Michael was on the phone the other day, after Caitlin and I had left for Hamilton, when he looked out the kitchen window to see Mim, in her gumbots, clutching Sarah's collar in one hand and scolding her with the other, stomping down from the top paddock.
She gets to the wire fence and has to let go of Sarah to climb over it, meanwhile Sarah jumps straight over and waits for Mim. Mim then grabs Sarah again and marches her down to the houseyard and in through the side gate.
She releases Sarah, turns to Michael, and with a frustrated sigh, says "Bloody Sarah, she jumped the fuckin' fence!"
Michael's blaming me for that one!
Sunday 27 September 2009
Happy Father's Day
Mim made this for Michael at Kindy. It amused the Kindy teacher, Michael and myself.
French, English.... they're only 20 miles apart, an honest mistake really! And it's good to know he can 'cook' Jelly!
French, English.... they're only 20 miles apart, an honest mistake really! And it's good to know he can 'cook' Jelly!
Special Persons Day at Kindy
Mim had a Special Persons Day at Kindy for their term break up party.
The idea was to invite all the special persons in your life (mum, dad, grandparents, neighbours, etc) by mail and have them RSVP by mail as well. Poor Mim, I was the only one who could attend. Others brought up to six special persons.We did activites (playdough, making necklaces from beads and macaroni) before watching the kids do some singing.
Then lunch was served. It was plentiful and delicious - everyone had brought something along, from platters of sandwiches, to scones that the kids had made, to cakes/slices, to sausage rolls.... it was enough to feed an army of parents. And one of the parents (who is a freelance photographer) took photos of each child with their special persons, for the kids' scrapbook.
It was a fun day, and Mim enjoyed herself immensely. She does love it when I can stay at Kindy with her.
We had to leave at 2 and go home to get ready for work. As it was Parent/Teacher interviews, Caitlin took Mim to Karate with her until I was able to pick her up. Apparently Mim had fun copying the older kids, and would like to take up Karate when she is old enough. (hmmm, do we think this is a good idea?!)
The idea was to invite all the special persons in your life (mum, dad, grandparents, neighbours, etc) by mail and have them RSVP by mail as well. Poor Mim, I was the only one who could attend. Others brought up to six special persons.We did activites (playdough, making necklaces from beads and macaroni) before watching the kids do some singing.
Then lunch was served. It was plentiful and delicious - everyone had brought something along, from platters of sandwiches, to scones that the kids had made, to cakes/slices, to sausage rolls.... it was enough to feed an army of parents. And one of the parents (who is a freelance photographer) took photos of each child with their special persons, for the kids' scrapbook.
It was a fun day, and Mim enjoyed herself immensely. She does love it when I can stay at Kindy with her.
We had to leave at 2 and go home to get ready for work. As it was Parent/Teacher interviews, Caitlin took Mim to Karate with her until I was able to pick her up. Apparently Mim had fun copying the older kids, and would like to take up Karate when she is old enough. (hmmm, do we think this is a good idea?!)
Bendigo.. or bust!
A few weekends ago, we took a trip to Bendigo to visit friends. I roped in the help of a friend's son to house/dogsit. He had pizza, chocolate biscuits, footy/cricket on Austar, dogs to play with and no siblings around ..... he was in heaven!
We left around 10.30, and stopped off at Ararat for lunch... at Rotten Ronnies. The locals were as feral as can be expected, and the food - well, it was ballast. It was on the road again, arriving in Bendigo just after 3.
It was a warm, windy and wonderful night. Used to the freezing cold and recent constant wet that we had been having, it was lovely to sit on their back patio, sipping on Brandy Alexanders and catching up with friends we hadn't seen for over nine months.
Charu and Dexter
Jemima enjoyed catching up with 'her' brother, Dhruv, as did Caitlin. They played Guitar Hero on the Wii and kept themselves amused.
Dinner was amazing. If Charu ever wanted to give up medicine, she could have a successful career opening an Indian restaurant! After dinner (and a few wines/scotchs/beers), Michael amused us all with his ability to take any subject, any style of music and any accent and make a little ditty, usually with a swear word or two in it.
