Day Off

Today has been my first rostered day off since starting in my new position. I have to work an extra 25 mins a day to get my day off but its really not that big a deal as I usually work till 5 anyway and have 50 mins instead of an hour for lunch. So I kind of get a day off every four weeks for working my usual hours.

I was up at 5.30 to see that Wes made it to the bus  on time as they are off to Ag-Quip. He isn't back until 7 tonight and will probably be very tired. Its alot of travelling in one day but Gunnedah is close enough that its not worth staying overnight.

I put some washing on, got tonights dinner ready and did the dishes, then went and had an extra hour in bed. Ahhhhhhh.

I spent this morning in the garden weeding. Not that you can really tell I spent all that time in there! But I do have the wheelbarrow as proof!

My winter garden has been pretty sad incomparison with last year. Everything has grown really slowly except for the first lot of broccoli which bolted really quickly.

I have just left them. They are pretty and the bees are totally loving them. I saw a bee that had so much pollen that I just don't know how he managed to take off!

I also made an orange cake with white chocolate icing which I got from Inner Pickles blog and is totally yummo. I will be using that icing on everything that moves.

Finally this afternoon Amelia and I pick some flower for the table. It is remarkable that anything grows in the front yard at all!

I am off to finish Radical Homemakers, what a great book, I highly recommend it to everyone.

Pioneer Girl

Amelia's class went to the Pioneer Village today. They panned for sapphires, went to the blacksmiths shop and had damper with honey for morning tea. They went to pioneer school and the church. They played running games and had an all round fun time. 10/10 was the verdict!

They needed to wear pioneer clothes, so last weekend we made this;

The skirt material was donated by my sister (Thanks again Linda!) which was also the material on her head kerchiefy thing. The lace and wide ribbon I bought and the white shirt was from the legacy shop and that was a dollar I think.

I cut the blouse down as it was a womens size small. I added lace down the front and on the cuffs. I think she looks really good and she was loving it.

She is fast asleep now- being a pioneer must be very tiring!

Lemony Goodness

I love lemony things! Lemon scented soap, lemon syrup cake, hot lemon drinks for sore throats and lemon butter.

I have a massive bag of lemons and lemonades from my sisters tree (Thanks Linda!) and I put 4 lemons to good use today and made lemon butter (or curd if you prefer). The recipe I used is fro Hazel Dene and you can get it here. I used Mum & Dad's eggs too!

Four jars!

I also have a massive pile of weeds to show for my day today and that IS immensly satisfying. I pulled so much chickweed! Too bad I can't sell it! I have Wednesday off this week and am planning on spending at least a couple of hours out in the chickweed patch.

Yesterday I made a pioneer outfit for Amelia, looks better than I had hoped, but more about that tomorrow as I get my pioneer girl to model for me!

Hope you had a good weekend!

Making a Birthday Present

Today has been a productive day. I have a friends birthday coming up this week and I was able to get the majority of it squared away.

I made this eco bag -

My sister gave me the material and I got the pattern from Zaberry's blog, you can get it here.

See? It rolls up!

I also made her a coin purse and have a jar of homemade jam and a bar of homemade may chang soap to add. All going well I will finish her scarf tomorrow night and be able to pop it all in a recycled bag for Thursday!

And speaking of birthdays, mine was early this week and I want to share the fabulous mixing bowl my parents got me. I have been after a massive bowl for ages and all I could find topped out at a 4L max, but behold this baby which holds a whooping 7L!!!! And it red and pretty!

And I have to wrap an arm around it... Oh I love it!

Smugness is not Attractive

Especially when it is totally not warranted!

I recently read The Winter Of Our Disconnect by Susan Maushart and was smugly shocked at how
'connected' she and her three teenagers were. How could they be allowed to stay up all night with laptops? Sounded so extreme.

Then yesterday, thinking about the book, I took a quick inventory of our home's technology.

3 Widescreen televisions
1 Analogue small television
2 DVD players
1  make that 2 laptops - thanks to the free one given to Year 9 students
1 iPhone
1 iPad
1 Android pad
1 Nintendo DSi
1 Game console
and 1 $29 mobile that I bought after my one died and I didnt want to spend $100+ on a new one.

Who is not so smug now? Ummm that would be me. Worse is that I know that there are people out there who will read that list and think the same as I did about Maushart's house.

I could try to excuse it by saying hubby works in IT so we kind of got some of that stuff by default, but it doesn't excuse the fact that we have come to rely on it to check ideas, enable homework or just to entertain ourselves. My kids don't sleep with DSi's, laptops or even tv's, they don't have mobile phones or are on Facebook - no, not even the 14 year old.

But we do use it alot, probably not more than any of our peers, but lets face it that really isnt saying much is it? Lately I have weaned myself of the PC and have been doing more craft/quilty stuff, both kids have taken up a new hobby each, Wes is doing archery twice a week with Dave and Amelia is learning piano. Since archery has arrived on the scene Wes' gaming is much much less and he has let his online gaming subscription lapse without tooo much whinging. I am taking that as a positive.

I am pushing for a more balanced life! How is your technology inventory?

Quilting Maths

I am still working on it!

The Quilt?

Here is the pattern I think I am going to go for. I am hoping I can resize to fit a king size bed, the one in the picture is from Homemade mag and is only 137 cm square!

See how the darker triangles are attached to the lighter ones and make squares of dark and light? That's what I am going for.

So far my materials are -

Love this paisley - 1 m

This is actually a medium taupe-y colour - 1m

This is a pale green colour - 0.5 m

What do you think?