Steamfest Sunday

We ventured out to Steamfest at Maitland today, checking out the various steam operated vehicles like the lorry above, and this tractor below.  They were so smoky and noisy, and I loved the loud shrill whistles.  The girls found them much too loud, and spent a good deal of time with their hands over their ears!

 There were a whole range of vintage vehicles on display...

Nathan particularly liked this green truck...

 and this one too...

 Lili loved the Clydesdales...

 We wandered over to the Show and Shine car show in Maitland park, where Nathan found his ideal Christmas present...

 or perhaps this one...

 By this time it was well and truly raining on us, so we didn't look for as long as we had planned to at the cars on show, and when we went to browse around the market stalls it was a bit too wet and many had packed up.  After an icecream and a bit of waiting it was time for a ride on a steam train - definitely the highlight of the day!  It was difficult to get a good pic as people were flocking to see the steam engines, but the one below is the 3265 Steam Locomotive, known as "Hunter".

 This impressive locomotive was built in 1901 and was still in service until 1968.

 The photos don't really do the engine justice.  They are very impressive to see and hear.  The sound of a steam engine building speed as it chugs away from the station is really fantastic. This photo below is attempting to capture just how high the black smoke plumed as the engine became ready to pull out.

 The carriages were all class with their timber panelling and curved ceilings.  We rode in a carriage just like the ones on the Hogwarts Express, and I must admit I had the theme music from Harry Potter ringing in my ears as we pulled away :)

 By this time we were glad of a dry spot to sit as we watched the scenery go by while the 3265 steamed along from Maitland to Branxton and back again.  You could hear the engine chugging and see the smoke blowing back from time to time.

Nathan couldn't resist the opportunity to stick his head right out the window when the train stopped briefly at Branxton Station...

Aside from the train ride it only cost us $4 to get in to the rally ground - quite the bargain for a family day out.  We had never been to Steamfest before - not being steam train enthusiasts - but we found you don't need to be an enthusiast to enjoy it,  and all had a great time.  Toot toot!

Cooking, sewing, knitting...

  I love to make and create things, and I have had time in the last few weeks to spend some time doing just that.  I sewed these cute little booties for the new baby of our neice.  I thought a crocheted flower would just be the thing to finish them off but alas, my crochet skills began and ended at single crochet.  Thanks to the wonders of Youtube (is there anything you might want to learn that's not on there?) I now know how to double crochet and produce the pretty crocheted flowers on the booties. Add a sweet pearly button and I was quite pleased with how they turned out. I must admit that this pair were attempt number three, and my daughters' baby dolls now have really great booties.  :)

 

It could be said that I temporarily went a little crazy crocheting flowers. Here's one with a vintage leather button now adorning my beanie (the beanie is handmade, but not by me).  There are more on the slippers I knitted for Lili.

 

I knitted up another pair of slippers for myself too.  One cannot have too many pairs of soft, knitted slippers!

 

I have the sewing machine out, sewing some winter tops.  This one is finished and I have a stack of fabric ready to make a couple more.

 This morning I cooked this yummy slice.  It is relatively healthy and a favourite around here.  The recipe is adapted from one given to me; I'm not sure where the original recipe came from.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup (80g) pepitas

3/4 cup (70g) dessicated coconut

1/2 cup (65g) wholemeal plain flour

1/4 cup (55g) raw sugar

1 cup (130g) traditional rolled oats

1/4 cup (40g) sesame seeds

1/2 cup (80g) sunflower kernals

1/2 cup (75g) sultanas

3/4 cup nuts - I used pecans, but walnuts or almonds are also nice

Mix together all the dry ingredients.

Mix 1 tablespoon honey with 120g melted butter and add to the dry ingredients with 2 lightly beaten eggs.

Mix well, then press firmly into a lined baking tray or dish. Bake in moderate oven til golden.  I use 180 degrees celcius in a fan-forced oven for about 12-15 minutes.

Yum!

Beauty found...

After much hard work and time (these things always take longer than I expect them to!) I think I have unearthed the beauty of the old orange vinyl chair that I blogged about previously. You can see the before pics here.

Here is the chair with new padding and timber work sanded back and refinished with Danish Oil.

Ta da! The finished chair...

