I have been trying to learn to crotchet for many years now. There are things that are easier to do with crotchet than with knitting and the multitude of small end balls of wool that I have in a stash are much more suited for crochet than for knitting.
So I decided that this year I was going to learn how to do it properly, even if it meant that I was going to have to pay someone to teach me how to do it. So when the local community centre ran a crotchet course for beginners I decided to bite the bullet and sign myself up.
Turns out that the reason no one in my family could teach me was because although I am right handed in everything else, I crochet left handed. You have to flip everything for me which is why it didn't make sense when they tried to teach me.
Nana! It wasn't your teaching, it was my learning cack handed!
And even more fun, I went to the Country Women's Association State Fair and was sitting with a bunch of ladies having an impromptu lesson in making crochet flowers and all of a sudden a lovely lady reached over my shoulder and corrected how I was actually doing it. Turns out I was "knitting crochet" instead of actually crocheting.
Expect crocheted items to start appearing - when I get my camera to work properly again and can give photo goodness.
Saturday, 1 March 2014
Tuesday, 21 January 2014
Cooking: Potato Wedges
If you're anything like me, your kids like chips. I don't know about you but deep fried foods don't do it for me anymore - ever since the doctor told me that as a 5'2" woman I should only weigh about 55 kilograms... Not the 109kg I was when she had me on the scales. So a lot of foods went out the door right quick. Fried fish and chips were the first to go.
But having read the packets for those frozen chips you oven bake... they're fried before they're frozen half the time. So how to do it yourself so they're ONLY baked, with as little oil as humanly possible.
First off the potato. We use washed Chats - because they're the ones we use for everything since there's only me and a 10 year old who doesn't eat. Small spuds = small portions. So a chat makes 8 wedges when you cut it up.
Next, the spices. I've got something called "Season All Salt" from McKormics I think it is, so I use that, mixed herbs and a little bit of Turmeric.
How to combine them? Sandwich bags! Use bigger freezer bags if you're doing more than the 5 spuds I do at a time but as I said, there's only 2 of us so portions are tiny. Spices and herbs to taste, chuck the cut wedges in the bag, close it up and shake lots to coat everything.
And stick them on a tray and bake. Or leave them in the bag and stick in the freezer - then when it's Fish and Chips night shake them onto the tray and cook from frozen. I've got 5 bags in the freezer at the moment - because we don't eat enough spuds to get through 5kg before they go off and at $1.50 a bag of 5kg - occasionally it's easier and cheaper to buy and freeze ready to cook portions.
But having read the packets for those frozen chips you oven bake... they're fried before they're frozen half the time. So how to do it yourself so they're ONLY baked, with as little oil as humanly possible.
First off the potato. We use washed Chats - because they're the ones we use for everything since there's only me and a 10 year old who doesn't eat. Small spuds = small portions. So a chat makes 8 wedges when you cut it up.
Next, the spices. I've got something called "Season All Salt" from McKormics I think it is, so I use that, mixed herbs and a little bit of Turmeric.
How to combine them? Sandwich bags! Use bigger freezer bags if you're doing more than the 5 spuds I do at a time but as I said, there's only 2 of us so portions are tiny. Spices and herbs to taste, chuck the cut wedges in the bag, close it up and shake lots to coat everything.
And stick them on a tray and bake. Or leave them in the bag and stick in the freezer - then when it's Fish and Chips night shake them onto the tray and cook from frozen. I've got 5 bags in the freezer at the moment - because we don't eat enough spuds to get through 5kg before they go off and at $1.50 a bag of 5kg - occasionally it's easier and cheaper to buy and freeze ready to cook portions.
Sunday, 17 November 2013
Another day - another location
I'll be the first to admit that I've not been keeping this up like I had originally planned. But plans are what you make while life is actually happening.
My back suddenly deteriorated and is now causing trouble for me walking, sitting and standing, naturally this also means I now have trouble driving, so I had to move house. I now live in an assisted living situation with the Smurfling. And it's been an adventure packing a 3 BR house into a 3 room unit that's for sure. There is an extension planned for later in the year when the weather warms up a bit since we have to cut a wall out to make it work and the weather has been atrocious. Amusingly.
There was no rain, complete drought in this location for years, watering done via the dam which we've kinda decided now is spring fed since the iron content in the water has gone through the roof. I move here, it rains. Solidly. For weeks. Wettest year so far, and my parents were here the year Victoria flooded.
One good side effect of the move is that I'm no longer turning into the "Crazy Cat lady Hermit". My mum got me involved in the Country Women's Association because at the time there was a play and dang it I trained for that!
