my 8 year-old immerse herself in her imagination.
Here are the girls as they have their fun. A lifetime of adoration. Love it.
Laura is a natural nurturer. She absolutely had to be snuggled from the day she was born. I wore her in a sling through most of those colicky months as a baby and squeeze her close as we read in the evenings now. She loves to pass on all her caring to her HUGE collection of stuffies, webkins and dolls. Parties are held for creature birthdays and everyone is included. There are a couple of friends who she is extra close to. This is one.
Her special doll is Taryn, a Maplelea Girl that we got for her last Christmas. It's an investment to have one of these dolls so you have to be pretty sure she will be valued for more than a week. Laura has definitely exceeded my expectations.
Taryn is like a little sister and Laura adores her. I hear them chatting in her room, making crafts together, getting dressed for outings or helping to cook in the kitchen. Laura made her friend her own epi-pen to wear for a shellfish allergy. She has her own cardboard box closet for her clothes (which is much neater than Laura's closet by far!) For the past week they have been camping at "Maplelea National Park", a created land that is like a summer camp. Owen has been in on this too as his room is their cabin where they all bunk out and sing campfire songs. It is such fun to watch my 8 year-old immerse herself in her imagination.
Here are the girls as they have their fun. A lifetime of adoration. Love it.
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Which is why I don't do a cooking blog
The tales of my spaziness just keep coming! I amaze myself. Today we venture into why I am not a cooking blogger.
DH, though not exactly allergic to eggs, simply can't be near eggs being cooked or eat any breakfast food containing eggs. Sounds like allergy to me but I ain't no doctor. Anyway, he was lamenting the other day that he wishes he could have french toast. He'd ordered it on his travels recently but he couldn't eat it because it had, you know, eggs on it. (Well, why did you order it?!)
Being all kinds of awesome, I "Googled" egg-less french toast recipes and came up with some cool ideas. This one looked good but we don't do bananas in this house so some adapting would be necessary. Laura loves to cook and create in the kitchen so she "helped".
The recipe called for coconut milk. Hmmm, no coconut milk to be found but condensed milk starts with "c" so it should do just fine, don't you think? The first can of sweetened condensed milk looked odd and the expiry date was in 2008 so, after much consideration, I tossed it. We opened another can. Thicker than I thought but no matter, we'll just thin the thing with milk and carry on. Laura wants to add a tablespoon of cinnamon. I talk her down to a half-teaspoon and whip up the mixture.
Bread tossed and flipped into a pan. Looks almost real! It burned a bit (probably due to the high sugar content) but it actually came out alright.
DH, though not exactly allergic to eggs, simply can't be near eggs being cooked or eat any breakfast food containing eggs. Sounds like allergy to me but I ain't no doctor. Anyway, he was lamenting the other day that he wishes he could have french toast. He'd ordered it on his travels recently but he couldn't eat it because it had, you know, eggs on it. (Well, why did you order it?!)
Being all kinds of awesome, I "Googled" egg-less french toast recipes and came up with some cool ideas. This one looked good but we don't do bananas in this house so some adapting would be necessary. Laura loves to cook and create in the kitchen so she "helped".
The recipe called for coconut milk. Hmmm, no coconut milk to be found but condensed milk starts with "c" so it should do just fine, don't you think? The first can of sweetened condensed milk looked odd and the expiry date was in 2008 so, after much consideration, I tossed it. We opened another can. Thicker than I thought but no matter, we'll just thin the thing with milk and carry on. Laura wants to add a tablespoon of cinnamon. I talk her down to a half-teaspoon and whip up the mixture.
Bread tossed and flipped into a pan. Looks almost real! It burned a bit (probably due to the high sugar content) but it actually came out alright.
No need for syrup on this creation. Apples make it seem somewhat healthy. Laura makes an applesauce mixture with 1/2 cup applesauce and 1/2 cup cinnamon for her piece. Owen refuses to try it.
It tasted alright, really. A little rich perhaps but not bad when you are hungry and are trying to convince yourself that you can handle variations in the kitchen. And then for the rest of the day, DH and I had headaches and our stomache's felt off. I'm not saying it was the french toast necessarily but consider yourself warned.
I got some real, unexpired coconut milk and will be trying the recipe again sometime soon. Perhaps when we all feel well and our sense of adventure has returned.
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Quest for the perfect water bottle
I am a heavy drinker. I do it for my health. Most of the time, thankfully, it is water in the bottle that I am sucking back. I do this to lead a good example for my kids and because I'm cheap. Today I wanted to share my struggle with finding the perfect water bottle.
These are useless: I have no idea why I still have them. They either leak, the straw falls out regularly or the top is too big to drink from without drooling all over the place.
These work well! They seal up nicely, come in a variety of sizes but kill polar bears, clear-cut forests and poison bunnies or something like that. If I do stoop to using the plastic water bottles, I reuse it many times, sometimes remembering to wash them too. They can also double as squirters if your kids are bothering you on a hot day.
These are the kids' favourites for school. Laura's is too big and adds about 3 kg to her daily haul to school if I fill it up to the top. However, it seals well and locks to avoid soggy papers. Owen's is stainless steel and boy-proof. He is very attached to it and I had to buy two to avoid meltdowns if it should dare go missing. A bit of a leaker if he doesn't body-slam it shut, but largely acceptable.
This is my bottle. Oops, wrong photo....
Do you have a must-have water bottle? Is there a mug that is your favourite for your morning cup of coffee? Do share.
These are useless: I have no idea why I still have them. They either leak, the straw falls out regularly or the top is too big to drink from without drooling all over the place.
These are the kids' favourites for school. Laura's is too big and adds about 3 kg to her daily haul to school if I fill it up to the top. However, it seals well and locks to avoid soggy papers. Owen's is stainless steel and boy-proof. He is very attached to it and I had to buy two to avoid meltdowns if it should dare go missing. A bit of a leaker if he doesn't body-slam it shut, but largely acceptable.
This is my bottle. Oops, wrong photo....
This is mine, all mine. I do not share. Stainless, wide enough mouth to add ice cubes and good spout. Love it! Except I wish it was purple ... and self-cleaning... and made me better looking, but it will do.
Do you have a must-have water bottle? Is there a mug that is your favourite for your morning cup of coffee? Do share.
Cheers!
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Ready for take off, sort of
Almost on the way to the airport. I think the prep list doesn't actually end. Luckily I have my handy little brain radio to boost me on. "Leaving On A Jet Plane" keeps playing today.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYhhDr-i07A&feature=youtube_gdata_player
Dangnabit! Can't do anything fancy with posting from this iPad right now so you get the basic version.
I hope to post some things from the trip but who knows what technology will allow.
Lame post but well meant. Bye for now!
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