.roses make my day

How nice to arrive at school today and have some students bring me these beautiful roses from their garden. I put them in this jug on my desk and they have brought me so much pleasure today. Why do flowers make us so happy? What a blessing they are.

Spring growth

How nice to feel the warmth of Spring and the advance towards summer. How lovely to wake up early and the sun is already up. My herbs are making progress. Here's how they looked back in July.

Nearly 4 months on and my sweet little seedlings have grown from this (above) to this (below)

And my Rosemary and Lavender cuttings have gone from this:

to this:

The rest of the herb garden is starting to look lush and healthy. Here's a patch of mint up the back of the yard:

Best ever tomato relish recipe

Here's the recipe I used this week, to make the tastiest home made tomato and onion relish, full of wholesome ingredients and packing a huge flavour punch. We have some food intolerance in the family, so all our ingredients need to be as close to nature as we can get. I have indicated what I left out to achieve this, and the flavour is still fantastic.

6 medium (1.1kg) tomatoes, peeled and chopped
2 medium (300g) onions, finely chopped
2 medium (300g) apples, peeled, finely chopped
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon grated lemon rind
1 teaspoon dry mustard (I ground my own mustard seeds with mortar and pestle)
1 teaspoon garam masala
2 tablespoons of mild curry powder (I used my home made madras curry powder)
1 1/4 cups (250g) firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 cup (125ml) white vinegar (which I had to leave out)
1/4 cup (60ml) lemon juice
1 tablespoon tomato paste (which I also had to omit)

Combine all ingredients in a large pan and simmer, uncovered, stirring occasionally for about one and a half hours or until the mixture is thick. Pour hot relish into hot sterilised jars, seal immediately.

Here's the mixture when I started to cook:

and here's the mixture after about 1 and a 1/4 hours of cooking:

the finished relish:

We have been having it with eggs for breakfast and using it instead of tomato sauce with meat balls. Thank you to the Australian Women's Weekly Tomato Cookbook for this recipe.

A place for everything...

Simon wanted me to go four wheel driving with him last week. We were running a little early to meet the other vehicle so we called in at Gottabee Country at Highfields and I found this old silky oak filing cupboard. It was love at first sight and I couldn't leave without knowing it was coming home to my place. Of course, it couldn't come 4 wheel driving with us, so we picked it up on the way home. Here is it in my study, doors closed:

And here it is chock-a-block with things that needed filing, like paper for the printer, folders, envelopes etc...

All in all, quite a successful four wheel driving excursion really. I ended up enjoying it much more than I thought I would, and I even have something to show for it.

Ah, the joy of having a place for things!

Camping in Comfort

We've just spent the weekend at the Goomburra Valley Campground which is just over 1 hour south of Toowoomba. Here's Simon and the poodle enjoying what we came for...Simon snoozing and Juliette keeping a look out for stray cows in the creek.

I loved setting up our camp site, stringing up my red and white bunting, drinking from our new red and white striped coffee cups and preparing meals when I wasn't relaxing with the dog on my lap. We ate some yummy meals. Here I am about to eat eggs, poatato cakes and grilled tomato for breakfast.

I loved the challenge of cooking everything fresh, with all natural ingredients. Here are the ingredients for a creamy, chicken pasta we had for lunch yesterday...

 and here's the finished product:

We had a really restful time...in bed by 7.00pm each night and sleeps during the day! Goomburra Valley Camp Ground is such a lovely place to stay, park like grounds, excellent amenities and you can have your dog there. What more could we want?

The vege garden

It's a rainy Saturday morning and I am enjoying the fact that the vegetable garden and all my little pots of herbs are getting watered. It has been so rewarding to pick greens from the garden over the winter and it adds so much flavour to our cooking.

My herb pots are making good progress. I am hoping to have a market stall in about a month and sell the pots of herbs and the linen tea towels and aprons that I have been making. I hope they get a good lot of growth on in this coming month.

Lovely lavender

A bunch of lavender is so uplifting, isn't it? I picked a big bunch this morning and put it in my new white jug that Jane gave me for my birthday and attached a birthday card from Lyndall. My first pansies are out and one pansy matched Lyndall's card so perfectly!