Been a while....

It's been a while since I posted. Slack much?! Just a little... Well we haven't been up to too much. Just work and home life, nothing too interesting. It's Master C's birthday next weekend, so I'm planning a little party for him. Well actually I'm paying for a little party for him that I won't have to set up or clean up after. It'll be at the Playshak (pretty smart right?), so he's looking forward to that.
I can't believe he'll be 6 though. My little man isn't so little any more :( Still small enough for squishy hugs though so I shouldm't complain. I dread the day my kids turn away from me when I try to hug them. Hopefully that's a looooong way off!

We head down to Tassie in a couple of weeks for a mini break, and to visit family and friends of course. I'm really looking forward to it. And am extremely excited to catch up with my sister and her family. It's been over a year and a half since I've been back so it should be a nice visit. I'll be sure to blog on my return.

Some happy snaps to leave you with.....

Out and About

Lately we've been trying to get out and about with the kids as much as possible. Last weekend we went to the Darwin Show. The kids loved it. My purse didn't :(
As much fun as the kids had, it was more than a bit expensive and we probably wouldn't do it again in a hurry! It reminded me how different my children are though, especially when it came to the rides. Miss C and Master C were quite happy to go on the jumping castles and slow rides. Miss E however wanted to go on EVERYTHING. The upside down, sideways, backwords , hair raising and shaking ones. You name it, she was game enough to go for it. Of course she was too little for most, but a couple she was just big enough for. I went on one with her (can't remember the name) and it had me holding onto both her and the bar for dear life.
Not a scream out of her though! She threw her arms up and smiled the whole time, waving at her daddy everytime we saw a blur of him as we spun past. When we got off the first words out of her mouth were 'That was SUPER fun!' She definitely makes me laugh!
I took the kids on another spinning one, but Master C couldn't handle it and we left with him looking a little on the green side........

Today I took the kids ten pin bowling for the first time. Gee they loved it! They had me laughing so much at their moves. Master C managed to get a strike (Not even I managed to do that) and Miss E somehow managed to get a spare - more than once.
I don't know how they did it but they pretty much did better than me for the most part. All in all they had fun and I'll definitely be taking them again.

HAPPY SNAPS

Wigs from the show

Rockin' the bowling shoes

Snacking

Spider girl and Miss Butterfly



Spider Man

Mummy!



The cast comes off!

I probably didn't mention it in a previous post, but a week before I returned home Miss E fell off a slide on a playground and broke her arm/elbow. (And boy did the mum guilt play on me for not being there!)
And so the poor girl has had a cast on her arm, and almost up to her shoulder ever since. She finally got it taken off today! I'm so pleased for her as it's been very heartbreaking watching her not be able to participate with her brother and sister in all the things they do.
For instance, her sister has recently learnt how to ride a bike without training wheels. Yesterday I watched her and her brother zoom around the back yard on their bikes, and E was just standing there feeling sorry for herself.
Just one of many moments in the last month! So it was really good that she got to get it taken off today. The only issue we have now is that her arm is currently still bent in the position that her arm has been in for the last 6 weeks. Apparently this is common in young kids and can take a few days until she has movement again. Gee I hope this is the case! Otherwise it's like her arm is still broken as she cannot extend it at all and still can't do anything :(
Will see how her arm goes in the next couple of days and then provide an update.
UPDATE: It took a couple of weeks but she is finally able to extend her arm fully. She's back to her active self!

I'm Baaack

I've been home for two weeks and I'm loving it! And what's even better is getting told that I don't have to head back out for another 6 weeks. This means I'll be home up until October so I'm feeling pretty good right now!

I haven't been up to much since I've been back, just enjoying doing nothing really! And spending time with the kids of course.

We've been baking up a storm since I've been home (no pics though sorry!). I really missed cooking! It's nice to be able to do something when I feel like it, and cooking is one of those things I just have to do.

Sometimes, however, the things I make don't always turn out like I mean it to. Take today for instance. The kids and I all worked together to make Butterfly cakes. Or that's what they were meant to turn into. What they ended up turning out as was overcooked and not even worth icing. They still tasted ok but nothing to be impressed over.

But we got over it and moved on. To make up for it I rounded up the kids again and let them help me make a baked cheesecake. We followed the recipe exactly (and the mixture tasted pretty good), poured it into the tin and popped it in the oven. All was good in the world until halfway through the supposed cooking time it already looked overcooked (my darn oven!). So I turned the oven down for the rest of the time, and hoped for the best...

