We had a really lovely time at the park yesterday, I do hope we get some more lovely Autumn days like that again. I did notice a lot of trees with some chestnuts, so in a few weeks time we will have to go chestnut picking. There is nothing I love more than chestnuts roasting on an open fire; cheesy I know but thoroughly fabulous in my opinion.
I think we will be having a more indoor day today, playing some of the kids computer games and board games etc. We are off to see the new Disney film “UP” later, which I must admit I am quite looking forward to. I will let you know what I think of it tomorrow!
Some brilliant news! My darling daughter’s netball team won their first ever match last night, so we had home-made pizza for dinner and ice-cream for pudding as our celebration! I was so proud of her.
Well, with half-term looming next week it looks like I’m going to be spending the rest of this week getting ahead with all my various jobs around the house in preparation for having the brood in! In addition to thinking up various activities to keep them occupied and prevent any kind of cabin fever setting in. Unfortunately it doesn’t look like the weather is going to be up to much so indoor activities are a must. Sadly Centre Parcs just isnt going to happen right now; we really need to put out extra money into the house. I’m off to research some other fun things to do now! We had a great time at water world recently, so perhaps a revisit may be in order! I must see what is showing at the cinema too, it’s been ages since we had a visit.
Hi there everyone.
I have a slight case of the Tuesday blues today, especially as it is so thoroughly grey and miserable outside today. Is it too early to assume SAD (seasonal affective disorder) is kicking in already? Probably! I have lots of tedious jobs to get on with today that seem to have all caught up with me at once and I know the longer I put them off the worse its going to get.
On a much lighter note, I just wanted to give another shout out to the fantastic Bambino Goodies Blog. I do check in on it a fair bit and would recommend it to all of you who have younger children especially. I also got my Centre Parcs inspiration from there too. Anyway, there is a great post all about the StoryBox Books my kids and I love up now, which is always great to read. So for all of you with bambinos, check it out!
As the weather was so good last night, we decided to BBQ the salmon I had ready for our dinner last night. I was going to serve it with a salad, but I had a quick search for some new recipes to try out and came across this “Asian Salmon” dish I was keen to have a try. While Michael cooked it on the BBQ I did a quick stir-fry with yummy noodles, broccoli and sugar snap peas. We just served the salmon steaks on top of the stir fry and everyone loved it. Plus it was a very healthy and nutritious meal, which always puts a smile on my face. It’s so so simple, and makes a change from the salmon with Caesar salad and new potatoes which is my culprit standard dish when we have salmon steaks in!
Good morning everyone. I hope you all had a lovely weekend, we certainly did!
I have just got back from dropping the kids off at school and am being very naughty and enjoying a croissant and a cup of coffee while I reflect on our lovely weekend.
On Saturday, I did help Michael out with a bit more DIY around the house as we have re-painted the whole hallway and are in the process of trying to spruce the whole house up, bit by bit. After a hard days work we had home-made pizzas (kids favourites) and then of course we sat around to watch the first leg of bootcamp on the X factor. I was really surprised at some of the people who went home, especially as those two obnoxious twins went through. I really don’t like them at all! I am yet to see the Sunday episode as we we didn’t get home until 8 o clock, but which point the show had already started, and to be honest we were pretty exhausted and I needed to get things ready for the kids to go to school this morning. So, I have that to look forward to this evening when the kids get back from school!
Sunday morning we had a bit of a lie-in followed by a delicious brunch of spanish omelet (made with my free-range eggs courtesy of the chickens in the garden 
). Then we headed out to Knole park in Kent (quite the trek but definitely worth it!) We arrived just after lunch and the sun was shining in the beautiful blue sky, it was just perfect – who would have thought it was nearly October? As we are members of the National Trust we had the opportunity to explore the magnificent house, although I must admit it is more my cup of tea than the kids, so after about an hour or so we headed out into the park and grounds. We enjoyed a delicious ice-cream as we started to go for a wander around the neatly kept gardens and grounds before heading out for a proper walk around the deer park. We did manage to see a fair few deers and stags which was just wonderful, especially as the kids have been learning all about these wonderful creatures in this months Storybox; they were very pleased!
As the sun started to go down we headed back to our car to come home. Unfortunately we did hit a fair bit of traffic on the way home, so we did something that is a real treat for my kids – stopped for a McDonalds. I don’t normally allow this (I’m such a party pooper) but seeing as the kids eat junk food so infrequently I thought go on then. I was pleased that I was able to order a side salad instead of chips with my meal so I suppose they must be becoming more aware of the health conscious people like myself.
Anyway, we will be having a lovely healthy salmon salad tonight while we finally get to enjoy last nights X factor!
I did a bit of research yesterday about nice places we have not been to before where we might be able to see some deer having learned all about the Stag in this month’s StoryBox.
