Christmas Cheer

Well Christmas has come and gone – boy does it happen fast~!!  We had a family Christmas Eve dinner at home with glazed Ham and Turkey and vegetables. The baby carrots were grown by my sweetie and were delicious. Dessert was made by Michaela – a chocolate cheesecake with Ice cream, mince pies and brandy custard. I think we all overate. Now we are ploughing our way through the leftovers all week!!

Every year we try and take an updated photo of the family to send back to family in South Africa. This always causes some groans and moans but I must say the family are getting better at it. This year was probably the most successful self-family portrait we have done – teenage son is over his puberty grumpiness and has come out of his shell so he was happy and the girls have no problem having their photos taken so all was well. We decided to do some serious photos followed by some silly season photos. What fun we had – the giggling was intense.

A number of people here in Australia put reindeer antlers and a red nose on their cars – this has had hubby in stitches all December  and he has not been able to get over how ridiculous it looks. Michaela and I were in the store the other day looking for props for our silly photos when we spotted the car reindeer kit. It was marked down to a $1.50 so we couldn’t resist. We wrapped it up and gave it to Hami as an early Christmas gift. The shrieks of laughter when he opened it had us all rolling on the floor. Eldest son vowed that if he put it on the car he would not travel with us. In the end hubby attached the antlers to his hat and put the nose on for our silly photo. Here are the photos we took.

Then our real family photo

Christmas morning was a great success. Everyone got what they wanted – and all were happy. Teenage son wanted a Onesie (this is like an all in one babygro for adults – apparently all the rage – to be honest I had no idea what it was until I ordered it online.) he chose a bear and was very happy with it – great for winter I believe – now Michaela wants one for her birthday.

 

We hope you all had a Happy Christmas and that the New Year will bring new adventures for you all.

What are we looking forward to in 2013:

• Michaela starts University
• Fostering children in our community.
• Completing my Graphic Design studies.
• Publishing my first novel (this has to be done in 2013)
• Making a difference wherever we are.

There are so many more things I would love to write but can’t just yet so I’ll leave my list as is – I have way more expectations for 2013 but don’t want to share them all just yet.

As Dr Seuss says, ”

 “Oh the places you’ll go! There is fun to be done! There are points to be scored. There are games to be won. And the magical things you can do with that ball will make you the winning-est winner of all.”

Mornington Beach and Frozen Coke….

The weather yesterday was beautiful – not too scorchingly hot (as it can get here) but perfect for the beach. We headed down to Mornington which is a 45 minute drive from our home to soak up the sun and sea. The kids had a great time. We did miss our eldest son as he was in the city with some of his friends yesterday. Hubby and I lazed and read our books while the children paddled and swam. We had to have a chuckle though at how empty the beach was despite being summer. The reason for us chuckling is that we saw a friend from South Africa post a picture on Facebook  of the beach there. I had to put the two next to each other to give you an idea of what I am on about. I had forgotten that the beaches get crazy in Durban in summer.

I love the beaches here in Australia. We had “dirty” sand on some New Zealand beaches and even black volcanic sand which would get blistering hot, but here the sand is either very white or golden and the water crystal clear. It’s almost like swimming in a pool. Aaron and Zoe found this huge starfish too and had to take it further out into the water as they kept standing on it.

Another favourite of mine is the brightly coloured beach huts that line the beach. I would love to own one, but at about $80 000 for one I think I would rather have a caravan, a boat and an SUV for that price.

 

Our morning ended when we all got too hot and so we headed for Hungry Jack’s as they are having a $1 Frozen Coke  special. $5 later we were all slurping merrily and feeling nice and cool.

An excellent day all in all – gotta say I LOVE summer!!

Yr 12 Formal

Last night was Michaela’s formal. She looked lovely as ever and her dress was perfect for her. Don’t worry I am not going to wax lyrical about her – done that already!! Enjoy the photos.

The Big Climb

My men (Hubby and  15 year old son) went off for a boys weekend with two other blokes. They decided to climb the second highest mountain in Victoria in the snow. Well, as any interested party, I decided to Google  information on this mountain – bad idea!! I first learned that it has steep summit slopes and not a nice round dome to stand on at the top. It also has a sizable snow cornice that forms along the summit ridge in winter, the collapse of which has claimed the life of a number of people who stood on it. So I could picture them all standing on this ice that had nothing supporting them underneath and the mountain giving way. I have to admit I was very nervous initially – neither hubby nor son are trained mountain climbers although they are both fit. I also read that it gets up to -7 degrees on the mountain and the thought of them camping in tents in that weather made me rather worried. That’s what mothers/wives do – we worry when our men need these testosterone adventures. I was very good though I didn’t say no and I convinced myself that men need adventure – it’s part of their make-up ( as I am typing this I am giggling thinking how many times my Mom has climbed gorges, pushed cars stuck in mud and many other things with my Dad!!). So after trusting that Jesus would look after them and giving Him strict instructions I waved them goodbye. I did make them promise not to stand on any edges and to snuggle in one tent if they were freezing and they humoured me by agreeing. My consolation in this adventure was that they were with a friend who has climbed this mountain a few times and knows it well.

