Kapiti Island Today 16th November 2012

Kapiti Island Today 6.15pm ...

I was aiming for a 6.15am shot. Up and dressed by 6.01am but as I picked up the car keys the heavens opened! I AM NOT THAT HARDCORE (yet)!


Heavens emptied the sky's were blue after work. Lovely Hubby is feeling a bit poorly so I left him with the kids and The Hound and I headed to Queen Elizabeth park. It's been a while since we (The Hound and I) have been running here. Lots of options inland track, coastal track, along the beach. All apart from the beach are hilly so it is potentially pretty hardcore! The picture was taken from the coastal track, a wee gap in the flora and fauna! A poop halfway round from The Hound gave me a break. No one likes to run hard with a bag full of shit flapping about in there hands!


The Hound is so funny he goes crazy on the way out, way ahead, sniffing out who knows what BUT on the way back he was the most faithful (tired) beast trotting along next to me. SO cute :). Although he does negate the cuteness by bathing in a stage to puddle half way round!!!!!

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A - Z of Aoteoroa; B

Is for BACH, BEACH and BARE FEET ...

BACH! A 'holiday home' here in N.Z. Pronounced batch! Back in the day almost everyone had a Bach they went to for weekends and holidays. Not necessarily flash but near the beach or near the lake. Reminds me of a 'but n Ben' in Scotland. In the current 'financial climate' not everyone can afford a Bach. In fact lots of the rentals in our area were once upon a time Bach's.

BEACH! Long skinny island!?! Bound to be a beach near by wherever you are! Beach life is part and parcel of Kiwi life. City life or rural!! When we discussed our around the world move it was initially Oz we were planning on! I had one pre requisite... I wanted to live in Home and Away not Neighbours. Well here we are not in Oz but in Home and Away New Zealand. Mayhap not as hot but beach life nonetheless! With the bonus of no snakes and less scary spiders!

BARE FEET! Not sure about the rest of the world but I know my U.K readers! If you were to see someone walking down the street with bear feet you would raise your eyebrows and think hippie or some such thing. Bring that attitude to N.Z and your gonna have tired eyebrows. These Kiwis are pretty laid back. Such a welcome change! Shoes are optional pretty much where ever you are.

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Kapiti Island Today 14th November 2012

Kapiti Island today 6.25pm ...

The forecast this week was pretty poor. We have been spoilt lately with the lovely weather. Sunday was to be the beginning of hideous rain BUT Sunday was as far as it went.

However despite the lovely weather today is our first day at the beach!

Tonight I decided to dust down our baby carrier! A bit fairer than Lovely Hubby pushing both Cherubs along in the double buggy (its the wrong height for me I tell you). I took the boy on my back and he took the girl in the pram. Although we swapped half way! Maaaaaaan our boy is heavy!

Archie Boy was casual as ever given it was a potentially exciting new mode of transport for him! If not a bit confused by the fact that he wasn't in the buggy! Ha! He was blathering away and flapping his wings before long though.

I thought Maisie Boo would be tired but she enjoyed getting out and pushing the pram herself (bit safer when the pram is empty). It turned into a game on the way back. Soooo funny I was the baby/Maisie and Maisie was the mummy. 'Mummy' wanted me to get in the buggy so of course I obliged but surprise surprise my big ass was never getting in that baby shaped space. Boy did 'Mummy' laugh! So cute. I as 'the baby' had to hold on to the lead of the pram and hold 'Mummy's' hand while crossing the road. Such a cute age. I reckon it's probably a good learning point, the role reversal, a chance for Maisie to realise why I nag her so much sometimes. Even when we got home she got her self dressed for bed, put her dirty washing in the washing basket and tidied her shoes away WITHOUT BEING ASKED ... Soooooooo Cute :)

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Wordless Wednesday 14th November 2012

How Not To Do Orange Segment Rainbow Jelly

This is what was meant to have been served up at Darling Daughters Care Bear Rainbow 3rd Birthday party;

Looks pretty cool what could go wrong?

Oh yeah I could get involved! Ignoramous moi!



To see how to do it properly click here.

How to avoid being a dick (sorry for naughty word but best descrption) like me and making a hash of it!