The result? Well it looked so good in the end that my darling son asked 'Mum is that chocolate on the top?' Um, it was a plain cheesecake.......
After some cooling in the fridge though it still tastes good. Well, as long as the biscuit base isn't eaten.........

Ah you win some, you lose some!  :)

Making Memories

Well tomorrow I go back to work, and the next day I'm heading field for three months for work, so for the past week I've been on holidays and have been trying to do as many fun things with the kids as I can.

Last weekend we went to Litchfield for a picnic and swim, and through the week we've been taking trips to the park to feed the ducks, going to the water park for a swim and a play, and yesterday it was a trip to the beach for a picnic and a play, and a stop at the water park on the way home.

I never like leaving my kids, but I hope one day they appreciate that what I do is to support them, and they don't hold any absences against me. In the meantime I'm giving them as much love and attention as I can, and memories they will (hopefully) grow up and remember.

And MAYBE they will only ever remember the times I was with them and forget about the times I wasn't..............

Easter Trip to Litchfield

After having lived in Darwin for almost two years now (wow time has flown!) I decided it was about time we paid a visit to Litchfield National Park.

I'd been wanting to go for a while, and I thought it might be the perfect thing to do for Easter Sunday. So after the kids scoffed their faces with chocolate for breakfast, we packed a picnic lunch and set off bright and early for the drive.

We decided to visit Florence Falls for a swim as it was such a beautiful day, and I must say it's absolutely gorgeous! The picture on the left is from the look-out after we'd had a swim and were on our way back to the car park.

On our way home we stopped at a park in Batchelor to have lunch. We had planned on having lunch whilst at Litchfield but it was fairly busy and we wanted to chill as a family without too many people around.

The kids enjoyed their lunch in the park (which consisted of potato salad, sandwhiches, fruit, and choc ripple cake for dessert) and really enjoyed their Easter over all.

A good day out in the beautiful Northern Territory!

This and That

I've been away from the blog world lately. Not for any reason in particular, just pure laziness really! So let's see, what have I been up to lately.....
Well I've thrown a surprise baby shower with a friend of mine for another friend of ours (which turned out as a success), and I've even thrown a Tupperware Party! It's not something I normally do (as those that know me would know), but I thought I'd give it a go as I decided it would be nice to get free stuff. As it turned out I made over $1400 in sales I did pick up a few free things which was great.

I've been baking a lot lately, though no surprises there. I'm currently sitting here feeling like a blimp due to the sticky date pudding I made from scratch about an hour ago. It was so good though! I made coffee icecream the other day, and a rainbow cake for the girls 4th birthday. The cake didn't turn out like I wanted but Miss E kindly told me that I was the best cake maker and wouldn't let me get rid of it. No pictures of any of these unfortunately though as the battery in my camera has completely died. :(

I can't believe how fast my little girls are growing. It feels like only yesterday that I was going through the highs and lows of having new born twins and just trying to get through one day at a time. Now they're four years old and in school 3 days a week. Wow!

They had a good day, though we didn't have a party or anything for them. We took them to the Playshak and Toyworld to spend their birthday money. They were kindly given enough cash as gifts to pick out their very own big girl bikes, which they absolutely love. Even Master C is jealous of them. They have been riding around all day yesterday and today on them, and hubby was kind enough to take them for a ride around the park this morning.

Master C had a good day today too. We've recently become acquainted with the neighbours (which I swore I'd never do! LOL) so he's been around there playing with their little boy all day. It's good for him because I can still see and talk to him through the fence but he's completely out of my hair!

The neighbours are nice people, one of which works on my base, so his son and Master C can boast together about their parents.

Righto I'm off to iron my cams, ready for the Monday that awaits me when I wake tomorrow.................. :/

You know you live in Darwin when...

