Mmm Mmm Mmm

One of my colleagues is going on extended leave for 6 months and I am a sad panda.  She is not only a most excellent person (cue Bill & Ted) but she is my mentor and my role model for what I want to be like at work.

To commiserate our last day working together, I did what any rational person would do and I baked.  I've seen this Hummingbird Cake mentioned quite a lot lately and was wondering what all the fuss was about.

Far out, this cake is easy peasy to make and went down a treat.  The compliments flowed so I will definitely be making this one again.

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Alas, I did not take any pictures as I was baking at 10pm at night and icing at 5.30am so I can't lay claim to the above cake but it so could have been mine ;)

Hummingbird Cake

Serves 8 | Prep Time 10 mins | Cooking Time 60 mins

Butter, to grease

1 1/2 cups plain flour

1 cup caster sugar

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp baking powder

3 eggs

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1/2 cup coarsely chopped walnuts

3 large over-ripe bananas, mashed

1/2 cup undrained crushed pineapple

ICING

100g cream cheese, at room temperature

1 1/2 cups icing sugar mixture

1.  Preheat ovent o 180C (160C fan-forced).  Brush cake tin with melted butter.  Line base and sides with baking paper.

2.  Combine flour, sugar, cinnamon and baking powder in bowl.  Crack eggs into jug and whisk lightly.  Add eggs to flour along with oil, walnuts, bananas and pineapple.  Stir until combined.

3.  Pour into prepared pan and smooth surface.  Bake for 1 hour or until cooked when inserted skewer comes out clean.  Remove from oven.  Turn out onto wire rack to cool.

4.  To make icing, use beaters to whip cream cheese in bowl until pale.  Gradually beat in icing sugar until light and fluffy.

Spread icing evenly over cake.  Slice and serve.  

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This is more what mine looked like minus the daggy plate.

Voila!

Try it, I swear you won't be disappointed.

Oh how I love thee...

I blame today's complete and utter work CRAP-tasticness on a distinct lack of coffee. 

Thank goodness tomorrow is the last day of my working week.  I'm not sure I could handle many more incidents involving bodily fluids.

Don't ask ;)

Designer Car Seats

With BuBba turning one, we decided it was time we turned his car seat around so that he was facing the front.  He was also getting a wee bit big for it so we've removed an insert from it too.  

When I turn to check on him whilst we're in the car, my little boy looks so different and BIG.  

He's changing before my eyes...

Btw, how cool is this Paul Frank booster seat???

Friday Drool

Look out, she's joined the slow cooker brigade!

Here's my first little effort.  I can tell we're going to get along just fine...

Thai Pumpkin Soup

1kg pumpkin

1 tin coconut cream/milk {for a healthier alternative, I used coconut flavoured evaporated milk}

1 brown onion

2 garlic cloves

1tbsp red curry paste

Handful fresh coriander

500mL chicken stock

Chop the pumpkin up into 2-3 inch cubes...the bigger the cubes the longer this takes to cook. If you're going be out all day, feel free to just chuck in some large wedges. Put your pumpkin in the slow cooker and add 1 tin coconut cream/milk and 500mL of chicken stock.

In a frypan/wok, cook off 1 large onion sliced, 2 finely chopped cloves of garlic and the curry paste to taste.  Once the onions are cooked through, add the coriander and stir through.  Then add the whole lot to the pumpkin and stir through again.

The soup is cooked when the pumpkin is soft.  I had it cooking for about 6 hours on low.  Once cooked, whizz it in the blender to get a nice smooth consistency and then plate up.

Whack a big dollop of sour cream in the middle and garnish with some fresh coriander.  

Serve with crusty white bread.

VOILA!

Recipe adapted from the Masterchef forums

Star Trek Meets Tik Tok

I'm not even a Star Trek fan but I found this video giggle worthy :)

Winter Lunching

BuBba and I braved the world of public transport last week and hopped on a train into the city so that we could have lunch with Daddy BuBbles.

We sat in the sun, ate pizza and drank wine (well not BuBba) and had a fabulous lunch.  

I really should make the effort to do that more often.

Side Braids R Us

How on earth can one possibly do a pretty braid on your own?  

Surely you must have to be a contortionist???

