Bumble Bee Cottage

Book - Food Rules: An Eater's Manual

2012-02-09T05:33:00.000-08:00

This book buying is becoming an addiction. This book is a wonderfully entertaining read. Michael Pollan's book 'Food Rules: An Eater's Manuel espouses 64 food rules based around his basic principle of 'Eat food, mostly plants, not too much.' (photographed here amongst my Sylvac collection)

He has divided the rules into three sections; What should I eat?, What kind of food should I eat?, How should I eat?. Under most of the rules is a paragraph or two expanding the rule's basic concept. Many of the rules are common sense and obvious (once you have read them that is) but sometimes having the obvious written down for you makes it more real and noteworthy.

Some of my personal favourites are:

* Don't get your fuel from the same place your car does.
* The whiter the bread the sooner you'll be dead.
* If it came from a plant eat it; if it was made in a plant, don't.

One rule we are going to adopt immediately is to 'treat meat as a flavouring or a special occasion food.' We usually eat two vegetarian meals per week and five meat meals. I am going to swap this around and aim for five vegetarian meals and two meat meals.

Much of the information I have been reading on the Internet about simple ways to help the planet (and in doing so, yourselves) list cutting down on the amount of meat you consume high up on their 'to do' list.

I had better get the cook books out and see what I can come up with :)

All Talk and No Action

2012-02-08T06:08:00.000-08:00

I know all I seem to be doing is alot of reading and not alot of action in respect to my lifestyle change but I have decided to take this slowly. I want to consider what I am doing and why I am doing it. I want to be able to explain why we are making certain changes to the Bumble Bee'rs as I won't be able to make the changes permanent without both their and Mr Bee's support.

I want our family to live in a way which lessens the pressure on global resources and makes us happier, healthier and less stressed (in my case) in the process.

A Subversive Plot

2012-02-07T05:26:00.000-08:00

I have been thinking alot about my life and the lives of my family lately. How Mr Bee and I choose to live our lives will directly impact the type of life my children (and possible future grandchildren) will be able to lead. The type of lifestyle they will lead will not be of their own creation but of the making of this generation of adults as a result of the type of world they leave behind.

I saw this YouTube clip of a presentation by Roger Doiron on the blog Hazel Dean. I found it very informative and just wanted to share this powerful message.

I do not believe in New Year Resolutions as they never tend to last past the end of January, at least in my case. That old saying 'There is no time like the present' tends to have a more resounding ring to it, to my mind.

Once upon a time in a land far, far away I used to bother to educate myself about 'greener' lifestyle choices and I actually used to try to live a 'greener' life. I need to find my way back there.

I have started this by re-educating myself and I will see where it takes me....want to come :)

Book - Living the Good Life

2012-01-25T05:59:00.000-08:00

My latest purchase in my ever expanding 'green' library is 'Living the Good Life' by Linda Cockburn (photographed here with Henry the Green Camel. Henry lived with my Dad for many years until finally after many admiring glances on my part he was allowed to grace Bumble Bee Cottage with this camelly smirkiness. Thanks Dad).

Linda, her partner, Trev and their six year old son, Caleb, document their six month experiment on living sustainably. In doing this they live mainly off the food they grow on their own block of land, bartering for items they were unable to grow themselves.They have water tanks, solar panels, a friendly but noisy goat and trade their car for the pedal power of bicycles.

Linda says, 'We didn't want to turn our back on the world, just reduce our environmental impact as far as possible without making our lifestyle unlivable.'

By the end of this book I was in awe of what they had achieved, the fact they had stuck it out to the bitter end (with only a few minor slip ups along the way) and had managed to save a whooping 44% of their income.

Throughout the book Linda gives definitions, and explanations about various environmental and lifestyle practices. Linda's expansion on 'The last day in the life of a hapless soon-to-be-headless battery chicken' made me cry (unashamedly) as it was so truly horrible. I buy free range eggs and this horrific tale made me very, very glad I do, although I suppose this may well happen to free range chickens as well. It also made me long to keep our own chickens for eggs once again.

I do not know if I have the level of commitment they showed to their chosen lifestyle but I have certainly taken inspiration from the wonderful story.At the end of the six months Linda says while they will not be sticking to such a restricted diet and lifestyle in their 'normal' lives they have changed the way they live both in terms of money and the environment.

Reading this book made me want to leap out into the garden and start planting out our vegetable garden, unfortunately I will have to wait a little while until the 4*C Guernsey Winter days warm up :)

Taste the Waste

2012-01-23T05:38:00.000-08:00

When I start to think about the world and what is has become I am overwhelmed, sometimes. A fresh year has begun and with it a promise to myself to renew the principles and ideals I held many years ago, when my life was slower, less full of people, namely of my own creation :)

In attempting to re-educate myself about the modern green movement, sustainability, planet care and grow your own I came across this video. I knew this happened but to see it in 'real life' is still a shock.

During the past week I have been systematically going through my cupboards and using up all the food I have purchased over the past year; dried beans, lentils, spices, tinned products etc. in an attempt to use the food I have bought and not waste it. It has been a very educational exercise as our grocery bill has been more than halved. Instead of taking the easy route of finding a recipe I fancy, writing out a list, crossing out a few ingredients we have and then purchasing the rest, I have been finding recipes using what I have in the cupboard and then buying the few items I need. After all why did I buy this food in the first place if not to cook it and eat it?

I have been making Mr Bee frozen lunches of lentil soup, lentil curry, pea and ham soup and beef madras curry. All have been healthy recipes, cheaper than buying lunch and far tastier (so Mr Bee tells me). I used to make his lunches all the time and then gradually over the years I have stopped with the usual excuse of 'no time'.

As part of this new year I have decided to 'make' the time and just see what I can do with it :)

Book - Low Cost Living

2012-01-11T05:13:00.000-08:00

The more I read about permaculture, living sustainably, living 'greener', lowering your carbon footprint and simple living the more I want to read. I bought John Harrison's book 'Low Cost Living' to give me some ideas on where to make a start so I can change the way our family lives for the better. This book was a good starting point for me as it reminded me of things I already knew, but hadn't thought about for a while, and it gave some common sense suggestions for some changes I can make in the future.

There are twenty-two chapters in this book: 1. Low-cost eating, 2. Beating the Supermarkets at their own game, 3. Cooking your Food, 4. Food Waste, 5. Storing Vegetables, 6. Storing and Preserving Food, 7. Making your Own Chutneys and Jams, 8. Baking Your Own Bread, 9. Making Your Own Butter Cheese and Yogurt (something I am very interested in), 10. Making Your Own Wine, Beer and Cider (something Mr Bee showed quite and interest in), 11. Food for Free, 12. Growing Your Own, 13. Keeping Chickens, 14. Bees in the Back Garden, 15. Pets, 16. Cleaning, 17. Energy, 18. Water, 19. Transport, 20. Recycling, 21. Skills and 22. Money.

It is not a huge book, 220 pages, but it does give a very good starting point which you could elaborate on yourself quite easily with a little research. Reading this book has made me look into my shopping habits and see where I can make a difference in both the types of food I have been buying and the cost of those foodstuffs.My shopping habits are reasonably good and I have always been an 'aware' shopper but over the past few years I have become lazy and a few highly processed foods have found their way into the shopping trolley.

We already recycle the majority of our waste, plastics, glass, cardboard, cartons, compostables but I think I need to consider each product I purchase and the amount of superfluous packaging it comes with. This book has given me much to think about and act upon.

It is time we started to 'Live Better, Spend Less.'

Book - Choosing Eden

2012-01-04T04:50:00.000-08:00

A change and a rekindling of old interests began in July last year, whilst we were home in Brisbane. We were wandering aimlessly around Indooro (Indooroopilly Shopping Centre for those not from Brisbane) just enjoying the fact we were shopping 'inside' as opposed to the cold and windy High Street of St Peter Port, when I came upon a book sale. It was one of those sales in the middle of the shopping centre floor space where they have just thrown up trestle tables and covered them with merchandise. It was here amongst the teetering towers of discounted books I came across 'Choosing Eden' by Adrienne Langman (photographed here in my lovely clean, tidy and toy free conservatory). It was only $5.00 AUD.

This book is the story of Adrienne and her husband, Larry's decision to sell up and move from Sydney suburbia to a twelve acre property in Nana Glen, three hours north, in northern New South Wales. When I purchased this book I was unaware that their story was made into a television program 'The Real Seachange' (even though this is actually written on the back of the book, but who has time to read all the blurb when the Bumble Bee'rs are loose in a shopping centre).

Adrienne writes about why they made their decision and the story follows them over the course of their first year of their 'greening' adventure. The basis of their decision is Peak Oil. They want to be prepared, for both their own sake and that of their family, to be able to deal with the changes they believe Peak Oil will bring to modern society.

Peak Oil is not a new term to me. My Dad has been talking about it for years and years. It has been a running joke in our family 'Oh Dad's talking about Peak Oil....again!' Well I'm not laughing now Dad. XX

While I do not agree with Adrienne's quite extreme view of a complete break down of society, I can certainly see the logic in both her choices, preparations and adoption of a permaculture 'lifestyle'.

I feel I need to investigate this concept further.

Merry Christmas 2011

2011-12-25T03:02:00.000-08:00

The turkey with two stuffings was prepped and ready to go.

A Christmas breakfast of snacks was in order (after the Bumble B'eers had eaten their chocolate coins and biscuits from Santa that is).

There has to be a bit of smoked salmon at Christmas.

The table was set; Mr Bee ironed the table cloth for me. It is his regular Christmas job :)

The branches on the table are real which was lovely as it smelt like Christmas. I love our fake tree but it does lack that special bit of Christmas pine-i-ness.

I opted for a silver table this year, keeping the traditional Christmas red to the lounge room.

Halfway through the frenzy of cooking.

I always try to be organised, it reduces stress.

The all important cranberry sauce.

Ta da! The turkey is done. I have cooked a goose every year for Christmas since we moved to Guernsey and although the turkey was tasty I think I will swap back to goose next year - live and learn.

Merry Christmas, especially to all our family and friends in Australia.

We miss you and love you.

xxxxxxxxxxx

A Christmas Tradition is Born

2011-12-24T02:36:00.000-08:00

Mr Bee has been very concerned about there not being enough food on Christmas Day so he wanted me to cook a turkey and a roasted gammon. When I pointed out to him that the actual weight of our turkey was 6kgs he calmed down a little.

I offered to cook the gammon for Christmas Eve dinner to make it special as my Dad was here. I cooked a Honey and English Mustard Gammon with Cheesy Potato Bake, Honey and Cumin Carrots and Broccoli with Bacon.....Mr Bee announced that we will have a roast gammon every Christmas Eve from now on!

Christmas traditions.....got to love them :)

(The containers in the background are full of ham stock from boiling the gammon - waste not want not).