Sunday morning, we had an amazing version of scrambled eggs, served with chapatis (what's the name for it, Jayant?) and then a trip downtown to play bowling. Do bowling. Whatever the correct terminology for hurling a heavy ball down a wooden runaway to hit some poor unsuspecting pins is.
Charu and I opted to be the cheer squad, whilst the others played. Jemima used a special ramp they had for young kids. You place the ball on the top and then push it down. Of course, it works better with a run up before the push.
Dr J and Michael checking out the balls
the final score!
Then it was home for lunch (a fantastic biryani), and a walk around the hill behind Jayant's house, checking out the old mine sites before heading home after 5.
It was an uneventful trip home, though Michael managed to find an amazing radio station in Bendigo... that supposedly played people's unusual requests. We had Hello Mudder, Hello Fadder; They are Coming to Take Me Away and some other bizarre songs playing! We stopped to 'dine' at Ararat again, though neither Michael nor I could stomach any bog burgers after the wonderful cuisine of Chez Charu, so we stopped off at a fish and chip place.
We arrived home, exhausted, just after 10pm. The dogs were ecstatic to see us - it'd been a whole 36hrs since they'd seen us! Oh boy, oh boy! Lick, lick, lick! So, after the fond greeting, they got shoved into Jemima's room to sleep with her and the rest of us tumbled into bed.
Only I was woken at 2am by the dogs whining and scratching Mim's door. I let them out and they indicated that they were desperate to go outside. My first mistake was letting them. They bolted off. After a few minutes, I called them, but nobody came. So I went outside to look for them. (Bear in mind that I was too tired to unpack my PJs so I was only wearing a Tshirt. And it was about 5 degrees). Sarah came to me but I couldn't see Jess. After five minutes of calling, I knew I'd have to go on a search mission. Came inside, got dressed, grabbed the torch and shut Sarah in the dogbox. Closer inspection showed that the side gate had enough of a gap that Jess would have squeezed out, and gone to play with sheep. But not our sheep, they were still grazing in the western paddock, their eyes reflecting in the torchlight. The silly bitch had decided to go through the neighbours fence and check out their paddock. Apparently there was a dead sheep somewhere there. I called her, and she came back.... but she had taken the opportunity to roll in shit! Sheep shit or cow shit - it didn't really matter which, she stank! And then she decided that it was important to round up our sheep, at 2.30 in the friggin' morning, under the starlight. By the time I was able to catch her, I was not a happy camper. Trying to catch a barking, rounding up dog, with the added noise of Sarah howling from the dogbox, wanting to be in the fun, is not conducive to being able to easily go back to sleep!
Needless to say, soap and water do NOT get the smell of shit off one's hands!!!!
We left around 10.30, and stopped off at Ararat for lunch... at Rotten Ronnies. The locals were as feral as can be expected, and the food - well, it was ballast. It was on the road again, arriving in Bendigo just after 3.
It was a warm, windy and wonderful night. Used to the freezing cold and recent constant wet that we had been having, it was lovely to sit on their back patio, sipping on Brandy Alexanders and catching up with friends we hadn't seen for over nine months.
Charu and DexterJemima enjoyed catching up with 'her' brother, Dhruv, as did Caitlin. They played Guitar Hero on the Wii and kept themselves amused.
Dinner was amazing. If Charu ever wanted to give up medicine, she could have a successful career opening an Indian restaurant! After dinner (and a few wines/scotchs/beers), Michael amused us all with his ability to take any subject, any style of music and any accent and make a little ditty, usually with a swear word or two in it.
Sunday morning, we had an amazing version of scrambled eggs, served with chapatis (what's the name for it, Jayant?) and then a trip downtown to play bowling. Do bowling. Whatever the correct terminology for hurling a heavy ball down a wooden runaway to hit some poor unsuspecting pins is.