As you will probably know, we also enjoy hiking and walking so the more research I did, the more I thought it would be nice to go for a lovely walk in a deer park and hope to catch a glimpse of some wild stags.
I have decided we are going to go for a stroll around the National Trust (we are members) Knole park in Kent (a fairly long drive, but worth it I feel having read about it). Especially as not only can we have a wander around the grounds and gardens but they also have a magnificent house to explore too.
Have a lovely weekend and hopefully I will have some good news to report about our weekend too.
I thought I would give a mention to my lovely chickens today, as I haven’t blogged about them in a while, and this week they have kindly laid me lots and lots of delicious free-range eggs.
As a result tonight we will be munching a nice big fritatta, the only problem being now is I am not sure what to chose to put in it. The classic spanish with potato, onion and cheese always goes down very well, but I have lots of vegetables to use up, so I’m thinking I might try out a courgette and pepper version. Fingers crossed it will still be very tasty.
I think we will be having another fairly home-based weekend; Michael wants to re-paint our hallway, but first of all we will have to agree on a colour! Looks like a trip to B and Q…
Have a lovely weekend!
As I mentioned yesterday, I was hoping to do something a little different with the remaining blackberries we picked on Saturday. I was looking through lots of different tasty recipes online yesterday, and was totally stumped as to what to chose. Then I came across a recipe for Blackberry Vodka, which I thought could be very interesting indeed. It was suggested that the optimum time to leave it for after making was 3 months, which would mean if I made it around now we would have a tasty home-made tipple for Christmas, so I am going to give it a go!
Recipe:
Into a 1 litre sterilized bottle, put approx 12oz blackberries. Add 4 good tablespoons of demerera sugar, 8 cloves and some broken cinnamon stick.
Then top up with cheap Vodka. A 75cl bottle should be enough. Put the lid on and wait… (ideally 3 months)
Then strain the liquid into another bottle. The berries can also be eaten and are delicious with ice-cream.
Looks like we will have a real treat this Christmas! Now I have to track down some cloves.
Good Morning everyone,
What a wonderful weekend we had after all; I was expecting the weather to turn bad on Saturday, but clearly the weather man had got it wrong again. It was a bit cloudy on Saturday morning but by the afternoon we had glorious sunshine. We decided go and have a walk in the local country park, and went down to the lake to feed the ducks, which the kids loved. We also found some bushes absolutely full of big tasty blackberries, so we went back with a couple of plastic shopping bags and picked as many as we could! I have frozen half of them, but used the other half to make a tasty blackberry and apple crumble which we had for pudding after our Sunday dinner (Michael was a happy chap!).
Of course on Saturday evening, having had a thoroughly lovely afternoon we all got together to watch the latest X factor. Whilst we did all love it, I have to admit, the contestants seem to be getting stranger and stranger! The lady who had entered in the groups for example, as opposed to the over 25 year olds, with a dog for her singing partner had to be slightly unwell! I was actually discussing this with another mummy blogger, the lovely Natalie from Bambino Goodies (a fantastic blog with lots of handy info on all sorts of kids goodies, along with lots of info on some great bargains/discounts). She thought that the audition stages aren’t as entertaining with the audience, and I think I would agree. However, after Susan Boyle’s troubles earlier on in the year, perhaps they are necessary to ensure contestants will be able to cope with the pressure. I did feel very sorry for young blonde girl who didn’t quite make it; bless her, she seemed so lovely.
For now I am off to investigate something more exciting to do with my remaining blackberries as I always make a crumble with them! I will let you know tomorrow if I have decided what they will become.
Well, this is the final weekend before all the kids return to school on Monday so we thought we would do our best to make it extra special and enjoy some great quality family time.
Michael has promised to be home nice and early tonight after work so that we can have a games evening together while we also enjoy a mexican-theme food night. I have bought some fresh avocados to have a go at making some fresh guacamole, plus some sour cream and fresh chillies and coriander to try and make it as authentic as possible. I was inspired by Jamie Oliver’s new cooking show “American Roadshow” that was on the other night; he spent some time cooking lots of mexican dishes that looked totally delicious so I thought I would have a go myself tonight too!
I am really looking forward to making eating lots of delicious food and playing all of our games later; Guitar hero, cranium and of course our home-made skittles game
Then tomorrow we are all going over to one of my best-friends house for a lovely lunch. I have blogged about her before, she is the one who lives on a farm and has two lovely horses that the children just love to ride! I haven’t seen her all summer though so it will be good to have a catch up, plus Michael can enjoy a nice beer with her husband Neil.
Then of course in the evening we will all be gathering around the goggle box to enjoy X-factor and probably some homemade pizza and popcorn! I can’t wait. So far we are already all totally hooked by the new series, sad but true!