I have tried over and over and over again with absolutely no luck.  

If you know any tricks of the trade or secrets, puhleeease let me know!

Spiced Lamb Fillets with Broccolini

I've probably mentioned before that I'm not the best cook in the shed.  I do however have a mass of accumulated recipes that remain vastly untouched.  

BuBba currently has me on a baby-proofing binge and thus, the kitchen drawers have been getting rearranged.  In the bottom drawer I found a massive pile of loose recipes begging to be sorted and organised.  Enter kikki.K and her recipe organiser accompanied by a large coffee in my favourite mug.

Tonight I decided to do a recipe with some lamb fillets that I had in the freezer.  The recipe is quite simple (BINGO!) and is fairly quick to prepare and cook (DOUBLE BINGO!!!).  For a triple whammy, it is also healthy.  In fact, I have a feeling it might even be a Weight Watcher's recipe.

Spiced Lamb Fillets with Broccolini

(Serves 4 for dinner)

2 cloves garlic

2 tablespoons olive oil

800g lamb fillets

2 onions, sliced

2 tablespoons tomato paste

1/2 cup red wine

1 1/2 tablespoons sultanas

1/2 small green chilli, chopped

1 tablespoon shredded mint

1/2 teaspoon paprika

1 tablespoon pine nuts

Zests of one lemon

2 bunches of broccolini

Place garlic and oil in a bowl.  Add lamb and toss to coat.

Heat a large frying pan over high heat.  Brown the lamb, then remove from pan and set aside.

Add onion to pan and cook for five minutes or until soft.  Stir through tomato paste, wine, sultanas, chilli, mint, paprika, pine nuts and zest.  Cook for 2-3 minutes.  Return meat to the pan to heat through.

Meanwhile, bring a small saucepan of lightly salted water to the boil and blanch the broccolini for 2-3 minutes.  Drain.

Top lamb with onion mixture and serve broccolini alongside.

*I substitued fresh chilli with chilli flakes and omitted the paprika (because I didn't have any) and the recipe still worked out superbly.

Daddy BuBbles was impressed and in my books that's a winner :)

Eggs-actly!

Now that BuBba is one, we can let him try all those naughty foods that are "forbidden" before hitting the magical twelve month mark.

Yesterday morning we ate breakfast together.  Yummy scrambled eggs was on the menu.

If you'd like to join in with Point + Shoot, just head on over to Fat Mum Slim.

Friday Drool

The newest Twilight movie comes out in a couple of weeks so I thought I'd dedicate this week's Friday Drool to one of the hunky men that star in it.

So, shall I be Team Edward or Team Jacob?  Decisions....  Decisions....

Well how about neither!  My latest celebrity drool is Peter Facinelli who plays Dr Carlisle Cullen, Edward's "father" in the Twilight series.

 

 

 

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I'm not really digging the blond hair so much but that's ok because I can still get my weekly dose of non-vampire Peter in one of my current fave TV series, Nurse Jackie.

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If that wasn't enough to get you to like him, he is also married to "Kelly" (real name Jennie Garth) from Beverley Hills 90210.

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On second thoughts, if he wasn't married to her and I wasn't married to Daddy BuBbles then we might have a chance.

Peter, will you marry me???

Love Your Teeth

When I lived in London in my twenties, I had an awesome job.  I worked as a Clinic Manager/Personal Assistant for a husband and wife team who owned their own practice in Central London.  

The people I worked with were fabulous and the clientele were rich (and I mean $$$ rich) and varied.  I got to meet some pretty cool people and see a lot of interesting things.

Last night I was sans Daddy BuBbles, BuBba was tucked up nicely in bed and I wasn't interested in watching the State of Origin in the slightest, despite me being a QUEENSLANDER!!! at heart.  

So what did I do?  Well, I googled my old bosses of course.

Wow, they've come a long way baby!  Not only have they spruced up their website but they've been busy designing a range of designer tooth pastes cleansers that's stocked exclusively in Boots (kind of like Priceline here) and has even had a mention in UK Vogue and Tatler. 

Dawood and Tanner Tooth Cleansers

Ooh La La :)

Might have to hit them up for samples when we return for a visit, hopefully some time soon.