How true..... You know you're in Darwin when:-

1. The best parking space is determined by shade instead of distance....
2. Hot water comes out of both taps.
3. You learn that a seat belt buckle makes a pretty good branding iron and bottle opener.
4. The temperature drops below 32c and you feel a little chilly.
5. You discover that in February it only takes two fingers to steer your car.
6. You discover that you can get sunburnt through your car window.
7. You develop a fear of metal car door handles.
8. You break a sweat the instant you step outside at 7:00am.
9. Your biggest bicycle wreck fear is, "What if I get knocked out and end up lying on the pavement and get cooked to death?"
10. You realise that asphalt has a liquid state.
11. Farmers arefeeding their chickens crushed ice to prevent them from laying hard-boiled eggs.
12. The trees are whistling for the dogs.
13. While walking back barefoot to your car from the beach, you do a tightrope act on the white lines in the carpark.
14. You catch a cold from having the aircon full blast while you sleep during the night.
15. You learn that Casuarina Square isn't a shopping centre - it's a temple to worship air-conditioning.
16. Sticking your head into the freezer and taking deep breaths is perfectly normal behaviour.
17. A cup full of ice is considered a great snack.
18. An electricity black out is life threatening because your aircon and your fans no longer work and you are seriously going to be cooked!!
19. You no longer sit on a couch - why would you whenyou can settle down on the cooling tiles instead.
20. You need a stubby holder to keep the beer cold, not your hands warm
21. No one cares if you walk around with no shoes on.
22. You keep everything in the fridge, including potatoes and bread etc....
23. People have enough left over beer cans to make boats out of and have a whole regatta with... 24. The effort of towelling off after a shower means you need another one right away.
25. Standing naked under a ceiling fan is an acceptable way to pass time.
26. You wait till it starts raining to go for a run!

First Day of School

Today was the day we'd all been waiting for - the first day back at school! Well it was Master C's first day back, but it was the girls' first day ever!Though they were excited, I thought that we might have an issue when it came to saying goodbye. But I needn't have worried - they were absolutely fine. After a big kiss and hug goodbye, they didn't even watch us leave. I was worried for nothing. They can't wait to go back tomorrow and play with their new friends and do more paintings. My kids are growing up so fast! :(

A broken down car and a kid in the back seat.......

I had quite an interesting day yesterday. I broke down in the car. Now this wouldn't be so bad if it was close to home on a side road or something. But this was driving through the front gate at work. Probably the most awkward spot to break down!

I drove to the airport to pick my friend up as she'd just returned from Sydney, and on the return leg the car just wasn't acting quite right. I would take off from the traffic lights and the car would only do about 5kph before eventually deciding to drive properly. Then my elecrtics stopped working i.e, no dash lights, headlights, indicators, not even the speedometer!

I had to pull over and let some cars pass at one stage as I'm sure they probably thought I was some crazy woman driver.

My friend had left her car at work while she was away, hence the reason we were headed there, and just as we'd pulled into base and were just about at the boom gate the car died completely. It was DEAD. I'd managed to start turning it into the visitor sig- in office just as this was happening but I only managed to make it halfway, so the car was still sticking out and no one could get through.

Luckily at the exact moment that I got out of the car ready to start pushing, a couple of the guys I work with were leaving base. They pulled over and helped push the car into the car park and out of the way. They were then nice enough to drive my friend to her work so she could pick up her car and come back for me and my little miss (who in the backseat was completely oblivious to the issues at hand!)

And did I mention it was pouring rain? Now this isn't just any rain, this is a Darwin downpour. It never rains lightly in Darwin! By the time my friend came back with her car and I'd rung my other half to warn him out, changed Miss C's car seat over, strapped her into the new car, and locked up my car we were soaked to the skin.

And to top it off my thong got caught in a puddle due to suction so I fell over!

Luckily I have a great partner who knows cars well, so as soon as i was home he left to go buy the part it needed (it was the alternator by the way) and went and fixed it for me, right there in the car park in front of the boom gate at work.

And don't worry, we can see the funny side of it! Ahhh such is life.....

Learning to ride

I seem to be baking so much lately that my blog is almost turning into just a baking blog! This isn't the case, and so instead of bombarding my page with just recipes I've made I have made a side page to add recipes on.
I made rum and raisin icecream last night, which i can't seem to stop eating (as you'll probably notice in the picture which has some missing in the corner!), so check it out when you have the chance. It's such a great recipe you'll be glad you did :)

I taught Master C how to ride a bike today! Without the training wheels, that is. The first time I let go of him and the bike he took off pedalling and balancing perfectly. I couldn't believe it. Made me think that I should have done it sooner. He still needs a bit of practice but no doubt he'll be making me take him riding to the park in no time. I'm so proud :)

The Cupcake Recipe

I thought I had better update this blog to add the cupcake recipe as promised, so here it is...

VANILLA CUPCAKES

2 1/2 cups SR flour

250g butter

2 tspn vanilla essence

1 1/4 cups caster sugar

5 eggs

1/2 cup milk

Preheat the oven to 180 c and line muffin pans with paper cases.

