Posts (page 2)

On Thursday afternoon I bought two fresh chickens and roasted them - I used the meat from one to make a chicken tagliatelle consisting of the meat from roasted chicken, tagliatelle cooked al dente, marinated artichoke hearts, some roasting juices from the chicken and fresh chives - lovely!

My second roast chicken was used for Friday night's evening meal of chicken rolls with fresh salad greens, avocado and whole egg mayo - Lovely again!

Today I boiled up the carcasses from both chickens along with the rest of the roasting juices with about 3 litres of water for 4 hours. I fine strained the bones, skin and flesh and now have 1.5litres of chicken stock for use in this week's family meal menu.... what to cook? I'm thinking the first thing I should do is a dose of chicken soup, then maybe a risotto or stir fry?

Any suggestions would be most appreciated - I think we're full enough of chicken to be a bit jaded on the chicken soup idea but as it's always been a family favourite and I do hate wasting the stock I've just made I am at a bit of a loss.

Where is the farthest you have ever been away from home? Did you get homesick? 
Submitted by Melissa.

The farthest I've been away from home - not distance wise but anyway - Beijing 1994. Although I'd been there before this time I cried all the way there as I'd left my 6 month old baby behind with my husband and family in order to complete a compulsory field trip for my degree. I cried on and off for the entire first week of my 3 month trip and came to fully appreciate what it was to be a mother and away from my child. I felt as though I'd travelled to the farthest reach of the earth and would never want to do that again.

Are you a good dance or do you have two left feet?  What's your signature dance move?

I consider myself a good dancer - I dance as though no-one is looking and give it my all. Dance is an expression of what you're feeling and when you've a skin full and have the opportunity of an empty dance floor (or even a square metre of dancefloor) you should let loose and show the world what you're made of! You know when I've had a skin full and have that precious square metre of dance floor when I start doing the Tina Turner quick foot. When that happens there's nought you can do but wait for me to stop.

*long sigh of relief*

It's just after 9pm here and my God I am one tired mummy. Friday night - family comes over for 9 yr old's birthday dinner - could write umpteen paragraphs of shite in order to debrief but am content to say that until cake cutting time I held it together well with 12 adults and 7 kids served the full big fat Greek dinner party (cake cutting time saw me loose it as usual with my dad standing right next to me telling me just how thick to cut the cake, every slice was subject to his scrutiny and in between handing out plates of cake there was a constant commentary on how the cake was very rich and I needed to cut much smaller slices - still, my reaction was better than last time when I handed him the knife and said "you cut the fucking cake then!!!' and this is something because the f word is off limits at my parents' house)

Saturday night one of my best friends came over for dinner with her two kids - both of whom are now experts at card tricks to the point where if I had any links to the entertainment world I would become their agent and exploit them completely! We had a great night which was made even better as my friend wrapped up the pass the parcel game for today's party for my 9 yr old.

Today - had a bit of a sleep in - noice!  Got up around 9am, went back to bed with a second cup of coffee (ds brought me the first one being the dutiful son he is) came downstairs and started to get things ready for the birthday party. Had a bit of an ordeal choosing music for ds's party as he's the most particular person alive when it comes to what he likes and we did have a few stoushes over his lack of appreciation for pre-child molestation allegation Michael Jackson and James Brown (he'd have none of it and I'm particular worried about his dislike of the Godfather of Soul I mean c'mon - papa got a brand new bag!!!).

Although I wrote 2pm on the invitations kids started arriving thick and plenty by 1:45pm - I've never been in that situation as I'm always the last parent to arrive anywhere so it was truly bizarre to me that anyone would actually have the audacity to drop their kids off early - It's all French 'appropriate lateness' in our household and I would never dream of arriving early to a party. Anyway, by 2:05pm on the dot 22 kids had arrived to add to the 3 resident kids who live here and I immediately thought 'shit, I don't have enough games to keep this party pumping'.

We played pass the parcel, musical statues, pin the nose on the clown and did biscuit decoration which was the most successful game of the day because the kids were actually quiet for 20 minutes. We had pizza (10 - we have 2 pizzas left) and the kids consumed 14 litres of soft drink before I called for a ban on soft drinks and offered only water for the rest of the party.

All in all we had a great day and it was fab that one of the mums stayed behind at the end and had a few drinks with me to recuperate!

We've just cleaned up and I'm currently making headway on my third crowny of the evening and lovin it!

In Australia we don't ordinarily celebrate Halloween and although I've always been of the ilk that would not approve of yet another Americanism infiltrating our culture I have enjoyed this year's 'halloween' and would like it to become more prevalent in our society.