Yahoooooooooooo!

I'M AN AUNTY!!!

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My beautiful sister-in-law had a gorgeous little boy yesterday and I am stoked to the max.  

The little darling was introduced to the world 10 days early but both Mum and bub are doing super.

Welcome to the world Elijah!

Hit Girl vs. Tavi

Over the long weekend Daddy BuBbles and I managed to sit down and watch the movie Kick Ass.

Initially it seemed like a fairly innocent movie based on a comic series about a school student who decides to become a Superhero but that was far from the truth.  In fact, one of the Superhero's is Hit Girl, an 11 year old girl with a potty mouth and a penchant for blood.

The movie was right up my alley and I really enjoyed it.  I found myself laughing loudly a few times and suddenly realising that I sounded like my mother!  OMG!1!!!

Anyways I ramble...  

The point of this post is that I couldn't help but think that Hit Girl and Tavi (of Style Rookie fame) must be sisters.

Hit Girl

versus

Tavi

What do you think???

For those of you wondering what the hell I'm on about, have a little look see at the trailer.

Long Weekends are Bliss!

BuBba turned the big 1 on Friday.  

We'd celebrated the weekend before with friends at the park which was just as well because Daddy BuBbles had booked himself in for Lasik eye surgery in the afternoon and I had organised a Mother's Group dinner for the evening.

In between running around the various appointments we had, BuBba did get a chance to "open" his birthday presents.

The box that the trike came in was far more exciting though :)

The next day we took the trike out for a spin in the beautiful Winter's sun and as you can see from BuBba's face, it was a big hit!

I hope everyone is having a fabulous long weekend and has a great week ahead.

{Once again, I'm playing along with Fat Mum Slim's Point + Shoot}

Friday Drool

Cheesy teenage dramas and I are practically best friends.  If you were to delve back in to my murky past, it can probably be tracked way back to even before Heartbreak High and Degrassi Junior High were on the ABC.

One of my current faves is Gossip Girl.  And it so doesn't hurt that the gorgeous Chace Crawford provides delicious eye candy.  

His latest movie is called Twelve and I can't help but feel that it's like an episode of Gossip Girl but naughtier.  But I don't care because I'll jump at any chance to drool over him.

Movie Trailers - Movies Blog

Heart, heart, HEART Chace Crawford.

Ouchie Mama

Tomorrow is BuBba's first birthday.  So guess what that means???  Needle time :(

He had his THREE! jabs this morning and he was super awesome.  I timed it so that he was chugging away on his milk which worked out well because he only cried a little.

Let's hope he's ok tonight.

Hurrah

Today is my Friday.  The last day of the working week.  Geez I love working 2 days a week.  

IT ROCKS!!!

And Another...

Yay, another blogland first for me  :)

Janette at My Sweet Prints has passed on the Versatile Blogger Award to me (amongst others).  This is my first blog award and the rules are to list 7 things about myself and then forward this on to my fellow bloggers.

Let's do this!

1.  Travelling is huge passion of mine.  I've been to the UK, New York, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Hawaii, Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Cuba, Iceland, France, Spain, Italy, Sweden, Austria, Germany, Belgium, Prague, Mauritius, the Maldives, Thailand, Singapore, Fiji, Egypt and Jordan - just to name a few.  Next on my list is Cable Beach in WA and Cambodia.

Our honeymoon destination -  Soneva Gili in the Maldives

2. The hardest thing I have ever done in my life, on par with childbirth, is trekking the non-touristy Inca Trail in Peru.  The whole story deserves it own post but let's just say that after nearly freezing my tits off and suffering from horrible altitude sickness, my hiking boots were permanently retired to the back of the cupboard as soon as we returned back home from South America.  They were bloody ugly anyway and difficult to co-ordinate clothes with :)

 That's me in the tent and ice and frost on the ground

3.  I'm a Brissie girl at heart.  I grew up there and left at the age of 21 when I had finished my uni degree and went in search of the bright lights of Sydney with Daddy BuBbles, who was my boyfriend at the time.  Whilst it's tempting to move back to Brisbane because of family, friends and a better property market, I just could not give up the beauty of Sydney.

