Blogtoberfest day 5

I'm the type of person who can't sit and do nothing, my hands always need to be busy! So when I'm having a bit of down time watching some TV with the kids this is what happens to my coffee table.....

  These little owl friends are waiting for their feet and wings, and I don't know why it is but I always make them in pairs. Probably so they don't get lonely!
Here are some delicious Spinach and Feta Triangles that my son made for us. Super easy and perfect for the kids to make. Only difference between our and the recipe and this one is we added some bacon.........even yummier!

Spinach and Feta Triangles

3 tablespoons olive oil

1 onion, finely chopped

315g frozen spinach - thawed, drained, chopped and squeezed dry

1 teaspoon salt

100g feta cheese, crumbled

125g cottage cheese

1 egg, beaten

1 packet puff pastry

50g unsalted butter, melted

How to

Heat olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Add onion and slowly cook and stir 5 minutes until tender. Add Spinach and salt and making sure all liquid has evaporated from spinach, stir in feta, cottage cheese and egg. Cook and stir until thickened, 5 - 10 minutes.

Preheat oven to 200 C

Unwrap pastry and lay out on flat surface. Cut each piece into 4, then brush the edges with melted butter. Place a heaped tablespoon of the mixture on each square. Fold one end of the square over so it forms a triangle, press the edges together. Brush with melted butter then bake for approx 12 to 15 minutes or until golden and crunchy.



Happy Blogtoberfest!

Things I'm loving.

Today I thought I would play along with Paisley Jade's " Things I'm Loving " and just share a few snippets of things which make me smile.

Firstly is the fact that I actually got some work done yesterday, it's amazing what you can achieve when your husband takes the kids to school and you can get an early start. I really enjoyed making some more little birds for a few orders I need to get done....I made sure to make an extra for Megan's room this time.

 I'm loving the fact that there is some action out at our block. These big trenches are for power, water and phone. These two little possums are so excited!

 I'm loving the look of my new Home pears!

I love it when I make something for my family ( Lemon butter ) and they totally eat it all in three days. Luckily I have plenty of lemons left and I can make some more!

If you want to join in head on over to Paisley Jade and say hello.

Lovely Lemons.

Last week I was given a huge big bag full of these gorgeous lemons, they are the first thing I smell when I walk in the kitchen of a morning. My dilemma was how do I use that many lemons? I'm not a huge pie maker..... but I'd like to give it a go. I've already used them in a fish dish.....but I still have a huge amount left.

 Last night before all the excitement of Master Chef about to start on TV I decided to give my first ever batch of lemon butter a go. My daughter Megan loves lemons, she'd suck on a lemon before she'll eat an orange so I knew she'd love lemon butter smeared all over her morning toast! 

To my surprise it was really easy to make, you just have to be prepared to whisk until your arms ache!

Recipe found here.

Rudolf is on his way!

Where did the time go? Christmas is upon us and I'm so looking forward to spending a bit of time with the kids and not having to worry about homework, sports activities and having to put a bit of spit and polish on the kids every morning as they adorn their uniforms!

I think the kids sometimes have a better social life than their parents. This time of year there are plenty of christmas parties to attend and today Megan was having her class party at school. I wanted to do something special for the kids and I have to admit that I totally copied this idea from Melissa Goodsell over at Day by Day, there is a picture of these scrumptious reindeer treats in her festive blog banner and I fell in love with the idea!
So because we had an end of year school mass last night and we didn't get home til late, the kids and I were up at 10pm cutting, slicing and piping to get these done for school today!

They looked gorgeous as they just kept multiplying and multiplying.......I found it hard not having a little taste, Megan didn't find it hard resisting, she jumped at the chance to accidentally destroy one so it had to be eaten!

So here is the difference between my two kids......one wants all the bells and whistles while the other is content with a bag of corn chips for his class party ( which happens to be at the pool ).

I hope you are all enjoying the end of year festivities!

Thanks for stopping by.

Yummo!

Because my husband accidentally took my camera to work today I am unable to show you what I've been doing today. What I can show you is the absolutely delicious Spinach and Feta Pie I made the other night!
It doesn't look exactly like the one in the Donna Hay book as I didn't have a food stylist on hand, but it did get the thumbs up from everyone at the table!

