Sunday, December 29, 2013

Lovely slow days ...

 

This is the makings of a trifle - sponge roll in the bottom doused with Tia Maria (use whatever liquor takes your fancy - sherry, port, kahlua are all good) then put in the orange jelly and set it. Then I put in a good layer of brandy custard then layered the (drained) tinned peaches on that. Finally a raspberry jelly is added to the top. Serve with cream if you like. Its a bit naughty be ause I am the only one who likes trifle in my family...its half gone now!

Just when I said Gus didn't need another fire recepticle to cook meat on ... we gave him another for Christmas! This is his new spit roaster - I can see many yummy meals ahead using this beast! This is a small leg of lamb which we all declared delicious!

The smell of the fat dripping onto the coals was amazing.

Morning quiet time - a coffee, some malt roll and a cherry ripe ball! We closed our business on Friday and Saturday to allow us and our staff 5 clear days off work. Its been lovely not having to 'get up and go'!

Someone put this list on Facebook and its exactly how I feel!

Gus made this Pork Tikka Masala on Friday night. I made fresh naan bread and the cucumber, mint raita and the meal was so yummy!

Gus got some pictures hung on walls - he is a Carlton Football Club fan and was given this Mark of the Century picture of his favourite player, Alex Jesaulenko by our staff for his 50th birthday back in June. He was very pleased with it. It is now hanging proudly in our hallway.

He also received this framed guernsey from his family. Go the Blues!

I received this print for Chrismas from Gus and the girls. I have been admiring it in a gift shop here in town for months ... I showed Kirby the other day and she was onto it!

Our 'new' house is just over 9 years old now and we have been very lax in putting up pictures (Gus hates drilling holes in stone walls!) so this wall had been bare all that time. Now it has the perfect print up which I love!

Here is gorgeous Brianna with her boyfriend. They were attending his sister's vow renewal back in Adelaide. She finished up her placement at our local hospital and received a great review from the head of nursing saying she was as competent as a 3rd year nursing student (Bri is 2nd year) and had a great relationship with the patients and nursing staff alike.

Kirby is at The Falls Music Festival in Lorne, Victoria with her friend, Matilda and some others. Four days of camping with minimal showering, no hair straightener or blowdryer (gasp!), dust, flies etc. We thought she went off well prepared (with everything but the kitchen sink!) but when she arrived she discovered that the tent we lent her had NO TENT POLES OR PEGS! Sorry, Kirbz! Parent fail !!

Fortunately, someone else they knew had a spare tent so they are using that! This is a view of where they are situated and where the festival is held (the big marquees in the distance). Apparently 30,000 people attend each year! I could think of nothing worse but she is enjoying it!

~

Yesterday, I had a lovely catch up with an old schoolfriend, Cindy, who lives away on a big sheep station out of Broken Hill, NSW. She has raised 3 children, home schooling them and also they did School of the Air (out of Port Augusta, SA). Another school friend, Heather, organised the get together with our other friends who are still local - Carmel, Kerryl, Pierina and Helen - we had lunch at our local Community Club. Lots of reminiscing and talk of kids growing up, comparing aches and pains etc. we hope to do this again in July when Cindy comes down this way again! We all turn 50 next year! :)

So thats me in a nutshell since Christmas. We are preparing Ruby so we can go for an overnight beach stay for New Years Eve then have a day at the beach NYDay. If I am good, Gus is taking me out to lunch today too!

What have you been up to since Christmas??

Cheer- Joolz xx

 

5 comments:

  1. Sounds like a lovely time Joolz. It's wonderful to slow down isn't it? Love the print!!

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  2. I enjoyed seeing your Christmas catch up Joolz.

    I am afraid that I am so over food at the moment, I feel like this every Christmas lol

    We are doing not much at all, and that is just the way I like it. I am getting to sit up late and sleep in in the mornings, something I don't get to do very often. I am getting to sit in my recliner with my laptop and catch up on some blogs I have been neglecting, I am getting to "just be" for a little while :)

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  3. got to love a good trifle..............do you pour the runny jelly on the cake and set it that way????? I usually put a custard on the cake...........oh and you have to have a drink of whatever you are wetting the cake with too............yummo
    got drunk on trifle once when I was about 6yrs old.............woops.............

    bit busy here with a few days out..............then today I have been outside most of the day..........feeding sheep then cows, caught a calf and brought it home......another one...........then lunch then went pigging with the boys at the neighbous and got 5 pigs...........swim in the pool and just about to cook tacos for dinner here with the neighbours...............nice..............

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  5. Oh that trifle sounds great. I haven't made trifle for ages because they don't sell jelly here would you believe. I try and remember to order it from England with other things I miss (like caster sugar, vanilla essence, pearl barley, Vegemite, TimTams). I must add it to my list.

    I usually use sponge on the bottom and sides (but I'm going to use sponge roll next time - what a good idea!). Then I crush 12 macaroons over the sponge. After I mix the peach syrup and sherry and pour over the sponge and add layers of chopped peaches, jelly (I like Port Wine jelly) and custard. Then decorate with lashings of whipped cream, a few peach slices and grated chocolate or those decorative glace cherries. It usually disappears quickly in this house.

    We are still eating our way through leftovers and bemoaning the fact that there's no snow this year. Although it means we can go out in our caravan for New Year's Eve. Our little doggy is scared of fireworks and it's full-on here with everyone buying them and letting them off, so we're going out to some lonely spot in the middle of nowhere for her sake. But I'll make a lovely dinner and we can sip champagne and hope that the aurora borealis appears so we get our own quiet fireworks anyway.

    Enjoy your NYE! And "see" you next year :-)

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