My day today....

It my daughter's 21st this year in November. I am organising a Chicken and Champagne Brunch in a local parklands and then a few friends (and apparently her old Mama Bear) are going out to some fancy smancy nightclub in the city to party the night away. I am so looking forward to her 21st and I cannot put anything on here with regard to decorations or what I am doing because she reads my blog and my facebook page so I have to be careful to keep it all secret. Her instruction are to be at her brunch by 9.30am all dolled up and feeling gorgeous and be ready to greet her guests as they arrive at 10am.

It was my birthday yeasterday and this is a photos taken exactly 49 years ago to the day with my Daddy in Mt. Isa. Love my parents to bits.

I cut a pattern of a little dress my grand daughter wears and I have used some scrap material to make her a little dress. Probably wear a little coloured t shirt under it when playing out in the sun. I have posted it to her so I can see if this one fits all okay and then I can't wait to make a lot more.

I picked up this second hand top for myself for a dollar last week and it was a bit to small for me - I like things baggy. It has a zip down the front and a draw string around the waist. So I thought maybe I could cut the sleeves of and sew it into some handles and then run across the bottom to make a carry bag - maybe for the beach for my towel or something.

So this is the end result and it looks like a awesome dirty cloths bag or pj bag for in your bedroom. It can also be used as the bag I thought of at first. I have made handles and stiched bias binding around the holes but when I hung it on the hanger I just thought it was the best dirty cloths bag which is easy to wash itself and unzips right down the front to get the cloths out easy.

My daughter gave me a food dehydrator for my birthday. I have a play around with it today. Success with dried orange slices which I can use as decoration but they are very tasty as well. It is suggested that you can coat in melted chocolate but I think the peel is a bit hard - I will try a few things.

I dried mushrooms as well and these were a complete success. I only did a few and I put them into a jar in the fridge and will use them in a week or so in a stew or soup and see how they go. Great idea once I perfect the storage to take advantage of the excess produce when mushrooms are on special or the shop has a sell out of mushrooms.

I tried banana and weet potatoe as well but even though I can eat what I dried I don't think they dried out to well. I think I have to do things a bit differently.

Oh well. Of to cook some dinner.

Cheers,

Wendy

  

Another day and burning the pool table.....

Hello to you all,

Today I did things differently by firstly letting things slide when I was trying to say something to my husband and just decided to let him decide. Oh I liked that feeling. (don't worry - I am way to bossy to let him tell me what to do all of the time but I am coming to realise I don't have to be the boss of everything). Secondly I instantly agreed to something he suggested we do for my birthday tomorrow.

Now this is such an awesome photo - and yes I am sure you are going to ask why? burn? a? pool? table?

It was water damaged - broken and not able to be used and we were at a big Hungi for a friends birthday a month or so back and they ended up throwing this pool table on the bon fire. This is a cool photo.

Getting the ground hot enough to pile the food into baskets and cover up to cook.

Food all in the ground in baskets and all covered with hot ash and sealed in and cooking.  Beautiful meat and vegetables a few hours later.

I went to a childs birthday party on Saturday and it was a racing car party for a 4 year old boy and his Mama had made him this tiny teddy race car treats.  Cool hey?

I went shopping yesterday. I was excited to purchase 3 pineapples - all looking ripe and smelling delish - cut each and every one open this morning and this is what each and every one looked like. I was cranky. I rang the shop and told them I had photos and will be in for a refund when I shop again next week. $6 wasted and I wasn't prepared to ignore it again. I had just cut open 2 avos I had got from another shop the same day and at a cost of nearly $4 was very disappointed when both are black and unable to be eaten. I have kept them and will return them on Thursday with my docket. That is $10 of my bloody hard earned money wasted on this and I want a replacement or my money refunded. Enough is enough.

This is my Lemon Vinegar Spray and Wipe soaking up the lemon into the vinegar. One week down and one more week to go and then I will strain it and bottle it up. I will add more vinegar and a few more lemon rinds and do the same thing again. I will get enough spray and wipe cleaner out of these two lots for the year for me. The lemons of my tree - the vinegar will have cost $4.40 all up and it works brilliantly on the stove top - the sink - the wooden boards and benchs. Smells devine as well. See Homemade Cleaning Page for the instructions on how to make this.

I purchased this punch bowl from a friend last week and it is just perfect for this type of thing and looks so fresh and pretty doing it's thing on my kitchen bench. 

I made two hand painted silk scarves at art group last week - I decided to sew them into a cushion. I was going to put a few dollars on it at the market this weekend - then I thought I might gift it - but - I am going to keep it. I really like it.

Mick has been building me the frame for my vegetable garden and my Dad and Mum have bought me a large roll of chicken wire for my birthday and the whole thing will be covered in wire tomorrow. I have planted some beetroot already but as soon as it is finished I will get some other goodies in there and start the learning process of growing myself some food that I hopefully get and not the possums.

Mick and went through our shells we have collected and put a lovely display out. The remainder are going to finally be tied up and made into a hanging display. I will post a photo when we are finished.

I watched a short documentary this evening on the ABC and it was called Take A Seat - Dominic Gill 

and it was such a great little documentary about Dominic Gill who road his tandem pushbike from the top of Alaska to the bottom of South America. I am now going to buy his book. Awesome story - but it is definately my cup of tea.

Cheers, Wendy