New Cook Book.

Yesterday afternoon while at the Post Office I spied this gorgeous book. It's a collection of "the best of Donna Hay magazine", and I think it was an absolute bargain at only $29.99. I don't feel that I'm a very inspirational cook ( give me something to sew no problems ) but the simplicity of these recipe's and stunning photography is sure to get me a little inspired in the kitchen.

I think there might be something special on the menu for dinner tonight.

I have Ryan home sick for the third day in a row today.....poor little possum! I'm sure he'll be feeling better in a while ( after the antibiotics kick in ) and be wanting to make something for himself out of my new book.

Thanks for stopping by.

Birthday Cake - My Creative Space

It's not a Donna Hay cake........but I'm not Donna Hay, and considering my cake making skills ( cooking skills for that matter ) I think it worked out pretty good. It was a total hit with the kids and for me.....that's all that counts!
I took a few tips from Donna in a recent Master Chef show.......the one with the layer cake. I made a couple of these and put them in the fridge to cool before I cut the layers.

I put some frosting in between the layers. Please excuse the slightly over-cooked bits, they were the tops so I stuck them in the middle ( after I sliced the bump off ) and used the bottoms for both the top and bottom of the stack.

I then gave it a good coating with some soft pink icing.

I melted an entire big bag of chocolate melts and put it in a piping bag so I could do some crazy piping on baking paper. This was the first time I tried this and I'm really pleased with the way it turned out, but next time I'll take a little more care with my design now that I know I have a few minutes to play with the melted chocolate.

Just as the chocolate was almost set I stood it up and pressed it around the cake ......like a crown!

I had a little chocolate left in my piping bag so I made a little flower to go on top.

I finished the cake a few hours before we needed it and I noticed that there were a few gaps in the chocolate.........I wonder who that could have been?

This kid loves anything with chocolate!

Megan had her little friend Tayla for a sleepover last night.......sadly I think it going to be the last. Tayla has just moved away, and even though these girls haven't been at the same school since Megan changed her school last term, they have been best friends for the past two and a half years!

They always had a great time together......we are really going to miss her.

We are hoping she can visit during the next school holidays.
For more creative spaces head on over to kootoyoo and take a look.

Campoven Weather!

The past few days have been a bit crazy trying to manage the kids and their activities ( at two different schools ) and trying to keep up with some Shop Handmade goodies. I managed to get another box ( the second this week ) in the post by lunch time Friday. Now I am going to devote the rest of my weekend to completing my Handmade Living submissions.......I've just set up a few props and I plan to have a bit of a photo shoot in the morning with some beautiful early morning light!

But for the past few hours we have been doing this......
It's perfect lamb shank weather, and what better way to cook it than on a campfire!

In about another hour when it's dark we are all going to sit around the fire, chat and cook marsh mallows on a stick........mine usually falls off the end of the stick into the fire. The kids are outside right now keeping an eye on things.......there is something about fires totally mesmerizing to the kids, they love having to go and collect logs in the Ute and help dad build the fire!

I remember doing this kind of thing many times growing up, mum wouldn't see us kids all weekend except for when we ran out of food to cook and we needed more supplies. I wonder if I can keep the fire going for the next three days? I think that's a plan!

Hope you are all having a lovely long weekend, stay safe and keep warm!

My Creative Space.

Well I gave the new glue gun a bit of a run yesterday afternoon, I'm not a big glue fan but I have to use it to secure the sticks inside my pears. I think I might go back to using my strong glue in a bottle, while it might take a little longer to dry than the glue gun glue at least I won't MELT THE SKIN OFF MY FINGERS in the process. That thing is seriously hot!!! Maybe I could find one with a temperature control......do they exist?

I bought a tray stand thingy last week so I could move my little creative mess around without much difficulty, and so my coffee table didn't become a makeshift craft table of an evening. It works really well for what I need and it's currently full of almost finished goodies bound for Shop Handmade.
My son Ryan is having a bit of a Creative Space this week. He is one of those kids that can pick up a recipe book and make what ever takes his fancy! He made these delicious cupcakes.

Then he decorated them in his own creative way...........pretty aren't they?