The fabric is from designer Amy Butler, and while it is not what I originally had in mind, I love it! A bit colourful and funky; elegant as well.


What do you think? Beauty found?

Hello Beef...

Yesterday we had the pleasure of joining our local Organic Growers Society on a tour of a beautiful organic farm that produces beef and olives. The farm is also where we have been getting our beef for the last couple of years. To this point we had only talked to the farmers on the phone, so it was wonderful to go and meet them and chat face-to-face.



We also saw our beef face-to-face; the actual cow that would fill our next beef order. We are usually so removed from the source of the meat we consume. I remember one of my kids asking what animal the dinner meat came from, and someone rushing in with a comment like "Oh, don't worry about that." We are taught not to ask where the meat comes from, how it lived or how it died.

I have also heard the comment that it doesn't matter what kind of conditions the animals experience in life or death, because that is what they are bred for. Increasingly, I find that I am not comfortable with that kind of thinking. I also suspect that if we saw first hand commercial chicken farms, sow stalls, feed lots and the like such comments would be harder to make. If you want to read more about this there is a great article at Sustainable Table.

If I want to eat meat then I feel I need to square up to the source of that meat, the conditions it lived in and the manner of its death. Or become a vegetarian. Facing the cow in the field was sobering - my choice to be a meat-eater means an animal must die. But I now know that the beef I consume spends happy days grazing in a field with it's herd, and then has a short trip to a local abattoir. I think it is great that my kids also have had this opportunity to see where their food comes from.

We had a tour of the olive groves too, where Nathan tried his hand at picking olives grown for oil...


There was plenty of time for the kids to play with friends, and for us the chance to chat with like-minded people was wonderful.

Can you pass the Kyinkyinga please?

We sponsor some children through Compassion Australia, and this term we have been learning about the countries they live in - Ghana and India. To finish off the term we have been cooking meals from those countries for our family dinners.


Nathan especially enjoys the messy parts of cooking, and Amy and Lili love to get their hands dirty too...
It was difficult to find recipes specifically from Ghana, so we cooked recipes that were from West Africa generally, such as this Palava Sauce...


and Jollof Rice...
and these Kyinkyinga...
Tonight we cooked Indian, with these delicious Naan...


and this very yummy Maharashtrian Chicken Curry...

We probably won't be dinning West African style again, at least not with the recipes we tried, but the curry recipe has made it to the recipe book for sure!

What we've been making lately...

We built a new Guinea Pig enclosure, and it's a glorious one at that! Based on a geodesic dome design, it's big enough to leave in one spot for quite a while without the hungry little critters eating down to bare earth. I am quite proud to say I did most of the construction myself!!


It's also big enough for the girls to get inside easily. They love to get in there, pick up a guinea and sit with them. I recently accepted the offer of a free male guinea pig, so we are expecting babies in a couple of weeks (thus needing bigger guinea pig digs).

Des also built a couple of raised vege beds, using recycled corrugated steel, some old hose on the top edges and some old bits of timber we had collected. I created a net frame over the top with some bamboo and old poly pipe. We need the netting to keep out the possums as well as our chooks.


With the cooler weather I have brought out the knitting again. These are some slippers I made for myself using some wool I had leftover from something else.

Next is the refurbishment of the fireside chair, as well as some more knitting...

Bingo Maths

For Maths today, we played a Bingo game. Amy is just learning to write and recognise her numbers so we included the numerals 0 to 9. Lili has been having trouble differentiating between the -teens and the -ty's, as in the difference between thirteen and thirty, or fourteen and forty, so we also included all the teens as well as all tens up to 100 (20,30,40 etc).


I wrote the available numbers on a strip of cardboard, and the kids chose 9 numbers and wrote them with whiteboard markers on squares of cardboard that I had covered with clear contact. That way we could easily rub them out and play again.

The Bingo Master then drew out the numbers one by one and read out the number without the kids seeing the written number. This way they had to listen and recognise which verbal number matched their written one. We used counters from a Four-In-A-Row game to cover the numbers once they had been called out.

We each took turns being the Bingo Master. Nathan joined in as well and it was a really fun activity. The kids especially enjoyed yelling out "BINGO!!" when they had a full card. We will definitely be using this activity again.