Lotsa Good Stuff Happening

I've had a very satisfying week. You know one of those weeks where there's been lots of stuff happening and it's all been good stuff.
MONDAY I started this online course.

 

I have been following Pip Lincolne's blog Meet Me At Mikes for quite some time and love her style so when she offered an online course on blogging I signed up to do it. Fortunately it is a 'work at your own pace' course because other stuff has been taking up my time over the last week. I have been following most on the posts on the Facebook page and have watch a couple of Pip's video tutorials which are really helpful. I'm hoping to get stuck into it this week. If you're interested in starting a blog or feel like you need to learn more Pip is running a another course in July. 

MONDAY EVENING & TUESDAY I did some Raw Food workshops with Cat Canizzaro from Wildraw.  Cat is one of Australia's leading raw(as in uncooked) food gourmet chefs and just happened to grow up with one of my best friends, Marita. We were very lucky that Marita was able to organise for Cat do the workshops in Corryong while she was in Victoria.

On the Monday evening we made chocolates

 

Healthy, good for you, delicious chocolates, salted caramels and peppermint creams. Lucky for me Ross doesn't like dark chocolate so I don't have to share. I have been rationing myself to only a couple a day to make them last but I think I only have one left. I have bought the ingredients to make some more when I have time

On Tuesday morning we made Puttenesca Zucchini Pasta and Mushroom Kelp Noodles.

The Puttenesca was beautiful and apart from not being hot, tasted just like the real thing. I don't like mushrooms so I tried the kelp noodles with just some tamari & sesame oil. They were nice too & very good for you so I think I will start substituting them from rice noodles.

Tuesday afternoon was desserts and other sweet treats, my favourite part.

 

We made Banana Avocado Mousse with Coconut Cream, Chia Pudding, Chocolate tart and Chocolate Nut Balls from the leftover tart base. Everything was soooooo yummy,especially the tart, it was hard to believe they were good for you as well.

Cat was great fun and so full of information about nutrition as well as chefy stuff. She will be back in Victoria for more workshops/classes in later in the year, so if you're interested keep an eye on her website Wildraw or you can 'Like' her on Facebook.  The recipes are available on the website too and Pete Evans' new cook book 'Healthy Every Day' includes Cat recipe for Lemon Lime Cheesecake and she has inspired a couple of others recipes in the book as well. 

WEDNESDAY wasn't quite so full on but we did have a farewell lunch at the local Neighbourhood Centre for one our committee members who is moving to Wangaratta. I am the self appointed cake/dessert maker for these events so having been inspired by the healthy nutritious food from previous 2 days I decided to bake my Innocent Chocolate Almond Cake (no, it isn't raw)and to go with it, a Raspberry Sauce & Coconut Cream.

Forgive the inelegant foodie photo but you get the idea. I came up with this cake recipe (which I will share in another post) about 12 months ago even before I found out I have a wheat allergy. There is no sugar, dairy or flour in it but it is delish and has become a family favourite. The raspberry sauce and coconut cream added a nice touch of healthy decadence and went down a treat.

THURSDAY this arrived.

Those of you who live in Australia know what a horrid summer we had. It was very hot for a long time and here in North East Victoria we had an unusual lack of spring and autumn rain (until about 6 weeks ago). We are on town water but we don't have great pressure and we have an acre of garden to keep alive. 5 years ago we cleaned out our dam, made it a bit bigger and diverted all our rainwater from the house and shed into it so that we could use it on the garden through the summer. This has served us well up until this year when we were pumping water for the garden twice a day for most of January. The dam got fairly low (we like to keep some water in reserve in case of bush fire) and we ended up with a scary water bill as well. At the end of summer Ross and I had tossed around the idea of putting in a bore for more water.

At the football on Saturday a week ago Ross found out the drillers were going to be in town. A phone call & an internet application on the Monday and they arrived 7am Thursday to start drilling. Ross is a "get things done' kinda fella but this was ridiculous. 



 They were set up and drilling by 8.30am and hit water at 25 metres in the afternoon.

FRIDAY They kept drilling down to 72 metres to improved the water flow/supply. I spent a lot of time watching the process and marvelling at what they can do with machines these days. Once upon a time it would have been very labour intensive but now days I could almost do it(with a bit of training of course). I was glad when they stopped though because while the noise wasn't too loud in the house it was annoying enough to make it hard to concentrate. They were packed up & ready to go home by 4pm that afternoon.

We were left with a muddy mess to clean up and a bit of polypipe sticking out of the ground. Not much to show for the money but the garden will be ever so grateful in the years to come & so will I.

I had to include this photo of our little lady, Lulu, who spent the whole time wandering between the house and the drilling site for the 2 days. The autumn leaves are so pretty on the ground too.

SATURDAY was spent at the football/netball where I assist the netball coach and umpire the 'A' grade game.

SATURDAY EVENING Ross & I went to his High School class reunion.

The photos were taken in individual classes. This is the 'C' class, Ross is hidden up the back on left.

It was a great night. Even though I wasn't in this class at school I was friends with most them so it was great to catch up, reminisce, have a few laughs and dance the night away. Fell into bed at 2am.

SUNDAY  I woke at 6. Technically that's a sleep in for me but 4 hours isn't really enough sleep so I declared it a 'sloth day'. A do nothing day, a bit of TV and a 2 hour 'nanna nap' in the afternoon.

 

There you go a great week don't you think? The only draw back with such a full week is that Bernina is feeling a bit neglected and I am missing working with her. Well, we will be back together pumping out some good crafty stuff pretty soon.

 

I hope to be back in the next couple of days with some recipes so stay tuned. Until then

TOODLES 

 

PS. I found this amusing; I was spell checking my blog post and it doesn't recognise blog or blogging as a word. Hehe.

PPS. I am also on Facebook and Instagram if you would like to follow me there as well.