Pantry, as promised

A while back I told you about re-organising my pantry (pantries), and promised to show pictures. I've had problems getting everything working on the computer, but now its all playing nicely together, so here we go!

Click any of the pictures to see them bigger.

Like I mentioned, the biggest problem with using one of the extra cupboards as extra pantry space, is that the doors kept getting in the way. Every time I wanted to get anything out of the pantry, I had to move everything off the counter, out of the way so could open the doors. Which was annoying, because there was a decent amount of space there for me to use.


Because of the way the doors opened, I couldn't even just move things over to the side - they would still be in the way. I would have to either put everything on the stovetop - if it was off - or next to the sink, and then move it back again.


I mentioned to Hubby that maybe we could take the doors off, and then we wouldn't have to keep moving everything. He said it sounded like a good idea, and the clever man removed the doors just like that. I reorganised the pantries so that mostly only the 'nicer' looking things were there like my canisters and the old coffee jars I use to store herbs, spices, and other powdery things, along with other baking stuff - baking powder, gelatine etc. The few non 'nice' items don't bother me the way a whole shelf full of oils and sauces would have.


Finding the hooks under the bottom shelf was brilliant. I can never find my measures in the drawer, and this way, they're right there where I need them. I also don't have to go rummaging in the towel drawer for my oven mits - they're hanging on the hooks in the pantry too! The counter space is easier to use (and theres even a little more of it without the doors in the way), and I can grab a jar of spice, use it, and put it back, without having to plan ahead (a little difficult when you add stuff at random the way I do when I cook) or move everything constantly. Because it's now open, it gives me extra incentive to keep it tidy, too.

The other pantry is not such a dramatic difference, and has actually been reorganized slightly since these pictures were taken, but it still easier for me with all my sauces together, all the spreads together, all my foil/plastic/paper together. It also serves as generic 'extra' storage, with excess bottles and packages sitting in the back behind the more frequently used items. Pretty much every shelf has regular use item in the front, and bulk storage in the back, from oats, to sugar, to bicarb, to teriyaki sauce, to olive oil.


I don't have any pictures, but I have actually commandeered another cupboard as pantry space, as well. It's one of those annoying corner cupboards that you can never quite reach everything when you try to use it as storage for plates, or glasses, or pots and pans, so I'm using it for things that won't fit in the other pantries. Juice, cordial, and soft drinks, cereal and muesli, and all our cookbooks and spare placemats.

Metabolism

I love weetbix. Just like any good Australian. I love them with a little bit of brown sugar, and enough milk that the outside softens just a touch, but the inside is still crunchy. This necessitates eating them rather quickly.

The fact that I love weetbix so much, is actually one of the reasons I haven't eaten them for a few years. I love them TOO much.

Something that is often asked on ads is how many weetbix you can eat. The serving suggestion is 2, but many sportsmen claim to eat 6, or 8. Football players mostly, big burly guys that you expect to eat half a cow for dinner and still have room for dessert. Or swimmers, who burn so much energy they are constantly eating just to stay in shape.

When I was 18, I would eat 10.

10 weetbix for breakfast. With sugar and milk. A cup of milk with each set of weetbix. Eaten by 2, that makes over a litre. A good tablespoon of sugar spread over the two weetbix, 5 times over, makes half a cup. and then I would have a glass of orange juice.

This didn't stop me eating during the rest of the day, either. When I was at school, I would eat two sandwiches for lunch - thats 4 slices of bread, 2-4 slices of cheese, and 2-4 slices of ham. Plus an apple, plus a muesli bar. And a glass of juice with lunch.

When I was working for my father, at 19, I didn't often have sandwiches for lunch. Instead I'd go to the local bakery and get a loaf of their cheese and bacon bread. And a sweet bun. And a 600ml carton of chocolate milk. And eat it all.

Dinner wasn't any better. If we had pizza, I would eat a pizza. By myself. Thin crust, yes, but not home-made, and I'd eat 1/3 of the loaf of garlic bread too. Milk with dinner as well.

Sometimes I made myself pasta - from a packet. You know the kind - add milk, water and butter, microwave for 10 minutes. Serves four. I'd eat the whole packet, plus a couple slices of bread to mop up the sauce.

What did I look like when I used to eat so much?


I looked like that. That is a 17 year old Sarah. Who hadn't started eating 10 weetbix at a time yet, but would regularly eat 6 (with all the accompanying sugar and milk) and one time ate 4 cheeseburgers, 20 chicken nuggets, 3 large fries and a thickshake within half an hour, then went to the movies and had a large popcorn and three packets of sweets (snakes, maltesers and violet crumbles for anyone wondering). I looked approximately the same until I had my son when I was 22.