St Peter Port Christmas Lights

2011-12-22T02:29:00.000-08:00

Each year we take the children into St Peter Port on one of the three late night shopping nights (the only late night shopping for the entire year!) to see the Christmas Lights. This is the view up Mill Street.

Down near the Town Church.

For the full length of the High Street there are candles and stars at regular intervals. I didn't get to take a photo of Smith Street but it looks like a blue ceiling of bright twinkling stars have descended especially for Christmas.

My Dad is staying with us for Christmas so he came in as well. It was a lovely night.

The Twelve Cocktails of Christmas

2011-12-17T02:19:00.000-08:00

On the first cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘Can I have one without the umbrella because it’s a bit gay!’ (No, here have one with a blue umbrella if it helps you feel more masculine.)

On the second cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘My second Pina Colada, is there much alcohol in these?’ No, just think of it as a health filled juice break

On the third cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘You said we would be having the weaker ones first and you could run a car on this Margarita.’ (To which I answered, ‘Suck it up or go home.’ So they did, suck it up, not go home)

On the fourth cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘What is in a Long Island Iced Tea?’ (30mls of Vodka, 30mls of Tequila, 30mls of Bacardi, 15mls of Cointreau, 15mls of lemon juice, 15mls of sugar syrup, 30mls of coke, a cherry and orange slice on the side and ice as far as the eye can see!)

On the fifth cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘Gill we are ready for the next cocktail, oh good it’s a pink one, how many have I had now?’

On the sixth cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘Is there more food coming, I need to line my stomach?’

On the seventh cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘I threw up on your plants, I am really sorry.’

On the eighth cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘Why is the drunkest person here washing the dishes?’

On the ninth cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘What else is there to try? B52s or White Russians but please don’t take your shirt off!’

On the tenth cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘Someone peed in the sink in the bathroom!’ (which was just a random drunken rumour as I found no evidence of this.)

On the eleventh cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘Perhaps you should stop now or you will be driving the porcelain bus all night.’

On the twelfth cocktail of Christmas my true love said to me, ‘Here take some Nurofen Plus for the road and goodbye until early next year when we have all forgotten the horror the morning will bring and people start to ask for another cocktail party.’

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

T'was the Night Before Christmas

2011-12-08T02:03:00.000-08:00

The Christmas foyer was a triumph this year!

You can't see in the photos but all the houses have lights on in the windows.

It was just beautiful and B1 and B2 were so proud of helping make it.

The staff at our little primary school go to so much trouble to make Christmas special for all the children.

You can see a silvery Santa and his reindeer off to deliver presents.

My favourite tree is the one made up of all the hand prints of the children in that class. Each class contributes a different aspect of the whole display.

Congratulations of a foyer full of the spirit of Christmas.

Merry Christmas to all the staff and children.

Angel Party

2011-12-03T01:46:00.000-08:00

This year B2 asked for an Angel Party in blue, pink and white.

The cake topper was a gift from her Tran and Pop in Australia. They didn't know about the angel theme and just sent it to her by chance. B2 wanted a two tiered cake with the bottom tier being a chocolate cake and the top tier being a vanilla cake (for B3, as she is allergic to cocoa). I thought this was very thoughtful of her, to think of her little sister :)

Here is a glimpse of our brand spanking new blackboard. This is the first message written on it.

B2 asked for a craft party, so as it is close to Christmas we made it a Christmas Craft Party, which tied in nicely with the Angel theme.

As it is a craft party I allowed FIVE HOURS (I know I am insane!) so that the children would have enough time to eat and finish the three activities I had planned. B2 was allowed to invite four friends, so we could fit everyone around the table comfortably. One friend was unable to come, which worked out for the best as there was more room for everyone.

I love this photo of her Angel Cake :)

The first craft we did was to make Christmas Wreaths from cut out hand prints. I bought several different types of green card and some red glittery berries. You can see their masterpieces on the table. In the fluster of organising six children for a craft activity I forgot to take more photos.

The next activity we did was to make Angels out of paper plates. They all did such lovely work.

The final activity was Christmas Card making which they did in between playing 'Just Dance' on the Wii and bouncing on the trampoline. All in all it was a very successful party.

Happy Birthday Honey.

XXXXXXX

More Flowers from Australia

2011-11-29T01:57:00.000-08:00

These flowers arrived today for B2 from her Aunty Sam and family.

The delivery man was amazed that a little girl was receiving flowers and said she was spoilt. I think it is lovely to receive flowers no matter what age you are and when your family are so far away on your birthday it is even more so. Maybe no-one ever sent the delivery man flowers on his birthday and he was miffed ;p

Thankyou Aunty Sam, Uncle William, T and A for making B2's day so special.

We love you and miss you so much.

xxxxxxxxxxx

Flowers from the PTA

2011-11-29T01:31:00.000-08:00

I have run the school's Parent and Teachers Association at the B1 and B2's school for the past four and a half years.

There are over thirty people on the PTA now; there were only eight when I first started. I don't mind doing the work but the management of all those personalities gets me down after a while. I think people tend to forget that there is only one of me and thirty plus of them and they all have ideas about how things should be done and what we should be doing. Over the years I have learnt to take the attitude of 'This is how we are going to do it because after all I am the one doing the work so I will do it my way, if you want to do it a different way then you can do the work!' It may sound exceedingly bossy but it kept me sane - you can't please everyone, so I stopped trying.

For the past two years I have been trying to resign but I always get talked into staying. This year I did manage to downsize the job to an organisational role plus running the BBQ - which was a HUGE relief.

This arrived on my doorstep the week after the PTA AGM; it is from the PTA to say thankyou for staying on and keeping them on the straight and narrow. Thankyou PTA for the beautiful flowers and thankyou to all the people who volunteered to take on some of the workload. I think we can look forward to a fabulous fundraising year!

Flowers from Australia

2011-11-28T01:52:00.000-08:00

These arrived today for B2 for her birthday.

They are from her Nan in Australia.

Thankyou Nan, B2 was so thrilled to get a bunch of flowers all of her own :)

XXXXXXXXX

The Big Number Nine

2011-11-26T01:16:00.000-08:00

B2 chose a vanilla cake with strawberry jam icing this year for her family birthday dinner this year. We tried out a new type of icing which involves cooking and whisking egg whites in double boiler and then adding the other ingredients. It was a very, very tasty icing but I think I need a bit more practice to get the consistency right.

Work the Camera Baby!

2011-11-22T01:11:00.000-08:00

You look beautiful darling....

....so fluffy. Have you changed hairdressers?

Just turn a little to the right.....

.....a bit more....

....a bit more....perfect!

Wonderful, just the right amount of disdain.

That's a wrap.

This is what happens when I leave the camera where small hands can reach it. They photograph their favourite thing - Tilly :)

(Please ignore the spilt cat food and pen in the background; they are added for gritty realism)

More Birthday Flowers

2011-11-18T01:06:00.000-08:00

This gorgeous bouquet arrived two weeks after my birthday; not that I am complaining as they were totally unexpected and made for a wonderful surprise.

They are from my sister and her family in Brisbane in Queensland Australia. Isn't international floral delivery a fabulous thing!

Thankyou so much for my lovely birthday surprise; there were lots of lilies (which are my favourite, as you well know).

XXXXXXXXXXX

Tiling

2011-11-15T02:45:00.000-08:00

I have realised I never posted photos of the kitchen floor tiles when they were completed.

We are very pleased with how they have turned out. The tiles are several shades lighter than the previous tiles and they are about two thirds the size.

The wall tiles were put on yesterday and will be grouted tomorrow.

Guernsey, being a small place, has a limited number of shop choices from which to buy tiles. I shopped around regardless and managed to get our floor tiles for less than half the price we were originally quoted.

I also managed to wangle free delivery; it pays to dress nicely and smile ALOT ;)

Worktops; how you miss them when they're not here.

2011-11-10T02:31:00.000-08:00

All the worktops are in. We choose the plainest black granite available.

It has natural black inclusions when you look closely but none of the gold glints that are in most granites.

One section of the bench had a large (ish) chip at the back but the tiler has assured me that once the wall tiles go on it will not be visible.

Now the bench tops are in I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. It is only just a glowing spot in the distance but it is there :)

Let the Christmas Cheer Begin!

2011-11-08T03:41:00.000-08:00

While Mr Bee has been away I have had to fill my time as best I could. Nothing like a spot of Christmas decorating to lift the spirits. I have told Mr Bee that he shouldn't complain as last year I put the decorations up the day before Halloween.

I have these four boxes of decorations, two trees (one six foot and one eight foot), a large wooden advent calender and various other odds and sodds in cupboards around the house.

I am doing a Christmas photo shoot in a few weeks so I need to make sure everything is just right.

Plenty of time to tweek; that's my excuse and I am sticking to it :)

Birthday Blooms

2011-11-04T02:55:00.000-07:00

It was my birthday this week and look what arrived at my door.

Thanks Mum, they are just beautiful. The lilies smell divine and fill the lounge with their scent.

On the night of my birthday my Dad called for a chat. I had just hung up the phone when my sister, in Australia, called. It was some ungodly hour in the morning there and I could hear my niece and nephew watching morning cartoons in the background. We talked for nearly two hours.

I miss home so much sometimes.

A Morning Tea Surprise

2011-11-02T03:06:00.000-07:00

Each Wednesday morning a group of my friends get together for a cup of something, a nibble of cake and a good old natter. It is two hours were all the worries of work and home can be put aside and we can just be people, not Mums or employees, just friends having a chat.

Today when I turned up for morning tea I had a wonderful surprise. The ladies had made it a special birthday morning tea for both myself and another friend who shares the same birthday as me. I was given a piece of the cake to take home so all the Bumble Bee'rs had some as well. I had to cut it into slices very, very carefully to ensure that they all had a piece of the rose.

There were gifts and cake and a wonderful feeling of being special. Mr Bee is away for twelve days in Singapore and Hong Kong 'selling' Guernsey to the Asian business market so I suggested that we wait and have a belated birthday lunch with the children when he arrived home.

As a result it didn't really feel like my birthday but thanks to my wonderful friends it does now.

Thankyou 'Wednesday Club' for all your kindness and friendship.

XXX

The casts are off and Hop-A-Long is off and running!

2011-10-19T03:19:00.000-07:00

It is what is left of the 'cast shoes' B1 has worn for the last six weeks. I have been stapling and sticky taping them together each day in the hope they would just get him through; which they did, fortunately.

The stinky casts are gone and have been turned into slightly less stinky night splints. B1 will have to wear the night splints for approximately twelve months. We have an appointment to see a specialist who will measure him up for permanent ones so we only need to suffer the stinkiness for another few weeks.

I have been considering Febreezing his feet but I think will will hold off on that idea..........for now :)

When Elephants Attack!

2011-10-10T02:23:00.000-07:00

Take one bookcase in the shape of a doll's house. Add three children who woke up cranky and in very silly moods. Make it 8.10am, five minutes before we leave for the school run.

