oh - and HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Some Lime&Cerise cupcakes I made for a friend's birthday on December 20. I am soo annoyed with myself for not taking better/more pictures of these cupcakes - they were gorgeous! Lime and vanilla flavoured cupcake with lime meringue filling (bright lime green, flowing out of the cupcake.. why oh why didn't I take a picture) and white chocolate flavoured frosting. My friend is christmas obsessed and every year she had a different colour theme - this year it was lime & cerise! Thus - the lime & cerise cupcakes. I figured lime tastes like lime and cerise tastes like pink white chocolate! I packaged them up in a white paper box with lime&cerise ribbon - they looked very pretty and I'm sure my friend was very glad to receive them. I think they would have been one of my best cupcake creations!

Have a very happy and safe New Year tonight wherever you are - its a quiet one for us!

xxxM

baking with a buddy

I had this week off work and I planned to do lots of baking but it didn't quite end up as planned. I ended up looking after a friend's daughter, so it wasn't the most conducive environment for the kind of baking I had planned, but still we managed to have some fun.

K and I decorated some gingerbread men and xmas trees, and baked a banana cake for my neighbour - with chocolate icing. K got a wee bit carried away with her decorating and some of the gingerbread had more icing than biscuit!

We made extra banana cake mixture so we could also make a small cake for D and some cupcakes for K to take home. The cake was extra moist and bananaery so we didn't even ice them.


The baking was Monday, we went to Wellington Zoo yesterday. Sadly my camera died just as we arrived at the zoo so I don't have photos of all the animals we saw (haha!) but we did have a great time. K got to feed (and get slobbered on by) a giraffe, we met Tahi - the 1-legged Brown kiwi, and generally enjoy the beautiful sunny day.

here is a pic from my last Zoo visit:

It was the first time at the zoo that I've actually made an attempt to go to all the guided talks. The talks were good - and I was pleasantly surprised that every Guide talked about only using FCS (Forest Stewardship Council) approved wood. Apparently, all construction at the zoo uses approved wood to ensure the wild habitats aren't being destroyed to provide the wood and paper products. To be honest, I think it went over most people's heads - they were too busy keeping an eye on their kids in the hot sun. I'd like to be more environmentally responsible in such things, I hate to think where some of our wood products come from!

D and I were planning to go camping tomorrow (after I work tonight ~ urgh!) but I've just realised I'm on call for work, so going too far out of Wellington probably isn't a very good idea. We're still going to look for a campsite very close to the city (with cell coverage) but its likely we'll be staying home! If our backyard was flat - we could camp at home! hehe.

I hope wherever you are, you are enjoying beautiful sunshine and a happy holiday season.

xxx M

Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone had a fantastic, sunny, and safe Christmas. D and I didn't get up to much, we went to the in-laws' house for a BBQ Christmas lunch. It was a really nice day here in Wellywood, we both got burnt a little. We got a digital photoframe from D's brother (we all buy for 1 person), which was a pretty cool gift I thought. From the awesome Ree, I got my very own Aiko plush rat! I declare it the coolest thing ever. Photos to come!

D and I didn't really do presents this year, we just spent some money on camping stuff so we can go away in February. Speaking of camping, we are thinking we might do a "test" camp this weekend! At the moment we are thinking Lake Ferry. If it works out well, we might go there for our week long camping trip. Its only about one and a half hours from Welly so if I have to go into work I won't have to drive for hours! (More about WHY I would do that later).

Anywho, I'm off to bed. D is watching the football with relish - the outcome could easily affect the Phoenix' position in the league. I'm a little melancholy tonight after a dismal baking failure. I was *trying* to make a delicious treat that I've been wanting to make for aaages and this particular recipe had the added bonus of Sconey being able to eat it (being gluten/wheat/dairy free). I'll give it another go tomorrow I think. I plan to do LOTS of baking and cleaning this week. Trying to make a to-do list, 'cause otherwise the days will just disappear! I've got Monday and Tuesday off work (D is working). I'm working New Years Eve though - start at 2am on the 1/1/09! The joys of end of month processing!

