No Nose Smiley :)

I recently bought a car!  Yay me!  It's a second hand 2008 Honda Jazz VTi Manual. I bought the car via Carsales from a lovely lady based in Thornleigh.  And dragged Patrick from work along with me to test drive the car.  (Thanks Patrick... esp since we were stuck in traffic for such a long time!)  It's my first car in a long time as usually the car ends up in W's name and I don't actually enjoy driving so... it's really not my call as to what car to get.  But I was happy with my purchase.  It put me back $6200 (was listed at $6500).  I'm sure I could have probably gone down to $6000 but I don't like bargaining when it's for the sake of it. The car however didn't have things like reverse sensors or Bluetooth for hands free calling.  So I could get both of those things installed or go the whole hog and get something a bit fancy.  I had been spoiled as I was driving my mum's Mazda 2 with all the bells and whistles which had a heads up ...

Since we got back from our latest holiday/vacation I've been baking bread. I'm  not sure what caused my need to bake bread.  Certainly I have tried it in the past but for whatever reason didn't really continue.  Maybe it was because I was using a bread maker before... and maybe it's because it really isn't this hard... and I'm getting encouragement from colleagues and friends about how good the bread is.  And it's not just empty flattery.  Even I think the bread is good :) It started with me watching this video on the plane: The key words "no sugar bread" were probably the reason I watched this one rather than another one.  That and the promise (or advertising) of 8 minutes of prep time! The day we got back I was trying to stay awake so thought to bake the bread.  It was pretty amazing.  Especially for attempt one! Bread in oven on pizza stone Baked bread.  Looks and smells so good! The issue with this first one was that... ...

I've been a fan of square foot gardening for years.  Our first one was in Kellyville Ridge where we had one bed with the squares.  The concept just makes sense.  Break down the spacing based on a 1 square foot square.  In metric terms that's a 30 cm (ish!) square. This time I bought some garden beds from Bunnings and just used them.  We have finally landed on a design we like incorporating our chicken coop and the 4 garden beds. This is what we ended up with in the front yard. One of the garden beds has been in storage so looks very new!  Over time it will age.  Each square is just a tad under 1.2m.  It's actually about 1.140m on the inside.  So each square will be around 28.5cm. I just bought the equivalent of Mel's mix.  It's expensive!  But worth it as we have tried the mix before and it does work well. The mix is 1/3 each of vermiculite, peat moss and a mixed compost. I bought most of the mix from Enfield Produce ...

I'm big on tiny houses.  I suspect it's a holdover from when I was a kid and loved cubby houses and dreamt of making a usable space out of things like a car (this was when I was really really small!) or a bus or a railway carriage.  Or a shipping container. In the last 10 years or so the Tiny House movement has taken off.  And I fell in love with the tiny houses being built by Jay Shaffer and  Tumbleweed  homes.  Jay has since moved on and started  Four Lights Tiny House  homes.  I've spent many hours looking at the houses, floor plans and investigating what is required to do something similar in Australia and the rules and regulations for building a tiny house.  But it's been a bit of a dreaming only. So when I saw there was a crowdfunding campaign for a flat packed tiny house in Australia I was in! Greetings from a flatpacked tiny home! Articles about the home here: http://inhabitat.com/tiny-new-flat-packed-off-grid-homes...

It's the little things that matter.  The ones that make all the difference.  One of my very good friends asked me what I wanted for my birthday.  At first I was thinking something practical.  In the end I requested some popsicle moulds.  But I was specific and wanted the Tovolo Robot Pop moulds. Each robot is different and were very cute. But popsicles?  I never eat them.  So the question was posed why I wanted them.  I love ice cream but usually scoopable stuff rather than popsicles.  And never the icy frozen sugar water stuff.  But by making my own I could make sugar free popsicles including a peanut butter one.   The delivery came on Monday Yep you can start seeing why it was on my list of desirable items! And of course I had a day at home yesterday and made up something.  I had some Coconut Cream Keffir, some frozen mango and a spoonful of rice malt syrup and whizzed it up.  I had no idea if ...

I don't know why but I always enjoy looking at property and questioning where I would want to live if I was unfettered by employment requirements (ie need a job -- more on this later)) and family/friends commitment. Somehow I've stumbled on a thought that won't let go.  Whilst previously I have thought about moving to a lower cost city or area in the future including Hobart, Tasmania or overseas such as Montreal, Canada I had an epiphany about a location where the weather is good, it has definite lifestyle benefits and is still in Australia. One of the big issues with Tasmania is that it has been off the mainland AND that I wouldn't have access to Chinese groceries and food easily.  And then there was the weather.  Whilst we like the cooler weather I think it may get to be too much.  Especially as we age and have arthritis problems.  In reality also do we want to be maintaining a property and yard as much?  Probably not. So where am I thinking?  ...

Our trip to Montreal has been great. We're already on a cruise ship to Quebec City and down to Boston. In the meantime here are some of the photo highlights Dunn's Famous Smoked meat window Dunn's Famous - Cake and dessert window Dunn's Famous Diner (not the one downtown) Half of what is left of Will's Smoked Meat sandwich (actually it was  Club Roll) I ordered the Smoked Meat Club sandwich-- yum!!  But I asked for a side of something 'else' other than fries and ended up with rice.  Which I didn't eat.  Lesson learned - just order the club sandwich with no sides.  The coleslaw and pickle weren't my thing although I ate most of the coleslaw. Carrot cake.  I wanted the carrot cheesecake but there was no way we'd fit it in.  This shared 4 ways was fine... after I took half my sandwich home in a doggy bag! The 3 day metro pass was $18 and a bargain allowing us to catch the bus and metro.  I used Google Maps and Tra...