A Challenge....

An old knitting acquaintance of mine, Amanda, just posted about her self imposed 30-Day Pantry Challenge. It's a fantastic idea, but our pantry was gutted in the move and is still recovering. SO instead of joining in the full spirit of the challenge, Amanda has set another challenge for me....

To use amaranth, millet and quinoa in a dish in the next 30 days, photographic evidence required.

I've been wanting to embrace a more "wholefood" philosophy and purchased the aforementioned grains/seeds with this in mind. Thing is I've never cooked with them before, well I've cooked quinoa once. Boo lives on chicken, rice, beans and broccoli, so in an attempt to add some more nutritional value to his stock standard, I was going to try and sneak in some quinoa, hoping he won't notice. Fingers crossed with that one, haven't managed it yet. No idea what I'm going to do with the millet and amaranth, however I do own all of Jude Blereau's cookbooks, so I'll be consulting those ASAP.

Also as part of the challenge, I've also decided to sort out this mess....

I am a total cookbook whore....so in the next 30 days I'll be going through everything on these shelves and only keeping the books I use. And those damned boxes have to go as well....

And just because....I'll be imposing another challenge....no purchasing yarn or fabric for the next 3 months....yep, nothing till the end of August....let's see if I can do that....I added another pattern and 2 projects worth of fabric to my collection today for absolutely no reason except that the fabric was pretty. I seriously have to stop.

a very scary post

for me anyway....

deep breath....

I think I'm finally serious about shedding some kilos, it's a weird thing for me to admit, because I really don't have any "body image" issues. I'm not unhappy the way I am, I've never felt uncomfortable in my own skin, so I've never felt the need or urge to do anything about the size of my bum.

I'm actually lighter than I have been in a long time, when I was pregnant with Big Boo I lost quite a bit of weight and hardly put any of that back on, then I lost more again when I was pregnant with Mini Boo.

I guess what's spurred me on was how good I felt once I'd recovered from giving birth to Mini Boo, I was wearing clothes that I'd never worn (working in apparel for over 10 years meant a lot of sample sales and there was a tendency to buy a lot of shit....and let's face it, a lot of it was just that!). Of course a few months on, the shine has worn off slightly, with all the day to day kid wrangling, etc.

So, as an incentive to myself, I'm putting my self imposed weight loss challenge out there for anyone who happens to read this post (which I know isn't many!) I'm not looking to lose half my body weight and let's face it, with 2 niblets I don't have time for any fancy exercise routines or classes. It'll just be a gradual chipping away of the BMI....and maybe I'll be able to fit into all those size 14's I got when working for Seduce/Katherine/Blue Juice....because I have some seriously gorgeous coats and dresses from them!....AND I also have drawers and drawers full of gorgeous fabric I'd love to sew up into non-sack like pieces....or even if they are sacky tunics, I won't look like a sack in them.

Anyway, here goes....I've made the picture small so it's not so scary! (hmm, this might also be an incentive to keep my toenails painted and pretty too)

Operation Green Bin

More housey stuff....

Our sloping block means that our "backyard" (most of it's really a "sideyard") is broken up into 3 distinct areas.

This bit is at the back of the house, very shaded with a little paved area up top that will eventually have a cubby house on it. The shade will be invaluable in summer, somewhere for the niblets to run amok out of the sun. Have to do something about the lack of lawn though.

Head down the "cranky stairs" as Boo calls them and you come to a paved section with garden beds around the edges....this is also the starting point for OPERATION GREEN BIN.

And down from there again is a large grassed area, where the "pirate ship" resides (come on, you can tell it's a pirate ship, right? - oh and excuse the washing, necessary evil)

Anyway, back to what I'm calling Operation Green Bin....

I'm missing my herb garden. I've been quietly obsessed with herbs since my mid teens, growing as many rare and interesting varieties as possible (very uncool, I know). I can't cope paying $2-3 for a bunch of herbs that aren't straight from the garden, half of which end up getting chucked, a wilted mess in the bottom of the fridge. I love just wandering out to the garden and picking a few fresh leaves of this and sprigs of that to add to dinner. Nothing beats fresh herbs. To me there's nothing more amazing than the smell of stomped on lemon thyme or brushed past basil.

So, in an effort to get the herbs growing again and make cooking more fragrant, I'm determined to send the green bin up the drive each fortnight, full of crap I've cut down from around the paved area of the yard! Nothing particularly exciting, a big job (some of the beds are thick with Nandina, which is really invasive and will need more than my trusty secateurs) but not exciting to most....just something that's going to give me back my place of zen, being in amongst my smelly, yummy leaves.