Wait! Didn't I say I was going to bed....

xxM

white fluffyness

I baked some chocolate cupcakes with white fluffy icing for work yesterday. D had a shared morning tea and my work colleagues always appreciate my baking! D wanted chocolate cupcakes with caramel filling and white marshmallowy icing. (To be honest, it sounded gross to me! too sweet!) I topped with a choc-covered coffee bean. They turned out alright, I added coffee to a standard chocolate batter for extra richness. I then made a caramel filling from condensed milk - but due to time pressure I was a bit lazy and didn't pipe it in after baking. Instead I folded it in with the batter. I immediately regretted this when I realised it had just sunk to the bottom.

I'll definitely pipe in after baking next time!! The other mini-diaster was that I didn't beat my first batch of icing enough. When I got up in the morning the fluffy icing had kind of lost their piped shape .... so there was a mix of melted looking and pretty. (Second batch I obviously whipped enough!!) They still looked OK....

Depsite my disappointment, it seemed everyone loved them. D got rave reviews from his dept, and one of my colleauges declared they were the best thing ever (and ate two!). I didn't eat any - for two reasons; I'm trying to be good, and they were waaaay too sweet for me.

Also from my recent cupcake exploits, I baked for when the in-laws came over. We had a BBQ for D's birthday. When I asked what cupcakes he wanted - he said purple with butterflies. I'm trying to reassure myself that he was thinking of our niece... (hehehe). So that's what I made!

I've been thinking about cupcakes a lot lately. Not eating them, creating them. It seems it is an affliction that has affected many many others in recent times. I can spend hours perusing cupcake blogs. I'm seriously thinking about trying to join Iron Cupcake or Cupcake Hero. Both are monthly challenges to bake cupcakes with a particular ingredient....

December is such a busy month, so far I've been to 6 christmas functions. I'm all christmas'ed out. (Though that won't stop me baking gingerbread this weekend...).

Some of our babies are leaving us on Saturday morning. Its going to be kinda sad, I've grown really attached. We are keeping a couple (read: three plus mum), but I'm very impressed with our ability to resist keeping them all. Two of the boys aren't going to their new home til early January so we'll have them for a wee bit longer.

OK, very much my bedtime.

x x M

i'm back already..

more snaps of our perth trip

Scarborough beach at sunset:

While in Perth, D and I did quite a few touristy things while Paul was at work. Including - a trip to Rottnest Island! Rottness is out in the Indian ocean off the coast of Freemantle. It was an awesome ferry ride - in fact I spoke to both mum & dad while on the way out (cheap mobile phone deal) as we were bouncy up in down in the waves - it was so rough. D got a little seasick - but I was loving it.

We rented a couple of mountain bikes and biked around Rottnest Island. It is beautiful. The weather was fantastic. This is the view from the spot we stopped at to have our picnic lunch:

and a shot of the pier where we hung out ready for ferry pickup - the water
was so clear and you could see schools of fish


perth at night from King's park

D has morning tea this week and I want to try out some new frosting ideas, so I'm off to whip up some cupcakes!!

xxM

how long has it been?

Yeah - I've neglected this blog for ages.... you know what.. I'm not even gonna go there. Lots has happened since my last post in April (?!) and I couldn't begin to cover it all.

In 1o points:

1. We lost many of our furkids. We are now down to three permanent residents. However, that said, we've just taken on a foster - pregnant female (was) ... so we currently have Shi (mummy) and her ten darling 5 week old babies. They are separated now (rats become sexually mature at 5-6 weeks, so we separate a bit before 5 weeks to be safe). We're trying to adopt out as many as we can - but I think we'll keep a couple + mum.

2. D and I went for a trip (in Sept!) to visit my brother in Perth. We had an awesome time, and also saw the Phoenix play (read: horribly lose) while we were there.

spooky pic of my bro @ Freemantle prison on a night tour!

the beautiful Combo

It certainly gave D and I inspiration to do a whole lot more "real" travel when work and finances allow!

I promise I didn't make him carry the bags alll the time!!

3. I got a new job... or perhaps two new jobs since I last posted. I'm still within the same company, but I've now moved to IT. Which is amusing for some, as I'm not exactly an IT guru. I'm doing ok - and really enjoying the change. There are some big changes afoot in my company - so its an exciting time to be involved.

4. I'm still Guiding.. its been a full on year and I'm really proud of our girls. We've been on two camps this year and have achieved so much! We awarded four senior Guide awards and our unit has grown from 20 at the start of the year to 35! This is awesome - go Girl Guides! Its especially cool because this year we celebrated 100 years of Guiding!

