Happy Birthday Mum

I know it doesn't look like much, but it tastes good.

We ate Angie's lemon cake from Stephanie Alexander's cook's companion, specially requested by mum, and cannelloni (because everyone likes it and it is easy to make enough to feed ten).

I spent most of last week cleaning house and catching up with gardening, my inlaws came to stay with us for the weekend too, so it had to be a priority. I don't mind living with a bit of a mess, but I feel a certain obligation to clean up when I know I have lots of people coming round to visit.

(this is where I remind myself that I really should KEEP the place tidy since I put in all that effort, but sometimes life intrudes)

My mother in law asked if my mum thought she'd been sufficiently 'birthdayed' I replied that I hoped she did, but that if she didn't it wasn't my fault (love you mum! (feeling tired and grouchy at this point- no one noticed did they?)).

So in the interests of PROVING that I do from time to time manage to get the place tidy I tried to take some photos this morning after hubby and daughter left to catch the bus.......






My son decided that it was time to take pics of him instead...... so I gave up in the interests of actually posting more than once this week.

I have plans today to get my housework done in half an hour today...... wishful thinking probably, but I thought that this would be my best chance because most of the work is already done. All I need to do is change bedding, whizz through with the vacuum cleaner and wash up a couple of things..... and maybe I should hang the washing out too..... everyone needs a goal to work towards don't they?

Where did my weekend go?

This is the story of my life at the moment...... rain, wind, more rain and more wind..... oh, and lots of washing to fold and put away.....

I managed to get an hour of sunshine this morning to put in some carrot seed and potatoes, I still have the beetroot seeds soaking, so hopefully I will get a bit more time later today to put them in too.

The garden beds are starting to look fuller, but I still have a lot to do digging and sowing seed in time to get plants in at the right time. That reminds me, I need to go and water my tomato seedlings...... and fold some washing.

Raspberries

The last few days have been strange......

The weather has alternated between sun, wild winds and rain, making it difficult to get outside and do anything much.

I finally decided that the raspberries needed pruning and tying up more than I needed to be inside out of the wind, they are starting to sprout, and the thought of trying to pick raspberries through twice as many canes as normal spurred me on.

These are not your average thorned raspberries, they could give loganberries a run for their money, I have resorted to picking in cotton gloves on occasion, and I don't do any sort of pruning or moving of canes without leather gloves.

The canes came from family friends, who had been given some prize-winning canes from an old lady when she sold her house years ago. So when our friends down-sized we were lucky enough to be given some of the canes that they were digging up. For around six months they sat dormant in 5L icecream containers along the driveway of our rental house, and when we moved into our first home (aka the bank's and our home), the raspberries were among the first things we planted (priorities). The raspberries themselves are beautiful things, you have to wait till they are almost purple for the full flavour and sweetness to be present, because if you pick them when dark red like most other types they will be bland and sour.

The canes run along the north facing side of the house, so they get a lot of summer sun, and the brick behind them means that they often fruit in autumn as well as summer. The leaves rarely fall till June, leaving me only a couple of months to get organised and tidy them up before they start to leaf again, obviously I am behind schedule this year.

Last year I trimmed the canes to the height of the top supporting wire and tied them on with jute string, unfortunately that didn't work too well in the exposed conditions, and the old canes were all leaning over and tangled with the new, and quite a few of them were a couple of metres long. I read somewere a while ago that twisting the canes along the wire was a good option for keeping the canes neat, and considering how long it took, and how scratched I got tying them with the ill fated string I figured that this could be a better idea.

So after spending a couple of hours here and there between the wind and rain they are done, and looking pretty nice too (although the light hasn't been cooperative the last couple of days so I don't think the picture does them justice), almost like a woven wicker basket. I can't wait to see them with more leaves (and of course fruit).

My grandmother called just after I had finished the last few canes, and on hearing that I have raspberries, has placed an order with me for some around christmas time. Let's just hope that noone else hears about them being nice, purple, rich raspberry tasty things because then they'll all want some.....

A trip to the beach

It was such a lovely day today that my mum and children and I went to the beach for a walk along the rocks..... well the drier parts anyway.....





We went out to the point and back, stopping often to look at rock pools 'wow look at that rock pool', and to investigate interesting shells.....




My poor tired boy needed carrying back to the car, and has since fallen asleep on the couch, I think rock hopping must be much harder with short legs, but lots of fun too....

Now that the weather is getting warmer we will be at the beach more often, something the children are very pleased about.....



This is my daughter's smiley face, she made it with the bucketful of shells and seaweed she collected. I explained to her that while it was fun to find lots of beautiful shells and velvety seaweed (uncannily like wet bottle green thick spaghetti), we really shouldn't take them home with us (and I certainly don't need any more clutter in the house). She was happy with that, and even happier that I took this photo for her (bonus points mummy!).

Eclairs

I have a problem......

...... every now and then I do or make something..... and it takes about three times as long as it should.

Sunday morning I started making eclairs, thinking that it would be quick to get the shells done before having to take my daughter to a birthday party, the whole saga started with me breaking the ziploc baggie that I was using to pipe the pastry.... managed to transfer to another bag and everything was going well until it came to taking the eclairs out of the oven..... the temperature of my oven is obviously not as accurate as Pierre Herme's - result: eggy pancakes...... not happy....

Send lovely (some would say long-suffering) husband to birthday party with daughter in the hope that I can get the eclair shells right the second time, wash up pots, pans and mixer bowl, realise that since the first batch didn't work I now need more eggs, pack son into car for dash to supermarket..... proceed to mix another batch of pastry, new piping bag breaks, give up in disgust and shape remainder of pastry by hand and bake..... nearly had pancakes again, except this time I shoved them straight back into the oven as they started to deflate, and lo and behold they puffed back up and stayed there! whew.... turn oven off and hope that sitting there for a while will keep them puffy until they are sufficiently dried, next step.... chocolate pastry cream, sauce, and glaze.....

