Day 175 - CELEBRATING

Yesterday was a beautiful 28 degrees in Hobart....the hottest it's been since summer.

It was the perfect night to take a walk by the river where Mia took this photo of Luke.

It was also a perfect night for continuing that walk onto the casino and having dinner in one of the restaurants there.....

.....perfect because we had something to celebrate.....

WE GOT THE HOUSE!!!

WOO HOO!!!

Day 174 - LICKING THE SPOON

Today we made brownies.

Why is it that the batter always tastes nicer than the end product :o)

Day 173 - REMINDS ME OF...

...Perth

As I sat at the Royal Botanical Gardens on the weekend and looked up from my resting spot on a bench, I saw these palm trees against the blue sky. 

It seemed like a familiar sight to me :o)

Day 172 - THE ROYAL BOTANICAL GARDENS

Page 171- LUNCH

If you're feeling like fish and chips for lunch the perfect place to head to in Hobart is down to the docks at Salamanca.

Here's the views we had whilst eating!

Page 170 - HOUSE HUNTING

So, as I mentioned recently on this blog, it is house hunting time again as we try and find a new (hopefully nicer, more modern but cheaper) rental to move into. It has been very slim pickings and one house that we loved, was snapped up as soon as it appeared on the internet before we'd even had a chance to have a look. So we realised that even though we still have two months left on our lease, we'd better start now.

I've had my eye on this house in Kingston for a week or so.

So, after realising how fast things move, we did a quick re-shuffle of our Friday afternoon (which included skipping Mia's swimming lesson which she didn't mind as she wanted to look at the new house) we headed down to have a look......

...and it is stunning. Pretty much everything I would want in a house (I would even buy this one). It's big, modern and beautiful.

So needless to say, we have applied!!

Fingers crossed that we get it!!

Maybe even a fingers crossed that our current landlord finds new tenants so we don't have to keep paying rent till the end of our lease!

PS This is the view we would have :o)

PPS The house does have plenty of room for our new table and fridge as mention in this previous post, and has the perfect backyard for my kids to play in as mentioned here. I  have a slight confession to make though that I have chickened out on getting my kids the trampoline I mentioned :s A table tennis table and cubby house will do just fine though......I hope!

Day 169 - THE HOBART ROYAL SHOW

(photos taken by Paul)

Day 168 - CHOOSING SHOWBAGS

Tomorrow there's a public holiday for the Hobart Royal Show and so these two are engaged in the very serious business of studying showbags to decide which ones they would like.

Abby Cadabby and My Little Pony are the top of Mia's list!!

Day 167 - 1ST PLANE RIDE

Just found this photo from Mia's first plane ride.

It's from back in 2008 when she was just 8 months old.

As it turns out, we were heading to Tasmania for our first ever visit!

Day 166 - ACROSS THE ROAD

(photos taken by Paul)

All these photos were taken across the road from our house.

Whilst I've mentioned on this blog that the current rental house we live in isn't very nice, I do have to confess that it is in a beautiful spot! :)

Day 165 - SLEEP-INS

Don't you just love how kids do this? There's the whole bed and yet they sleep squished up against you on the same pillow :o)

Love sleep-ins though....especially next to a warm, cuddly little body!

Day 164 - GONE SHORT

....again

Ok, so I know that I said in this post that I was growing my hair....and I was. But a girl can change her mind! :o)

Day 163 - SCHOOL FAIR

It seems that it is the season about town for school fairs and so Friday night we walked over to check out the one at the boys' school.

Their school sure does have some great views.

Day 162 - CRICKET

...is coming!!

It will be entering our lives in a big way real soon!

Not just the watching of games live but a certain 11 year old will be doing it 3 nights in a row as well as one afternoon a week in school!

Phew! I'm exhausted just thinking about it!

Day 161 - THIS IS WHAT WE DO

...a lot of!

Going to the supermarket.

We always seem to be there picking up one thing or another.

But I don't really mind too much....and Mia is such a good helper!

Day 160 - TUESDAYS

Tuesday for us means playgroup day.

This is the third playgroup I have attended during my parenting years.

Mia LOVES it and it has definitely been a real blessing to me as it's been through playgroup that I've made the friends that I have here in Tassie.

What do you do on a Tuesday?

Day 159 - THE LIBRARY

Tonight we did something with the kids that both Paul and I remember doing with our own parents when we were younger. 

After Paul got home from work we headed down to the library. Actually I re-aquainted the males in our house to this wonderful place where you can borrow books, saving you from having to buy them all the time! 

Despite having a school library, Mr 11 year old was still a little baffled by this seemingly new phenomena (I took them to the library lots when they were little.....but obviously not for a while!) "You can borrow up to 15 books for 3 weeks? Really?" "Can you renew them?" "But how does a library make any money then?"

As kids Paul and I were often taken to the library in an evening where we would all stock up on several books. The difference here was that instead of heading to the local suburban library, our closest library in Hobart is actually the one in the city just 5 minutes away. It's so nice being so close to the city.

Oh and the evening was capped off with some KFC for dinner after having done all that cooking on the weekend :o)

Day 158 - BOXES

We're doing it again.

The same thing that we were doing this time last year.

Packing boxes that is.

You'd think we'd be quite good at it by now having moved 7 times over our 14 years of marriage.

But as much as I am dying to move out of this house and hopefully into something much better, I am not looking forward to starting to fill these cardboard containers with our stuff again.

Paul has made a start though.

This first box has been packed.

(and as is our tradition, it started with books....always the easiest of our stuff to pack!)

Day 157 - A MASTERCHEF DAY

Today we made Gary Mehigan's crepes for lunch, Matt Preston's Carbonara for dinner and Anna Gare's divine Hot Chocolate Sauce to go onto ice cream for dessert. Yum!

What did you cook today?

Day 156 - RECIPES

So I mentioned recently that I had gotten a bunch of cookbooks out of our local library to pour over. Well, I have a favourite already, and as you can see below, coincidentally it just so happens to be written by the first ever winner of MasterChef, Julie Goodwin.

I love it though not just because of the beautiful photos it contains and not just because it contains recipes of real, homemade cooking rather than those super fancy, super tricky restaurant type dishes with the obscure ingredients. What I absolutely love about this book is that all the recipes she has chosen to share come from family and friends, from those known and well loved......her mum, mother-in law, grandmas, friends.... In addition, the pages are filled with the wonderful memories she has of these same people and the food they made that was part of her childhood.

This is where despite loving the book (and it's a good thing that Christmas is coming soon!) I become a little jealous of Julie and people like her. Neither of my grandmothers were bakers or cooks that I know of so I have no memories of homemade spongecakes or scones filling the house with delicious smells when we visited. Nor do I have any of those precious, handwritten recipes written on yellowing index cards to treasure and hand down. However, new traditions can be started at any time and so I have begun pulling together my own recipes that I bake and cook often just in case one day my own children want to know how to cook a dish that they remember from their own childhood. 

Oh and speaking of this, Julie has actually included a blank chapter in this book so that you can write your own recipes and add your own photos and stories yourself! She read my mind! So if you have any recipes yourself that can be associated with you or someone you know, make sure you pass them onto others so that people like me can build up a tradition of well tested recipes......because the ones gathered from family and friends are always the best!

xxxx

PS I've included a quote from the book below. I just love the last sentence. Think I might practice some of her recipes and see if this is indeed true!!