5. D and I have the camping bug I think! We've been slowly acquiring gear so that we can go away camping on our own! Our car getting broken into and all my camping gear getting stolen didn't help matters - but we're getting there. We've got leave in Feb next year, so hope to go away and "rough it" for a week.

6. The whole weight-loss thing isn't going so well right now... I was really good, but I rolled right off the wagon! Back on I jump - I'm back at the gym and trying to eat well - December is the worst (yet best) month!!

7. I've still been baking up a storm and have had some great success with new cupcake variations. I'd like to get into the habit of baking a new thing once a week... so I can take pretty pictures and feed my work-mates!

chilli-choc cupcakes with chocolate ganache icing


birthday cake I made for a colleague's daughter

8. I've bought D a couple of cook books (I know, I know, gifts for him that are really for me!) and we're trying to cook two new things a week. Its been fantastic and we feel all chef-y! I definitely need to make/find us some funky aprons to style us right.

borscht (beetroot soup)

sweet potato frittata

9. I removed my 101 list... it was big! and long! I think I need a shorter list - both in term and number of items. I haven't deleted the list - I still want to work on it - but it was daunting and made me not visit my blog. So watch this space for my new short term goals!

10. I finally gave in to Facebook - so if you know me in real life - look me up! I hear its cool to have lots of friends. I've even uploaded some photos.....

That my dears, is it for tonight!

x x xM

goodbye little man..

We lost one of our little darlings over the weekend. He was only young - it just isn't fair.

Goodbye Hiro - we love you....

beach walk

D and I went for a walk along the beach out at Eastbourne. I wanted to walk round to the Pencarrow Lighthouse but I was only wearing thin jandals. Rocky beach + jandals = bad combination. It was yet another gorgeous Wellington day. Recently, I've nearly forgotten I live in Wellington and think I'm back in sunny Nelson. It has been an amazing summer.

Life has been a bit crazy lately - with lots of extra hours spent at work. I've been doing a wee bit of baking - but nothing memorable. I never got round to making Easter cupcakes, which is sad because I had some great ideas.

Mum is coming for a visit this week which I am looking forward to. It will be nice to chill out and spend some time with her. D commented today that he was worried about cooking (yes... he does the bulk of the nighttime meal cooking - he loves it, I swear) as my Mum is such an amazing cook. I thought that was lovely (though I'm not 100% convinced that Mum actually lives up to this idol-lic status... Sorry Mummy!).

I made some blue and green cupcakes for D's brother's birthday. they didn't cope with the heat very well (what was I saying about Wellington weather) and the icing melted a bit....

M

Beautiful Easter cupcakes

1. peepcake, 2. Easter Cupcakes, 3. Easter Cupcakes, 4. Easter Cupcakes_1, 5. Easter egg cupcakes, 6. cupcakes; 365, 7. Bunny Cupcakes, 8. Hatching Chick Easter Cupcake, 9. Easter Cupcakes

I finally figured out how to create a mosaic over at Flickr!! So I took the opportunity to make one with photos of some of the beautiful easter cupcakes that others have made! Talk about inspiration!!!

M

cupcakey goodness

I made cupcakes. D and I both had morning tea commitments at work - what better excuse to bake?! These ones went down a treat - the green ones have green tea icing which everyone loved! This surprised me as when I talk about green tea flavoured stuff, everyone goes 'yuk'.

There would have been a lot more cupcakes if a certain kitchen disaster hadn't happened! Something went very very wrong with my vanilla cupcakes. Though, for the life of me I cannot figure out what!

I also made D some cupcakes with a red bean paste and green tea icing. Red bean paste is a traditional asian sweet and D loves it in the sweets he buys from the asian food store. D was very impressed and now wants me to try and make mooncake......

Bedtime for me...

M

vege bean soup + green tea custard...

Today I made some yummy vege soup for dinner, and also to freeze for lunches. I basically just threw in all the veges we had in the fridge into a soup. This includes; celery, carrots, capsicums, canned tomatoes, and spinach! Once it had simmered away, I pureed it up and added some cannelloni and butter beans. I made enough for 6 servings - and only 1 WW point per serve! (That is, if you don't add that teaspoon of ricotta....)



It doesn't look that pretty - but its tastes damn good.


While I was on such a domesticated bender, I made some green tea custard for dessert. (Low in points too!!) The photo REALLY doesn't do it justice - it was much brighter green in real life.