• Expect waste. Leftover jelly, dudd orange shells, off cuts from the finished product.
• Give yourself plenty of time to let the jellies set. If I just did the original plan the jelly would have set better and I would have been able to do each colour one after the other and just chuck out the spare jelly. I do not like food waste so I decided (way too late) to do a big bowl of rainbow jelly to use up the spare jelly. This meant that I had to do one colour at a time allowing each one to set before doing the next one. I was setting an alarm to make the next colour so I would finish all the colours in time for the party. I actually had to get up in the middle of the night (see told you dick) to fit them all in.
• Use an electric device to hollow out the oranges like I did but don't go crazy and hollow out too much. I was trying to get all the orange out so I was left with a white shell to get best background for the coloured jelly to show up on (so anal, so very, very anal). I ended up with a hole in the first one. If I looked at the picture of the good ones closer I would have seen that they have some orange left in.
• Buy extra oranges so you can make a few mistakes.
• DON'T use the freezer to speed up setting of jelly. I googled it and found mixed reviews. I can tell you it doesn't work!
• Use a sharp knife when cutting the jelly filled orange, obvious I know but just saying!
• Make sure you have an appropriate dish to serve. I had to use two (of the dishes my friend lent me) dishes. I actually ditched one of the colours because it was such a mess. Just as well really as I didn't have the room!

I probably set my expectations a bit high! Especially as I had never even made jelly before let alone practiced the dish and was really underprepared! Regardless my guests were impressed. Hopefully genuinley impressed!

I originally got the idea from this awesome facebook page Mama's Style, check it out, some cool ideas.

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Kapiti Island Today 12th November 2012

Kapiti Island today 6.35am ..

Starting the week as I mean to go on out and about at the crack of dawn! Hound walked and exercise done by 7am! Intention as ever was to run but with Mother Nature blowing a gale in my face on the run out forget it! We managed a rather pathetic 19 minutes and 2.2 km! Nonetheless the thought was there! However it didn't help the sole destruction when I weighed in and I had put yet more weight on *sigh*. Never been this heavy without being preggers! What IS the point in starvation and exercise if weight is still being gained????????

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Meal Planning Monday 12th November 2012

This week I am on the early finishes at work so there isn't such a stress to be super organised but I've still tried to pick simple and hopefully a little healthy.

Dusting of a few old faithfuls this week. Two in fact, both of which are Lovely Hubby specials. He is an awesome cook but not the healthiest cook! Will need to up the exercise this week to balance it out!

Again I've not really planned what days we are having what but one way or another we will be eating ...

• spicy butternut squash (pumpkin in our case) soup from last weeks Meal Plan. We didn't get round to having this as the Chick Peaans Butternut Squash (pumpkin in our case) lasted two nights.
• fillet steak, baked potato and corn on the cob. Expiry date dependent if there is a nice night this week this could be a barbecue meal! The forecast is not promising though
• Old faithful no. 1; Home made KFC style wraps. Lovely Hubby invented this when he was living here on his own. Clever boy! Some frozen breaded chicken chopped in a wrap, garnished with tomatoes, cucumber, cheese, jalapeños, sour cream, salsa and/or anything else you fancy. Yummers. I made him make this so many times when I moved over that he got sick of it but I wreckon it's been a year!
• Garlic prawns with jasmine rice and brocolli. The other week when we had spicy prawns I had baked potato with it and lovely hubby had rice. Whatta mistaka to maka! He par boiled the brocolli then fried it off in sesame oil. He then popped the cooked rice in with the brocolli and added a spot or three of sweet chilli sauce. Jealous!!!! So this is what we will be having with our prawns.
• Lentil Dahl. Easy, simple and healthy.
• Old faithful no.2; mushroom risotto. Lovely Hubby invented this after the first series of Hells Kitchen with Gordon Ramsay. They made mushroom risotto on the show, I expressed an interest in the dish and Lovely hubby went to work and came up with my fave dish! One of the courses in my last supper menu! Risotto rice, porcini mushrooms, asparagus, bacon, rocket, Parmesan, butter, wine put together in only a way Lovely Hubby knows how!
• Cheese Toasties.

Linking up with At Home With Mrs M.

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