Take one large Schleich elephant. Propel said elephant, at speed, down the slope of the doll house bookcase. Place youngest child's head directly under the speeding elephant. Add screaming and lots of it. Add blood, even more of it, covering both B3's hands, her shirt and her jumper. Fortunately she couldn't see the back of her head or there would have been alot more screaming.

Why do head wounds bleed so much? I know it is to do with blood flow and blood pressure but honestly. By the time I had put pressure on the wound and calmed B3 down (and myself, as no-one like to see their child bleeding, even a little, and this was not a little) the cut had stopped bleeding so I had a chance to inspect the damage. I was imagining a gaping wound but in actual fact it was less than one centimeter long and did not require any stitches.

Imagine telling the hospital that this is what happens when ELEPHANTS ATTACK!

B3 is fine. We cleaned her up and all she was worrying about was going to school to tell her friends all about it. She marched into class holding a tissue with a few spots of blood on it to show everyone. I think I'll go and have a nice cup of chamomile tea now.

Storage how we adore you.

2011-10-08T02:54:00.000-07:00

Please excuse the mess, we are currently using the top of the cooker and a small sheet of plywood for a bench until the granite ones arrive in three weeks. You can see in this photo that we have blocked up the hatch. Alot of homes in the UK and Guernsey have hatches from the kitchen to the lounge/dining room. Our kitchen has had two extensions in its life so now it is lovely, large and light, but this wasn't always the case. Once upon a time the previous owners would have had their dining table in the lounge area and passed the meals through the hatch to save carrying them through the house. As we have a kitchen large enough to accommodate a table the only use the hatch gets is when I open it to tell the kids to stop fighting or to turn the TV down.

Mr Bee is so excited about having a pantry! We have had all our groceries stored in various cupboards in the kitchen, but now we have a double door pantry that is large enough I am going to have trouble filling it.

The tiler starts on the kitchen floor on Tuesday and the walls will be tiled once the bench tops have been done. We have been quite lucky really as it has only been four weeks of disruption so far and it will probably be another four weeks until we have a cooker and a sink that work. All I keep focusing on is that all the work will be finished in time for Christmas. Everything has to look nice for Santa after all :)

The Late Night Fairy Ring

2011-10-06T03:27:00.000-07:00

The fairies have been and paid B3 a little visit.

There were no mushrooms available so animals had to suffice :)

The boxes have arrived!

2011-10-05T02:39:00.000-07:00

The kitchen arrived on Wednesday morning at 11.15am; only five days late. There was one unit and a door damaged so they will need to be replaced. It takes two weeks to get a new unit delivered. One of the problems of living on an island; everything takes a little more time.

The kitchen fitter was so quick. He had the large larder units in place by that afternoon. He now has three and a half days to do five days work (he is going to work Saturday). I'll keep you posted :)

Smooth floors, rough walls and no fish tank.

2011-10-04T05:28:00.000-07:00

This is our tiler starting to pour the self leveller on the kitchen floor. He blocked off the hallway so it didn't ooze its way up the hall. The hall and foyer will be self levelled a little later on.

So now we have a lovely smooth kitchen floor just crying out to the tiled.

This is the corner the fridge and dishwasher used to be in. The dishwasher is being moved over closer to the sink. This corner will soon house a larder/pantry unit, a large cupboard and an incorporated larder fridge. I miss large Australian fridges. In the UK and Guernsey they tend to opt for small fridges that are similar to Australian bar fridges. This type of fridge does not hold more than a few days food for a family of five. We decided on a larder fridge rather than a fridge freezer as we already have a small under bench freezer in the utility room.

The kitchen fitter boarded in the fish tank - hooray! The previous owners had built a fish tank into the wall and for four years we have been talking about getting rid of it and now at last it is done. Once the kitchen is installed we will get a plasterer in to finish it off, ready for painting.

The sink is going back in the same place, under the window, so I can look out at the garden. The kitchen designer suggested we move the sink but I really don't want to stare at a tiled wall each time I do the dishes.

This is where the kitchen is supposed to be delivered and stored. Can you see any boxed up kitchen units there? No, I can't either! First they were going to be delivered on Friday, and then they were going to be delivered on Monday and then they were going to be delivered this morning. Well it is 1.30pm and they are not here yet. The electrician is ready to start. The plumber is ready to start. The kitchen fitter is ready to start. Pity the delivery men don't seem to be.

Hop-A-Long Cassidy has come to stay

2011-10-01T05:51:00.000-07:00

B1 had to have an operation on both of his legs a few weeks ago. I went with him to Southampton General Hospital. The children's ward staff we so kind and helpful to me in what was perhaps on of the most stressful times of my life. If it had been me having the operation I would have been a little nervous but as it was my child I was freaking out although I had to only freak out on the inside so I didn't scare B1. Here he is the day after his operation in the plain white plaster casts.

He chose one green and on red cast. The staff in the plaster room asked is this was so he could tell his left from his right foot or was it for stop and go. 'No' said B1, with a condescending eye roll, 'It is red for Mario and green for Luigi of course.' We who do not worship the cult of Nintendo DS should know this, naturally.

Sorry about the photo. I have 'turned it' three times but it doesn't seem to want to stay. Here he is at the airport waiting to fly home to Guernsey. He was very excited as he had to be lifted up to the back door of the aircraft in a special truck. I think it was the same one they use to bring the trolleys on and off the planes.

This is after a hard day at school. He took a permanent marker to school so all his friends could sign his casts. I'm not allowed to sign them until the day they are being removed; just in case I write something embarrassing like how much I love him :)

He was only in a wheelchair for a few days and then he was walking with a zimmer frame. We were told that he would need crutches to help him walk after this however when we went to see the physio for a lesson on safely walking with crutches she said he was less of a danger to both himself and everyone else if he just walked without them.

Which is precisely what he did. He is recovering amazingly well and will have the casts removed in two weeks.

Jackhammering's All Done

2011-09-29T05:06:00.000-07:00

We have removed the maroon carpet in the hallway and the white tiles you can see in the foyer/cloakroom have now also been jackhammered up. We will be tiling from the front door, down the hall and through the kitchen in the same tiles.

Even though the hallway is relatively short the carpet removal took alot longer than expected. In Australia the carpet would have been held down by lengths of wood with hundred of tiny nails which grip onto the underside of the carpet and hold it in place. This wood would have been nailed to the slab. In Guernsey they do not use nails they use some type of adhesive. It works very, very well as getting the wooden strips off the concrete took a few hours whacking with a hammer and a large screwdriver. We don't own a chisel.

The tilers, on the other hand, took up all the tiles in the kitchen in less than four hours! I left for the school run and then went shopping; when I came home at lunch there was already a large waste bag full of broken tiles on the driveway and a huge mound of them in the middle of the kitchen floor.

The sink is gone now and we are washing up in a bucket which we fill up on the downstairs shower. You don't realise how often you use a sink during an average day until you don't have one.

The room looks larger somehow, now the tiles are gone. Perhaps it had something to do with the angle the tiles were originally laid.

The last of the wall tiles and the floor tiles under the cooker were removed the next day. It is amazing how quickly you can demolish a kitchen.

Kitchen Renovations - The Second Weekend

2011-09-25T06:43:00.000-07:00

Mr Bee removed the rest of the kitchen this weekend. The most hated and hideous copper hood was on the way out - hooray!

He removed all the copper to discover an over engineered mess. This large wooden construction was built around the existing original extractor fan. Our house has had two extensions in its lifetime, both of which involved the kitchen. At some point (judging by the copper sometime during the 1980s) the previous owners decided to snazz up their kitchen and add the copper hood. The problem was the cooker is 110cm wide but underneath the hood the actual extractor was only half that size. As a result it never actually extracted much at all and made a sound like a jet taking off to boot!

I am going to be repainting the kitchen again once the construction is all finished. I painted a few years ago and changed it from yellow to blue but I think I am feeling the need to change it once more. As to what that colour may be, I think I will have to look through my decorator books and Country Living magazines to narrow it down.

We are keeping our Rangemaster cooker as there is nothing wrong with it and it was one of the reasons we originally bought Bumble Bee Cottage in the first place. Look not a smidge of copper in sight :)

We have chosen the matching Rangemaster rangehood so finally all the cooking smells and grease will be whisked away and no longer coat everything in the immediate vicinity.

The plumber is coming this week to disconnect the sink and to remove the old dishwasher taps and drain. We are moving the dishwasher over next to the sink. I think it was placed in that awkward corner as this is where the sink would have originally been prior to the extension.

The tiler starts tomorrow with his jackhammer; so it will be bye bye ugly picture tiles. Needless to say I am going out for the morning with all that noise.

Kitchen Renovations - The First Weekend

2011-09-18T06:13:00.000-07:00

Our kitchen was starting to show each and every day of its twenty-two years. We were going to paint it but the kitchen had other ideas. The cutlery draw was opened one day and literally collapsed in a heap on the floor. So we lived with a gap where the drawer used to be and procrastinated a little more. A few weeks later a second drawer followed suit and a third. We now had more missing drawers than usable ones. When I say the drawers collapsed I mean they actually collapsed, with all four sides falling off. Then the cupboard doors started to fall off one by one. It was as if the kitchen had simply given up the ghost. After deliberating for three years we were finally forced into a decision.

And so the work of demolishing the old kitchen began. Mr Bee and I spent seven hours packing up cupboards and the dismantling said cupboards. We filled one large waste bag that day and many more in the week that followed.

I am going to use the new kitchen as an excuse to force myself to thin out many of my collections, whether I am true to my word remains to be seen.

The kitchen looks so HUGE with no furniture in it. I am going to have to give what I place in the new kitchen some serious thought.

Month of the Spiders

2011-09-16T05:52:00.000-07:00

September is called the 'Month of the Spiders' in Guernsey. When I first heard this I did wonder why. I am not wondering anymore.

I went outside to load the children and all their assortment of school paraphernalia into the car to be greeted by this. Our rosemary bush in the front garden was absolutely covered in the most beautiful spider's webs. There were perhaps ten of them and they were all larger than a dinner plate; sparkling, dew covered in the morning sun.

There are no poisonous spiders in Guernsey so they were doing no-one any harm. I half expected there to be a quote about a pig appear in one by the time I arrived back home ;)

Run, run the chickens are coming...

2011-07-12T17:46:00.000-07:00

We have had so many visitors during the first half of this year that I have been neglecting my poor kitchen hutch.

I normally change the display every three months of so, just to keep things interesting.

Afterall what is the point of collecting china if it lies hidden in your cupboards all the time.

My spaghetti poddles are safely packed away until it is their turn to be on display again.

This lovely trio was given to me by a dear friend of mine - Royal Albert 'Old Country Rose'.