Place sifted flour, butter, vanilla, sugar, eggs and milk in a bowl and beat on low speed with an electric mixer until ingredients are just combined. Increase the speed to medium and beat for about 2 minutes, or until the mixture turns a paler colour.

Drop mix into paper cases and bake for 20 mins.

Once cool, ice and decorate as desired and enjoy!

This recipe will make about two dozen cupcakes.

Cupcakes and lego

Master C and Hubby's lego plane

Cupcakes!

The kids tried their hand at decorating
The finished products

I got bored today and decided to make some cupcakes with the kids. Now I'm not very artistic but with the kids help we did our best to decorate them with fondant icing, which we coloured with food dye. The kids made their own special ones and had them for dessert tonight. The cupcakes were vanilla and it was a really nice recipe which made almost 24 decent sized ones. I'll post the recipe tomorrow!

Hopefully this video works, because this is Master C's little video showing off a leg plane that him and his dad made. I thought it was pretty clever!

Banana Cheesecake

I made a baked banana cheesecake a couple of days ago and it was super easy and tasted divine! Master C asked me to make a banana cake but I'd been meaning to make a cheesecake for a while, so banana cheesecake is what we ended up with.

Miss E and Miss C helped me by eating - I mean adding! - in the ingredients along the way and doing the girly baking thing with them was quite enjoyable.

The cake turned out perfect for a first attempt and it was a big winner with all of the kids so it will definitely be made again!

Ok so the recipe.....

Baked Banana Cheesecake

Ingredients

1 x packet of biscuits of choice for the base, eg, nice, marie etc...

100 - 150g butter, melted

3 x 250g blocks cream cheese

4 bananas

150ml cream

120g caster sugar

3 eggs

30g cornflour

1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence

Method

Crush the biscuits in a food processer, add the butter and mix together. Place in a greased and lined 22cm round springform tin, spread evenly and press down to form the base. Place in fridge for 10 minutes.

Add the remaining ingredients to food processor and process until smooth.

Bake in oven at 170 c for 30 - 40 minutes.

And it's that simple! This makes a good amount of mixture so I made a miniature cheesecake with some of the mixture in a mini springform tin.

I LOVE this cheesecake, it was so creamy. I had to use guesswork with some of the ingredients as I don't have any kitchen scales so I'm glad it turned out.

Right now I have a pavlova baking in the oven so am looking forward to eating that too! Until next time............

UPDATE: The pav was great! Kiddies helped decorate it with whipped cream, bananas, blueberries and passionfruit pulp. Was so good even Dwayne cleaned his bowl and that's saying something! I used pavlova magic but next time I'll be trying it from scratch! Mmmmm

Holiday Shennanigans

Well last time I blogged I was looking forward to Christmas, travel, and time off from work. I've been away from work for a couple of weeks now and I must say I am thoroughly enjoying the holiday break!
The plan a few weeks ago was to spend our Christmas as a family by ourselves here in Darwin before heading off on our roadtrip adventure on Boxing Day. As the time neared closer however, we were put on cyclone watch and were preparing for a cyclone to hit on Christmas Eve.
Fearing we'd be cut off by floodwater and stuck in Darwin we didn't want to take any chances of our plans being ruined. So with half a day's notice to leave, I took the rest of the day off work and came home to start packing. We left home at 0500h the next morning, 23 dec.
The plan was then to make it to mum and dad's house in Brisbane by Christmas night and spend the last hours of Christmas with the family.
It was a long, but (mostly) enjoyable three days in the car, and Santa managed to make it to the motel room we were staying on Christmas Eve (Good ole' Santa!) so the kids were still excited and had presents to take in the car with them.
We finally finished the drive and got to Brisbane at about 1800h Christmas night and had a great Christmas dinner.
We spent the night there and the next 9 nights at an apartment in Spring Hill right near the Brisbane CBD. Hubby, the kids and me had a great time in Brissy, shopping, Going to Dreamworld (3 times!) and White Water World, Surfers Paradise, the Old Petrie Town Markets (whiched I loved!), and playing laser tag against with the family (which was awesome). The kids loved spending time with their Nanny and Poppy, and Hubby and I even had a few nights to ourselves.
It was sad when our time was up and we had to leave again. Again though, the long drive back was enjoyable. There's some great places along the way to stay at and explore. We really enjoyed staying at Barkley homestead, and Mt Isa was a good place to shop.
It was such a great holiday, I'm already looking forward to next years trip. And what's even better is I still have almost 2 weeks off work. It's so nice to spend quality time with the kiddies!