It took them about five hours to get to the mountains. The first night they slept in a cabin ready to have an early start the next day climbing. Bright and early they parked their car at Mt. Hotham and began their route across the Razorback.

This is an 11km hike across the mountain ridge through snow – a very tiring walk. It took them about 5 hours to walk to Federation Hut which is a base camp on the mountain. There they set up their tents for the night and had some lunch.

Then the hard work began. Climbing up to the peak took a few more hours. They needed to put spikes on their boots as it was an uphill climb in slippery, hard ice at times.

I was so relieved to get a call from the summit and hear they were safe ( all the while reminding them not to stand too near the edge!!). I did leave strict instructions to call me when they got back down to base camp.

They had beautiful weather during the day (although the wind howled when they slept in their tents) which was another answer to prayer. A great adventure for them both and I was so delighted at the father-son bonding time they had together – We have seen a big change in our teenage boy in the last 3 months – he is coming out of his man-cave and becoming likeable and friendly once more. (Murphy’s law – just as I type this he has made his sister cry – aaarggghhh!!!). Nonetheless we are so pleased to see him interested in family activities again, making some good friends and getting fit and gyming – all positive signs. Let’s hope this was one of the first of many father/son trips and outings.

Marengo Beach Holiday

In early January we came back from one of the nicest holidays I have had in years. We headed off to Marengo which is just 2 km from Apollo Bay along the Great Ocean Road. We camped in tents and despite the fact that our air mattress deflated every night, I had a wonderful, relaxing time – this is really the first holiday we have had as a family since we went to South Africa in 2007 so it was really needed. The campsite was crowded but absolutely perfect. We could hear the waves at night as we slept. The beach was lovely for swimming and the kids had a ball.

 

We decided to do a trip to the Twelve Apostles and Michaela was our tour guide as she had been there. I am so glad we did the drive – the scenery was breathtaking.

We then headed to Port Campbell for lunch and a swim before returning back to camp.

We had the cutest birds come to our campsite – they would hop right into the tent – these little Superb Fairywrens were gorgeous.

 

Aaron enjoyed his new cricket set and the older kids had a marvellous time catching waves on their bodyboards.

Hami and Ethan had a go at fishing too but caught nothing.

 

We took a walk to the Marriner Falls one day through the beautiful lush forests. The large tree ferns reminded me of New Zealand. Aaron and Zoe were brave enough to hop into the icy water for a dip.

New Years Eve found us heading into Apollo Bay where the kids enjoyed the carnival – Zoe experienced her first ever carnival ride (yes believe it or not at 11) and she loved it.

We saw the New Year in with an amazing fireworks display that we all enjoyed before heading back to our tents.

We were so blessed in that we had the most amazing weather – no rain and beautiful hot days. Hami and I both agreed that having an annual holiday had to become a non-negotiable event in our lives. Looking forward to the next holiday!!

Holiday outings

Last week was cold and miserable but the sun has made a comeback and this week has been glorious. Michaela has headed off with a mate from school on holiday and she is having a wonderful time. On Monday we decided to head to Lysterfield Lake for a dinner time picnic. The kids had their bikes and tried out the new BMX track there.

Aaron loved the cycle track and had great fun going around it on his little bike. We realize that we need to get him a bigger bicycle for Christmas – he seems to be outgrowing this little one. Zoe also enjoyed the track although we did have one mighty accident where she went sprawling and received two bruised knees and a grazed hand.

It was glorious sitting soaking up the sun with my spritzer (that is my favourite drink concoction –  one third of a glass of wine mixed with diet lemonade – very refreshing) and our Kentucky Fried Chicken take outs. Hubby and I relaxed watching the birds, the water lapping on the lake and the wallabies hopping past as we relaxed.  All in all it was a lovely evening.

 

 

 

I have said it before – I love the country – I think I am meant to live out in the hills away from the crazy city. I would love to just move onto the land and live off it as simply as possible – I could then really enjoy living with all my bits and pieces that I collect. We are so blessed that we live right out from Melbourne city and that we have this beautiful lake and piece of nature only ten minutes from our home.

Yesterday we had another beautiful day and so we headed down to Mornington to have lunch in the little village. Then we walked along the path and down to the rocks where the kids played.