A beautiful Brisbane sunset on our wedding day

4.  I love fast cars.  My car BC (Before Child) was a gorgeous black Mazda RX8 that I miss so much.  It was reluctantly sold to make way for a more family friendly Subaru Liberty, which so happens to be a sporty little turbo number.  I always felt like a million bucks in "Rotors".

The bogan number plate was Daddy BuBbles doing

5.  As a youngster I used to play Tee-ball.  My team was the Hawks and we had a stylish beige and brown uniform that used to put the other teams to shame.  I lie...  I actually used to secretly wish I was in the Angels because their uniform was a more trendy aqua colour.  My hopes of moving on to becoming a Superstar female baseball player were quashed when my parents refused to let me move up the ranks in fear of me getting hurt or my studies being interferred with.

Check out that stance!

6.  If we had had a baby girl, her name would have been Allegra Grace.  About a year before I was pregnant and even before we were considering having children, I had a dream where I had a daughter called Allegra.  It was such a vivid dream and I was convinced while I was pregnant that it meant we were having a girl.  Lucky we had a boy's name picked out just in case :)

Her nickname would have been Leggie

7.  And finally, I am a terrible gardener.  I try, I really do but I rarely manage to keep plants alive longer than a few months.  My latest venture was a herb garden.  My Mum helped when she was down visiting a while ago but sadly only half of the plants are still alive today and half of those are being eaten by grubs and aphids.

 Freshly repotted herbs

TA DA!!!

There you have it.  Seven things about me.  Seeing as I'm new to all of this, I'm not sure if I've gone a bit overboard but to be honest, I've enjoyed doing this and sharing little tidbits about the life of BuBbles.

I hope you enjoyed it too.

It's now time to pass the baton of the Versatile Blogger Award on to some of my favourite bloggers: 

*  Ms Curious @ Confessions of a Curious Mind 

*  Cotton Socks

*  Chantelle @ Fat Mum Slim 

*  Sonja @ Tied With a Bouw 

*  Victoria @ The Yummy Mummy Secrets 

Go and check out these Versatile Bloggers if you haven't already. 

Girl Got It Going Onnnnnnnnn

Christina Aguilera at the 2010 MTV Movie Awards...   

Phwoar!  She is one hot Mumma!

Point + Shoot

The rain gods must have heard all of my prayers, begging, mumbling and swearing and the sun shone bright for BuBba's 1st Birthday Party in the park yesterday.

 

And how perfect is this?  Just as we were about to walk back inside after the party in the park, the heavens opened up and the rain came pouring down.  

Perfect timing if ever there was...


Come and play along with Point + Shoot over here

Friday Drool

I have a thing for cushions.  I'm always on the search for new ones to add to my ever growing collection and I picked up a cute Mossimo pair yesterday at the Myer Stocktake sale.

A couple of weeks ago I featured some funky Missoni cushions that I seriously LOVE but today I thought I'd share a few more that are on my radar.

Daniella Rosen Black Pearl

Aura Pewter Love

Table Tonic Large Ikat Pink Spot

I've been following Louise's Table Tonic blog for a while now and have admired her handiwork.  Imagine my surprise when my latest Shop Til You Drop arrived in the mail yesterday and who should be staring back at me from the Lifestyle section but Louise!  Nice one!

On a side note, whilst writing this post, I got distracted about a million and one times but I'm happy to say that a couple of those distractions led me in to buying both the Aura and Table Tonic cushions.

Now... how do I incorporate them in to the apartment so that Daddy BuBbles doesn't notice???

A First

A few weeks back I won my first blog giveaway over at Fat Mum Slim.  Squeeeee!!!  I was so excited and last week I received my beautiful gifts.

Thank you so much Chantelle for taking the time to organise such a brilliant Mother's Day Giveaway.  

A big shout also goes to the makers of the DIVINE handmade Goodies Galore I received:  Lulu Frou Frou, Mad Stitches, Scissors Paper Rock and Re-arranged.

I feel so lucky!

Eye Candy-orama

I've just finished watching the latest episode of Glee and it is Gaga-tastic!  

The first song is superb - even better than the Madonna episode in my humble opinion.

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Dear sweet Puck is such delectable eye candy.  I just had to share... You can thank me later ;)