Little Lou turns 3

Happy 3rd Birthday Little Lou,

mummy's little angel. Don't grow up too fast...:)

XXX

Happy 6th Birthday, My Sunny Boy

Happy 6th birthday

for last Friday, 7th May.

Mummy has been a bit late posting this.

You had a wonderful day. Some of your friends came around to celebrate with us.

Your big sister, Katie, took some great photos.

We ate all the chocolate beetroot cake - yum!....

and had lots of fun.

I found this cute photo from when you were about 3 months old. Nearly six years later you have still kept that funny little grin...:)

Fingerless Gloves

I've been invited to a birthday party this Saturday (woo-hoo) - a child free party my friend said. It's been a looooooong time since I've been to a party without kids. It's going to be weird actually finishing a sentence. I'm so used to having short conversations. I'm allways chasing Lou around. LOL...:)

My friend has been talking about making fingerless gloves. She is tall and has long arms, which I never noticed, but she was saying that long sleeve tops never seem to fit the length of her arms and her wrists are always cold in winter. She wanted to make herself some wrist warmers/gloves to keep warm. So I went through my stash and found this ball of Jet by Patons. It's an alpaca/wool mix that I bought from a bargain bin at the wool shop at Katoomba. I love these autumny colours.

I found another quick and easy pattern off Ravelry. This pattern is an easy basic rib pattern : -knit 2 purl 2.

I cast on 34 stitches and used size 5.5.mm needles. I was amazed at how quick these knitted up. I used up almost all the wool to make the gloves 7 inches long. Only a tiny bit of wool was left over to sew up the sides.

I think I'm going to have to go through my stash again to knit myself a pair..:)

Anzac Biscuits

A Basic Anzac Biscuit Recipe

1 cup plain flour

1 cup rolled oats

1 cup of desiccated coconut

3/4 cup brown sugar

125g butter

2tbs golden syrup

2tbs water

1tsp bicarbonate of soda

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 160 degrees C. Line two baking trays with non-stick baking paper or grease baking tray. Sift the flour into a large bowl. Stir in the oats, coconut and brown sugar.

2. Put butter, golden syrup and 2 tbs water in a small saucepan. Stir over a medium heat until melted. Stir in the bicarbonate of soda (it will froth).

3. Pour the butter mixture into the flour mixture and stir until combined.

4. Roll level tablespoons of mixture into balls. Place on trays, about 5cm apart.

5. Press with a fork to flatten slightly. Bake for 10 minutes or until golden brown (or slightly longer for crunchy biscuits).

6. Set aside on the trays for 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack so it cools completely.

Anzac Day 2010

Lest we forget

Happy Lou...:)

Happy Lou...:)

Bush Walk

A couple of weeks ago (before I had this cold) it was a beautiful sunny day so we headed off for a bush walk up here in the mountains. I feel very lucky that I have such a beautiful spot in the world to live that is not that expsesive (well, my landlord just put my rent up $20 a week - I'm not happy about it but I won't go into that here).

We patted numerous mossy rocks that felt like velvet.

We looked a different rocks. Here's some beautiful sandstone rock which had rings like a tree.

We found a tree hollow and looked for little elves, fairies and gnomes, but no one was home.

This track had a little stream which we followed. It ended at a cliff edge that dropped for a couple of hundred meters.

We crossed stepping stones, ...

... climbed rocky stairs while the boys climbed the railings, ...

... and found ant holes that little Lou so desperately wanted to stick his finger in.

He did put his finger in one - lucky no one was home. Nothing like the curousity of little ones! They love sticking their fingers in any holes, don't they ?(LOL). Lucky we have five fingers on each hand - lots of spares! ;)

Finally, we got to the end of the track. It was such a beautiful view. We sat and listened to the wind pick up and howl around us, watched the birds flying by, and just sat there taking it all in.

And a little snack of Rice Wheels and water.

And of course, we had to have an ice cream too. ;)

Autumn Gardening

Finally, a lot of the leaves are starting to drop in my garden. Lou and I have been doing a little bit of raking up of the leaves.

Lou is a good little worker ;) He put his gardening gloves on, got his rake and
wheel barrow that is falling apart, ...

... raked up leaves and took them to the new veggie patch where they will compost with our kitchen veggie scraps over the next few months.

.... and off he goes!

I started making a second veggie patch a few months ago. I dug up the soil and sieved it to get out the rocks and this pesty bulb of a weed which takes over the veggie patch. It is just as annoying as onion weed but not as hard to get rid of. It has a purple flower and big clover like leaves. I wanted to grow carrots and onions in this spot. A few days later we had all this rain that washed all of my hard work away. The boys did have a great time in the muddy swamp that mummy made! So lately it's been a little boys quarry for the last 2 months.

I got my partner to do the digging to turn the leaves in to the soil. He does it so much better

than me! LOL

But one thing lead to another

and we kept finding rocks.......

....... and more rocks.

and a huge rock!

I got excited. It would make a lovely garden feature - keep digging, let's see if you can dig it out. In the end it was bed rock so my partner buried it. We just have to be mindful of what we plant there because it does come into the veggie patch a bit.

Well, for the last few weeks I've been fighting off a cold and now it has finally beaten me. I have been in bed with night sweats, aching bones and this really bad headache. I couldn't even do any knitting in bed - Aaarrrhhhh! I am so close to finishing my cardigan. I was also too tired today to make it down the mountain for this month's Knitting Guild meeting. :(

This is my first cold, and hopefully the last, of the season - that's why I've been absent from the computer for a while.