In the Burrow

A few photos

2009-02-17T12:45:00.005+13:00

We haven't received our professional photos yeat (it's only been 3 days...)but I've managed to steal a few photos from friends/family who kindly took some of us. It was a great day - no hiccups really, altho it was raining in the morning but it cleared up in the afternoon just in time to take some photos outside! What luck!

Tomorrow....

2009-02-13T08:52:00.001+13:00

I'm going to the chapel to get married!!!

It's the final countdown....

2009-01-21T17:37:00.003+13:00

Happy New Year! 2009 is set to be a big adventure for us. We've been busy with a few things and the countdowns are now on!

6 days left of work for me,
9 days left of work for FH,
24 days til the wedding,
39 days til the big adventures starts..

Now, the big adventure has been brewing for a while now and the plan has been decided. We're off to Hong Kong for the honeymoon, then from Hong Kong we're heading to Berlin, Germany for a few days. We're then going to hire a car and drive through Europe all the way to Spain. Once we hit Spain, we're gonna jump on a plane and head to the UK for a working holiday. Hopefully, there'll be a lot of holiday and not so much work!

So it is all go here in the burrow. We're organising, packing, cleaning, fixing, clearing out, throwing away, giving away and recycling a whole bunch of stuff! It's a bit stressful but rather exciting!

It's Christmas Time In The Burrow!

2008-12-02T22:27:00.002+13:00

I've been tagged!!

2008-11-20T17:31:00.004+13:00

Sara from Sakura flavoured tagged me so here we go!

Outside my window... I can see my lovely garden, full of nice green weeds!! I really need to look at fixing that sometime soon......

I am thinking... about my wedding in February and why I have a cold when it's almost summer....

I am thankful for... my fiance, supportive family and friends, having enough to eat and a roof over my head.

From the kitchen... my latest recipe is Singapore style noodles!

I am wearing... light blue trakkies and a dark blue t-shirt

I am creating... wedding invitations!

I am going... to take a day off on Monday to try to shake this cold!

I am reading... The Potter's House by Rosie THomas

I am hoping... that I get well soon!

I am hearing... the traffic outside my window...thankfully I'm not stuck in it!!

Around the house... are wedding things - invitaion samples, fabric samples, menus, business cards etc!!

One of my favorite things...is getting up early on a sunday in summer, sitting on the deck with a refreshing drink and enjoying the quiet.

A few plans for the rest of the week... work tomorrow, meeting with the florist/cake-maker on Saturday, then relaxing in bed for a few days to get rid of this cold!!

Here is picture thought I am sharing..

It's a watermelon latern from the Chinese New Year Festival at the beginning of this year. I chose it because whenever watermelon reminds me of summer and summer is just 'round the corner!

I am tagging... not sure if anyone reads this but i'll try Lulu and Melanie from Kimono Reincarnate!

A Feast FOr The Eyes!!

2008-11-10T17:01:00.003+13:00

Last Friday, FH and I went to see The Phantom of the Opera. We got all dolled up and if I'm honest, I wasn't expecting much. I've been to other shows and enjoyed them but forgot them quite quickly. WELL......The Phantom was absolutely FANTASTIC!! I must say that if you haven't seen it, you must, must, must go as soon as you can! THe costume are so beautiful and colourful, the ochestra is magnificent and the sets, wow, the sets are just amazing. I was in awe the whole time. The time went by so quickly and I was actually quite disappointed when it finished! I wanted more! Even now, 3 days later, I'm still thinking about it and telling everyone I see about it!

In other news, I have another cold.....that's what you get when you work with kids....totally not recommended BUT the Phantom totally is!

Healthy Lifestyle Plan

2008-10-26T09:48:00.003+13:00

Now that Summer is on it's way, I've decided that it's time to get back to my healthy lifestyle plan. I haven't really gone so far off the plan but I could be doing better. Last year I lost 15kg and I want to lose 5kg more before my wedding in February 2009. For me, slowly but surely really does win the race, which is why I am starting from today. The healthy eating part is easy, the exercise part on the other hard is not so easy. My excercise of choice is walking, but on rainy days I do a step aerobic DVD at my house. Weather here is unstable so it is always good to have a back up plan.

