Baking Day

This last week has seen us finally get a new oven installed, the old one gave out weeks ago and it was a bit of a process to get a new one.  But it is all sorted now and since I took time out to clean and tidy the pantry yesterday I decided to do some baking with my supplies today.

 

First up was this delicious ginger crunch slice, my boys both enjoyed some and happily informed me that it tastes really yummy just like gingerbread men.

 

There was a lot of crumbs left in the tray from cutting the ginger crunch, so I poured it all into a little jar and am thinking it might be nice sprinkled over vanilla ice-cream later in the week.

 

And next was my very first attempt at Chocolate Brownies, made with dark, milk and white chocolate.  It smelt divine whilst cooking and I must say has turned out fantastic.  Very yummy indeed.  I think next baking day I might need to add some savoury as well, although we don’t cook a lot of very sweet treats like these brownies so I think this is fine.

I have also been busy with my crochet hook, whipping up some wash cloths and have managed to make a small start on a dish cloth today.  I am hoping to be able to gift some for Christmas presents, and I am adding myself to the list as well, I mean I really should make some for myself to know that they are nice to receive as a gift…… right….. thats my idea anyway.   Now I might make a cup of tea, and settle down for a short time to do some more dishcloth making.

Take care xx

 

By The Seaside

I enjoy looking back through our vacations photos, brings it all back nice and fresh in my memory.   Especially when I am finding it hard to get back into the swing of things, so I am happy to share some lovely seaside photos here today.

One of my favourite things to do is simply fossick along the shoreline for pretty shells, I remember doing this as a child, and now I am doing the same thing with my children, and it is wonderful.

Look at all these gorgeous teeny tiny little shells.  Can you imagine a beach made entirely from billions of these tiny shells……… we visited one such beach and appropriately it is called Shell Beach.  It is apparently one of only two beaches like this in the World.  Amazing……

Bright blue sky, crisp white shells, and the clear sea water………. was spectacular indeed.

From here we headed further along the coast and found some pretty impressive beaches and very nice weather, after leaving grey stormy days it was a bit of a surprise to the senses to be in such warm weather.  There was lots of slip, slop, slap, sunsmart practice happening this week.

We spent some lovely days here on this beach, and seen some very friendly sealife doing their own thing as they desired.  This is Monkey Mia, located within the Shark Bay World Heritage Area in Western Australia.

This is Mr Pelican, who was paddling along the waters edge.  We stopped and said hi and then went on our way.  The water is absolutely beautiful, crystal clear, turquoise blues, very enticing.

Oh the joy I felt when this dolphin swam past as we were wading along, we were so lucky this day as the dolphins were doing their natural thing, had spotted some yummy looking fish and were hunting them along the shoreline, so they came close to us, we simply had to stand still and let them do their thing and take lots of photos of course.   Some lucky swimmers had them swimming around them, you could see the delight on the young swimmers face, reflected in my own as they swam past me I am sure.   Most of the day you see them here and there off in the distance, but to see them come in this close was wonderful indeed.  Oh I absolutely adore dolphins, they are simply beautiful.

This is the nearby town of Denham, we would stroll along the beachfront every day to enjoy the sights, and I must say I took a lot of dinghy photos, but I do like them, looking very relaxed resting on the beaches.  We would spend our evenings relaxing on the beaches ourselves, with our picnic tea, how easily I could go back there right now, it was very enjoyable.  We seen so many lovely sights, and most of all I enjoyed spending time with my loved ones, hopefully making many happy memories for our little ones.  They do talk about our vacation, the many exciting sights we seen, the activities we filled our spare time with, and I like to think that even though they are young, they will remember this for years to come.

And now I am off to make a cup of tea, before I have a few chores to do then hopefully I might be able to do a few rows of knitting whilst dreaming more about our vacation days.

Enjoy xx

Spring Vacation

Sorry I have not blogged for a few weeks, we decided at the last minute to go away for a Spring Vacation,  we packed up our little camper and away we went for a couple of weeks of sunshine and sightseeing.   We spent time exploring the countryside we passed through until we eventually reached our destination which I am happy to say was by the seaside.   I do love the seaside, and I think living in the great outback of Australia for biggest part of the last 6 years has made me appreciate it even more.  I would like to share some of our Spring Vacation, starting with the countryside.

Rolling green as far as we could see, blue sky, white fluffy clouds and wonderful fresh country air.  We  ventured a little from our main route to visit family who we do not get to see very often, and was delighted when they offered us some space to unfold our camper and spend the night camping with them, it was wonderful to catch up, and made for a lovely start to our vacation.

The following morning we got to go wandering and fossicking for wildflowers.  These ones are known as Donkey Orchids, they are very pretty and so very tiny.  We found quite a few different wildflowers, and I enjoyed myself and it kind of reminded me of childhood wandering and exploring, finding treasures.

We came across this fungi growing from a fallen tree.

Then it was time to move on, although I did manage to sneak another wildflower photo in when my Husband stopped to check the camper was travelling okay.

We spent the next night camping near this watering hole, people were swimming, kayaking and enjoying the great outdoors.

We settled for a lovely serene walk around the waters edge, more exploring was done.

Where we came across my favourite wildflower, the mulla mulla.   This one was lovely shades of green and yellow,  the pink mulla mulla flowers remind me of fairy floss, so sweet and fluffy to look at, my favourite of the mulla mulla.

The following morning as the rain clouds rolled in, we packed up our camper and headed towards the coast to blue sky and sunshine.  I will post more photos this week as our next destination involves sand, sea, shells, and the most wonderful and friendly sealife.  I hope you can pop back to have a look.

Take care xx