HOW COULD I LOOK LIKE THAT????? On a day when I ate 10 weetbix for breakfast (with milk, sugar, and orange juice), pullapart for lunch (with finger bun and chocolate milk), and pizza for dinner (with garlic bread and milk) I would easily consume 5000 calories. Thats nearly 3 times what my current suggested intake is.

I HATE my metabolism.

Brought To You By The Letters "E" and "W", and By The Number "2"

Things Gosling doesn't (or does, but only partially) digest:

• peas
• corn
• carrot
• broccoli
  
• olives
• sultanas (golden raisins)
  
• pumpkin

I can understand all except the pumpkin, considering it's well and truly mushed up when she eats it.

Ok. I'm done. You can go eat now.

:D

It grows up

My baby Spaceghost has been acting odd recently. She's gone from feeding 7-8 times a day and sleeping for at least 6 hours in a row at night with at least one 2hour sleep during the day, to feeding 10-11 times a day with her longest night sleep being 3 hours and only sleeping in 40minute bursts during the day. Its driving me crazy, and I'm beginning to get frazzled.

I had ever intention of keeping her exclusively breastfed until she was at least 6 months old. We have a history of allergies in this house, and I wanted to wait as long as possible before having to deal with the crazy. I also think its better for them to hold off solids as long as possible - their little tummies aren't necessarily ready for 'real' food for a while.

Spaceghost will be 5 months old next Tuesday. Today I broke down and asked hubby to pick up some rice cereal on his way home from work. I mixed 2 teaspoons with about 4-5 teaspoons of breastmilk, and she ate almost all of it, throwing her head towards the spoon in anticipation and grabbing it to hold it in her mouth so she could get all the cereal off.

I think she was ready. If she sleeps for more than 3 hours tonight, I'll know she was.

Grocery Addendum

$93.00

Oh yeah.

We rock.

This week will likely be a lot more however, as we are in desperate need of meat, and cheese, and milk, and fruit and veg. No non-food items I can think of however, so maybe it won't be too huge a shop...

Grocery test

We havent been grocery shopping for over a week. We've run out of milk, and where its $2.79/2L at the supermarket, its $5.15/2L at the convenience store around the corner, so we need to go to the shops. But theres very little else we need.

Even with meat, the last shop we did was about $30 under budget, and this one is looking like a rather small shop (only about 6 items other than milk) so we should have a lot of money left this time too.

I'm wondering if this means next time will be a big shop? Remind me to let you know how it works out.

more boredom..

along with some requests and frustration, leads to............ foooooooooood.

to be updated sporadically, and spare you all from hunger when you dont want to be hungry.

stir fry

i made stir fry for dinner tonight, because its easy.

but as i was making it, i started wondering how easy it REALLY is.

• defrost the meat, get hubby to cut it up (i CANNOT handle raw meat/chicken unless its through a bag, and even then i get queasy. this is not a pregnancy thing, this is just me).
• cut up the veg
• add sauces and spices to the electric fry pan until it smells right, add some of the veg.
• add the same stuff to the normal fry pan, and cook the meat.
• add the rest of the veg to the electric.
• add the meat to the electric.
• add a bag of hokkien noodles to the electric.
• hope nothing burns.

granted, its not as involved as, for example, red meat (where you need a million ingredients to make the sauce, and let it cook for 20 minutes before adding it to the cooked meat, and adding partially cooked green beans), but its not as easy as lamb chops on a lazy day - stick the chops in the grill, put the rice on, cook a veg.

but in my head its still easy. and theres not much washing up, which is good. 2 pans, 2 chopping boards, 2 knives, spatula.

i wonder what else is embedded in our heads as 'easy', even when it really isnt so much?



tereyaki stir fry (which really isnt, i guess, because i add so much water)
feeds my family of 3 with a serve or two left over. can easily feed more with the adition of more veg/more noodles. meat is really an accent in this dish, and has on occasion been left out. any veg is doable, and the noodles can easily be left out to serve with rice.