I have plans for green tea related things... and also for adzuki bean related things....



M

random blossom

I don't have any pictures today, so have a photo of a random blossom I took in Spring.

Life has been a bit 'arrrggggh' lately. I have so much to do and find myself re-prioritising every five mintues.

I'm still obsessed with making cupcakes, though I've realised I have to find people to give them to BEFORE I make them. Otherwise I end up taking truckloads of cupcakes into work and pissing off all the people on weight watchers!

Speaking of WW, I have started going to the actual meetings. I probably won't stick at the meetings - but it is a good start to get me motivated. (I'm too stingy to pay forever.. and I am more than a wee way from my goal weight when it will be free!) We'll see how it goes.

M

baby shower cupcakes

I am just heading off to a baby shower for a good work friend of mine, Mariana. Mariana and her partner Dan are expecting a wee baby girl in about three weeks. I'm very excited. I baked these cupcakes for the baby shower. Aren't they cute. The photo doesn't really do them justice - the two types of pink are much cuter in real life.

I've planned a few games for the baby shower including pictionary/scupltionary where the items are baby related. (E.g nappy). So that should be entertaining. I made the playdough a nice bright pink colour.

I also bought Mariana a wee book (kinda like a visitors books) where friends and family can record their comments/suggestions/advice. I've noticed on several occasions, first time mums friends getting overwhelmed with all the 'helpful' advice given by their friends and family. I think that new mums need to be treated carefully as it can be quite daunting and upsetting they way people offer their advice. At least with the book, Mariana can read it in her own time with her new beautiful baby girl.

M

bloomin' tea

Oh my god. This tea is awesome. I'd heard about teas that bloom when you pour hot water on to them, but I had no idea how cool they were. AND it tasted great! This particular tea is called Good Fortune and came from T Leaf T in Wellington. I did some googling and apparently there a heaps of different types of tea! You can refill your cup for maximum value (this tea was quite pricey).

I really need to start drinking more herbal tea - would be a good excuse to buy a box of this... (if only it didn't cost $40 for a 100g tin!!!)

So pretty:

M

congratulations to my dearest K

Last weekend one of my dearest friends got married. Congratulations Kate & Richard!

D and I flew to Nelson for the weekend to be part of the celebrations. Kate looked gorgeous in a beautiful blue dress. I am so happy we were there to share the day with them.

We held a Hen's night for Kate, which was quite entertaining, especially as Scone and I were the only sober ones! We had great fun dressing Kate up in all kinds of bride-to-be gear. (You like the fishnet stockings? the bride2be sash? or perhaps the abundance of wedding veils and garters??)

There were also several typical hens night games that were most entertaining... Luckily for those involved I have a no face photo policy on my blog... (the internet is a scary place you know!)

It was of course also fantastic to spend some time with my Nelson friends and family and just relax! I really love going back to Nelson and wish we could afford to do it more often. Mum has had their house renovated and they now have a fabulous (and huge) kitchen/lounge/dining area. It was lovely to chill out in.

D went on the whole weekend about how he wants to move to Nelson! I don't want to ruin my perfect holiday destination!

So to those Nelson lovelies who actually read my blog, (yes I know I ramble) it was wonderful to see you and I can't wait to see you soon!

And huge hugs and kisses for my mummy who had an operation yesterday and is at home recovering.

Oh - I forgot to say what fantastic weather it was:



M

inarizushi

Tonight I made inarizushi for dinner, (I also made enough for bento tomorrow and to freeze a couple). All I can say is YUM. They were absolutely delish and so easy to make! I got the recipe/inspiration from JustHungry. JustHungry (& JustBento) is an awesome blog for Japanese style food. That said, there are lots of fantastic non-Japanese style recipes too. I highly recommend a trip over there to check them out.

Despite being REALLY good (I did go out to Flying Burrito Brothers for a work dinner one night - but I didn't have dessert!) I haven't lost a lot more weight. I think I've only really maintained last week's 4kg loss. I'm consoling myself with the thought that I would have been perfectly happy with two weeks of 2kg weight loss - so whats the difference!

My daily walks home with Natalie have been really good and we've walked in lots of different weather! Boiling hot sun to gale force winds and sea spray. Last week I took my camera on one such day and took these snaps: (which meant I had to run to catch up with Nat!)