Here it is! All white, a bit of a change. I used to have an all white hutch in Brisbane but was wooed by UK Ebay into accumulating a large patterned china collection so the all white isn't on show often. My chicken collection seems to be growing.

Little Victorian chicken salt and a hobnail sugar bowl, possibly Fenton but I'm not sure.

I have a bit of thing for chickens :)

We are going to be remodelling our entire kitchen in the next few months as it is literally falling to pieces. Three drawers have collapsed so far. This was a better way of accessing the cutlery than having the broken drawer just sitting on the bench. I kept thinking I was going to come home and find Tilly curled up amongst the cutlery.

Op shopped lemon squeezer. I think it cost 40p.

Hen and rooster salt and pepper shakers.

One of my best friends from Australia and her family came to stay recently and she gave me this 'Thankyou' angel from Willow as a gift.

She also gave me one set of these matryoshka Russian nesting doll measuring cups. Unbeknowst to her my Mum had already given me a set of these for my birthday a few months earlier. They both know me so well - great minds thinks alike. I think both sets on the hutch balance the display nicely.

One more chicken, for good luck.

I am linking to Faded Charm's White Wednesday party.

Buddleja and roses

2011-07-11T09:11:00.000-07:00

I went Op Shopping last week and was fortunate enough to come across this Stuart crystal vase for only £5.00.

I didn't buy it straight away. I actually walked out of the shop and came back and got it on the way back to the car. Don't ask me what I was thinking!

I only say it is Stuart crystal as it said so on the price sticker. It might not be Stuart but it is definitely crystal. It is in perfect condition, with no chips anywhere.

I imagine it was very special to someone as it was so well looked after. Unfortunately the vase it cloudy at the bottom. I did a bit of research and I will buy some soft scrub cleanser and mix this with a little bleach. Apparently this will do the trick - I hope.

The buddleja and roses are from my front garden. The buddleja bush is heavy with hundreds of white blooms which are all literally buzzing due to the hive full of bees who visit each day.

The rose is called Deep Secret and it a truly outstanding performer. It produces masses of highly scented blooms with long stems which are perfect for picking. There scent wafts into the house each time the front door is opened. This bunch have filled the kitchen with the most heady aroma.

Onion Harvesting

2011-07-06T01:00:00.000-07:00

I don't know if it is the correct time of year to be harvesting onions but the vegetable garden was a disaster zone so Mr Bee gave it a good clear out.

These onions were two different varieties that were supposed to grow over autumn and winter. While they did grow there wasn't really much action until the warmer weather arrived.

We harvested five kilograms of onions but only three sad little garlic :(

We have tried growing garlic before with varied success. I think we will give it one more try and if it doesn't work this time we won't bother again. Does anyone have any tips for growing garlic in the UK?

The onions won't fit in the fridge so they are gracing my benchtop at the moment. I think I will have to come up with a few onion recipes tout de suite!

Sunday Morning Deliveries

2011-07-05T05:52:00.000-07:00

There was a knock at the door early Sunday morning and we opened it to be presented with this:

A good friend of ours had been out fishing at 5.00am and caught this beautiful Bass. He said it was a bit small (which I find very hard to believe!) but he thought we might like it. I am glad it was 'small' or it would not have fit in our oven.

I used a Rick Stein recipe and it was delicious!

Thanks Mr DLM :)

PTA BBQ Cakes

2011-07-01T06:27:00.000-07:00

It was our annual PTA Summer BBQ this week. A few years ago we sold approximately 140 tickets, now we usually sell nearly 210; that is alot of hungry people to feed.

Last year we were rained out and had to have all the tables and chairs in the school hall. This year the sun was shining and not a cloud in the sky so everyone was able to sit outside and soak up the sunshine.

My kids didn't want to go home when the time came which is a good sign. They didn't win any of the competitions or prizes but they did not seem to mind; I suppose they were having such a whale of a time it really didn't matter.

We had lots of games and things to do to keep little people happy; a swim in the school pool, a Fancy Hat competition, chalk drawing, colouring-in competition, Hook-a-Boat, Lucky Lollypop, Name the Toy, sandpit play, football, all the climbing frames in the school grounds and a quiz, meat raffle and a cake raffle for the bigger people present.
All the PTA pitch in; they cook the food, serve the food, run the stalls and clean up afterwards. It was a very long day, lots of hard work but it was great fun and the children all have such a wonderful time. There is something special about a party at school.

I made these two cakes for the dessert table. There was none left so I guess they tasted ok :)

Well done to the PTA for another fabulous BBQ!

Harder than I thought....

2011-06-22T05:37:00.000-07:00

I am out of practice with blogging, this is what I keep telling myself. I stopped for a variety of reasons, not just the Chinese porn issue. A few friends have asked me when I am going to start again as they like to read about what we have been up to. I thought about it for a few weeks, or was that months, and then I remembered that the main reason I started in the first place was to keep in contact with family and friends.

So here I am once again feeling just like a newbie, wondering what I am going to blog about. Do not get me wrong just because I stopped blogging didn't mean that we stopped existing :)

I scrolled back through the photos of the last few months and came across this cake. I made it for my girlfriend's birthday. It was a chocolate cake with a chocolate butter cream filling iced in a dark chocolate ganache. I used 1.5kgs of dark chocolate in that icing; that was one heavy cake.

The flowers are from our garden as I am not au fait with fondant flowers, so fresh it was. I do keep meaning to enrol in a professional cake decorating course. I am fine with buttercream but I find fondant a bit of a mystery. I am sure there are plenty of special tricks in respect to producing the perfect fondant bloom.

Well that's all for now. I am going to ease myself back into this and see how it goes. Thanks for popping in.

Pooh Bear Cake

2011-05-12T06:13:00.000-07:00

I asked my daughter what cake she would like for her birthday party. She assured me she wanted a Princess cake like her sister had for her birthday as few years ago. It was the type of cake with a Princess doll sticking out of the top of a cake skirt. So I leapt into action and prepared for a Purple (as she HATES pink) Princess Party extravaganza.

Just before sending out the invitations I thought I had better double check that Princesses were still the popular choice.

'No,' I was told. 'I have always wanted a Pooh Bear Party!'

I have to look on the bright side, at least a Pooh Bear cake was easier to do than a Princess cake.

Torteval Scarecrow Festival 2010

2010-08-31T08:13:00.000-07:00

There were a few political statements in the Scarecrow Festival this year. This one was called 'BP slicks across the Pond!' It came complete with oil slick, hence the plastic drop sheet.

This was Mr Bee's favourite 'Le Tour De Torteval'. Mr Bee has become a great supporter of the Scarecrow Festival. He loves coming as much as the kids.

This was Granddad's favourite - 'Hung Parliament'. You can just see the Australian green and gold hats Mr Bee bought the kids when he went to The Oval to watch Australia vs England, the fifth test in The Ashes.

This one was one of my favourites. I can't remember the exact name, as I have lost the program we were given at the start of the walk but the Mad Hatter complete with silver teapots was very well done; very Johnny Depp.

B3 loved the Cheshire Cat too.

This one won second prize. It was hung with bird feeders filled with nuts, which are a staple bird food here in Guernsey. It was decorated with a variety of little birds. There was a recorded message about how to feed birds which was playing on a loop. Its name? The Nuts So Scary Crow of course.

I was a little concerned when I read the name of this fine fellow. I kept telling myself this was a family event so I need not be worried. He was called 'The Peeping Tom'. As the festival is held in the lanes around Torteval quite often you can not see where the next entry is so I was preparing to leap in front of anything inappropriate, fortunately once I saw him I realised I was being rather ridiculous. I blame it on sunstroke; nothing wrong with me!

This Medusa entry was named something clever to do with Gorgons. B2 really liked this one, especially all the snakes.

This family have entered every year we have come. Their entries are always clever and push the concept of 'scarecrowiness' to its limits. It was called 'Eye Saw'. It came with an accompanying poem about the dangers of modern architecture ruining Guernsey's traditional look.

'N.E. Old Iron' pushed the definition of a scarecrow as well. B1 always has plenty to say about whether it is truly a scarecrow and whether it should be aloud to compete in the competition. This was awarded a Highly Commended ribbon. They were lucky B1 wasn't one of the judges :)

B3 loved Fifi and Friends. She chatted away telling me all about them, who was who and who was friends and who wasn't. Fifi is a TV series made by the creator of Bob the Builder. Apparently when he sold the rights to Bob the Builder he decided to make a show specifically for little girls and came up with Fifi and the Flower Tots; what a smart and very wealthy man he must be judging by the number of little girls sporty Fifi clothes, including B3.

The kids, and Granddad, loved this one. 'Full Moon' was perhaps one of the most photographed entries of the whole show. All the kids thought it was THE BEST!

Here we have the First Prize winner, 'Traditional Torteval Scarecrow'. What a handsome fellow he is too.

We finished the day with a bounce on the jumping castle, a rummage through the jumble sale and an ice-cream.

My Dad was here with us this year and seemed to really enjoy the festival and the walk through the lanes. Dad always comments on the fact that there are very few places to walk without cars. In the Isle of Man there are kilometers and kilometers of walks, all with public access. In Guernsey nearly everything is private land so I think it was a nice change for him to wander the lanes and realise that although there are no truly wilderness areas here there are still quite places to amble.

Secret Garden in the heart of Town

2010-08-26T08:44:00.000-07:00

Mr Bee spotted this open garden advertised in the Globe. It coincided with the week my Dad visited in June. 'La Bigoterie' opened its doors from 2.00-5.00pm on 19th June with all funds going towards helping the Guernsey Alzheimer's Association. Fortunately the way was clearly signed otherwise we might not have found it.

What a view! It must less than 100 meters, as the crow flies, to the Harbour. We had the kids with us so we didn't linger near where they were serving tea and cakes to avoid the whinging.

Such a wonderful, uninterrupted view of Castle Cornet. We made sure we arrived early as we have been to quite a few open gardens in Guernsey and on a fine day, as this was, they are very, very popular.

This was one of the loveliest flowers on the day. I have tried to grow foxgloves, white ones, but the sea breeze at Bumble Bee Cottage has other ideas and they ended up bending over so much that you couldn't see them over our front wall. I have since seen some rather good metal plant supports so I may give them another go.

I love blue and lime green together in a garden. We have a few beds with this colour combination. I have never grown Irises, as I have always thought of them as fussy plants, however I have seen them on a gardening show recently and they claimed that they are easy to grow.

The Garden comprised of four graduated tiers down the hill. The first tier was housed the entry gate and car park. The second tier held the house and largest lawned area with large swathes of flowers beds. Tier Three was the orchard (which you can see in the background) and a formal hedged garden, complete with Roman statue. and the fourth tier was the vegetable garden, sheds and large pond.

This is the view from the fourth level. What you can see is 'The Maze' , also called 'Commercial Arcade'. It is not really very maze like comprising of four intersecting alleyways which run off the High Street. This house really is in the centre of town but you would never even know it was there whilst you shopped below.