Baking Day

2008-10-21T18:09:00.003+13:00

It's baking day in the burrow! Today's recipe was Matcha and Chocolate cakes! Mmmm super delicious!

Recipe (as per Lulu's request)

Ingredients

3/4 cup flour
3/4 cup sugar
8 tablespoon (114g) melted butter
3 large eggs
3 oz chocolate
1.5 teaspoon unsweetened cocoa powder
1.5 teaspoon cold milk
1.5 tablespoon Matcha tea powder
1 teaspoon baking powder

Method

Melt the chocolate using a double boiler and add the unsweetened cocoa powder and milk.

In seperate bowl, melt the butter.

Sift flour and baking powder into a large bowl. To the same bowl add eggs, sugar, and melted butter and mix well.

Divide the batter into two halves.

To the first batter add matcha tea powder and mix well.

To the second batter add the melted chocolate and mix well.

Grease 6-8 small cupcake molds and coat with a even thin layer of flour. (The flour will stick to the greased mold, invert the mold to remove any excess flour)

Pour half chocolate then half matcha into each mold, fill to about 3/4 full (the cake will expand as it cooks). With the back of a spoon make a swirling movement in the batter mixture. This will create a beautiful marble effect in the cake.

Bake in 180 C degree preheated oven for 30 minutes.

Twice In One Day!

2008-10-18T17:36:00.002+13:00

This IS unusual! I'm posting TWICE in one day! It's hard enough for me to post twice in one week so this is a new experience!! I started the bag I was talking about in the post below - I've finished the outside part, just need to do the lining. You can get a good idea of what it looks like in the photo below. Please excuse my foot!!

Alone, but not lonely

2008-10-18T11:52:00.002+13:00

FH has headed off to Greece for 14 days to complete his International Business component of his MBA. So it's quiet here, and clean, and rather relaxing.

I have managed to get so much done - grocery shopping, general tidy-up of the house, washing - and it's only 11.56am! It's funny how when he's here, not much gets done yet when I'm alone I'm so productive!!

I found a cute sewing tutorial for a bag on the internet this morning. I'm contemplating making one just for fun. I'll post a picture if I make one.

It's so great not having to do anything - I could even change back into my PJ's if I want to!!

Though, it's quite cold in the big bed and I do miss cuddles!

Steamy McSteamer

2008-10-08T17:04:00.002+13:00

Steamy McSteamer is my new love.

He is a Sunbeam Electric Steamer and I got him for my birthday and is totally the BEST thing I have ever gotten! I have used him to cook dinner every night! Why is it that steamed veges just taste so much nicer? I have also made steamed fish and steamed wontons which were greatly appreciated by the eaters of that dinner!

The best part is, I can load up Steamy and cook all the dinner in one go, without using heaps of pots, utensils etc!

Oh Steamy McSteamy, you are wonderful!!

Pre-birthday celebrations

2008-09-25T18:21:00.003+12:00

One of my students baked me a birthday cake! (even though it's not my b'day until Saturday) Her homestay mother kindly drove her to school so that the cake would arrive in one piece. Then, during class, the cake was brought in as a surprise, along with popcorn, chips, cookies and fizzy drink. My students are so nice!

Oh, and in other news, I went shopping on Tuesday and found really cute Disney kids books for $1 each, brand new!! So I got 7 books - Sleepin beauty, 101 Dalmations, Jungle Book, Winnie the Pooh, Toy Story, Cars, Wall E - for $7!! I'm not yet sure what I'm going to do with them, but I'm sure they'll be great dust collectors for a while!

Give me a bucket, please!

2008-09-22T17:01:00.003+12:00

WARNING: This is a little bit gross so it might be a good idea to not read it you are either eating something or have just eaten something.

This week at work we are having a 'food festival' which will be celebrated in some form or another for the week. Today was the first day of the festival and it went quite well. Basically today there were several fruit platters set our for the studetns and teachers to enjoy a healthy morning tea. We also blew up balloons and decorated the common area.

As part of the festival, we have been told that each class needs to create a wall display and a performance item for the end-of-festival concert. My class has decided to do a puppet show. (They have written a story and made it into a script, made puppets and a theatre!) So our performance item is sorted but we hadn't thought of any ideas for the wall display. So today I decided that we would look at 'unusual food of the world' and make a big display with information about the strange...sorry unusual food people eat. The students latched onto this idea quickly and soon we had a great class discussion going on about what foods they eat in their countries.