 

 

 

 

Finally we headed for the beach and soaked up the sun. Ethan and Zoe had great fun burying poor Aaron in the sand. The sand was so fine and white that it squeaked when you jumped on it. A lovely couple of days – the only thing missing – my beautiful Michaela!!

House tour

This post is mainly for my family who have never seen my home here in Australia (except for my brother and his family). Sometimes it is hard to picture what a whole home looks like because photos don’t really show you the layout so here is my attempt to draw our house plan and to show you some photos of some of the rooms – hopefully that will enable those nearest and dearest to feel as though they know our home a little better. ( if you want to read how we have been blessed out of our socks over the last 5 weeks read my Fresh Encounters blog). God has truly been good to us and we are loving our life here in Australia – it has been a very good move for us all around. So everyone – enjoy my house tour!!

This is our main living room – a very large room with wooden floors and ceiling and some very rustic old brickwork. I must say I am not a fan of the old arches – reminds me of the seventies/eighties look. I hope to cover the fireplace arch with a very large mirror when I can find what I am looking for on ebay. I have divided the living into two areas because of the rooms size – mostly we enjoy time around the fireplace most of all. We love the new cream leather couches that were given to us – it really does make my living room lovely. We have an amazing porch that leads off our lounge and bedroom and this is also a well used area for us.

Please excuse this photo – it is a panorama of the whole living room from one end to the other so looks a little strange!!

 

 

The master bedroom leads off our living area and is completely separate from the rest of the family.

 

I love my kitchen and dining area as it is spacious and a lot of family activity happens here. We have our computer stations here and so often the whole family will be in these rooms. I love the black granite work top benches in my kitchen too – beautiful.

 

Our rumpus room is marvellous – the kids spend a lot of time in here – this is the room that can get messy and I don’t stress too much.

 

 

Don’t you love my retro wall art – a collection of vinyl records that I hung up – cheap but quite effective.

 

The kids rooms are all the other end of the house as you can see in the plan. At the moment the boys have decided they want to share a room so they are in the smallest room at the moment – we are looking at how to change this so that they can have some more space, but for now everyone is happy. There are no photos of their room – too messy I’m afraid to grace my blog!! Zoe’s room has been shown on my blog so left those pics out too!!

Michaela’s room has just had a revamp – she and a friend rearranged it the other day – she loves anything that is to do with Paris.

The garden is looking green but there are no flowers – the roses are pretty much over and they are ready to be pruned now. I think we are in for a cold, wet winter.

Hope you all enjoyed my tour and can picture us a little more in our space. And finally – a very rare picture – the four rugrats playing a game together – wonder how long that will last??

Photo Editing Tutorial

Okay everyone – I am so excited about what I have discovered using the photo editing program Picnik that I am going to share it with you. This free online editing program is so easy to use and is amazing – for a few dollars more a month you can get the premium features. Up to now I have only used the free version but I am considering paying the few dollars so that I have all the features, especially with the Graphic Design course I am studying. Start by going to the website http://www.picnik.com/ . Then click on the GET STARTED NOW button. Then click on the button that says UPLOAD A PHOTO. Choose a photo from your computer that you would like to edit. It will load the picture for you. For general editing of colour and exposure or for cropping, you can play around with the various headings on the EDIT page. I am going to show you something a little more complicated. We are going to edit photos so that there are some areas that are black and white and some areas that have colour.

This is the image I will use for demonstration.

When your image is loaded click the tab at the top of the page that says CREATE. This will relaod your photo with new headings. Click on the heading that says EFFECTS.  Now scroll down the side bar of effects – there are many to play with, but for this tutorial you need the Black and White effect. Click BLACK AND WHITE. This will change your photo to black and white. A little box that says EFFECT PAINTING should come up next to the photo – if not then look at the black and white effect box you just clicked and click on the little paint brush. Now click the side that says ORIGINAL. Then tick the box at the bottom that says REVERSE EFFECT. Immediately the colour of the picture will return. Now you are ready to play. Choose your brush size – if you are painting large areas black and white then use a large brush, but if you are painting small areas then use a small brush size. This is quite tricky as painting with a mouse is quite difficult. Begin painting the areas that you want black and white making sure to cover all areas properly. Keep areas that you want impact or contrast in colourful. If you make a mistake click UNDO at the top of the page on the right hand side.

This is what I have done.

When you have finished painting click APPLY to save it. Then go to SAVE AND SHARE to save your photo to your computer. When it has saved it will take you back to the Home page of Picnik where you click CLOSE PHOTO. Then you can start all over again by uploading a new photo to play with. Have fun!!!

Here are some of my photos of the kids that I have edited with this feature.

I really love this one – the vivid blue of the dress is fantastic with the Black and white.

Hope you all enjoy trying out this feature. As for me it is time to get back to my assignment – no more distractions – it has to be done!!!