The arcade holds all manner of shops. They were originally built in Victorian times and the original plan was to enclose the entire area under a glass domed roof. Unfortunately the developers ran out of money and the roof was never added. It is such a shame as it would have been such a lovely place to shop during winter and would be a wonderful venue for weekend markets in all types of weather. We would not have had to worry on this day however as it was truly spectacular.

As you can see the crowds were starting to arrive by now. This is the view of the length of the third tier.

The orchard was my favourite part of the garden as although it wasn't that large it seemed to exude the very essence of 'The Secret Garden'; high stone walls, gnarled fruit trees. It was a lovely place.

The view looking out toward the Town Church across Commercial Arcade and out to the Causeway which leads to both Castle Cornet and the Lighthouse.

Here is a shot through the entry to the vegetable garden with some naughty little pixie dashing through.

We left the garden via the fourth level gate which lead to a side road which was literally 10 metres to the High Street; there is alot to be said for the wonderful privacy high stone walls grant.

A new French patisserie and ice-creamer had opened up in Town so we took the kids and Granddad for a well deserved Saturday afternoon treat.

Tourist Season is upon us

2010-08-25T08:36:00.000-07:00

These photos were taken in July in St Peter Port.

The cruise ships that visit Guernsey are truly enormous.

They are much taller than the buildings in town. There is a height restriction here and, I believe, buildings can not be taller than four storeys.

As you can see the visitors harbour is chock-a-block.

Tourism only counts for 3% of Guernsey's GDP.

The locals still seem to think it counts for alot more - still living in the bucket and spade holiday days of yesteryear!

August Hydrangeas

2010-08-09T07:41:00.000-07:00

Thankyou for everyone’s kind comments on my previous post.

No, I have not given up posting it is just that it has been simply manic at Bumble Bee Cottage.

School finished two weeks ago.

The approach of the end of the school year (July in Guernsey) seems to signify that more and more and more needs to be jammed into each and every school day; so instead of things calmly drawing to a close the kids end the year hyped and ready to go, full of the expectation that the holidays will offer a similar amount of non-stop activity.

Fortunately for me, just four days into the start of this summer holiday, visitors arrived.

My Aunty Sue and her grandson (my second cousin, I suppose) arrived for a week and then as a surprise for my Aunty Sue my Dad came to stay as well.

Their holidays overlapped by two days so there was a fair bit of bed shuffling going on but we managed to squeeze everyone in.

My Dad left today on the 12 o’clock to Manchester. He should be putting his feet up in the Isle of Man enjoying a well earned cup of tea as I write this.

So this, my first post for six or so weeks is simply to say ‘hello long time no see.’

My next few posts will be about what we have been up to these last few weeks and what has been going on in this 65 kilometre square piece of land in the middle (well slightly off centre really) of the Channel.

These hydrangeas were photographed on the weekend in the southern parish of Torteval.

I like the faded ones best :)

Beware the dotted blue line.......

2010-06-30T11:44:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

I haven't posted for a while as I have been really disheartened by the Chinese porn comments that have been appearing on my blog.

I have deleted my two rants about them as that is not why I started to blog. I started so friends and family can see what we at Bumble Bee Cottage have been up to and I have been very fortunate to meet a few lovely people in the mean time.

Mr Bee has just told me that he checks my blog each day, just in case, and he noticed that I had published a few comments by people with Chinese symbol blogger names.

Mr Bee noticed that when the mouse arrow was over the dots at the end of the post, like this ....................., that the arrow changed into a finger, which represents a link.

I went and checked this out this evening and sure enough there were two more links to Chinese porn sites. I had published the comments as they were in English and I just, stupidly, assumed that all the dots at the end were just a way Chinese bloggers ended there comments.

DO NOT BE FOOLED BY THIS.

Please check your comments and be sure this does not happen to you. I suppose I am quite naive in thinking 'What the hell would a Chinese porn site be interested in posting a link on a blog about what there is to do on an Island thousands of kilometres away, with a little bit of china collecting and children's artwork thrown in,' but there you go, what do I know.

So ladies who are interested in my humble raving please, please roll up for the new representative of global Chinese porn sites.

That's right you can get it ALL RIGHT HERE in Guernsey.

I bet you never knew how raunchy we are over here :P

Lihou Island

2010-06-07T07:49:00.001-07:00

Last weekend the causeway to Lihou Island was open so we ambled over.

If you decide to go to Lihou Island whilst in Guernsey take the warnings seriously. You will NOT want to get stuck there overnight! There is a cottage for rent on the island but it is not usually 'manned'.

There is a two to three hours window in which to safely cross over, depending on the tides. This is more than enough time to walk over, circumnavigate the island and walk back.

The first time we went it was the week before Christmas 2007 and we wore sneakers - we were totally unprepared novices. We are old hands now well equipped with rubber feet :)

The walk around the island is fairly safe for small children. There are a few areas where they will need to hold your hand as the island drops away a few metres onto a pebble beach.

The walk around the island will take less than an hour at a small persons pace i.e. B3.

This is the view from the island back to the mainland. Can you call it 'mainland' when it too is an island?

You can see one of the larger Nazi Towers built in Guernsey. It is open to the public several times a year. It is on our 'to do' list.

The seagull chicks have hatched and are hiding amongst the bracken ferns. There is one in this photo.

There are two chicks in this photo; well camouflaged, just in front of their parents.

The Sea Thrift was in full bloom on the sea side of the island. We have some of this planted in our garden. It really is one of the toughest plants I have ever come across, I can now see why considering where it originates from.

The bracken fern has done it usual swift, surprise appearance. It grows so fast it is like a green jack-in-the-box; here one minute, gone the next.

There was a Benedictine Priory on the island in the 12th century. Once again Guernsey Tourism has baffled me (although I am perhaps easily baffled) as this too is numbered 'Number One' on the tourist information board. There are three Number Ones we have come across now; perhaps it is some type of secret code!?
These are the ruins of the Priory.

This is the causeway. It is made of local granite and snakes its way through the rocks back to Guernsey. The Bumble Bee'rs always have a lovely time filling up their pockets with sea treasure and I always make sure I clean out their pockets BEFORE things go in the wash; large rocks are not good for the barrel of the washing machine, especially when it is front loading and you can't open it until the cycle has finished.

The times Lihou Island is open are printed in the Guernsey Press and the Globe (I think). It is an enjoyable way to spend a few hours and makes for a nice change from racing around the usual tourist traps. Lihou Island is on the west coast and there are buses you can catch from St Peter Port. Entry is free - but bring the wellies!

Secret Gardens of St Pierre Du Bois

2010-06-06T09:14:00.000-07:00

Yesterday afternoon we headed down to St Pierre Du Bois for the Secret Garden tour. It began at 2.00pm and continued on until 5.00pm.

We arrived bang on 2.00pm in order to secure a park. Parking in Guernsey is always at a premium. This is St Pierre Du Bois Church.

I am glad we did arrive on time as there were 19 gardens to explore along the picturesque lanes of this beautiful parish. Don't get me wrong; I do love where we live but the chocolate box appeal of the a 'country' parish, as opposed to a seaside parish, is hard to ignore.

We managed to see 17 of the 19 gardens on display. The Bumble Bee'rs did very well considering we walked for two hours and forty minutes. The entry fee was £6.00 for adult and children were free. The first garden was that of the Rectory of St Pierre du Bois church. The photo above is on the way to the Rectory, not the Rectory itself.

It was a perfect Guernsey summer's day; clear, blue skies, 19*C and a cool breeze.

This photo and the one above were taken in Maison de La Cure. It is owned by Mrs Diana Meldrum. This garden was once part of the original Rectory Garden.

The next six photos are from the 'Le Chemin du Tresor', which is Guernsey French for 'Walk on Church Land'.

You may enter the meadow from the cemetery. There is another entrance at the other end but if you are visiting Guernsey and would like to go for a wander this is the easiest way to find entry to the meadow.

It is open to the public on Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday from noon until 6.00pm.

The paths follow the douit (stream) and pass the living willow bird hide (pictured below).

La Societe Guernesaise are working in conjunction with the Floral St Peter's Group to protect the large variety of plant life which grows in the meadow and to try to encourage the wildlife to move in.

St Pierre Du Bois means St Peter in the Wood. I should probably explain this as many people on the island refer to it as St Peter's which is different from the capital of the island, St Peter Port.

This seems to be a popular garden ornament in Guern gardens, the Granite Mushroom, made from local stone. I believe the story goes that it is a 'witches seat' and that by offering a witch a place to sit she may not decide to enter/hex/curse your home. Well, everyone likes a good sit down now and again!

This is the entry into Les Reveaux, owned by Mr and Mrs Brian Livesey. The owners greeted us when we enter their fabulous garden, as did their dog, Poppy, much to the Bumble Bee'rs delight.

This really was a hidden garden, as from the road it looked to be a fairly average sized plot, but once you passed through the climbing hydrangeas and red roses on the gate the true size of it was revealed.

This is their lovely glasshouse. It is very popular in Guernsey to have a glasshouse; I think it stems from the tomato and cut flower industry of a few decades ago. We have one but it is certainly not as palatial as this one, mores the pity.

In Queensland home gardeners do not seem to be plagued by pesky birds stealing their fruit as much as Guernsey gardeners do. They will fight for their fruit as this construction clearly shows.

This garden ornament was found in Granville, garden number 10. I love bicycles used in gardens. I am always on the lookout for one to use in my vegetable patch for the peas to grow up.

Unfortunately Le Douit Beuval, number 11, was not open to the public on the day; however they had moved the younger members of their goat herd down to one of their roadside paddocks so the kids could look at the kids :) This small holding has the largest herd of Guernsey Golden Goats (try saying that ten times fast) on the island. They sell goat milk and cheese from their home.

The next three photos are taken in the garden of Mr and Mrs Paul Winter, Le Beuval. The rhododendrons were truly spectacular.

Mr Bee was very impressed with their BBQ area; talk about grilling in style.

One of the paddocks of Le Douit Beuval was open further up the road. The Bumble Bee'rs were so excited that they got to pat this sweet little fellow.

Throughout the Guernsey countryside you will come across steps such as these running up the walls which make up the sides of the road. Steps to no-where. I would love to know where they used to take you to.

This is the National Trust water mill found opposite garden number 17, the Granary walk.

The next three photos are from the charming garden of Mr and Mrs James Bridges, Moulin de Becquet. It was my favourite garden on the day. Whilst it was only quite small it had such huge appeal. I spoke to the owners and they told me they fully renovated the cottage six years ago and it has taken them five of those years to get the garden up to this standard.

This is Evison's meadows, Rue des Vinaires. They displayed a large collection of haymaking, tractors, vintage farm and garden implements. Some of the demonstrators even dressed in traditional Guern attire.