Wonderful group of ladies, and people to talk to while I knit once a month if I either finish early on the group craft or don't want to do it for whatever reason. I strongly urge everyone to go find their local group. If nothing else they're lovely ladies and there's generally someone there who makes scones to die for!
My back suddenly deteriorated and is now causing trouble for me walking, sitting and standing, naturally this also means I now have trouble driving, so I had to move house. I now live in an assisted living situation with the Smurfling. And it's been an adventure packing a 3 BR house into a 3 room unit that's for sure. There is an extension planned for later in the year when the weather warms up a bit since we have to cut a wall out to make it work and the weather has been atrocious. Amusingly.
There was no rain, complete drought in this location for years, watering done via the dam which we've kinda decided now is spring fed since the iron content in the water has gone through the roof. I move here, it rains. Solidly. For weeks. Wettest year so far, and my parents were here the year Victoria flooded.
One good side effect of the move is that I'm no longer turning into the "Crazy Cat lady Hermit". My mum got me involved in the Country Women's Association because at the time there was a play and dang it I trained for that!
Wonderful group of ladies, and people to talk to while I knit once a month if I either finish early on the group craft or don't want to do it for whatever reason. I strongly urge everyone to go find their local group. If nothing else they're lovely ladies and there's generally someone there who makes scones to die for!
Wednesday, 30 January 2013
Kids: The Lunchbox Monster - Oz Style
I've been reading quite a few blogs in the past few weeks and I have to say the cultural differences between here in Australia and what I've been seeing from American mothers is breathtaking.
I went looking for ideas for lunchbox fillers. And I found a ton of fantastic suggestions. Avocado and fruit pastes, tossing in a boiled egg, peanut butter filled celery with sultanas on them. All wonderful ideas. All banned from the school the Smurfling attends.
No eggs: Allergies
No Nuts of any kinds: Allergies
No yogurt/tinned fruit/jelly (Which also kills the pastes): Too messy
Jam/honey no more than twice a week: they're "sometimes foods"
No fruit juice: Jealousy issues with the kids who can't have them
No muesli bars: Allergens in them (nuts)
No chips/crisps: Unhealthy
By the time you run through the list of disallowed foods that get added to every couple of months... I'm almost at the point of bringing lunch in every day and having him eat in the car - so that he gets something to actually eat. I'm waiting for them to ban all meat and dairy products because of either allergies or the fat content. Then I will HAVE to bring him home for lunch.
So... what do you send to school in the lunchbox of an ASD child who when at home eats Nutella, peanut butter or egg sandwiches for lunch, who doesn't eat the same fruit 2 days running and who has periods where he doesn't eat either cheese OR meat, sometimes both at the same time?
Popcorn. And water. I bought an air popping popcorn maker last year so I could send popcorn with him to school. I'm personally not a fan of plain popcorn, I like mine dusted with icing sugar - but that's evil and unhealthy.
Occasionally I use another of my little bench top machines that I bought in the last couple of years and send tiny doughnut shaped pancakes as well. Why doughnut shaped pancakes? Because we tried the doughnut mix recipe and he's not a fan, but he'll eat pancakes like they're going out of fashion, and it cooks up just as fast anyway.
I had all these wonderful ideas before Smurfling went off to school. Homemade muffins, egg salad sandwiches, mini quiches, home made sesame snaps, home made fruit and nut bars.... I still make all these things. It's just I'm making them in tiny batches for weekends and school holidays instead of the masses that I was going to fill the freezer with so I didn't have to get up every day and make ruddy sandwiches.
Every day I make 2 devon and cheese sandwiches - or rolls - fill a bottle of water and try and sneak in half an apple or a handful of grapes.
I don't know who is more bored with school lunches - me or the Smurfling.
I went looking for ideas for lunchbox fillers. And I found a ton of fantastic suggestions. Avocado and fruit pastes, tossing in a boiled egg, peanut butter filled celery with sultanas on them. All wonderful ideas. All banned from the school the Smurfling attends.
No eggs: Allergies
No Nuts of any kinds: Allergies
No yogurt/tinned fruit/jelly (Which also kills the pastes): Too messy
Jam/honey no more than twice a week: they're "sometimes foods"
No fruit juice: Jealousy issues with the kids who can't have them
No muesli bars: Allergens in them (nuts)
No chips/crisps: Unhealthy
By the time you run through the list of disallowed foods that get added to every couple of months... I'm almost at the point of bringing lunch in every day and having him eat in the car - so that he gets something to actually eat. I'm waiting for them to ban all meat and dairy products because of either allergies or the fat content. Then I will HAVE to bring him home for lunch.
