ANZACs for Playgroup

This week we made ANZAC biscuits for playgoup using the trusty old CWA (Country Women's Association) Cookbook. The CWA is like the Australian equivalent of the WI (Women's Institute) in the UK and the cookbook is full of lots of traditional baking ideas - no pretty pictures but very simple easy to follow recipes.
If you can't read this the recipe is;
1/2 cup of sugar
1 cup of coconut
1 cup of flaked oatmeal (rolled oats)
1 cup of flour
125 g melted butter
1 level teaspoon of carbonated soda
1 tablespoon of golden syrup
3 tablespoons of boiling water

Mix dry ingredients together, pour in melted butter, add syrup and soda dissolved in boiling water, and mix well. Drop in small pieces on oven slide and bake in a moderate oven for 20 mins (I used fan-forced oven at 160 degrees for 15-20 mins)
Enjoy!

One of those difficult decisions

One of the dilemmas many mums agonise over is when to return to paid work. I have been lucky enough to get a few months paid maternity leave with both my boys and the time is rapidly approaching when I told my boss that I would return to work a couple of days a week. Late last week my childcare centre notified me a place was coming up in the baby room for Bub if I would like to take it.

Oh the agony and the ecstasy. I love being at home with my little ones and seeing them grow and develop every day but I must say it is exhausting! Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Especially as both my boys are erratic sleepers so I'm usually functioning on very little sleep which does make for a very grumpy mummy sometimes. Anyway, my point is it is hard work 24 hours a day 7 days a week.

The other part of the equation for me is that prior to having children work was something I very much enjoyed and something I still do although it has taken a much less prominent roll in my life for the last few years. Anyway, a childcare place means that very soon I will be toddling of to work a day and a half each week and leaving my little baby in someone else's care.

All the worries and concerns I had last time I made this decision are coming back again. Even though I know that my children are in fantastic hands, (I'm very happy with our day care and I'm actively involved in their management committee so I know the excellent work they do) it is still a big step to leave my baby with someone else.

To date the longest I have been away from him is two or three hours at a time and generally while he is asleep. The only other person who has cared for him is his Dad. But soon it will be his turn as well. I just hope it all goes smoothly and that I don't feel too guilty about enjoying exercising my mind on something other than parenting for a few hours each week.

We took a little visit to the baby room at day care earlier today and Bub seemed very happy, smiling at all the carers and trying desperately hard to impress them with his attempts at crawling (slowly shuffling around backwards and rocking a lot). Bub is quite an easy going boy so I suspect the transition will actually be more painful for me than for him - oh they grow up so fast. I will let you know how we get on in a few weeks.

Bread dough and Play-doh

Well it's Friday already and I don't know where the week has gone. It has been a week of sunshine and rain - unfortunately more of the later than the former, so we are all going a bit stir-crazy.

We have played with the Lego, the trains, puzzles, jigsaws, cards, boggle junior, watched far too many DVD's, had the neighbours over for morning tea and in the sunny patches ridden the bike around the yard and played in the cubby. However, much to our dogs discussed, we have only maaged two trips to the park for a play.
Anyway, given that today is again more rain than sunshine it seemed like a good day for baking. I have baked a few batches of biscuits and muffins with Junior as well as the odd pizza but I should try a few more savoury things to encourage his interest in real food not just treats. So today, thanks to Jennifer for supplying a simple White Batter Bread recipe, I made my first loaf of bread.
It wasn't 100% successful - I needed a slightly bigger loaf tin and I should have buttered the tin more because I had trouble getting it out of the tin, but all in all it wasn't bad for a first attempt.
Junior certainly enjoyed it with butter and jam for lunch - perhaps it isn't that savoury after all!
We have since had a request for homemade jam and current buns too - what have I got myself into?

Junior also did a spot of cooking today - he mixed up a fresh batch of play-doh and enjoyed playing with it on the patio during a short burst of sunshine.
Now that Bub is napping the sun is out again but I don't think it will last long enough to make it to the park when he wakes up - our poor dog will be very disappointed.

Ring Ring why don't you give me a call

This weeks science lesson was making tin-can telephones. They didn't work as well as I remember from when I was a kid, perhaps I'm now too used to the mobile kind, but Junior enjoyed the exercise and was quite enthusiastic about testing them out. Only problem was he also wanted to practice cutting the string with his new left-handed scissors so we had a few faulty connections!

A little bit of winter sunshine

Well after a couple of very wet and wintery weeks we have been treated to a weekend of sunshine. We made the most of it;

with a trip to the farmers market,

walking the dog in the park,

drying lots of washing while I can (I'm managing to keep up with my clothesline challenge), and

a nice morning by the river where we tried out the Perth Wheel (not quite the same as the London eye but some nice views on a sunny day), and

then lunch by the river watching the ferries come and go.

I nice way to round off a sunny weekend. Just as well we made the most of it because there is more wintery weather on the way

Yummy Stars and more Rockets

We did finally get round to making some star biscuits for our rocket themed week. We used this Donna Hay Gingerbread recipie from hop skip jump. Junior liked the rolling and cutting - just like play-doh really and of course he liked the taste test. Bub observed from the sidelines but would have loved to have got his fingers in that sticky mix.
And this weekend hubby joined in the theme and built a lego duplo rocket ship and launch pad which Junior was very pleased with.

3, 2, 1 Blast-off

Earlier in the week, just before bed as Junior and I were saying our goodnights, we got a little sidetracked, something Junior often does to avoid going to bed, and we started discussing the rockets on his new PJs. This discussion has led to a big interest in rockets so this week we have been doing lots of rocket related thing.

We put some new stary sheets on the bed to go with the PJs.

And after a quick search of Kids Craft weekly for inspiration we made cardboard roll rockets and did lots of space themed colouring which we cut out and pasted on a night sky collage.
We watched Wallace and Gromit's "A Grand Day Out" (always a favorite with Mum and Dad too) and we have been making all sorts of green space monster with some home made play-doh.
We have even attempted to make a rocket in the playroom but it isn't nearly as good as hubbys pirate ship from the other weekend.
We are also thinking of making star cookies tomorrow after a trip to the library in search of rocket themed books. After all this rocketing I think I'm a bit burnt out - perhaps we will have to move on to another theme next week.