These were just a few random shots of plants and flowers that caught my eye.

And how did we reward the Bumble Bee'rs for not whinging was we dragged them around gardens for over two and a half hours? Chocolate cake on the Rectory Green of course!

The Grange

2010-06-03T05:16:00.000-07:00

Last weekend there was an open garden at The Grange. The Grange (the house) is situated on The Grange (a section of road) on the way into St Peter Port proper. I assume the road was named after the house.

This is the view of the house as you approach it from the road, through its blue iron gates and up the driveway. It is a Georgian house built in 1823 for the 17 year old daughter of the Delancey family, a prominent Guern family.

The house was originally called Villa Carey, as a namesake of the girl's mother's maiden name.

From the road you can only really see a 15 to 20 metre frontage with a glimpse of the house behind the trees. Once you walk up the drive, well that's a whole other story!

There are two acres of secret garden squirrelled away behind the other homes and businesses on the street. You would never, ever know that this beautiful garden existed; that's what made visiting it so exciting, for me anyway :)

The house was commandeered by the Nazis during the Occupation. It was this act that saved the house from being damaged.

Some of the trees in the garden are over 100 years old. If the Nazi officials had not taken the house those trees would have been chopped down for firewood, a fate which befell nearly every tree in Guernsey during the Occupation.

The sheer size of the garden was a true shock. There are huge expanses of immaculate, lush lawn; something Mr Bee was very envious of. Living near the coast, on sandy soil, means our lawn frequently dries out and scorches :(

The Bumble Bee'rs had a wonderful time. B2 brought her camera and was happily, snappily, wandering her way around the garden.

It is nice to know that they can still appreciate nature, even the primped variety, and that TV has not truly rotted their brain!

There are over 350 roses dotted throughout the grounds. Unfortunately we were just a few weeks too early to enjoy them in their full glory.

The house is currently owned by the Johnson family. They have owned The Grange for the past six years.

They have a full time gardener who works on the garden. Apparently they remove 2 to 3 trailer loads of green waste (weeds, branches, grass etc.) each week.

It cost us £10 for our family to enter the garden. All the proceeds are going to help the Rotary Club's End Polio Now campaign.

There were stalls selling bits and bobs, a tea and coffee stand and a tombola. I hope they had a very successful fund raising afternoon.

Thankyou to the Johnson family for opening the beautiful garden to the public. We all had such a lovely afternoon poking around, oohhing and aahhhing as we walked from garden room to garden room.

The End

Sorry I couldn't resist :)

A self fulfilling prophecy

2010-05-18T13:03:00.000-07:00

Mr Bee is very, very busy at work. Poor thing!

This is why he gets all the best YouTube videos.

Here is one he shared with me this evening.

I haven't laughed so much for quite a while.

He is apparently, according to Mr Bee, the most watch man on YouTube; I mean come on, 143,701,965 views at the time of this post for goodness sakes!

Mr Bee is worried that if I blog about this I am perpetuating the prophecy.

Oh well, maybe Judson Laipply deserves it.

Go Judson! Go you good thing!

I hope it gives a grin :)

Emma missed out on.......

2010-05-17T10:31:00.000-07:00

....the Rainbow cake so I made her one of her own :)

Mr Bee works with several different departments in his job and in one of those departments is my friend, Emma. She read my blog, saw the cake and asked Mr Bee where her piece was? It was a very large cake after all. Surely there would have been enough to go around.

This is a chocolate layer cake. There are three layers with chocolate buttercream in between each layer.

This is a special diet chocolate cake. If you only eat half a slice you will only put on half the weight - until you go back for the other half :)

I hoped you and every at the Registry liked it Em.

This Cake has got a secret....

2010-05-10T09:44:00.001-07:00

It is quite unassuming isn't it?

Please note the well smoothed icing - I bought a new toy :)

Please excuse the wonky cutting but it is hard to cut through six different layers of cake when the cake is taller than the knife.

SURPRISE!

Four and a half hours of baking and icing later and I managed to capture a little bit of sunshine.

Therapeutic baking is just what I needed and it was time for Mr Bee to take another cake to work.

The Bumble B'eers are most put out that this is not for them :-0

I have promised the possibility of more baking tomorrow and I seem to be forgiven.

Liberation Day 2010

2010-05-09T09:00:00.000-07:00

Happy Liberation Day Guernsey

65 years of Freedom

The Guernsey Concert Band lead the Liberation Church Parade from the White Rock Cafe, along the seafront to the Quay.

The parade was under the command of Major Bob Place.

This is the first year the Ghurkhas participated I believe.

B2 was very impressed with the pony mascot.

The Guernsey Cadets

The Standard Bearers were followed by the multi-service Veterans and the Chelsea Pensioners.

We missed the parade last year so we made sure that we were there on time this year. This is the Town Church (view down the High Street) all decked out in Guernsey colours; yellow, red and white.

Mr Bee and I were interviewed live for BBC Guernsey Radio. The kids were very impressed. I could help but see the funny side of possibly the only two Australians in the crowd being interviewed and asked to comment on why the Liberation Church Parade is important.

The French Markets were in town again.

We opted for 1kg of the most delicious strawberries for £6.00.

The quality of the fruit and vegetable for sale is of a very high standard. The problem with the fruit and vege for sale in Guernsey in the supermarkets is that everything need to be distributed via the UK so all the produce has an extra few days transportation to get here. Hedge Vege is definitely the way to go when the Market is not in Town.

Six cheeses of your choice for £10

The carousel was free to all, big kids and small :)

It fined up to a truly beautiful day.

We ate most of them this afternoon and any leftovers were blended up into fresh fruit ice-blocks/ice-lollies now that the warmer weather is upon us.

The mustard cheese (on the right) was a new experience - the jury is still out on that one!

Fresh bread - one plain and one with black olives.

Until the Guernsey tomato season is in full swing these French ones will have to do.

We wandered around for about two and a half hours until the whinge-o-metre hit about 7 then we made our way back to the car. The Cavalcade didn't reach Town until 2.00pm so we did not stay until then. Next Year we will rotate and come in for the Cavalcade instead.

Thankyou to all the men and women who protect the freedom we enjoy!

Space Party

2010-05-01T01:00:00.000-07:00

Last weekend was B1's Space Party. I themed it blue, green and silver; blue and silver for 'spacey' type colours and green for the aliens. B1 invited six guests, plus our three, made for nine little space explorers.

I used Word for Windows 'wingdings' script to write the invitation in 'Alien' language and then wrote the translation in 'Earth English' down the bottom. This was received well by all the guests when B1 handed the invitations out at school. I still haven't told him how I did it - well a Mum's got to have a few tricks up her sleeve hasn't she?

B1 chose the Space Rocket cake from the Women's Weekly Children's cake cookbook. I can highly recommend this cake as it was VERY quick to do, with very little stress. I did alter the design a little to suit the sweets and decorations I had to hand.

I also made 'alien' cupcakes using little frog icing cake toppers I bought in Waitrose when we went to Manchester. OOHHH I love English supermarkets, compared to Guernsey the choices are seemingly endless.

We played five space games; they scored points for each game and the person at the end of the party with the most point got to choose first from the prize box, then the person who came second, and so on, so everyone received a prize. I made sure that there were a few more prizes than players so that the person who came last did not feel like they received the leftovers and were able to still choose a prize for themselves.

'Find the Moonrocks' is a version of the Australian party game, the 'Minty Hunt', where sweets are hidden around the garden and the children have to find them. To make the sweets into moonrocks we simply wrapped them in aluminum foil, B1 enjoyed helping with this. The children received one point per sweet they found.

'Space Quiz' was a quiz of twenty questions relating to our Solar System (which B1's class are learning about at the moment), Dr Who and Star Wars. They received a point for each correct answer.

'The Great Space Race' was a game where they had to run to our garden wall, touch the wall, run back, eat three dry biscuits, run and touch the wall (once all the biscuits were in their mouth, though not actually swallowed), run back, blow up a balloon (the boys loved this as all the biscuits not yet swallowed were blown into the balloon which resulted in lots of screaming about how fabulously gross it was ;p), run with their balloon, touch the wall, run back and drink a glass of orange juice but the problem was I had filled the bottom half of the glass with orange jelly! It was great to see the total confusion in their faces when they couldn't pour out the last of the orange juice :) Lots more screaming about the grossness of eating jelly with your fingers! The winner received nine point and each player received point in descending order until the person who came last received one point (I hope that explanation makes sense but I want to tell you about the games so you can use them at your own space parties if you need a few ideas).

'Space Food' the kids had to kneel with their hands behind their backs and eat a gravity defying donut (which was tied to our clothes line). I took a lot of very funny photos here I can tell you!

Last but not least, 'The Alien Body Parts Game'. I had placed four cardboard boxes over four bowls of Alien body parts. The box had a small hole cut in the top so the players could put their hands in to feel which body part was inside the box. I had placed a tea towel over the top of each box so no-one could sneak a peak and also so they could wipe their hands to get the alien goo off after they had felt the body part. There were quite a few nervous nellies waiting for their turn. More absolutely priceless photos, lots of screaming, laughing and being totally grossed out. The body parts were 1. a tin of lychees in juice for the bowl of eyeballs, 2. cooked spaghetti coated liberally in oil to make slippery intestines, 3. a lump of tofu carved into the rough shape of an alien brain, 4. a tin of creamy tapioca for the foulest possible alien poo! I highly recommend this game - after they were all feeling a little queasy I fed them lunch :)

We lit up the rocket's boosters and blasted off. Unfortunately the table cloth and the table will never be the same again; you can just see the burn holes under the sparklers.

B1's rating of his party - 'This was the best day of my life Mum!'

I can't really ask for better than that!

Bluebell Wood

2010-04-30T01:00:00.000-07:00

We went for our yearly trek to Bluebell Wood on the weekend. We park down by the bathing pools in St Peter Port and walk for about 20 to 30 minutes to reach the wood.

No blue just yet.

These beauties are not in the Woods themselves but on the way.

I do not think they are native bluebells but rather the Spanish imports but lovely just the same.

A little wild borage amongst the blackberries.

Once again we have timed our visit poorly.

Whilst there were flashes of blue, a lot of the flowers are yet to open.

The native bluebell.

I understand that native English bluebells are becoming endangered in the UK as too many people are picking them and as a result they are not reproducing new bulbs. You are not permitted to pick the bluebells in Bluebell Wood for the same reason, much to B2's disappointment.

The plants at the bottom of the wood receive far more sunlight and as a result bloom earlier than those in the shade of the wood.

We will come back next weekend to see if more beautiful blue blooms have appeared.

A Day at the Races

2010-04-29T01:09:00.000-07:00

Mr Bee and I were invited to an Ascot party on the weekend. There was going to be a prize for the best hat, so I got busy.

