Beach Baby

We’re all going on a summer holiday, no more working for a week or two... except for Wolf... and it was only for a day... and not really much of a holiday, just a few hours away from regular life... eh, scratch the song, it’s just not going to work for this post.

I took off up to our family beach hut for the day yesterday with the boys, Grannysaurus, Grandad and Great Grandma. We popped in to visit family friends who live in the area for morning tea and then headed to the beach hut for the rest of the day. Unfortunately I don’t have any photos of the big boys because I took all those ones on Mums camera. I do have a few of a certain little Monkey’s first trip to the beach! Lion and Dragon were both at our beach hut before they were two weeks old so this is quite a wait for little Monkey... and I think he liked it.

This beach is wonderful, it has just the right mix of everything you need and no one to share it with! While the grandies and the kiddies had a nap/rest during the heat of the day I headed down the road a bit to take Monkey to visit Aunty Em who was having a holiday with ALL her family nearby... and we may have stayed a bit longer than we intended since it was stinkin’ hot and their cabins were air-conditioned.

When it did get cool/shady enough to go down to the beach Monkey and I spent most of our time in the shade to protect his fresh new non-sunscreen wearing skin and let the grandparents (great grandma had gone home) deal with the big boys.  Dragon and Grandad took a wander down to the point and trialed a nearby playground and Grannysaurus and Lion took on the stinger enclosure.  Now don't think I was shirking all the hard work in this deal... Noooo, Monkey and I worked on his kissy face.

Unfortunately it was hard to get a photo with one hand and keep a hold of Mr Wriggles with the other.  He is really good at it but he has to be in the right mood or it just ain't happening.  Oh, and just in case you can't tell, he's VERY serious about kisses!

Monkey had his first feel of sand between his toes and I think the only reason he like it is because he made it into something close enough to work for mummy to do... he would keep his feet still JUST long enough to let me cover them up then he would kick it off and wait for me to do it again... possibly he just kept freaking out when his feet kept disappearing... who knows.

Most of the time he wanted to be sitting in my lap or carried but he did get his feet wet (photos on mum's camera) and he did have a little lay down on a beach towel just chillin' in the afternoon cool.

Now, just because I can't get enough of those sweet little beach baby toes here's another photo...

 Now I need to plan when we can go back as a whole family for a few days... We are a big family with four generations and one beach hut so if you don't book in early all the good weekends are gone!

Best served warm

With icecream and custard.

That's how I like my memories.

It's been nearly 2 years since my great-grandma passed away. When the great-grandkids were told to come around and pick what they wanted as her house was packed up I determined to be practical. After all, my memories of her were not hinged on things, I can pull out wonderful memories from my mind without needing props or 'stuff' and some of the photos we have are the best reminders. I selected things that I would actually use around the house and things that I was getting the vibe that my grandma (her daughter) wanted me to take.

There was stuff left over after everyone had selected different items and almost 12 months later when our church was having a carboot sale grandma gave it to us to see what we could sell... the rest was to go to lifeline. I put it all out at the sale and a few things went. Most of the rest went to lifeline but I have a kind of hard time getting rid of kitchen stuff. So I kept a range of dishes and things in a box in the garage.

There was one dish that I was tempted to take originally since I didn't own a pie dish (I don't make many pies so usually I'm happy to make do with the cover of another dish or whatever) but I have held on to this dish with a few other kitchen things and then today when I was feeling like making an apple pie I remembered the dish, in the garage, wrapped in newspaper. I thought it would be perfect.

Indeed it was. This is no secret family recipe... My grandma may have even laughed if I had told her I did this... packet mix pastry... tinned apple.... frozen berries... easy as, well, PIE.

The dish needed a good scrub since it held remnants of the last few pies she had used it for and had been stored in the garage but she must have put her name on it with some super-duper masking tape!

Not that I tried too hard to get that off.

GREAT grandma!

