The things you find....

when you least expect it. A copy of "The Tassajara Bread Book" for £1 in one of the city centre charity shops. It's been sitting on my Amazon wish list for a while know and I kept meaning to pop it into my basket with every order, I put through, but something kept stopping me. So I was both happy and surprised to find. I must say it's a beautiful book, well written with lots of tasty looking recipes to try out on the family.

Other finds were a couple of Jacquline Wilson, a TinTin adventure, Mary Popins (which I've never read so will be taking on holiday to read to Stella) all for Stella and the new Artemis Fowl paper back.

Hobbits, birthdays and another Amazon order.

Thing have gone rather Lord of the Rings round here as we seem to be rediscovering our love of all things Hobbitish. Stella and I have been relistening to our muchloved audio book of the Hobbit while Kyle and I have rewatched the Lord of the Rings trilidgy on Dvd. Also much listening to a new copy of Led Zep 4 which is heavily infulenced by the Hobbit and LOTR. I've forgotton how much I love the Hobbit it makes me smile and want to run off and live in one of those wonderfull hobbit holes that was built for the LOTR film but sadly my plans for a life as a Hobbit have been dashed as Stella said no as daddy's to tall, to live in a Hobbit hole, so we'd have to leave him here.

We've had three birthdays in the last week me, Kyle and our wonderfull puppy has turned one. I'm now the grand old age of 38 and the gray is showing more and more every year and I got some lovely prezzies from the family. Kyle has turned 14 and is know bigger than me. Oh what happened to my little boy who would hold my hand and sit on my knee? Well he's know a rather kool teenager, fab to hang out with, a wonderfull sence of humor and a very kool taste in music.

Kyle, for his bithday prezzie, chose to have a weeks game camp at the "Games Workshop". He so loves model making, painting and all thing War Hammer and to be honest I think it a great hobby for kids his age. We also ordered him a couple of Dvd's form Amazon and a book just as a little something to open on his birthday but they took ages to come with one not apearing untill after his birthday even though we'd ordered then a over fortnight before. Next time, I think, I'll try a month.

The Waitings Over

Well the Amazon order finally arrived and guess what it some of it was wrong! Pete's' tee shirts were right, my book order was right but the shoes I had ordered were the wrong size. I had ordered a size 7 pair of fuchsia pink (to match the lovely fuchsias I'm growing) prima crocs But they sent me a size 9. I could have paddled up the Tyne in them they were so big. I love crocs prima shoes. I managed to grab a still bagged brand new pair from the charity shop last year but have sadly worn them so much that I've put a hole in the bottom.

My book order I relay happy with. I ordered Permaculture in a Nutshell by Patrick Whitefield, Circle Round by Starhawk, Dianne Baker and Anne Hill and Food For Free by Richard Maybe in a handy pocket sized edition. I've started on the Permaculture book first and so far it's very interesting. Food for Free is one of those books that you have a well loved copy of, let someone borrow and you never see again. So this time I'm keeping this copy all too myself. Circle Round will need a bit more time to digest, i think but I'm looking forward to reading it as I heard so many good things about it.

Stovies

I don't know if it's because i haven't been home for a while but I have this sudden need to eat something Scottish. Goodness knows where these sudden cravings have come from. May be it's the distint lack of artery clogging amimal fats that are missing from my diet or the need to want my teeth to fall out, all by them selfs but all I want is some chips with brown sauce and a can of Barrs Red cola, I'm even dreaming about the veggie hagis supper I will get from a certain famous chippy I know of. Well I can't have any, of those, so there. But what I have been able to pull together is a veggie version of every Scottish childs favorite Stovies. It's one of those dishes like Scouce from Liverpool, Colcannon bubble and Squeak that if you ask any Scotts person how to make it you get a different anwser form each person. Wars have been fought over lesser things. My grannie would make it with sausage, my friends mum with minced beef and I've even read that there's a versions with chicken and fish. Any way here's mine

Lorna Veggies Stovies

4 med potatoes peeled and chopped into bite sized pieces
3 carrots peeled and chopped
large onion chopped
stock made up
oil
couple veggie sausages I used frozen Quorn as they keep their shape well but you could use Relate chicken/beef style pieces

Put around a table spoon of oil into a heavy pan and brown off the sausages then add the onions and fry till clear. Add the potatoes and carrot fry for a couple of Min's then cover with stock. Put a snug lid on top and leave to cook for around 40Min's.
Proper Stovies should be on the dry side with little or no gravy.