My youngest son was born on Halloween and I was not aware of this until a few years later when an American woman on a message board I frequented alerted me to the fact. I've since made a bit of a big deal about his auspicious birthday and this year he decided he wanted to go trick or treating. I bought a small pumpkin (most of our pumpkins here are so hard you can't even cut them with a knife let alone scooping out the pulp with a spoon!) and hollowed it out to make a jack-o-lantern which we placed on our doorstep with a candle inside. We actually had 8 children come trick or treating in full halloween regalia which was really cute!

I sent my youngest out trick or treating with my eldest son and a neighbour and he came home with a bag full of treats - only one household had actually said they wouldn't participate which I was reallly surprised at as I thought he'd have the door slammed shut more than once.. He and his neighbourhood friend had a great time and can't wait until next year. I think Halloween may yet become an Australian custom in years to come. I may even let him go out after dark (with appropriate supervision of course) as all 8 kids who visited us this year waited until the sun had set whereas I sent my son out in broad daylight and limited him to our very small street.

Needless to say I don't mind this level of acculturation!

Watching TV late at night in bed is bad for the soul. Unfortunately I had to go to sleep the other night absolutely incensed by the new DF ad and happily I was not alone in my incensement as dh felt the same way which is a happy but infrequent occurance as he regularly dismisses my frequent ire as something superfluous to the human condition.

If you haven't seen the new DF ad you can find it here on there website, in full view of any who may wish to view it unless you have diall up at which case you will be sitting there for a while - but oh, it's worth it!http://www.dairyfarmers.com.au/df/aboutus/tvcommercials I apologize in advance for even posting the link as I'm sure it will lead to an irksome period in your life that will surely cause you several days' worth of consternation.

It's the ad called 'Dairy Farmers - Australia's Milk'

And it's a doozy for anyone with a mere semblance of social conscience. The fact that milk is a finite product that has a very short life when it's fresh makes this ad even more offensive i.e unless I'm mistaken it's alot less expensive to buy fresh milk from a local vendor than importing longlife (aka already heat treated) milk from say Europe, South America or the Middle East so it is painfully obvious to me that the ad is capitolizing on our perceptions of what an 'Australian' dairy farmer would look like. What this ad says to me is that unless the person milking the cow that provides your milk is wearing a dryzabone and an akubra hat you wouldn't want to be drinking it - and that is where the problem doth lye. I'm so pissed off about this ad I'm considering writing a letter - to whom I don't know yet but you can be sure I'll stew upon this for several days forthwith and will probably forget about it at a later date and not have written anything at all save for this precious post herein wherefore-in the problem lyeth! F-you Dairy Farmers - we're not all sporting dryzabones and wearing akubras to save our precious lilly white anglo saxon derma!

After yesterday's hay-fever ridden hell which meant that while I spent all day in my pyjamas with a face that felt like it was made of concrete, my kids also seemed hell bent on acquiring DVT in their efforts to make the most of my incapacitation and spend all day in front of their respective favourite video games. So, today was screen free day and may I say it was the nicest school holiday activity I think we've ever spent together! No TV, computer or video games were allowed which meant we actually listened to a cd at dinner time and talked for what seemed like the first time in ages. We'll definitely be doing this again. We spent the day doing jigsaw puzzles, visiting a Golf driving range where the kids hit off around a hundred balls each, then off to a friend's place for lunch and a swim, back home for more puzzles and board games. I did cede tonight as we decided to watch a dvd together to wind the evening up. It was just luxury plus for me and reaffirmed that I really do have great kids who are fun to be around :)

It's wine time at the Sally residence this evening, kids are in bed fast asleep, dh transfixed by the xbox  (absolutely no pun intended - it really is as sad as it seems) and I'm sitting here typing away on a laptop that now smells like a distillery. Of course I left my wine glass too close to the puter and as I tend to be on the speedy side when typing and spilled an entire glass of very nice white wine all over the keyboard, monitor and myself. A few months ago I watched as a colleague of mine spilled her freshly brewed hot chocolate on her laptop and it shut down immediately. All attempts to reboot were in vain as it was entirely stuffed. Thankfully this hasn't happened to mine yet, I held it upside down and drained it then wiped it over furiously with a tea towel and I'm hoping it will start again tomorrow after I turn it off tonight....

This has to be the worst hayfever I've ever experienced. We've run out of pills here so I've been reduced to triple doses of children liquid medicine - and it's not doing anything at all.....feel sorry for me....I need food and medicine but I just can't be bothered.....