I managed to get the pastry cream made without any trouble, it's made similarly to the lemon meringue pie filling that I use, heat, mix, cook, mix, cool etc.

Make the chocolate sauce, realise that it's ok and it's not going to take too much longer and I'll be done (famous last words).

Heat cream for glaze, mix in chocolate, reach for cubes of butter and SPLAT!..... resist the urge to scream and throw things knowing that it's just going to make more of a mess for me to clean up...... wipe up star shaped puddle of chocolate and cream on the kitchen floor.... wash pots..... start again, more chocolate and cream, mix in butter and the chocolate sauce...... success!

Take a deep breath, pull eclairs out of oven..... still puffy (yay!)..... slice and start filling with chocolate pastry cream, glaze, sandwich gently and place in shallow plastic container to transport....

Give husband first taste test.... gone in two bites, am told that 'they are not worth taking anywhere, lets just eat them here', ask how they compare to his grandmother's cream puffs (raised to legend status) 'they're right up there, I think I might need to taste some more to be sure'..... hmmmm (not buying that)..... pack husband and children off to parent's house.... eclairs last less than half an hour after arriving.

Tell lovely husband that the next time I suggest making something so involved on the day they're needed that he should tell me to stop being stupid and go make something nice and easy.

Happy father's day

There's a reason this photo looks like it was taken in the dead of night...... I woke up this morning and realised that in my efforts to make my dad the type of meringues he likes (crispy) I had managed to leave them in the oven, with it on, all night (that's what happens when you fall asleep on the couch and forget all about them).

So at 6.30 this morning in my rush to make sure they hadn't turned into charcoal I pulled them out of the oven and onto a cooling rack with no regard for cooling slowly...... of course the chef needs to test the finished product, so I am happy to be able to say that your meringues still taste fine dad (and they're not bad warm either).

After realising that even though there was a lot of crashing and banging going on in the kitchen everyone else was asleep I thought I should take the opportunity to catch up on my blog reading and look up that yummy chocolate eclair recipe at tartelette so I can make some for my husband (and for afternoon tea with my parents - assuming he doesn't eat them all).

so, father's day pressies delivered by offspring - check
baked goods - in progress
breakfast in bed..... hmmm better get going on this one or he'll sleep all morning, because his new 'do not disturb the king' door hanger is working far too well

Spring

Ok..... I know it's now officially the fourth day of spring here..... but I will claim lack of sleep and sick children for not getting out and about to see what my fruit trees and the rest of the garden are doing.

I remember thinking about a week ago that it wouldn't be long before the buds burst on my peach but I was surprised a couple of days ago to notice that the apricot was already flowering and I had missed it (blush).

When we bought our house the first thing we did outside was to plant the quince (smyrna), peach (anzac), pears (triple grafted something-or-other and a red williams ), apricot (moorpark), damson plum and cox's orange pippin apple...... the idea being that I would at least get a decent crop off them by the time I was ready to deal with them (having delivered our son four days after settling on the house)..... that and I am not good with delayed gratification.

Three summers has resulted in three quinces, six or seven cox's, a handful of peaches and a tree full of apricots, and a couple of mini pears (which really don't count). We have since planted a bramley's seedling apple, a granny smith apple, and last winter we added a cherry along the side fence.

Hmmmm just counted the number of fruit trees in this garden..... (bit deceptive really because some are in the front yard and others are espaliered so it looks like there are less) .....ten's not excessive is it?

(my husband need not respond to this question on the grounds that he might not get anymore crumble, jam, apple pie or anything remotely yummy ;))

Asparagus!

Yay! asparagus for me! well in a couple of years anyway.....
I put these crowns in about a month and a half ago, at the bottom of the garden in a little spot that doesn't quite fit into my crop rotation scheme. The area is not quite in the brassica or onion beds, it is too small for anything tree sized, and is far enough from the lawn that it will be undisturbed by children (crossing fingers).
I was stepping around on my pavers/bed dividers yesterday, trying to figure out which seedlings were onions, which were leeks and which were a dead loss (must get new, better labelling tags), when I noticed bits of green sticking out of the nicely weed free 'asparagus bed' (note: although it sounds good, the asparagus bed consists of eight crowns) .
I nearly fell over when I realised that they WERE asparagus. So I dash inside, grab my new camera and spend the next half an hour (allocated for transplanting before getting oldest child from school) playing about/taking photos of my 10cm tall asparagus spears. So much for getting jobs done.....

Birthday presents

Question: who buys their wife a camera, designs her a blog and then presents them to her for her 30th birthday?
Answer: Apparently MY HUSBAND

so..... for my first trick..... working out how to drive this runaway train.....

something I have been working on this week since a package arrived from my inlaws (I need to make sure I don't give too much away, it's a christmas surprise for someone special). The patch is called fox and geese and it came in a flip book with 101 other patterns from here (and my mother in law who knows I enjoy these sort of things). I have plans to use eleven other blocks for a small project, this block is 4'' when finished and is seriously fiddly to sew, hold together and adjudicate children's arguments at the same time, I think I have that sorted though. I have gained some mummy time by scheduling a favourite television show for about 4pm, so I get half an hour to get something creative done before the rush to get children showered, fed, homeworked and put to bed before they get too tired and grumpy.
So now that I have figured out how to get my pics on here, I need to get going on the housework that has been a bit neglected over the weekend (I do have an excuse.... more birthday surprises from my lovely husband..... I know I'm spoilt :D).