Leafygal

Serial Celebrations

I opened the letter and there it was... my application form for a Senior's Card!

Ah well, there have to be some compensations for offically becoming a Grumpy Old Woman.

I started celebrating on Wednesday with lunch with the Girls at The Deck in Southbank.

Continued all yesterday starting with breafast at The Sheraton on the waterfront.

Shopped for my present to myself - a new watch.

Dinner at the newly opened restaurant on The Pier in Geelong. (Its second night). Called Baveras after a water goddess in a fantasy game. The menu is modern and offered a degustation menu, which we tried, or 2 or 3 courses for a set price.

Here is their Dinner menu. My favourite course was the Lamb. Great flavours.

Will be continuing the celebrations on Saturday in Melbourne! More great food and company to come!

PS. I don't feel 60! OR "60 is the new 40"

Post Christmas - Post New Year - 2009 is well under way!

Here we are well into the New Year and me not having posted anything yet.
Can I plead being busy?
Christmas was fun but a lot of work with Tony's family here for lunch and then an adjournment to my family home in Ocean Grove to do it all over again for dinner. Thoroughly enjoyed by all.

My brother did what I think we all should have done after lunch!!

We spent a few days at OG, but not holidaying. We are still in the throes of clearing out the house and this time tackled the 3rd bedroom. One chest of drawers contained my mother's "upstairs" studio. I scored a lot of my mother's art supplies so once I get myself sorted at this end I should be able to do some sort of arty stuff. We still haven't done her "downstairs" studio(a whole room)  and I hate to think where all that stuff will go as quite a lot will be for keeping.

The frenzy of clearing was to accomodate my nephew and a couple of his friends who are going to live in the house for a while, especially over the summer. I went back last week to bring back the family history collection, which is now stacked in my bedroom awaiting distribution and more bookshelves.

New Year we were back at the house where we wined and dined with a couple of friends and even managed to dance to some "oldies but goodies" from the sixties! We later managed to convince the neighbours that the noise was the nephew and friends up on the top lawn!!  Watched the fireworks over the Bluff and could also see them going off down the coast at Torquay.

Eating and drinking hasn't abated with my resolution to entertain more friends this year. So far one couple overnight including a trip to Kilgour Estate Winery for lunch on a perfect (not too hot) summer's day overlooking the ever sparkling waters of the bay.

Two couples minus one partner for dinner last Monday. I did a "proper" dinner party for a change. Anti-pasto platters included baby witlof leaves stuffed with a cream cheese mix and topped with Smoked salmon. I also stuffed the biggest mushroom I've ever seen with a herby ricotta mix and baked it. We also had the smallest zucchini, just fresh and crunchy with mayo.

Main course was baked lamb with baked garlic peppers, asparagus, eggplant salad and baked Kipfler potatoes.

Dessert had to include the gorgeous sour cherries that my last week's guests brought from the Dandenongs. I made a  clafoutis, which turned out well even though the ratio of cherries to batter was a bit high. (The picture is not of my effort as I didn't think to take photos!)

As usual we have started the year with plenty of good cheer, good friends and good food.

Pink Pigs and Watermelons

I do sometimes finish knitted items. This one has been languishing in the UFO (unfinished objects for the non knitters out there) pile for nearly a year. All that it required was for me to sew the "pips" on to it.
This proved to be one of those monumental tasks that are so difficult because I had to:
A) Have the item out in plain sight
B) Have a darning needle in my hand at the time
C) Have the right colour wool handy
As you can imagine most of these only coincide during a blue moon, so one night recently I went and found the hat, got out my sewing kit, found the wool and BINGO!!
This watermelon hat is destined for one of my sister's de-grandchildren. Hope it still fits her.

 The photo doesn't do it justice as the colour is up the creek. The fetching model is the cute pink pig that was my first gift to my eldest nephew when he was born. This photo ties events together as I took it on the night of Ryan's (and the pigs) 18th Birthday.(May11th) Congratulations to them both and to my sister and her spouse for surviving the first 18 years!

Merry New Year and Farewell to Xmas

It's now a new year and I am reflecting on life more than usually at this time. A lot has happened during the year which will lead to big changes in a variety of ways.

Xmas was spent divided neatly between our two families as usual. Lunch in Melbourne with the Norris's followed by a drive to the  Menzies meet up in Ocean Grove for high tea.
It goes without saying that much was eaten and drunk unnecessarily, but very enjoyably.
The pudding - my first attempt at the Norris family recipe, was a success. The slightly burnt Xmas cakes that kept me up 'til the wee small hours decorating tasted fine and looked sparkly, thanks to the gold cachous and painted gold stars.
The real Xmas tree was wonderful, and I had fun decorating that too. I hadn't done it for years at OG and this time was my turn. I'm glad we did the real tree, it may be for the last time.

We did miss my father, but it was not as difficult as I had imagined, perhaps the hard work of packing things away helped to obliterate the gap in our ranks

We must make decisions about what to do with the house.
In the meantime we have taken home most of our inherited pieces with the intention of leaving just  holiday home basics to be used in the interim.

New Year was also different with Tony's mum spending a few days with us. The heat forced the decision to stay home in the cool of our one airconditionable room.  We dined on oysters, prawns, mango salad with asian dressing and topped it off with raspberries.  My version of the good fortune foods that are associated with Chinese New Year - they make me happy anyhow.  Our better than usual bubbly added to the festivities.  My only sadness here was that I was the only reveller in the household, apart from Charlie the cockatiel, to ring in the new year by watching the fireworks on the TV.
It's a lonely job but it must be done!!

Now for the big decision making - I expect this year to be a very different one, with new thoughts about work and health, as well as life in general.
Bring it on- I'll just have to keep jumping the hurdles as they arise!!