in an electric fry pan:
a good drizzle of olive oil
as much again of each: red wine; tereyaki sauce
teaspoon or so of cinnamon powder
teaspoon or so of ginger (fresh, powdered, or can of minced, any is fine)
turn heat to about half way, add about a cup of water

chop a head of broccoli and add to the fry pan
also 2 cans of baby corn
(keep adding water whenever it starts looking dry, and tereyaki if it starts looking pale)

in a separate fry pan on the stove, add same amounts of oil, wine, tereyaki, ginger, and cinnamon. NO WATER.
turn heat to half, and add meat (3 cheap boneless steaks from the butcher, cut up small).

when the corn and broccoli are starting to colour, and the meat needs to be turned, add one large carrot, and about as much mushroom to the electric fry pan, with more cinnamon, and more water/tereyaki if needed. and obviously, turn the meat over.

stir the veg every now and then to make sure all sides cook.

when the meat is well browned, add to electric fry pan, along will all juices. doesnt matter if its cooked through yet.

cook everything in the electric until there is minimal liquid left, then add hokkien noodles, stir until all mixed and all liquid is gone.

tada.

homemade musli bars

my wrists have been playing havoc today, probably because i slept in a truly odd position last night, and as a result, i havent got the courage to brave breadmaking. i am however in a very cooking mood, so i made musli bars.

and i even took pictures. well.. the kid took most of them. which is why there are so many.

also, please ignore the belly. its getting in the way of everything.


the measurements listed are what i use. the only really important ones are 4cups oats, and 1tin sweetened condensed milk. everything else is up to your own personal tastes. dont like apricots? leave them out. or use something else instead. want to go healthier? use more fruit instead of choc chips. want real indulgence? buy different types of choc chips and leave out the fruit. and of course you can add more or less as you want. sometimes i use more sunflower seeds, sometimes i use more sesame seeds. it all comes out just as well.

i have no idea how much these cost to make. not much. the choc chips are probably the main cost involved. ETA: ok so i was curious, and whipped out my handy spreadsheet.. this tray cost me $8.26 to make, but if i'd used coles choc-chips it would have been about $6.43 and the way i cut them, theres about 14-20 in the tray, making each musli bar 41-59c this time, or 32-46c if i use coles choc chips. not bad at all. and if i can get sweetened condensed milk on special, theyd be even a little bit cheaper.



so here we go. home-made musli-bars. YUM YUM YUM!!

oh look.. almost everything is actually in a packet for once!

put in a VERY LARGE BOWL:

4 cups quick oats - no-name brand are fine, just make sure theyre QUICK oats. (instant oats? the instructions should only list about a minute of cooking time.)


1 packet choc chips - about 250g (ish) or if you keep them in a canister or something, a little over a cup

i usually dont use brand name. i like the taste of coles-brand, and i prefer the size.. cadburry's are too large. but we went to woolworths, not coles, and woolies choc-chips leave a horrid aftertaste. so cadbury's it was. and oh look! you can see my living room.

1 cup sultanas (raisins)


1/4 cup sesame seeds


1/4 cup sunflower seeds


1/2 cup finely chopped dried apricots

i like to chop mine up about the same size as the sultanas, and i usually make sure the 1/2 cup is over-full, instead of flat. i like apricots.

1 tin sweetened condensed milk

this has got to be the only thing he DIDNT take a picture of. i have pictures of the clock, his sandal, the floor, the counter, the cat, my belly, but no tin of milk.

mix everything except the sweetened condensed milk together. you may find you need to stop occasionaly to break up clumps of apricot.. they tend to stick together until coated in oat powder.


add enough s.c.m for everything to stick together - probaly the whole tin, might be a little less. mix well.


it might look like there isnt enough s.c.m for a while, there will be a lot of dry oats in the bottom of the bowl. just keep mixing. it will all come together. sometimes helps if you turn the bowl around a bit as you go.


line a.. um.. large tin with a lid? with baking paper (the cheap stuff that doesnt work for baking is fine for this).

dont you just love my terribly attractive kitchen floor? 70s lino baby, oh yeah.

pour/scrape everything into the tin, trying not to break your wrist, or drop the 30yr old+ bowl you're currently holding, which isnt actually yours.


press down and smooth out. you may have to use your hands here.

yay. my belly.

cover with clingfilm, and put the lid on. (if your tray doesnt have a lid, the film WILL NOT STICK to the tray, so you'll have to wrap it ALL around, instead of just over the top.


stick it in the fridge to set. it doesnt matter where, just wherever theres room. which for us is usually the bottom shelf.

oh look.. my fridge is FULL!! YAY!!

when the musli bars have set, which will take a couple hours at least, you can cut them up, and theyre ready to eat. i usually cut the whole thing lengthways down the middle, and then across to make the individual bars, as i want them.