Take one £3.00 hat from a charity shop,

paint it, glitter it, glue on some ribbon, purple feathers, white rose, plastic horse and a few daisies and this is what you get. Am I a contender do you think?

I baked a banana cake with cream cheese icing. I have shown this recipe before on my blog so you can find the recipe in my recipe list on the tool bar.

Cupcakes,

and more cupcakes; 32 in all.

Unfortunately the strawberries slowly slid off the cake in the drive to deliver them. I didn't think I was that crazy a driver! I managed to rectify the problem but it didn't look as good later on with snail trials of strawberry juice all down the sides of the cake.

The glamorous.

The patriotic.

The glittery.

The comical - look closely for the horse poo!

The subtle.

The floral.

The chic.

The Hostess with the Mostess.

The fabulous.

The betting was a minimum of 20p and it cost £2.00 to buy your own horse. Mr Bee and I won twice with our own horse winning £16 each time. By then end of the evening we had nearly covered the cost of the babysitter!

The Prize.

The races. I am surprised the police didn't turn up as we did cheer rather loudly at times ;p

The winner.

Congratulations Sarah (and Sarah's Mum - hat maker extraordinaire)

Tulips in St Peter Port

2010-04-28T01:00:00.000-07:00

It is not only the countryside which is in full bloom in Guernsey at the moment. The Island's capital, St Peter Port, is looking lovely all decked out in it Spring finest.

I never really appreciated tulips before as they are a seldom seen flower in Brisbane gardens. I expect people can not be bothered keeping the bulbs in the vegetable crisper in the fridge for all those months to plant them out and then only have them flower for a week or two before the Queensland sun bakes them to a crisp.

Wallflowers are another new love of mine. They smell just gorgeous and come in a huge variety of colours.

Those plant pots on the poles are filled with blooms during the Summer months. The pots clip on and off the poles so the council gardeners can rotate them so they are always looking their best during the peak tourist season.

This is the only double-laned roundabout in Guernsey, in fact this is the only double-laned stretch of road on the Island, all one and a half kilometers of it!

The huge flag pole in the middle of the roundabout has been recently refurbished. I'm not really sure what they did but I am glad it has been put back as the roundabout looked a little bear without it.

The kids love the fact it looks like the mast of a ship, crow's nest and all. The tulips will only last a few more weeks and then the council gardeners will be out in force, trimming and weeding and preparing for the new Summer display.

St Peter Port is a lovely place to be when the sun is shining and the flowers are so bright and happy. It is a promise of a warm Summer to come; fingers crossed.

Trafford Centre - Shopping Centre of the Gods

2010-04-27T01:00:00.000-07:00

Whilst we were in Manchester we visited that shopping mecca of all shopping meccas, the Trafford Centre.

As you drive in through the gates to the car park there is a LED car counter to let you know how many car parking spaces are left. There were 5026 left on the morning of our visit so I think we were going to be ok :) I had been warned about the dangers of never finding your car again, the peril of wandering the car park, walking up and down aisle after aisle until you finally collapse from starvation and exhaustion; so I made sure we knew exactly where we parked - and here's a picture.

I agree with Seinfeld on this one; if they gave car parking rows a name instead of a number you would be more likely to remember where you parked. For example if our row was called 'monkey vomit' you are not really very likely to forget that in a hurry. Really you would think car park designers could be a little more imaginative.

The designers of the Trafford Centre however were very, very imaginative. I have never seen so much marble or Greek/Roman style statues in my life.

The glass dome in the centre of the building is truly fabulous, even more so when viewed from underneath.

We arrived at 9.00am and as the shops do not open until 10.00am we had plenty of time to look around. Mr Bee walked several meters away from me as he was highly embarrassed by my oohhing and aahhing and taking photos of everything in sight.

Every surface is decorated in some way. There are murals, cornices, columns, Greek/Roman themed plant pots, and benches.

Here is an example of one of the murals. There is one of these painting every few meters. I am not sure if they are people from history or if they are more modern celebrities. For arguments sake lets call this lady Kathy. Imagine how excited Kathy would have been to be asked to sit for one of these murals.

Then imagine that you became Kathy Queen of the Toilets. I think the excitement may have wained a little by now don't you?

OOhhhhh

AAAhhhhhh

Each one of these pots must have cost several hundred pounds each, and there are hundreds of them scattered throughout the centre.

Here is the dome from underneath. Large murals cover the walls under the dome. You can enlarge the photo to have a better look.

This will give you the idea of what they look like. These were done in a more traditional Greek/Roman design. The Trafford Centre construction must have kept quite a few Manchester based artists employed for years completing all these paintings.

Egyptian lifts

Cruise Liner Food Court

I think the statues are made from reconstituted stone, but don't quote me on that. They are all white with molted brown clothing draped on them. If they are not reconstituted stone and are actually carved by hand it must have taken years and year to complete them all as every way you turn you can see a statue. They even line the roof outside.

The Trafford Centre is effectively one large rectangle with two floors (ground and level one) which houses some 230 stores. There is a walkway which joins the rectangle half way along the top floor, near Boots, which take you to the furniture and home wears shops in the open air section. There are Christmas shopping trips from Guernsey to the Trafford Centre. You fly out on the 7.00am flight and home again at 8.00pm. Buses meet you at the airport and drop you off at the Trafford Centre. I could never see the point in this type of shopping trip before.....I can now! I would need to take a large suitcase with very sturdy wheels as I do not believe I could carry all those bags all day ;P

This is one of the murals on the walkway. There was also a piano which plays itself but I didn't get a photo of that as it was getting a bit crowded by this point.

Another Greek God just for good measure.

And another.

Mr Bee dubbed this the Trevi Fountain designed by Top Shop.

There has been some serious money spent in the decoration of this shopping complex.

We stayed and shopped until about 1.00pm, as Aunty Sue was kindly looking after the Bumble B'eers. It was for the best that we left when we did as plumes of smoke where wafting from our wallets due to the frantic card swiping going on in all the shops we visited.

Now lets go find the car. Where did we park again? Oh that's right aisle Monkey Vomit!

Daffodil Wall

2010-04-26T01:06:00.000-07:00

This was out garden wall in the first week in March. I finally finished the last four or so meters of planting remaining to do at the far end of the wall so this year there was no 'bare patch'. The daffodils are finished now. Mr Bee found the very last yellow bloom on the weekend. The muscari are past their best and soon we will have a wall clothed in green, brown and yellow foliage as the bulbs leaves die down. I suppose it is the price you pay for growing bulbs.

This is fine when they are in a mixed border but unfortunately there is nothing to hide them up on the wall so we will have to endure them looking manky for a few weeks until I can trim them back in preparation for Summer planting. Mr Bee has been a very busy bee, as it were, growing fifty or so red geraniums from seed for our Summer wall.

I sometimes hate the lack of privacy in our garden but at other times it has its benefits. When our neighbours walk past and see me gardening away they quite often stop for a chat. The garden has enabled me to meet people in our clos who I might never have otherwise spoken too. One lady stopped and asked me if we lifted all the bulbs in the wall each year; the horrified look on my face must have said it all. When I told her that there are well over 1000 bulbs planted she understood why we don't; what an awful job to have to do each year. I think the pure dread of lifting all those bulbs may take away the pleasure of them.

I love our daffodil and muscari wall, mankiness and all!

Mille Fleurs Open Garden

2010-04-25T08:01:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, while we were out on our Sunday afternoon drive, we came across a sign for an open garden.

We followed the signs through the lanes to discover a very organised event. There was a car park in a nearby field which was manned by five car park attendants who were there to ensure no problems arose from the hundreds cars overflowing with garden lovers all coming for a sticky beak.

'Mille Fleurs ' is a property which has been recorded in the Balliwick of Guernsey's Land Registry for over one hundred years, although I expect the house itself is much older.

'Mille Fleurs' means a thousand flowers and on this bright, warm and sunny day it certainly lived up to its name.

There property's gardens are set on two and a half acres of hilly countryside. The sloping land allowed for many different terraced areas all dedicated to different types of plants.

The grounds are not only home to beautiful gardens but also contain several holiday cottages. It would be a wonderful place to stay whilst in Guernsey; the swimming pool area is fabulous (sorry my photos of the pool area didn't turn out).

I love euphorbias; the lime green flowers give a great accent to any border planting. We have some of the smaller variety in our garden but after seeing this display I am trying to find room for one of the larger growing varieties.

This is one of my favourite photo from the garden. This wheelbarrow was hidden away at the back of one of the sheds. This photo sums it all up really, that is to say the secret behind any good garden is an awful lot of hard work which goes on behind the scenes.

The magnolias are in full bloom. There was quite a large variety of different magnolias in the garden.

B3 was highly skeptical about the bird scaring qualities of this fine fellow. She said that he was too friendly to frighten away anything!

The vegetable garden was brimming with plenty of tasty treats. It has spurred Mr Bee on to put some more work into our own modest plot at home.

The property backs onto a small reservoir. I think water in a garden adds that special extra something, it feels more peaceful somehow.

The Bumble B'eers were hopeful that they would be allowed one of the delicious looking cakes being sold at the 'cafe' but by the time we had finished looking around the garden half of Guernsey had turned up and all seemed to be queueing for cakes so we squeezed our way through the crowd and made our way back to the car park. We promised the kids a treat on the way home.

It was such a pleasure to have an opportunity to look around one of the hidden gardens of Guernsey. I call them hidden as when you walk or drive around the lanes most gardens are hidden away behind tall, thick hedges or enormous stone walls so you never have a chance to truly appreciate them.

Congratulations 'Mille Fleurs' on being a finalists in the RHS Britain in Bloom competition; a very well deserved honour indeed.

Spring Blossoms

2010-04-24T07:32:00.000-07:00

Originating from a sub-tropical climate I have never had the opportunity to experience the true loveliness of Spring blossoms.

The temperatures in Brisbane never get cold enough for them to flower properly.

A few brave, die-hard Brisbane gardeners do try to grow them but their displays are nothing compared to the blooms I have had the pleasure of seeing since we moved to Guernsey.

Their flowering period is only brief but oh so worth the wait.

Most of the blossoms I have come across are not scented, mores the pity.

They remind me of frothy, frilly, pink and white dresses you might imagine princesses or fairies wearing; the type of dress which held all the joy and wonder of childhood.

They will all have disappeared in a few short weeks and then my wait will begin again.

The Easter Salmon

2010-04-10T01:20:00.000-07:00

My Aunty Sue wrestled that sucker and poached him good :)

There's snow in them thar Hills!

2010-04-09T07:46:00.000-07:00

When Mr Bee and the boys arrived home from the Old Trafford B1 excitedly told us that they saw white on the top of the Peaks; so later that afternoon we went in search of the elusive 'white'.