So... what do you send to school in the lunchbox of an ASD child who when at home eats Nutella, peanut butter or egg sandwiches for lunch, who doesn't eat the same fruit 2 days running and who has periods where he doesn't eat either cheese OR meat, sometimes both at the same time?
Popcorn. And water. I bought an air popping popcorn maker last year so I could send popcorn with him to school. I'm personally not a fan of plain popcorn, I like mine dusted with icing sugar - but that's evil and unhealthy.
Occasionally I use another of my little bench top machines that I bought in the last couple of years and send tiny doughnut shaped pancakes as well. Why doughnut shaped pancakes? Because we tried the doughnut mix recipe and he's not a fan, but he'll eat pancakes like they're going out of fashion, and it cooks up just as fast anyway.
I had all these wonderful ideas before Smurfling went off to school. Homemade muffins, egg salad sandwiches, mini quiches, home made sesame snaps, home made fruit and nut bars.... I still make all these things. It's just I'm making them in tiny batches for weekends and school holidays instead of the masses that I was going to fill the freezer with so I didn't have to get up every day and make ruddy sandwiches.
Every day I make 2 devon and cheese sandwiches - or rolls - fill a bottle of water and try and sneak in half an apple or a handful of grapes.
I don't know who is more bored with school lunches - me or the Smurfling.
Wednesday, 26 December 2012
Cooking: Ice cream anyone?
Between my son's fussy eating and my parents and their ability to grow 500 kilos of strawberries every year, we've had to come up with recipes.
Mum makes jam - but there's only so much strawberry jam you can eat before you really want a Vegemite sandwich to cut through the sweetness.
So when I got talked into buying an ice cream machine by Smurfling I decided we had to figure out a way to use the strawberries to make ice cream.
Now I don't like pips in my ice cream so just dropping the strawberries whole into a vanilla ice cream mix wasn't going to work for me. So enter the combination of "Raspberry Sorbet" and "Classic Vanilla Ice cream".
If you or anyone in your family is allergic to eggs this would also work with one of the many egg free Vanilla ice cream recipes, but Mum also has chickens who lay more than she can use with only two people in the house.
Now we started with a 5L container full of strawberries which worked out to nearly fill my medium sized pot - which I'm told is about a 5L pot. Not all of that is going into one batch of ice cream. My machine isn't that big!
Step 1: Make up the vanilla custard so it's chilling while you make up your berry sauce.
Step 2: Hull and cut strawberries. For home grown strawberries this step is more important than for shop bought ones. You need to take out any bruising and bug bites.
Step 3: Wash the berries. Mine had grass in them, and being home grown, snails may have been on them at some point and that's just icky. Besides, I know what my Dad fertilizes with.... liquid cow manure - not in my ice cream!
Step 4: Add approximately 1/2 cup of water per kilogram of berries and 1/4 cup of sugar. This is not jam. It's sauce, so less sugar and more water than you'd put in for jam. Cook it down until the house smells of strawberries and the majority of the colour is out of the fruit.
Step 5: Blitz it. Vitamise, blend, puree. Stick it in the blender and turn it on. You want a puree. Pour this into a seive over a bowl and let it strain. I stuck mine in the fridge and let it go overnight. Because there was so much of it, it kind of needed that long to get all the sauce out of the pulp.
Step 6: Add strawberry sauce to vanilla custard - I used 300ml of strawberry sauce to 1L of vanilla custard - because my icecream machine is little. Chill it again because icecream machines like really cold stuff. Then whack it in the icecream machine as per directions.
Step 7: Eat. Try and stop the children eating all of it in one sitting which is harder.
There you go, preservative free, artificial colour and flavour free strawberry icecream. It's not as pink as shop bought stuff but it's better for you. (And if the kids won't eat it because it isn't pink, a couple of drops of red food colouring will change that.)
Mum makes jam - but there's only so much strawberry jam you can eat before you really want a Vegemite sandwich to cut through the sweetness.
So when I got talked into buying an ice cream machine by Smurfling I decided we had to figure out a way to use the strawberries to make ice cream.
Now I don't like pips in my ice cream so just dropping the strawberries whole into a vanilla ice cream mix wasn't going to work for me. So enter the combination of "Raspberry Sorbet" and "Classic Vanilla Ice cream".
If you or anyone in your family is allergic to eggs this would also work with one of the many egg free Vanilla ice cream recipes, but Mum also has chickens who lay more than she can use with only two people in the house.