I’m feeling creative….

I have an assignment that is fairly challenging  that needs to be done and I am procrastinating. Well actually, I am not really procrastinating – I am hoping inspiration will strike. Trying to get one’s mind back into study mode is a bit tricky and hubby has been helping me by insisting I  do an hour of study in the evening – good man that he is!! Anyway I am feeling creative – just to complete the tasks I have been wanting to tackle for ages!! My rumpus room/TV lounge is not a nice place. It is full of mismatched furniture and carpets and I am tired of it – I know what I want so I am in the process of revamping – will reveal all when it is done. Another project I have wanted to tackle for a while has been my fridge. This is an old fridge that is beginning to rust and look very unappealing as the photos show. No matter how hard I scrub the front, it still looks like there is food on the front – NOT A GOOD LOOK!!!

So my solution was to make it into a feature.  I sanded the paint on the front and down the sides of the door with sandpaper. Then I cleaned it and finally I painted it with Black chalkboard paint. Now I can stick photos on it, or write my shopping list on it – whatever mood takes my fancy!!

So here is how she turned out!!

So far no one has been allowed to write on my fridge – I am enjoying the neat black finish for awhile – this confuses the family of course but too bad!!

These are some more of the photos that I took of Aaron and Zoe at the Cheese Factory. This is a lovely old building and the brickwork made a lovely backdrop.

Getting Aaron to co-operate was a little harder – he was sick of having his photo taken by this stage so we had to bribe him with a chocolate easter bunny. Amazing what chocolate can accomplish!!

So that is what I have been up to – I have two birthdays coming up soon where I will need to come up with some cake ideas. Michaela is celebrating her 17th birthday on Mother’s day and Aaron will be 5 a week later – I can’t believe how fast they grow!!

Now it’s time I stopped playing on my blog and got down to tackling my assignment ….. mmmm …… well yes!!!

Chocolate Meringue pie and the Easter Weekend…

School has started again today and I almost feel guilty saying that I am enjoying the order of home again with the kids gone. I love having them home in the holidays but all routine does go out the window and I find myself behind on chores. Hubby is back at work too and I probably miss him most – I love the time I have with him during the school holidays!!

Yesterday Michaela made this amazing chocolate meringue pie – it was divine!!  She did this all on her own while I was out and she and Zoe were even kind enough to take photos for me so that I could blog the recipe for you.  This was the best afternoon tea I have had in a long time.

Ingredients:

• 225 g chocolate digestive biscuits
• 55 g butter
• 3 egg yolks

Filling:

• 4 Tbsp caster sugar
• 4 Tbsp cornflour
• 600 ml  milk
• 100 g plain chocolate broken into pieces

Meringue:

• 2 egg whites
• 100 g caster sugar
• 1/4 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 190 degrees. Place the digestive biscuits in a plastic bag and crush with a rolling pin. Melt butter and stir into biscuit crumbs. Press the mixture firmly into a pie dish covering the base and the sides.

Beat the egg yolks, sugar and cornflour in a large bowl to form a smooth paste. Heat the milk in a heavy based saucepan until almost boiling, then slowly pour it onto the egg mixture, whisking well.

Return the mixture to the saucepan and cook gently, whisking until it thickens. Remove from the heat. Melt the chocolate in a heat proof bowl over simmering water. Whisk it into the egg mixture to make a chocolate custard. Pour into the pie base.

Whisk the egg whites until soft peaks form.. Gradually whisk in about two thirds of the sugar until the mixture is soft and glossy. Fold in the remaining sugar and the vanilla.

Spread the merigue over the chocolate filling, swirling the surface with the back of the spoon to give an attractive finish. Bake in the centre of the oven for 30 minutes or until the meringue is golden. Serve the pie hot or warm.

I have had lots of opportunity to practice my photography this last week. Michaela had to do some photography assignment for school and her theme is Innocence so she took photos of some children. I took the opportunity to tag along and snap some photos on my camera to pass on to the Mum who “loaned” us her kiddies for the morning. These are some of the shots I got – I haven’t used their faces as I don’t feel I can paste her kids all over my blog without her consent. The faces you do see are of course my own precious darlings!!

Aaron was a bit grumpy when I took this shot but I actually quite like the look!!

This little button had a great time playing with this apple – she is so cute!!

The baby enjoyed chewing her rattle while we took photos.

The other opportunity I had to take some photos was at a wedding of friends of ours from church. Hubby did the ceremony and he did an excellent job. I thought he looked pretty hot in his suit and tie too!!

Actually both of these photos were taken by Michaela as she was standing where the light was right – the shots I got had really bad lighting!! All in all it was a busy but fun Easter weekend. Hope yours was good too!!