Charu and I opted to be the cheer squad, whilst the others played. Jemima used a special ramp they had for young kids. You place the ball on the top and then push it down. Of course, it works better with a run up before the push.
Dr J and Michael checking out the balls
the final score!Then it was home for lunch (a fantastic biryani), and a walk around the hill behind Jayant's house, checking out the old mine sites before heading home after 5.
It was an uneventful trip home, though Michael managed to find an amazing radio station in Bendigo... that supposedly played people's unusual requests. We had Hello Mudder, Hello Fadder; They are Coming to Take Me Away and some other bizarre songs playing! We stopped to 'dine' at Ararat again, though neither Michael nor I could stomach any bog burgers after the wonderful cuisine of Chez Charu, so we stopped off at a fish and chip place.
We arrived home, exhausted, just after 10pm. The dogs were ecstatic to see us - it'd been a whole 36hrs since they'd seen us! Oh boy, oh boy! Lick, lick, lick! So, after the fond greeting, they got shoved into Jemima's room to sleep with her and the rest of us tumbled into bed.
Only I was woken at 2am by the dogs whining and scratching Mim's door. I let them out and they indicated that they were desperate to go outside. My first mistake was letting them. They bolted off. After a few minutes, I called them, but nobody came. So I went outside to look for them. (Bear in mind that I was too tired to unpack my PJs so I was only wearing a Tshirt. And it was about 5 degrees). Sarah came to me but I couldn't see Jess. After five minutes of calling, I knew I'd have to go on a search mission. Came inside, got dressed, grabbed the torch and shut Sarah in the dogbox. Closer inspection showed that the side gate had enough of a gap that Jess would have squeezed out, and gone to play with sheep. But not our sheep, they were still grazing in the western paddock, their eyes reflecting in the torchlight. The silly bitch had decided to go through the neighbours fence and check out their paddock. Apparently there was a dead sheep somewhere there. I called her, and she came back.... but she had taken the opportunity to roll in shit! Sheep shit or cow shit - it didn't really matter which, she stank! And then she decided that it was important to round up our sheep, at 2.30 in the friggin' morning, under the starlight. By the time I was able to catch her, I was not a happy camper. Trying to catch a barking, rounding up dog, with the added noise of Sarah howling from the dogbox, wanting to be in the fun, is not conducive to being able to easily go back to sleep!
Needless to say, soap and water do NOT get the smell of shit off one's hands!!!!
Wednesday 9 September 2009
Never leave children and animals alone
....again. This is what happens when Jemima gets bored.
See that look of long suffering! It got worse, the headband plays a Christmas tune!
Anybody know a good pet psychologist?
See that look of long suffering! It got worse, the headband plays a Christmas tune!
Anybody know a good pet psychologist?
Happy Birthday Jenny!
Michael and I had a night away a few weekends ago. It was Jenny's 70th birthday and she'd planned a 'little do' in town. We arranged for our professional house sitter, Liz, (17) to look after the girls, dogs, cat and chooks and we booked a room at a motel in town.
Even though I know Jenny is not your normal 70 year old, I still half expected the night to be .... tame. I knew that the 'cream of Hamilton society' had been invited, as well as friends from all over the state. I wasn't expecting the raging night we had.
We started off with nibbles and drinks in the bar area - all 90 of us. Jenny had made most of the nibblies herself and asked me to assist in taking the trays around. There were the usual sausage rolls, toast and pate, seafood bites, mini salmon quiches, arancini balls.... and plenty of them. I think most people were almost full before they'd even gotten to the dinner part of the evening.
We then had dinner - alternate fish pies and beef braised in guiness pies, served with mashed potato and peas. Jenny made all of it (she was the chef at the Stirring Pot restaurant for a few years!). I'm not a big fish fan, but the fish pie was delicious! Dessert was fruit stewed in brandy, with icecream, followed by platters of cheese and biscuits, fresh from the Queen Vic Markets, and platters of hand made chocolates to accompany the coffee/tea.