We then went into the computer room and that's when the trouble started. I'd found a website (www.weird-food.com) that had lists and lists of strange and unusual food of the world so we had a look. There weren't any pictures so the students used google images to see what these dishes looked like.....

Well, I had students screaming and jumping around, some with their eyes covered, some staring intently at the computer screen and even one who was crying! The things people eat in the world....unbelieveable. The grosser ones included whole calf's head, alligator on a stick, snake blood cocktails, baby mice wine, roasted ants, deep fried spiders and of course, everyone's favourite, dog meat soup.....bleugh...remembering this is making me feel sick. To be hoest though, it's actually really interesting (and gross) to read about what people eat in different countries - You might be surprised that the alligator on a stick dish comes from good ole America!

Yummy Yum Char

2008-09-21T19:14:00.003+12:00

Today we went to Yum Char. I love Yum Char so much. I especially love the steamed prawn dumplings, coconut jelly and the fried tofu. Anyway, we went to a different Yum Char restaurant to the one we usually go to. The new one is much nicer - it was really clean, food kept coming around at a great pace (we were in and out and fed in 20 minutes!!) and it was quite cheap. We got 6 plates and chinese tea for $30. We ended up with too much so we took it home with us and had it with our dinner. It was still yum. I think we'll have to make this our new Yum Char restaurant!

Addict?

2008-09-17T18:30:00.001+12:00

I feel that I may have a bit of an addictive personality. I'm not addicted to things like smoking, drinking, gambling etc. I actually have a strong dislike of all of those things. My addiction are kinda...quirky I guess would be a nice way to put it. I'll give you a few examples:

1) I'm addicted to buying pens. Any pens will satisfiy my need. The crappy $1 bic pens are even enough. I have so many (more than 200 I'm sure) and yet I still buy more. I even buy them FOR people. (well I buy two, one for myself and one for the present.) The funny thing is though, I'm also caught withOUT a pen.....

2) I'm addicted to making cupcakes. I bake a batch of 12 cupcakes every week on Sunday at 9.30am. Then my FH and I have a cup of tea and a cupcake at 10.30am. Always the same time, always 12 cupcakes, always a cup of tea....(they sure are tasty tho!!)

3) I'm addicted to buying fabric. I don't actually buy it with a purpost to make anything, I just like to buy it to have because it looks pretty. I'm sure I have enough to last me for the rest of my life!!

I guess the good thing about these addictions is that they'll only ever effect me (and my bank balance)!

Work isn't my life but this post is about work...

2008-09-15T19:55:00.000+12:00

Okay so this blog thing isn't going as well as it could be but that's ok. Slow and steady wins the race. Also I dont really have much to say so i'll tell you about last Thursday. Just a heads up: It's a work story unfortunately....

Last week I had my lesson observation. My boss and the head teacher said that they would be coming to one of my lessons sometime during that week for about half an hour to observe me. Well, all the other teachers were freaking out but I took the positive attitude of what's the worse that can happen? I can't be fired, I can't be demoted (where can a teacher be demoted to???), I can't get a pay cut - the worst thing that can happen is that they'll say "you did a bad job" which isn't that bad anyway. You can't hit the nail on the head perfectly everytime anyway. Turns out, all this positivity was worth it. They said I did well and I was the only teacher who they didn't have a ten minute meeting about and who got their feedback in less than a minute. Seems like I might be good at teaching, despite not enjoying it as much as I probably should. Think it would be great to have a job I love, but I'm not sure what kind of job I'd love to do. I wonder if there are a lot of people in this predicament with me?

Return to Blogging

2008-09-10T17:46:00.000+12:00

So it's been over 2 years since I blogged or even had a blog. Luckily for me, blogger had saved my information and my blog from Japan so it has been an easy return. I'm not sure how often I'll blog or even what I plan to blog about but I've been keenly reading a few blogs over the past few months and it's given me a bit of motivation. Funny thing is, now that I've started this 'new' blog, I don't have much to say. Maybe I'll have something to say tomorrow.