A bunch of us trundled over to my grandma's on Thursday night for dinner. I took along the camera because I never remember to get photos of the boys with their great-grandma. I nearly forgot again except that Grandma wanted some other photos taken and that reminded me that I needed to get mine in.

To keep Little Bear still she got to wear her mum's "princess bracelet" until He-Man himself flogged it. He looks oh-so-tough in his precious gems doesn't he? That's my Dragon.

So we got one of Dragon, Grandma and Lion.

One of Little Bear, Grandma and Cheetah.

And one of Grandma and Cheetah after Little Bear didn't want to sit for the camera anymore.

Rosella Jam... FINALLY!!!

For those sick of hearing about our Rosella monster bush we have finally harvested and made the jam!!!

Picking the Fruit...

Everyone got involved, Dragon was quite helpful, Lion felt his skills would be better put to use running around the yard pretending to be an echidna sucking up ants.

Making the Jam...

First you make a batch of peanut butter cookies to keep you going because there is a lot of work to do...

Mummy McTavish Peanut butter cookies

1 cup peanut butter

1 cup sugar (best with half brown and half white or raw for that gooey inside and crunchy outside)

1 egg

mix it all together, add bit and pieces if you want (chocolate, chopped dried fruit...) bake in a moderate oven for 10 minutes. let them cool on the tray.

then you've got to get all those seeds out, so get some helpers... I roped in Grandma and GREAT-grandma. Also, great-grandma knows how to make it so we really needed her.

then there is a lot of chopping (we got through it super fast thanks to our two Tupperware Quickchef's:) ), cooking, waiting, stirring, messing, bottling and a few other steps and you get some REALLY YUMMY JAM! we got 11 bottles of various sizes. some quite small some were REALLY large. It took all day, because we had nearly 6kg of rosellas to get through, but we learnt how to make rosella jam and we have a cupboard full of jam to have on scones and pikelets!

Did you know???

That smoke, dust or steam in the air makes the moon change colour? okay, you most likely did but if you are old enough to read this without help then you dont count. I just wanted to brag that Lion now knows about why the moon changes colour. And if you ask him he says it so matter-of-fact that you would never doubt it even though it is coming from the mouth of a three year old. We'll just add that to his adorable little explaination of how a car engine works. Oh he's so intelligent... and i'm not at all biased.

Grandma and Grandad took Lion and his big cousin M up to the beach hut today to see Great grandma. it's an easter tradition, Great grandma goes up there and we all make the pilgrimage to visit for at least a few hours. This year we had mountains of cleaning planned so it was great that the grandies could take lion and we got cracking. Aunty J even took Dragon for a couple of hours so Wolf and Mummy McT could go and have lunch together. YAY! anyway the moon colour conversation came up in the car on the trip back and Lion Proudly informed us on his arrival home how the moon changes colour.

Then we had to decide where to put out the easter baskets... Mummy sort of might have influenced his decision a little. I am guessing that had i not intervened they would have been put in his room or the lounge room so that he can get them first thing in the morning and eat all the eggs before the rest of us even woke up. probably not much chance they would have been put on top of the tall-boy in mummy and daddy's bedroom well out of reach of Lion paws but there they are and he thinks that it was all his decision. As I am a mummy for longer and longer i start to wonder how many of the things i thought were my decision growing up really were my decision...

the bunny is a bit tight this year. thankfully they arent up to comparing their bunny's leavings with other kids bunny's. I dread the thought of all that chocolate in the fridge until i get sick of it and let them eat it all in one go and just put up with them on a sugar high for 24 hours (or more). The bunny decided not to do it this year, they are only getting a couple of pieces each and I have, I hope, given enough hints out that I really hope others do the same. They are getting a box of duplo to share with the money great grandma gave them for easter instead of buying them more chocolate! I was very happy with great grandma!

well, off to bed now. Dont forget in all that chocolate that JESUS IS ALIVE!!!!!