grocery addendum part II

just thought of something. the price of meat in woolies doesnt make sense.

we needed chicken breast, so we went over to the cold section, obviously thinking buyng the bulk packs would be cheaper. well.. it was cheaper to buy 8fillets than 2, by about $2/kg - it was only $14/kg to get the bulk pack. which i thought was absolutely ridiculous, seeing as everywhere else chicken was only 12/kg.

so we wandered over to the deli section, where they also sell chicken, seafood, and sausages, and guess what? $11/kg.



i guess packaging really cost them a lot, if they have to raise prices by up to $5/kg just to cover it...

bread stuffs, raisin and otherwise

NORMAL

2 Tbsp (40ml) oil
2 1/2 cups hot water
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
10g dry yeast (3tsp)
2 tsp salt
3 cups plain flour
3 cups wholemeal flour


disolve brown sugar in water, add oil, salt, and yeast, leave to froth.
add plain flour, mix well. add enough wholemeal to turn into dough, knead on floured surface until smooth, cover in oiled bowl and rise to double.
punch down, knead again, divide in 2 and shape into loaves - either freeform or in loaf pans, rise to double again.
bake at 175C for 35min



WITH RAISINS

almost exactly the same:
add 2tsp cinnamon to yeast/sugar mix, add 1 cup sultanas (raisins) with flour. if they fall out while kneading, poke them back in.



in theory, you could add anything. havent tried it with other fruit yet. considering trying it with cheese and herbs.. but no fruit, of course.

chocolate pudding

so a couple of my lurkers, who refuse to comment, but send me emails instead (seriously guys, comment already), asked how we make chocolate pudding.

unfortunately i didnt get the emails till after i made it, so no pictures for you today, but ill take pictures next time i do it, 'k?

its not very hard to make, either. other than the bit involving bubbling lava, critter helped me all the way through. and hes only 4.


this is my mums recipe - exactly as she emailed it to me - and it only loosely corresponds to instructions on the custard powder packet (ingredients are the same other than the cocoa, but her method is rather different). i dont know where she got it from. i modify it a little.

2 well rounded tablespoons (those big silver serving spoons) of custard powder
2 slightly rounded tablespoons (serving spoons again) of sugar
1 heaped tablespoon (once again the serving spoons) of cocoa
1 pint (about 600 ml I think) milk. The Pyrex jug has a pint measure on it, I think

Put custard powder and cocoa in a pudding basin. Mix to a paste with a little of the milk - about 1/2 a cup or so. It feels really strange at this stage. Looks liquid but feels rather stiff.

Put the rest of the milk and the sugar in a saucepan and heat slightly (to about blood temperature) until the sugar is melted. Stir to make sure the sugar is disolved

Pour a bit of the warm milk into the custard powder and stir so that it is well mixed.

Pour the mixture back into the milk in the saucepan and heat gradually until it boils (it will look like lava bubbling up). Make sure to do this gently so that it doesn't burn on the bottom and stir continually so that it doesn't go lumpy. It needs to bubble so that it is thoroughly cooked as this is what thickens it.

then I pour it into individual dishes (or on top of the trifle!!) to cool.

the serving spoons she's talking about.. i really have no idea what they correspond to. possibly about a tablespoon?

ok i just went and measured it.. theyre 20ml. so thats 1tablespoon if you use australian measures, or 4teaspoons (1Tbsp, + 1tsp) if you use US measures. (why are they different? messes up my recipes something awful why is an american Tbsp=3tsp but australian Tbsp=4tsp.. grrrrrrrrr.)

ok.. so thats my mums recipe. i made it like that ast week, and while it was nice, it wasnt quite what i wanted. so today i made it just a teensy bit differently, and it was exactly right. very slightly sweeter, and a little less dense.

here we go!


INGREDIENTS

2 Tbsp (VERY heaped) custard powder
1 Tbsp (heaped) cocoa powder
2 Tbsp (slightly heaped) + 1tsp sugar
1 pint + 1/2 cup milk

METHOD

mix custard powder and cocoa together in a large bowl, and add the 1/2 cup milk. stir until well combined - try for no lumps. it might still feel stiff, this is fine, as long as it looks like a liquid.

put the sugar and 1pint milk in a saucepan, and heat till warm, NOT HOT, and the sugar is disolved.

add about 1/4 - 1/3 cup milk/sugar mixture to the custard mixture, and stir until well mixed and smooth.

poor contents of bowl back into saucepan, and bring to boil, slowly, stirring continually, all the way to the bottom of the pan.

once mix is thick and smooth, pour into individual dishes.