I can't take it...........

The problem is I've become addicted to Amazon. It's brill, fab, wonderful but the waiting for the parcels is driving me nuts. I mean I'm lying on the door mat, slobbering, waiting for the postman to to drop something on to the mat. I can remember feeling the same way, when I was little, coming up to my birthday. It's that feeling of anticipation that you get when you know something good about happen but you so have to wait for it.

The other thing I'm enjoying about Amazon is the price difference between them and high street stores. I just can't believe how cheap things are and also the choice between buying new and second hand. I also love the fact that they seem to have every book, CD and DVD that I've ever wanted all in the one place and I don't have to pay a fortune just because it isn't in the top ten or best seller lists.

Next is Ebay..

Mary Mary

I'm quite pleased with the way the gardens coming on. The potatoes, onions, beetroot and peas are doing realy well. The carrots are so so and we can't decide wither we have salad or a patch of weeds. The plants in the green house are small but are doing very well. I've also picked my first radish, which was pot grown and the herbs patch and potted flowers all look amazing. But if I'm going to be honest I think Stellas sunflowers are doing the best.

We have pretty rubish soil and should have realy done some work to get it in better condition but of Pete's knee problem last year we never got round to it.

Half term heaven

We've managed to have a relay busy half term this time. Mainly because the weather's been so good here. We started off with the VegNE stall in town then a trip to the Taste Festival at which we bought some local cheese from The Northumberland Cheese Company and some jam and lemon cheese mmmmm.

The Sunday and Monday were spent doing the garden and catching up on the washing and Stella had her first sleepover at her friends up the road.

Tuesday was fantastic, we took the dog to Whitley Bay beach and walked from there all the way to North Shields. We did stop half way, at Cullercoats to have chips from the chippy but what made it relay special was that Pete managed to finish early and meet up with us on the way to the beach. We didn't get home till half ten with two shattered kids and one knackered puppy.

Wednesday we did the Orange Wednesday film offer and we went with Ruth, Ian and Josh to see the adaptation of the Neil Gaiman's book Coraline in the new 3D. Stella had borrowed and read the book, from Ruth and relay enjoyed it so was very excited about the film. We all relay enjoyed the it, it looked beautiful, the story was good but the 3D was a bit of a let down.

Thursday we went to our local garden centre to see if we could track down some grow bags. We'd tried all weekend to get some but for some reason there seems to be a shortage of them in the NE. It's a lovely walk along a footpath then over a couple of fields so we took Bracken with us. The farmer had just cut the grass in to lovely straight rows so the dog had a fantastic time jumping over the piled up grass there and back. We didn't have any luck tracking down grow bags though they, were all sold out so we bought some sorrel, lovage, a pot geranium and some lobiella for the garden instead.

On the Friday we decided to rest well rather pot out the new plants, tidy the house and do more washing. I knew my friend Ruth was going to pop over as Josh was having a tidy out and had some Goosebumps books books for Stella. When she turned up she had a supprise for us, two lovely grow bags. She had also bought some bedding plants which she split with me and I passed on what I had left over of the Lobiella.

We did our usuall Saturday stuff Stella went to dance class well rather we tried to get todance class but the bus didn't turnup so we were realy late and decided to forget about it and leave to the following week. Then we went shopping.

Sunday was again spent in the garden. I got out the 99p paddling pool we've had for years and put Stella in her UV suit and let her loose in the garden. Kyle even came and joined in and had loads of fun playing with Bracken and the pump action water pistol. Even 13 year old boys will allow them selfs to have fun when there's a pump action water pistol around. It was such a lovely day that we even eat dinner alfresco.

I love weeks like this it's nice to just be able to do things with the children with out the pressure of having to get up early or the routine of school. Roll on the summer holls and lets hope we have some of that promised good weather.