Now we started with a 5L container full of strawberries which worked out to nearly fill my medium sized pot - which I'm told is about a 5L pot. Not all of that is going into one batch of ice cream. My machine isn't that big!
Step 1: Make up the vanilla custard so it's chilling while you make up your berry sauce.
Step 2: Hull and cut strawberries. For home grown strawberries this step is more important than for shop bought ones. You need to take out any bruising and bug bites.
Step 3: Wash the berries. Mine had grass in them, and being home grown, snails may have been on them at some point and that's just icky. Besides, I know what my Dad fertilizes with.... liquid cow manure - not in my ice cream!
Step 4: Add approximately 1/2 cup of water per kilogram of berries and 1/4 cup of sugar. This is not jam. It's sauce, so less sugar and more water than you'd put in for jam. Cook it down until the house smells of strawberries and the majority of the colour is out of the fruit.
Step 5: Blitz it. Vitamise, blend, puree. Stick it in the blender and turn it on. You want a puree. Pour this into a seive over a bowl and let it strain. I stuck mine in the fridge and let it go overnight. Because there was so much of it, it kind of needed that long to get all the sauce out of the pulp.
Step 6: Add strawberry sauce to vanilla custard - I used 300ml of strawberry sauce to 1L of vanilla custard - because my icecream machine is little. Chill it again because icecream machines like really cold stuff. Then whack it in the icecream machine as per directions.
Step 7: Eat. Try and stop the children eating all of it in one sitting which is harder.
There you go, preservative free, artificial colour and flavour free strawberry icecream. It's not as pink as shop bought stuff but it's better for you. (And if the kids won't eat it because it isn't pink, a couple of drops of red food colouring will change that.)
Wednesday, 12 December 2012
Kids: Dealing with end of year blues
December is always a difficult month in my house. Christmas planning, birthday planning and of course the dreaded "End of year blues"
Hair trigger meltdowns are less than fun.
But Smurfling learned an important lesson this past weekend, one that's caused him to miss the last full week of school even though he really didn't want to.
Sometimes, just sometimes, Mum's know what they're talking about. Like when they tell their fair skinned son to wear a shirt when going outside to play in the middle of Summer in the middle of the day.
Sadly Smurfling isn't the only one suffering because he didn't listen and got sunburnt in the half an hour he was outside. Hyper sensitivity to the itching and the heat in the skin means noone's getting any sleep- except the cats who have taken to sleeping in the shed away from the screaming.
We've tried every single sunburn remedy that exists I think. So far only 2 have actually done anything. So. A list for those who may find themselves in a similar situation!
Remedy 1: Oatmeal bath. The idea is that oatmeal is a moisturising agent, so 1 cup of the stuff in a bath of tepid water and soak for no more than 15 minutes - otherwise the water will dry your skin out more than the oatmeal can moisturise.
Remedy 2: Bi Carb bath. Not sure what it's supposed to do other than make it hurt less. We used about half a cup in a bath of tepid water.
Remedy 3: Aloe Vera gel. Normally this helps most people, not so my son, but that could be because there had to be touching to get it onto him.
Remedy 4: Moisturiser. Again, this normally helps, if you can touch and all.
Remedy 5: After Sun Spray. Not sure if this one is Australia specific. We used Banana Boat's aloe spray. Helped a little the first day, after that not so much.
Remedy 6: Tepid shower. This is the one that worked most often. But only while he was actually under the water.
Remedy 7: Solarcaine spray. This one is a chemist recommended use. Anaesthetic spray. When combined with paracetamol worked wonders.
And that's the other thing that you should do. Give the child paracetamol of ibuprofen at the recommended dosages. We personally had to up the pain killer to a chemist only paracetamol and codeine mix, but that's because Smurfling was so hyper sensitised. The itching of the skin healing was bad enough to be painful.
Hair trigger meltdowns are less than fun.
But Smurfling learned an important lesson this past weekend, one that's caused him to miss the last full week of school even though he really didn't want to.
Sometimes, just sometimes, Mum's know what they're talking about. Like when they tell their fair skinned son to wear a shirt when going outside to play in the middle of Summer in the middle of the day.
Sadly Smurfling isn't the only one suffering because he didn't listen and got sunburnt in the half an hour he was outside. Hyper sensitivity to the itching and the heat in the skin means noone's getting any sleep- except the cats who have taken to sleeping in the shed away from the screaming.
We've tried every single sunburn remedy that exists I think. So far only 2 have actually done anything. So. A list for those who may find themselves in a similar situation!