Wine flowed freely that night. Michael counted that our table (of 8) went through at least 10 bottles. Before dinner was even served, I had a bottle of red knocked over almost on top of me. And it wasn't even me that did it, it was Jenny's son-in-law! Before anybody was even pissed! I only got a bit on my sleeves and pants, so it wasn't too bad - though I did reek of eau de Cab Sauv all night.
Jenny is an Elvis fan, so she had an Elvis impersonator singing songs and entertaining us. It was hilarious watching him kissing up to all the older ladies, the supposed prim and proper matrons. Like hell they are!
Jenny's grandchildren got up on the stage to give a speech about there Nan. I loved the story from one of the grandsons, now about 21. He said that when most people talk about grandmothers, they have the image of the knitting, tea sipping little old ladies. When he tells people about his Nan, he tells this story which epitomises the character of Jenny. "She went to a kitchen store in Melbourne and bought a $60 pepper grinder. When I asked her why she spent so much money on a pepper grinder, she said "Because it's fuckin' classy, asshole"." Yep, that's Jenny!
After copious amounts of wine had been consumed, dinner had been eaten and Elvis had exhausted his repertoire, a few of us (included Jenny's slightly uninhibited daughter) got up on the dance floor and shook our groove thing. The others just retired into the bar and kept drinking. We finally got kicked out at 1.30am, so they could lock up the club.
It was a fantastic night!
The next morning, we were invited to Jenny's for breakfast. I had thought it was just going to be a small select group of family and close friends... and it was, about 60 of us! I'd been supplying Jenny with eggs for weeks previously and I'd wondered if I'd been oversupplying her. Nope, she was also getting eggs from another source and had over 14 dozen. John, her son that owns and chefs at his Melbourne restaurant, stood in front of the stove poaching eggs for most of the morning. There was a large bowl of fruit salad, poached eggs, bacon, toasted homemade bread, tomatoes. A barista friend brought along his coffee machine and was doing coffees with the loveheart or ferns in the milk trick. The first bottle of champagne was opened about 9.30am.
Jenny mentioned that she had gone to bed about 4am. She'd invited her family in for a nightcap, so they finished off another three bottles of wine..... and then she saw the scotch and thought that looked like a good idea. Yet she was up bright and chirpy (and still probably pissed) with no sign of a hangover, whilst her fellow nightcappers looked like death warmed up.
It was a wonderful weekend, only marred by the fact that Jess greeted us on arrival home with her tail between her legs. It seems that whilst the girls were occupied inside the house with painting their nails and playing the Wii, the flying chook (the one that laid the enormous eggs) flew out of the protection of the pen and was 'plucked' by the dogs. So we are down to five chooks and none of them have shown an interest in flying...... yet.
Even though I know Jenny is not your normal 70 year old, I still half expected the night to be .... tame. I knew that the 'cream of Hamilton society' had been invited, as well as friends from all over the state. I wasn't expecting the raging night we had.
We started off with nibbles and drinks in the bar area - all 90 of us. Jenny had made most of the nibblies herself and asked me to assist in taking the trays around. There were the usual sausage rolls, toast and pate, seafood bites, mini salmon quiches, arancini balls.... and plenty of them. I think most people were almost full before they'd even gotten to the dinner part of the evening.
We then had dinner - alternate fish pies and beef braised in guiness pies, served with mashed potato and peas. Jenny made all of it (she was the chef at the Stirring Pot restaurant for a few years!). I'm not a big fish fan, but the fish pie was delicious! Dessert was fruit stewed in brandy, with icecream, followed by platters of cheese and biscuits, fresh from the Queen Vic Markets, and platters of hand made chocolates to accompany the coffee/tea.
Wine flowed freely that night. Michael counted that our table (of 8) went through at least 10 bottles. Before dinner was even served, I had a bottle of red knocked over almost on top of me. And it wasn't even me that did it, it was Jenny's son-in-law! Before anybody was even pissed! I only got a bit on my sleeves and pants, so it wasn't too bad - though I did reek of eau de Cab Sauv all night.
