To Sand or Not to Sand, That is the Question.

Our carpet is green and gross.  I'm not sure why it has taken us so long to actually do something about it (probably my husband's lack of enthusiasm to do anything about the house until we actually purchased it), but we're going gung-ho now!

The carpet is sitting either in neat rolled up piles outside (my handiwork), or in a mishmash heap (Phil's) ready for the Council Clean-up next weekend.

All that's left to do now is remove more annoying little tiny staples from the floor, and figure out whether we want to sand the floors and lacquer them, or put down floating floorboard.

We're still deciding...

 Bunnings had a really good deal on these floating floorboard last weekend.  Phil bought 10 of them for $10 (an opened slightly damaged box) to see if he liked the look, and to 'play' with them.  My guess is that Bunnings might be out of stock on these ones by now - just my luck.

 He even played with a roll of underlay.  He was able to get an estimate of how many packs he would need to do the hallway.

 *Sigh* MORE annoying little staples to remove!  Seriously, these things are the absolute worst part so far about ripping the carpet up.  If we were to put new carpet down, we'd just hammer these down but as my Grandfather says; "If you're going to do a job, you may as well do it properly" and the last people definitely didn't do a proper job.  We're going to a good job *crosses fingers*!

 My tools of the trade for this task.  Can't forget the all important ipod docking station!

THE best invention ever!  I can't believe how much easier this makes pulling out those staples.  We were using a screwdriver and pliers to remove them, but this does it much faster.  Should have bought two of them Phil!  One end is a hammer, the other end is kind of like a pointy screwdriver.  The middle acts as pliers but the curve in the head means that you can 'rock' the tool to get the staples out.  Brilliant!

Stumpy Is Getting Bolder

This Eastern Blue Tongue Lizard is getting bold!  It no longer hisses at me but tries to jump up on to my hand instead of waiting for grapes to be put down on the concrete in front of it. I didn't even know they could jump!

 Mmmmm grapes!

 Swallowing grapes and dribbiling.  They crush grapes up in their jaws then wait until they have two or three lined up, then gulp them all down.  It freaked me out at first because I wasn't sure what was wrong.  You can see a mass on the outside of their neck moving down internally.

 Trying to eat hair and struggling.  I pulled it out and it gagged.  Are they even supposed to have a gag reflex? - gross!

 Back to grapes.  Much better.

These were juicy grapes.  They squirted whenever 'Stumpy' crushed them.  I hope it's tail heals.  It is still weeping a little, and I'm not so sure that's a good sign.  It seems happy enough though, and will continue to be looked after as long as it visits.

Saturday Family Chores

Recently I have been organising a Saturday chore for the family to do together (or at least for the children and me to do if Phil is out working).

A few weeks ago I decided we were going to have some water fun aka cleaning the garage door and fence near it.

 One of the tools of the trade...a soaking wet sponge.

 While the children were occupied I took the opportunity to do some gardening.

 I don't think Jacki was soaking wet at that stage, but it didn't take long for the children to end up with suds running down their arms, and then the sponges started flying!

 The ground was soaking wet, and so were we!

 The children weren't quite finished with soaking each other...I mean...cleaning things, so I moved them to the front porch where they cleaned the bars.  Ahem...

This was 3 hours later and there was still a lot of water around. My camera isn't waterproof, so I didn't get to actually take photos of everybody soaked, but the children definitely loved this project.

Mildly Renovating

Faced with the prospect of having to move if my son doesn't get into the High School we know he needs to go to, we have started to tidy the place up...which we were going to do anyway.  But now there is a deadline.  Eek!  Phil and I (mostly "I") have come up with a schedule of things that have to be done around the house.  No ifs, no buts.  Bit by bit they will get done!

The first job was ripping up the carpet in the hallway.  It was gross green stuff that really should have been removed long ago, but we didn't.

 I did this much all by myself!  It took me 10 minutes of solid work, but boy were my legs and arms wobbly for hours after that!

 The floorboards are in excellent condition!  The carpet is so very green!

 Then Phil stepped in to help.  He does a much better job.  He has muscles, you see!  It took him half an hour to do the rest of the hallway.

 But he says when he got to this part of the hallway, he was feeling that jelly-like wibble wobble in the arms and legs.  I got the job of clearing out the carpet and underlay, and sweeping up the remains.

Just the carpet in the two bedrooms to go now :D (and a time frame of one week to remove all the little 'staples').

Having one of those days?

I'm having a slow morning.  You know the ones?  When your alarm goes off and even though you know you've had what should be enough sleep, you're bone dead exhausted. (Phil had gotten up 2 hours before I did - poor him!!).

I had to get up so I could wake the children up.  It took them half an hour before they even put their feet on the floor.  Definitely a slow morning.

Piano practices were done, children showered and dressed, hair brushed, lunches made, breakfast was on the run today, prayers said, hugs and out the door.  Well, the children were out the door.  I love being able to say goodbye to them at our gate.  It takes them 5 minutes to walk to school across the oval at the top of our street.  There are no roads to cross, and with other children walking to school at the same time, I feel it is safe.

Now I'm sitting here in my dressing gown and ugg boots with leftover raccoon mascara that I thought I had completely removed last night, contemplating the never-ending list of things I have to get through today and wondering where to start.

;D So I started on chocolate mud cake.

Please Mum, Can I Have a Lego Cake?

A Whaaaaaat???

So I came up with this.  I did leave it to the last minute to bake and throw together, so here's what I did in 2 hours (including baking time):-

 1 chocolate and 1 vanilla cake with strawberry swirls.

 I went with Orchard Icing.  I bought two packs, but should have gone with three.  I was so rusty on my cake decorating skills!!

 I didn't have any colouring paste, so I had to make do with some extra icing sugar and liquid colour.  It worked just as well.

 I cut the cakes like this...

To get this.  Lego pieces!  You do need to brush the cakes with runny jam (for vanilla ones) and a chocolatey drinking powder mix for chocolate cakes otherwise the icing doesn't stick.  I was really lazy with the yellow and red blocks and didn't do that.  Silly me - I should have known better!  But I did with the blue cake (a chocolate one) and it was so much easier.

I used the screw on end of a piping nozzle (not the actual nozzles themselves though) to cut out the circles.  I guess it looked like a mini scone cutter.

If I was more patient, I would have let the cakes sit for a bit more, smoothed the icing out more, and possibly allowed some more time (not to mention the jam!!) but I had to get the kids from school and then it was on.

Needless to say, my son loved it anyway :D

Show Scones With Jam and Cream

These scones are my husband's absolute favourite.  He devours them whenever I make them.  They do have to be eaten on the day, and preferably once they hit the 'just cool' stage.

I made this batch for my children to enjoy as an afternoon snack.

Mmm!

I used:-
- 4 cups Self Raising flour
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 250 mls cream (you should use pouring cream, but I used the remainder of whatever I had purchased from Aldi)
- Up to 400 mls milk (add carefully)

Mix all these ingredients lightly.  I usually use a big bowl and a butter knife for really light results, but this time I used the Thermomix on a gentle mix until all ingredients were combined.

Knead lightly on a floured surface, roll until 2-3 cms thick.  Cut with scone cutters and place on tray.

Brush with a little milk and into a hot oven they go for approx 12 mins or until golden and risen.

Serve with butter hot, or with jam and cream when cooled.

I adore these with the Morello Cherry jam from Aldi.  It has just the right tartness for my liking with the sweetened cream I make.