NOTE:

1. warm milk - blood temperature. got kids? drop some on your wrist the same way you would with a bath or a bottle. thats about right. you dont want it hot yet, but the warm helps it mix with the custard mixture.
   
2. my mum mentioned about it getting lumpy. no matter how much i stir, IT GOES LUMPY. this is fine. it smooths out if you keep mixing. i near panicked the first time, trying to figure out what id done wrong. then it stopped being lumpy, very suddenly.
3. it really does look like lava when it boils. it doesnt boil rapidly the way milk or water does, it swells slowly then bursts, and only 3-4 at a time.
4. pouring it out of the saucepan can be tricky. i find it much easier to use some sort of scoop. ive been separating my pudding into 6 slightly-larger-than-a-ramikin sized dishes, which is about 2-3 scoops in each one, using my trusty silver serving spoon. a ladle or measuring cup would probably work just as well.. just be careful not to urn your fingers if you use a measuring cup.
5. the extra teaspoon of sugar makes a WORLD of difference, as does the extra little bit of milk. maybe you like it less sweet, dont add the extra sugar. mum thinks its too sweet with more sugar, but maybe she heaps her spoons to a different degree than i do.
6. there will probably be a very dark bubbly-looking layer on the bottom of the pan once youve got all the pudding out. this is what teaspoons are for. probably youve shared the dregs with the chiildren, but now, tell the kids its no good because its burnt, make them play in another room and SCRAPE OFF AND EAT AS MUCH AS YOU CAN BEFORE THEY REALISE YOU'RE LYING. it looks burnt, but tastes like heaven.
   

hmm. should i eat one hot, or wait till they cool down and have it after dinner?

kids in bed.. im going for hot.


you cant have any. go make your own.

groceries, oh joy

today we're going grocery shopping. it usually takes a while. during the day, i write up a list of everything we need, and get the pile of green bags out (note for non-aussies - a lot of our grocery stores now sell re-usable bags you can use instead of using the plastic ones. theyre usually green, and are referred to by many as 'the green bags', even though they DO come in other colours - our 'cooler bags' - like a collapsible coolbox - are blue), and then when hubby gets home sometime before 6, we head to the stores and do the groceries.

there are 4 places we go in a normal week. woolworths first, because thats where the ATM is, then aldi, harris farm markets (green grocer) and the butcher. these last three are all next to each other, and woolworths is between them and our house, so it works well.

at woolies i pull out our weekly grocery money, and then we start to shop. which is fairly easy, despite the million different places we go, because i know what needs to be bought where, and write my list in 4 parts. some things arent set, we just get them wherever theyre cheapest, but i know which ones those are, and will buy them if theyre super cheap, even if they were written down in a different part of the list.

the only thing that bugs me is the cost. i budget $200/week (which will sound insane to any random americans who drop by, but what would your weekly grocery bill look like if there were NO COUPONS?) and usually we come in under. sometimes we go over, but anything that doesnt get spent stays in our grocery envelope, so i never have to pull more out of the machine. and every few weeks (usually around 5-6) we end up needing practicaly nothing (mainly milk and fresh veg), and just stay at woolies because the extra cost of petrol, though minimal (and the bother), wouldnt be worth it - we usually end up spending less than $80. one week it was about $40. this is also the week i usually ignore the green bags, so we have a stock of plastic for the small rubbish bins in the bathroom and bedrooms. why buy, when you can re-use the plastic grocery bags?

ive been trying to get our costs down, but i just cant see it happening. we waste hardly anything, often have leftovers for dinner - at least once a week, more for the child if hubby and i are having chicken - and i always check the catalogues first to make sure i stock up on cheap stuff, and avoid luxuries if theyre full price. now that my morning sickness is well and truly gone, and my energy seems to be increasing a little, oddly enough , i can get back to baking bread (yeast was SO BAD), but that will only save a couple dollars a week, and may have to stop again soon anyway if my wrists get any worse. kneading can get achy. we only buy name brands if theres no alternative, or the homebrand alternative tastes disgusting/flat out doesnt work (like the cheap toilet paper.. no thankyou. im sticking with my quilton. its not cheaper if you throw out the whole 8 rolls and have to buy new stuff.)

i guess im stuck at the magic $200.. ugh.

oooooooooooooh what have i done

well its not that bad really i suppose.