Remedy 1: Oatmeal bath. The idea is that oatmeal is a moisturising agent, so 1 cup of the stuff in a bath of tepid water and soak for no more than 15 minutes - otherwise the water will dry your skin out more than the oatmeal can moisturise.
Remedy 2: Bi Carb bath. Not sure what it's supposed to do other than make it hurt less. We used about half a cup in a bath of tepid water.
Remedy 3: Aloe Vera gel. Normally this helps most people, not so my son, but that could be because there had to be touching to get it onto him.
Remedy 4: Moisturiser. Again, this normally helps, if you can touch and all.
Remedy 5: After Sun Spray. Not sure if this one is Australia specific. We used Banana Boat's aloe spray. Helped a little the first day, after that not so much.
Remedy 6: Tepid shower. This is the one that worked most often. But only while he was actually under the water.
Remedy 7: Solarcaine spray. This one is a chemist recommended use. Anaesthetic spray. When combined with paracetamol worked wonders.
And that's the other thing that you should do. Give the child paracetamol of ibuprofen at the recommended dosages. We personally had to up the pain killer to a chemist only paracetamol and codeine mix, but that's because Smurfling was so hyper sensitised. The itching of the skin healing was bad enough to be painful.
Wednesday, 28 November 2012
Kids: Getting organised
There's so many things that I've found I have to do every week that I never thought that I'd have to do. I've been doing them for nearly 7 years now but I never thought that I would have to have life organised to this degree.
Menu plans, things to do before school, things to do immediately after school, things to do to get ready for bed, what chores need to be done on what day - and whether it's a before school job or an after school one...
I'm sure my childhood wasn't this organised. I know my meals weren't listed up where I could see them every day.
For those of you who don't have kids who need every little thing planned out in advance, some of the lists that I have had to make or my son will seem kind of strange. So a learning opportunity for you - not all children remember everything that they did the day before - even if they have to do the very same things every single day, some of them don't remember from day to day. We have lists so I don't have to repeat myself every single day with the things he has to do. I ask if he's checked his list. Then when that task is done it gets marked off of the list so he knows that he's already done it.
Personally we use a bunch of chore charts that I found online - but forgot to save the links for so I can't share them. We have Before School chores, After School chores and Before Bed chores for both of us, and because he wanted to know what I did all day, there's also a During School chart for me.
We also have meals planned out for 6 weeks in a plastic pocket stapled to the wall so he knows what's for dinner that night.
While we're still getting into the habit of things there's still the "I don't wanna do it Mum" whining - but I can deal with that. It makes him seem like a "normal" (and gods do I hate that word) kid to people outside of our house.
I won't give out our lists, because not every child needs to have a thing on the wall to check off that they're wearing all the correct clothes for school, or that they've brushed their teeth before bed. But the blank charts...
I will hunt down the links for the printables that we use and post them up here for all to share, because they've really helped us, and if they can help just one parent out there to not lose their voice repeating the same thing for 20 minutes a day then they've done their job.
Menu plans, things to do before school, things to do immediately after school, things to do to get ready for bed, what chores need to be done on what day - and whether it's a before school job or an after school one...
I'm sure my childhood wasn't this organised. I know my meals weren't listed up where I could see them every day.
For those of you who don't have kids who need every little thing planned out in advance, some of the lists that I have had to make or my son will seem kind of strange. So a learning opportunity for you - not all children remember everything that they did the day before - even if they have to do the very same things every single day, some of them don't remember from day to day. We have lists so I don't have to repeat myself every single day with the things he has to do. I ask if he's checked his list. Then when that task is done it gets marked off of the list so he knows that he's already done it.
Personally we use a bunch of chore charts that I found online - but forgot to save the links for so I can't share them. We have Before School chores, After School chores and Before Bed chores for both of us, and because he wanted to know what I did all day, there's also a During School chart for me.
We also have meals planned out for 6 weeks in a plastic pocket stapled to the wall so he knows what's for dinner that night.
While we're still getting into the habit of things there's still the "I don't wanna do it Mum" whining - but I can deal with that. It makes him seem like a "normal" (and gods do I hate that word) kid to people outside of our house.
I won't give out our lists, because not every child needs to have a thing on the wall to check off that they're wearing all the correct clothes for school, or that they've brushed their teeth before bed. But the blank charts...
I will hunt down the links for the printables that we use and post them up here for all to share, because they've really helped us, and if they can help just one parent out there to not lose their voice repeating the same thing for 20 minutes a day then they've done their job.
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