Pop the cork!

Yesterday morning we received a text message from our second son Daniel, asking if we were able to go out to their house and help them with something. This wasn't an unusual request as we do that quite often.

So when we got out there Daniel was doing some paving, and after chatting for a while, I said, "well what do you want us to do?". He said "Nothing, we just wanted to let you know that we got engaged this morning!". We were delighted, so there were hugs all round, and tears of joy!!

Telesha's family had also had a message and arrived soon after!!

We ended up out at their place for tea, testing out their new pizza oven and having a few celebratory drinks.

They don't have any plans at this stage for when and where they will be getting married, but I'm sure that will all start to fall into place as time goes along.

Very excited :)

Fun in the kitchen!

We had some friends around for drinks yesterday arvo, so I enjoyed putting some nibbling platters together.

The fruit cheese going down the middle of the above photos is really simple to make and delicious. I find the supermarket fruit cheeses a bit plasticy. The one above is Apricot and Almond and all you do is buy a block of Phildelphia Cream Cheese, allow to soften and then mix in dried diced apricots (Australian ones!) and diced or flaked almonds. Roll into a log and wrap in alfoil, then place in fridge. When ready to use, just slice into discs. They last in the fridge for quite a while. I usually do 2 logs.

 

 

I also made some Spicy Meatballs and served with a toothpick and some sweet chilli sauce for dipping. They were baked not fried...so much easier and better for you.

 

The recipe was:

500g chicken mince

½ cup sweet chilli sauce

¼ cup coriander

½ cup coconut

1 cup breadcrumbs

Mix together, roll into balls and place on lined baking tray and bake in a moderate over for around 10-15 mins.

 

This is not my photo...I forgot to take one once I'd cooked them but they looked like this!

I hope you are enjoying getting into the spirit of Christmas too.

Aahh a few days off!

It's arrived...it's that time of the year when even though there is work to do, people close their offices and take time off, and that's just what I'm doing as of this afternoon...yay!

I've just baked some Almond Crescent Cookes. I hadn't tried the recipe before but they taste quite nice.  I got the recipe from here. I gave up on turning them into crescents and instead rolled them into logs and sliced them into discs. I don't have much patience for moulding into shapes!! Some of these will get packaged into cello bags for small gifts.

I also made a version of the Chocolate Ripple Cake this afternoon as we have a Christmas breakup tomorrow and we were asked to bring a dessert. I layered Milk Coffee biscuits and Chocolate Ripple biscuits between whipped cream in which I had added some vanilla essence, icing sugar and some dissolved coffee. It will sit in the fridge overnight and by tomorrow lunchtime it will be a delicious, soft, cake-like texture. Always a favourite.

 

The letters we have received in the mail over the past couple of weeks have been an interesting mix of Christmas and Sympathy cards, due to my Dad's passing.I received some beautiful flowers too from an association I'm involved with. Simple reminders that we have lots of lovely friends.

 

I'm sure I won't get around to another post before Christmas, so I wish all my blog friends a happy Christmas and hope you can spend it with those you love.

This is my holiday workout plan!!!  Hope you enjoy my humour!!

It's been a while!

The past couple of months has been a real juggling act with my time. With Dad deteriorating daily, there have been many trips to Adelaide to be with him and support Mum.

Sadly, Dad passed away on the 6th Dec, and we had a lovely private funeral with immediate family on Tuesday morning, and then a 'Celebration of his life' service for the public in the afternoon.

We can be thankful that Dad had a very long, happy, healthy and fulfilling life and it was only in the past months due to the brain tumor that his quality of life wained.

In Dad's words..."I've had a good innings"!