Jenny is an Elvis fan, so she had an Elvis impersonator singing songs and entertaining us. It was hilarious watching him kissing up to all the older ladies, the supposed prim and proper matrons. Like hell they are!
Jenny's grandchildren got up on the stage to give a speech about there Nan. I loved the story from one of the grandsons, now about 21. He said that when most people talk about grandmothers, they have the image of the knitting, tea sipping little old ladies. When he tells people about his Nan, he tells this story which epitomises the character of Jenny. "She went to a kitchen store in Melbourne and bought a $60 pepper grinder. When I asked her why she spent so much money on a pepper grinder, she said "Because it's fuckin' classy, asshole"." Yep, that's Jenny!
After copious amounts of wine had been consumed, dinner had been eaten and Elvis had exhausted his repertoire, a few of us (included Jenny's slightly uninhibited daughter) got up on the dance floor and shook our groove thing. The others just retired into the bar and kept drinking. We finally got kicked out at 1.30am, so they could lock up the club.
It was a fantastic night!
The next morning, we were invited to Jenny's for breakfast. I had thought it was just going to be a small select group of family and close friends... and it was, about 60 of us! I'd been supplying Jenny with eggs for weeks previously and I'd wondered if I'd been oversupplying her. Nope, she was also getting eggs from another source and had over 14 dozen. John, her son that owns and chefs at his Melbourne restaurant, stood in front of the stove poaching eggs for most of the morning. There was a large bowl of fruit salad, poached eggs, bacon, toasted homemade bread, tomatoes. A barista friend brought along his coffee machine and was doing coffees with the loveheart or ferns in the milk trick. The first bottle of champagne was opened about 9.30am.
Jenny mentioned that she had gone to bed about 4am. She'd invited her family in for a nightcap, so they finished off another three bottles of wine..... and then she saw the scotch and thought that looked like a good idea. Yet she was up bright and chirpy (and still probably pissed) with no sign of a hangover, whilst her fellow nightcappers looked like death warmed up.
It was a wonderful weekend, only marred by the fact that Jess greeted us on arrival home with her tail between her legs. It seems that whilst the girls were occupied inside the house with painting their nails and playing the Wii, the flying chook (the one that laid the enormous eggs) flew out of the protection of the pen and was 'plucked' by the dogs. So we are down to five chooks and none of them have shown an interest in flying...... yet.
Cooking
Caitlin had to make a variation of a pancake recipe, including fruit, for her home ec assignment. She came up with layered chocolate pancakes with bananas and strawberries. Looked quite.... edible :)
So I tried a variation on the cake I'd made for her birthday - a chocolate cake injected with caramel, and covered with crushed crunchie pieces. It didn't last long!
So I tried a variation on the cake I'd made for her birthday - a chocolate cake injected with caramel, and covered with crushed crunchie pieces. It didn't last long!
Caitlin's Photos
Caitlin borrowed my camera two weeks ago to practice taking photos. She came up with some good ones.
Monday 7 September 2009
Another notch in the belt (or colour)
Caitlin had her karate grading on the weekend. She passed, and is now a green belt.
So watch out chooks, Caitlin can beat you up. Don't worry sheep, you're still safe until she becomes a black belt.
So watch out chooks, Caitlin can beat you up. Don't worry sheep, you're still safe until she becomes a black belt.
Camping - in your own bedroom
Mim decided last night that she wanted to camp. So she set up her fold up bus, put the sleeping bag inside it and crawled in.
I heard some noises from her room after I'd switched off the light but wisely chose to ignore her. Sure enough, she went to sleep soon after. When I checked on her, she'd put her toothbrush, paste, hairbrush and lipgloss in a container next to her pillow. Just in case she needed a photoshoot as soon as she woke up?
I heard some noises from her room after I'd switched off the light but wisely chose to ignore her. Sure enough, she went to sleep soon after. When I checked on her, she'd put her toothbrush, paste, hairbrush and lipgloss in a container next to her pillow. Just in case she needed a photoshoot as soon as she woke up?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