last night, for the first time since.. im not sure.. about january i think.. i ate....... a burger from oporto. and i feel awful about it. and it tasted sooooooooooooo good. ive had the 1/4 chicken a couple times. rip it up and have in in a quesadilla or something.. but the burger.. mmm....


i decided to give up fast food, and try to avoid the kid having it too. subway does not count. but we cut out maccas (mainly him) and oporto (entirely me, since he's allergic to chicken) and other than the occasional chip whe someone else was eating it, i was determined to stick to it.

in actual fact i gave in a couple months back. there was nothing else to eat, and i was soooooooo hungry, and if i get hungry when im pregnant, i start feeling sick beyond belief, so i gave in and had mcnuggets.. and they tasted good. very good. and ive had them a few more times since. but nowhere near the amount we used to eat.

but the burger last night.. oh man. i just KNOW im going to be craving oporto from now on.

must be strong.

sproglet needs real food.




at least its better than a bigmac.

one good thing

.. about having a cold at christmas. i have double the excuse to eat more chocolate than is good for me.


not that i really need an excuse..

shhhh. you didnt hear that.

i have discovered something amazing

i like cheesecake.

i didnt think i would.

it seems too.... non-floury.

but hubby loves it.

and there was a recipe on better homes and gardens that was in the magazine and easy to follow.

white chocolate cheesecake, with dark chocolate sauce.

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. chocolate.

and some very dear friends came over on tuesday night. (i will have known them for 25 years in jan/feb. i turned 25 in august. they are as close as family.)

and i wanted dinner to be really nice.

so i made the cheesecake.

and managed not to ruin it.

and i tried it.

even though it contains EIGHT EGGS.

and it was yummy.

oh was it ever yummy.

and i am now a convert.

and my friends loved it.

and hubby loved it.

and mum loved it.

and i want to make another one for hubby.

with raspberry sauce.

because he said it would be good.

and i love him so much it hurts.

i had such a wonderful day yesterday

a few weeks ago i got in contact with an old friend from school. she dropped out before we finished, because she didnt like school and the school didnt like her, and i basically havent heard form her since. that was in 2000. then i suddenly found her on facebook just a few weeks ago.

she has an 18month old daughter, shes engaged, and she and her fiance have bought an apartment, and she has grown up so much since high school. i guess i must have to, but we rarely see these things in ourselves, do we.

my son and her daughter get on so well. he really looks out for her, helping her up when she falls down, pushing her on the rocking-horse-thing at the park, holding her hand when we're at the shops, showing her how to do things. its great. he really has a chance to shine as the Big Boy instead of playing baby like he tends to do with me. and she just laps it up. she follows him everywhere and wants to do whatever he does - being that shes still really just a bay there have been a few possessiveness issues, but my friend is quite happy for me to take my sons things away from her and tell her No, so its all been great.

every wednesday they come over and we cook or go to the park or something. she's been missing intelligent-adult-parent company, as all the other young mums she knows are, to put it mildly, very young. they may only be a couple years younger than we are, but by golly they are babies. im slightly alarmed that someone could possibly not know what 'migrating' means. or think that "its amazing how you meet people and stuff."


on to the point.

as well as finding K on facebook, another old friend who left in about '98 to go back to the USA recently appeared on facebook. so K and i coerced her into coming around yesterday - not too hard a task since she's clucky as anything. we made pizza and garlic bread, M brought a salad - and gifts for the kids, a stuffed gorilla for little S and some toy cars for my critter - and K brought chocolate, then we made some peanut-butter-choc-chip cookies as well, so we were all well and truly stuffed. have i mentioned i like to feed people? M had a great time playing with the kids, K and i were ecstatic to see her again, and the kids just lapped up all the attention.

unfortunately, we only found M a few weeks ago, and shes going back to the USA - probably for good - in a couple months. i am going to miss her so much.


but through Teh Power Of Teh Interwebs And Facebook we will at least be able to keep in touch this time.


i love my friends.

on the subject of chocolate..

.. ive been eating far too much of it lately. i know part of it has been a comfort thing, but i thought i was ok now... and yet especially this past week or so, i cant stop eating the chocolate.

its not that time of the month, so that doesnt explain it. pregnancy is highly unlikely. is there something in chocolate that my body needs, and isnt getting elsewhere?

i know sometimes i randomly get cravings for other foods, like carrots, or apples, or dairy - ANY dairy - for a while, and i assume ive been leaving something important out of my diet without realising.. but chocolate? seriously. whats in chocolate??