Peanut butter and fudge ice cream pie and birthday fun!

Valentine's Day is my husband's birthday, so we really only concentrate on that - which is totally fine with me. We tend to celebrate our wedding anniversary as Valentine's Day anyway.

We had a small gathering of friends and family on Friday night for dinner, which was really nice. There was far too much food - but it was great. I made one of the best dips ever - tex mex. Absolutely love it!

I also made a Peanut Butter Ice Cream Pie with Chocolate Fudge sauce for dessert. Boy was it rich! I think next time I would change the recipe and not add so much peanut butter. But, my husband loved it, which I was happy with!

We went out for a delicious breakfast to a French cafe yesterday morning - YUM! Then our friends Simon and Lucy came over for lunch and to play boardgames. Then, we finished of the day by going to one of the Cirque du Soleil shows that is in town. It was fabulous and such a good show to watch. Birthdays are fun! Love you gorgeous - hope you had a fun day - here's to the next year together! xx

Back to baking and thinking about creating...

After being away for three weeks, I've really been looking forward to getting back to my kitchen and cooking again. Tonight we are going to my sister in laws for dinner, so I thought I'd bake some cupcakes. Nothing fancy, just added chocolate butter icing and a chocolate freckle on top. Yummo!

The last few months I've been collecting pink and aqua fabric to make into a quilt for a daughter (if I have one, one day!). I love the range I've collected so far, and I'm quite surprised at how many different fabrics I've collected - now I just have to pick a pattern (and have a little girl, ha!).

The other thing I have to start this week is the doll that I am making my god daughter for her first birthday on the 29th January. Here is a picture of it, I have chosen some really sweet pink and green fabrics rather than the blue and red. Isn't it sweet?!

If you can, please pray for Kelly who has just had her first baby, Harper. Harper is having trouble breathing and has been diagnosed with serious pneumonia. Please pray for this lovely family, that they will know God's peace and comfort at this distressing time.

New hairdo!

Well, I had my hair done yesterday and it is a coppery brown colour. It is the darkest I've ever been. I quite like it - nice for a change. I think it is taking my husband a while to get used to it, he has only known me as a blonde!

Anyway, I've had a successful weekend of Christmas baking, a raspberry and white chocolate cheesecake, mini oreo baked cheesecakes and chocolate caramel slice - yummo! We had an early Christmas dinner with my husband's extended family tonight. It was at his cousin's place and they have their own woodfired pizza oven outside, so we put on our own toppings and cooked them all up. Delicious.

A new look!

Do you like my new photo and look of my blog? I decided it was time for a change. We are in summer in Australia and our Christmases are hot, not snowy. We go to the beach a lot, and have lots of barbecues outside. So, I thought it was fitting to make my blog look a little more like what we are used to now! I took the photo in my header in January this year when we were on holidays - this is in my state - isn't it magnificent?! My husband is on the very left and the rest of the people are friends of ours we went away with.

I'm having a bit of a change tomorrow too - I'm getting my hair done a bit differently. I've been blonde all my life, but I'm going to go slightly darker - not much - but a little. Hopefully it will look ok!

Today, I'm going to do some Christmas baking - the first thing on the list is a Raspberry and White Chocolate Cheesecake for a dinner tomorrow night - yum!

A new system and aprons to make...

Well, I love to cook - I'm not quite sure where that originated from. I didn't grow up in a family that spent a huge amount of time in the kitchen...but I absolutely love it. I think I like it so much because it is another outlet for me to be creative. My friends and family know me well and often for my birthday and Christmas I receive a new cookbook. So, my collection is getting quite large. Sometimes I enjoy just flipping through them, for no other reason than to see the lovely pictures of well displayed food and delicious ideas. But with this growing collection of recipes, I tend to forget which ones I've used and if they were good or not. So, I decided to try a new system - not very sophisticated, but easy. I bought a packet of the coloured star stickers and after each recipe, Craig & I will have a chat and rate it. Gold is for amazing, silver is for really good, blue is for good, green for ok and red for stop! (ie. never do again!) I'm even starting to write down little comments or changes to the recipes directly in the books. Some people may not like that, but I think there is something great about looking at an old cookbook of an older relative, seeing that it has been used well and even documented. It's like a little piece of history. Here's what dinner looked like last night, thanks Donna Hay!

Changing the subject now...in two weeks I have organised a 'Gingerbread House Construction Party' at my house for a group of girls from church. Usually we do this as a church event running over two nights where we see around 120 women constructing and decorating gingerbread houses to take home to eat or decorate (or both). This year we aren't having one at church, so I decided to throw my own party, although there will only be about ten of us. It should be heaps of fun. I decided last week that it would be extra fun to make Christmas aprons for all the girls coming, so when they arrive they see an apron on their chairs that they can wear and then take home afterwards. I've cut all the aprons out of a dark apple green coloured curtaining material, I just have to sew them now. I've got just under two weeks, so I have to stop procrastinating and get to them! Here's what they are starting to look like. More photos later.