Although I think next time I might help him with the quantity of food colouring he uses in the icing........his teeth turned blue after eating this!

Hope you enjoyed my creative space this week? Head on over to Kootoyoo and say hello to Kirsty and all her creative space followers.

Stitching and Creative Thinking!

Here is a glimpse of a new cushion I've been working on.........I'm was hoping to have it finished by now but between all the commotion in the chook yard and having a dose of the runs yesterday I just didn't feel like it!
Remember how I told you that Ryan thinks he's a bit of a whiz in the kitchen, well he spent most of Sunday cooking up a storm for us all, he wanted to cook something for dinner so I asked him if he could do a potato bake. I told him he needed to dice an onion, I also told him to be quick or his eyes would start to sting and he'd cry!

This is what I found him doing..........now that's creative thinking!

Dinner was nice.......and he was very proud of himself, and so was I !!!

Have a nice day.

My vintage find!

I love my little vintage thread collection, I bought 5 reels at an antique store in Huonville while on holidays in Tasmania. I was quite proud of my small find and was eager to show it off to my mother, she thought they were lovely then showed me what was inside her sewing cabinet ( which very rarely gets used these days ) a whole heap of thread which would have to be 40 years or more old! They weren't any good for sewing with anymore so I claimed them all.....now I have 16 reels of vintage thread for my collection!
Here is another little owl......I named her "Floss", can you guess why?

Here is Floss and some of her friends ready to be boxed up. I made my own cards to go with them and I'm really pleased with how they turned out.

And finally here are some yummy Lemonade Scones which we made to have with our morning cuppa yesterday......super light and fluffy, I didn't follow the recipe exact and they still turned out great.......something that never happens for me!

If your want to check out some more great Vintage Finds head on over and visit Sophie, she found an old frame, chair and a ladder......all of which I wish were mine!

Another Huge Weekend!

My kids have a new hobby......cooking!!! They spent last Thursday and Friday in the kitchen cooking up a storm, literally, you wouldn't believe the mess that was left. It's really great to know that they want to learn....great skill to have! They're even wanting to help with the dinner of a night time which is great except that they need to learn that when you get meat ( a ham specifically ) out of the freezer that if you don't want it you need to put it back in the freezer.....NOT IN THE PANTRY!!! Yep I found a whole ham DEFROSTED in the pantry!

Here is Megan with one of her creations.......don't you love the amount of choc chips she sprinkled on top? Clever Girl!!!
I love this!! This one of the many new belts I made for the markets.......of course I had to keep one for myself! I still have some little kids belts and mummy belts left, I will list them in my side bar after Christmas if you are interested.

The "50" on the belt is not the price it's the length in inches. The belts made for mums are 4cm wide and sell for $30 each.

The kids belts come in 25 inch and 24 inch lengths and are 2 - 2.5 cm wide, the sell for $15 and $18.

There are a few new colours which will be available soon so stay in touch for that one.

Another huge weekend over, the kids went down to my mothers and then over to our farm to do some cattle work, and I spent all day Saturday sewing like a mad-woman getting ready for the markets in Tamworth on Sunday, had a great day.....now I'm looking forward to a big rest.

Hope you are all ready for Christmas.

Time to cook!

On Sunday Megan decided she was going to turn our dining room into a nursery for all her babies, she fussed and changed them, fed and rocked them when they cried, when she decided that it was time for all the babies to sleep she wanted to do something which involved cooking!
So it became pancakes with a twist! She was told only to put one or two drops of food colouring in.........it didn't quite happen like that I knew it wouldn't, I knew even before we started that she would tip half the bottle in!

Food colouring overload!

I wonder how it's going to taste?

We used cocoa for the chocolate ones then put them in the pan!

One by one she poured waited for bubbles and flipped. Don't they look........errr colourful?

And take a look at this...........

They turned out amazing, the colours are beautiful and so pretty all together. All I wanted to do was take pictures of them and all Megan wanted to do was eat as many as she could.

They were (surprisingly) very nice to eat and didn't last long.....I had to put some away for Dad and Ryan otherwise they were going to miss out!

I've been getting a bit creative over the past few days so hopefully I'll have a picture or two to share very soon.

Hope you are all having a great day!