Better late than never

Oops...time has gotten away on me this year and I suddenly realised it was December in a few days and I hadn't made a Christmas cake!   :(
Traditionally, I have always made one during Labour Weekend to give it time to 'mature'.
So, out came the recipe books (and the multitude of loose pages of recipes that I pull from magazines but never get around to putting in a folder or cookbook!)

This year I wanted to try a new recipe. I had made the same cake for about 10 years now and while the old rule of 'don't fix what ain't broke' is a good one, I decided that it was time for a change!

 

So, FINALLY, I was able to use one of those "loose pages" that I knew I had held on to for a reason    :)

 

It was an incredibly quick and easy recipe to make and this is the cake mixture ready to go in the oven.

 

A few hours later and voila! My Christmas cake is done. I hope it tastes as good as it looks.

 

It's currently wrapped and being stored in the hope that even a couple of weeks may improve its flavour...time will tell. I decided to do an uniced cake this year to make it last longer...my girls like to get a piece of cake just to eat the icing! This way they will only have a piece of cake if the REALLY want fruit cake! Cunning, huh?   :)

I just put these decorations on to show what it will look like when I serve it up closer to Christmas (but I may not add the green ribbon. I was looking for my 'Xmas frill' but couldn't find it quickly)

 

So, yay...I have one Christmas task ticked off my list. And as I (belatedly) type this post (the cake was actually made 2 weeks ago!) it is now Dec 1st and I can start to decorate our house for Christmas. I love the Christmas season and having 3 girls on my side means the Christmas Grinch of our house gets outvoted on whether or not we decorate   :)

 

Do you have any traditions for Christmas? I'd love to hear about them! Or any (non-complicated!) yummy Christmas recipes? Watch out for a post on the gifts we make for the girls' teachers and friends closer to Christmas.

The Taniwha

November 9th saw us rising early (on a SATURDAY!!!!) and on the road by 7am to get to  the 2nd annual Taniwha event. This local event is fantastic-you have so many options to try. If mountain biking is your 'thing' then try 21km, 42km, 60km or 83km. If you enjoy running or walking, you can choose from 7km, 14km, 21km, 42km or gasp! 60km!! You can even enter as a team and share the beautiful scenery...and effort!!

 

 

Jeff and Olivia decided to enter the 21km mountain bike and the start line was the gorgeous Mangakino lakefront. Don't they look keen to get started??

 

 

The start line...and they're off! See you at the finish line, guys. (Olivia is in the red shirt centre of the picture)

 

 

Their awesome support crew was waiting for them at the halfway point at Whakamaru. (where there just happened to be a lovely café open serving wonderful hot coffee-hey, it had been a really early start!!)  

 

 

We stopped along Ongaroto Road to give them some more encouragement...looking great there Olivia. Just wish that slow guy in front of you would get a move on, huh?!

As you can see, there were all ages doing this event-great to see!

 

 

The finish line...well, nearly! We parked the truck and were there to see Jeff and Olivia fly past on their way to the finish line. Great riding! Total ride time = 1hour 56mins.

 

 

The awesome support crew!!

 

 

The best part of the day-chilling out after the event. The weather was just glorious (almost too hot!) and we enjoyed sitting around catching up with friends and listening to music.

 

 

Check out the scenery-not a bad place to have lunch, huh? All the events, which utilise the River Trails,  finish at the Lake Whakamaru Christian Camp and it is a stunning location.

 

 

Finally, it was time to head home. They say you should 'leave it all on the racetrack' ...and somebody obviously did just that! Well done, Olivia-we learned later that evening at prize giving she come 1st in her division (0-20yr female) so AWESOME EFFORT!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stationery

Anyone who knows me, knows I love to write letters...and receive them!! I have several international penpals and some local friends too that I write to regularly and I like to vary the stationery I send them. However, with only one stationery store in town I often struggle to find different designs. I have attempted to make my own but it is not very professional looking and I find it uses up my time that could be spent writing!

Luckily a couple of years ago I stumbled upon a wonderful penpal blog written by a lovely Canadian girl, Julie. (I think all Canadians must be wonderful as I have a sister-in-law and a penpal who are both Canadian and are just the nicest people I know :)  )

Anyway, Julie designs her own stationery and does an AMAZING job of it! She recently offered a "stationery of the week" service where the design is made available for one week only then a new one is offered. So we are getting fabulous variety, and I can vouch for the quality of her stationery, having ordered it in the past. I have just ordered this gorgeous set and can't wait to receive it and start my Christmas letters to my penpals.

Go and have a look around her blog-it is amazing- and who knows? You may even find yourself a penpal! :)    www.penpaloftheweek.com

Thanks, Julie, for your commitment and hard work in offering letter writers everywhere a wonderful choice in stationery-I for one am very thankful for what you do!

Guy Fawkes

 This year we decided not to celebrate Guy Fawkes in a big way, however, I cannot resist a sparkler or two. We got together with a good friend and her girls and had a lovely evening eating, drinking and setting fire to things!

Jeff is always in charge of lighting the bigger fireworks-they scare me!

 

 

 

Sparklers are more my style :)

The kids had heaps of fun with them (so did the BIG kid you can see at the front of the picture!!) 

 

Wow, they even produce heart-shaped sparklers now. We also had star-shaped ones as well.

 

 

 

And no evening is complete without dessert! We were lucky enough to try some cake pops for the very first time and I am SO going to make some in the near future. They were great!

 

And that was our fireworks for this year!

Labour Weekend 2013

Yay! Finally, a long weekend!! It seems so long since Queens Birthday Weekend in early June but finally Labour Weekend arrived. As we are now feeding a veritable menagerie of animals we cannot get away for a break so decided to take a 'local' holiday and spent the afternoon down at Lake Whakamaru. We usually spend a week or so camping here in January but it was really  nice to go down before it gets too crowded and enjoy the lake by ourselves. There were a few keen campers there but nowhere near as many as in Dec/Jan.

 

We set up day camp with some chairs and the chilly bin under the pine trees and unloaded the 'toys'! We took the kayaks and the paddle board down with us to play on and everyone was on, and IN, the water in no time!

 

 

I thought the lake would still be a bit cold but ...apparently not!  :)

 

 

We are so lucky to be able to enjoy such beautiful scenery right on our doorstep.

 

 

Briar and her friend navigating my paddle board.

 

 

Phew...they made it back to shore!

 

 

Enjoying the first summer (ok, spring!) sun

 



 

Gotta have food...oh yeah, and a beer! :)

We had a lovely picnic lunch of bacon & egg pie, tomato & goat's cheese tarts, ham & salad rolls and chocolate cake. Yum, yum.

We had a wonderful afternoon just chilling and relaxing and having fun-we should do it more often!!