B2 was very skeptical. She keep saying, 'I can't see anything. I think you are trying to trick us into going for a drive!' A 'drive' is one of the Bumble B'eers most hated activities :)

We came around a corner and B1 and Mr Bee were vindicated. This is the start of the Peak District just behind Macclesfield, on the way to Buxton.

B2 gave us a running commentary, 'We're getting closer. We're getting closer. We're getting closer. There it is!'

We stopped at the tearoom's car park and got out for a snowball fight.

There wasn't that much snow really, but it was certainly enough to make it special for our family as we have only seen snow a few times before. All of the children have only seen it once before, in February 2009 in Guernsey.

The temperature was about 2*C, which was 5*C colder than at my Aunty Sue's house, which was a 35 minute drive away. We were not dressed for the colder weather and B3 soon turned every shade of purple and blue and started to shiver and shake. When she finally gave in to frostbite and asked to go back to the car we prepared to leave.

Mr Bee had to throw, or perhaps lob is a more appropriate word, one more snowball in an attempt to even the score with B1. Fortunately for B1 he was swift on his feet :)

Lizzie Finlay

2010-04-08T01:41:00.000-07:00

On Thursday we had a boys outing and a girls outing. Mr Bee took B1 and my cousin's two boys to the Manchester United Museum and Stadium tour at the Old Trafford, the fabled 'Theatre of Dreams', whilst the girls had a more literary morning.

My cousin, B2, B3 and I went to Simply Books for a 'Meet the Author' morning. The author we were going to meet was Lizzie Finlay. Lizzie is an illustrator who has begun to write her own books. So far she has published 'Little Croc's Purse' and her more recent publication, 'Dandylion'.

Lizzie began by drawing a picture of Dandylion and speaking to the children about her book. She then read the book to the enraptured crowd, using enlargements of each page so all the little people present could see the pictures clearly.

After the story there were Dandylion activities. You could plant a dandelion seed into a pot to take home, colour-in an image from the book and have a moustache painted on your face, just as Dandylion did in the story. This young lady in red had a matching red moustache painted on and then walked around the village and a rather large Tescos causing quite a few stares, smiles and smirks!

You could purchase both of Lizzie's books from the shop and she would autograph them for you. B2 was given 'Dandylion' and B3 was given 'Little Croc's Purse'. B1 wasn't concerned about the fact that he missed out on a book as he was bought a football at Old Trafford.

Lizzie was a lovely lady and I can highly recommend her books; they have a message behind each of them and the illustrations are beautiful.

Simply Books is one of the most wonderful and child friendly book shops I have ever been into. In 2009 they won the 'Independent Bookseller of the Year 2009' - they are the best book seller in Britain. It is well deserved. They are located in the centre of Bramhall village in Manchester and they are open 9.30am-5.30pm Monday to Saturday.

The girls had a fabulous morning and were so excited that they actually met the author of a book they now owned; and as for the boys - well they didn't feel that they missed out as I believe they actually got to touch the grass on the pitch!

York Minster

2010-04-07T01:00:00.000-07:00

After we left Betty's we went straight to York Minster. You catch glimpses of the Minster from all over York. Its imposing presence dominates the York skyline.

The site where the Minster now stands has been occupied since Roman times; nearly 2000 years. In around AD71 it was the site of a Roman Head Quarters building which stood in the middle of a Roman fort.

The first Minster in York was built for the baptism of Edwin, the Saxon King of Northumbria, in AD627. This was a small wooden structure.

The wooden Minster was replaced by a stone structure in AD640. With the arrival of the Norman's in Britain a Norman Cathedral was built on the site by Archbishop Thomas of Bayeux (AD1080-AD 1100).

In around 1220 Archbishop Walter Gray began to rebuild the Minster in the Gothic style. This mammoth task took 250 years to complete, until we have the Minster in the form we know it today. The Minster is constructed of sandstone which has suffered alot of damage due to weathering over time.

Here is a photo of the arch above the Great West door which was replaced/repaired in 1998. It depicts the story of Adam and Eve. The detail is truly amazing and it made me appreciate and admire the work of stone masons even more; such incredibly intricate carving.

Once inside the Minster Mr Bee and B1 paid the extra few pounds to climb the 275 steps up the central Tower; whilst the girls and I tried our hand at the York Minster Treasure Hunt. This is a brochure given out to children visiting the Minster to see if they can find the treasure trove of beautiful and interesting things inside the building. Here is a very out of focus photo of the Great Western Window, built in 1338; it is affectionately know as the 'Heart of Yorkshire'. Can you guess why?

I was in awe of some of the needlework in the hassock, or kneeling cushion, in the Minster.

B3 was very concerned about the tombs in the Minster. She wanted to know why the people had been turned to stone. Even after I managed to get her to touch some of the marble statues she was not convinced, although she was fascinated by this weeping Putti on the tomb of Archbishop Richard Sterne from 1683.

Tomb of Archbishop Richard Sterne, 1683

B3 was even more concerned by the tomb of Sir Henry Bellasis (1624) as these statues were coloured and even more life like. B2 was fine about the whole ting until she realised that the bodies of the people depicted on each tomb were actually entombed within.

We went to find Mr Bee and B1 after the epic climb and we were greeted by a slightly flush faced duo. B1 was so proud of himself and made sure that I knew that it was not only 275 steps but actually 550 steps that he had climbed - up and down the stairs!

B3 became a little confused about the whole statue representing the dead thing as later we came across the Eagle lectern, which naturally enough, has a large golden eagle perched on top. Up pipes B3, 'Poor eagle, he's dead!'

This was an incredible tomb of an Naval Admiral. All the carvings were nautically based, seashells around his head, cannons, muskets, rope, globes, flags and all manner of sea faring paraphernalia, whose names I shan't hazard a guess. Once the beauty of the carvings was pointed out to B2 she forgot all about the dead bodies and focused on the artistic side of the tombs instead.

The stain glass was spectacular. A few large sections of stained glass are currently under repair but instead of the construction site marring the Minster a life size poster of the window hangs in its stead. It may not be the original but it certainly give the 'feel' of the window under repair.

This is a photo of a section of the Quire Screen. There are fifteen kings on the screen in all but due to the number of tourists I was unable to get a full length photo of the entire screen.

We looked around York Minster for about two hours, venturing to Undercroft, where below the floor of the Minster there are displays about the Minster's history, together with excavations of previous building on the site. No photography was allowed here.

We headed out into the fine Yorkshire weather to be drizzled on a little more. One of Mr Bee's favourite movies is 'V for Vendetta', so he was pleased to see the Guy Fawkes Inn which is situated in the place of Guy Fawkes birth.

Glimpses of the Minster from around the town.

We wandered around the narrow street of York and 'happened' upon the one store I have been wanting to visit for quite some time, Cath Kidston. I asked if I could take photos inside but alas no photography is permitted so you will have to make do with a photo of my purchases:

I have never seen this red spotty pattern on her website so I snapped these pillowcases up straight away as they will match in wonderfully with our bedroom linen. These were my only purchase as whilst I could easily fill half a suitcase with CK goodies our bank balance could not take the punishment.

There are a few stores in Guernsey which stock some of the Cath Kidston range but after seeing an entire store filled with it I doubt I will ever be able to go back :) B2 came into the shop with me and is a convert. She wanted to buy herself a lip balm, but at £5 a pop I told her she wasn't allowed to as it would use up nearly all her holiday spending money. Naturally I am the cruellest mother in the world as a direct result of this unspeakable injustice.

We left York at 3pm after a truly fabulous, if a little expensive, day. The Bumble B'eers were getting to the point of poopedness, as were Mummy and Daddy, truth be told, so we hopped into the car and headed back to Aunty Sue's. There still remains many family oriented activities to do in York and on our next visit to Manchester I dare say we shall return to York to appreciate more of her historic delights, and squeeze in a quick trip to Cath as well :P

Betty's

2010-04-06T23:55:00.000-07:00

We arrived home yesterday after a week in Manchester staying at my Aunty Sue's house. We were supposed to leave Guernsey on Sunday but the airport was fogged in, so after waiting around and spending a fortune at the Airport Cafe trying to feed the kids until they stopped whinging about the fact we were not actually going anywhere we went home and tried to leave on Monday. The fog stayed away this time - hooray - so we darkened my Aunty's doorstep mid afternoon.

On Tuesday we set off on our 'big' drive of the week and headed to York, which is about a one hour and forty minute trip if you manage to avoid the traffic; which we fortunately did. I have been to York once before, some fifteen years ago, and remembered it being a truly beautiful place. My memory served me well on this occasion as it was every bit as lovely as I had recalled.

We arrived in York at around 10am and went straight to that most wonderful of Yorkshire tea and cake supping Mecca's, Betty's at St Helen's Square. I had attempted on my previous Yorkshire jaunt to sample its delights but the thirty metre queue, which snaked its way down the road, put me off a little. This time I was prepared and went well before traditional tea times. I am very glad we did as by the time our drinks arrived the queue was some twenty people long. We were seated immediately and colouring in supplies appeared just as swiftly which gave Mr Bee and myself enough time to peruse the menu in peace. The Bumble B'eers all had the same, a mini chocolate milkshake, which contained a large dollop of chocolate ice-cream, and a chocolate brownie, which was really more of a sundae as the brownie seemed to form some type of raft on which another large scoop of ice-cream (vanilla this time) floated in a lake of chocolate sauce. The Oowwing and the Aaahhhing from the Bumble B'eers was quite loud at this point!

Mr Bee had his favourite croissants whilst I sampled their Eggs Benedict, as I had had no breakfast in anticipation. If I am being completely honest it was an expensive morning tea however sometimes you just need to throw caution, and a few pound notes, to the wind and just enjoy the experience.

As you walk through the door to Betty's you pass through their shop front, which sells bread, cakes, biscuits, tea, chocolates and all manner of tasty delights. Mr Bee ushered the Bumble B'eers out of the crowded shop so I could take a few photos. I bought each child a Lebkuchen Hen, which is a German gingerbread biscuit in the shape of a hen which is iced in fondant, feathers and all (sorry they were consumed before photographic evidence could be taken), an Easter Simnel cake for my Aunty Sue and a cook book for myself.

We ate some of the Simnel cake on Easter Saturday and it was truly delicious with its marzipan topping and another marzipan layer inside the cake. It was moist, fruity and one of the nicest fruit cakes I have ever tasted; except for my Mum's of course.

A Simnel cake is traditionally consumed on Easter day. It harkens back to medieval times, around the 17th century, when servant girls would bake this cake to give to their mothers on Mother’s day (Australian) or Mothering Sunday (English). As this day falls during Lent the cake was eaten on Easter Sunday, which signifies the end of Lent. The word Simnel is derived from the Latin word ‘Simila’ which means fine wheaten flour, which is what the cake was traditionally made from. The cake also has religious meaning as traditionally there are 11 marzipan balls around the rim of the cake which signifies the 11 ‘loyal’ disciples of Jesus. Sometimes eleven crystallized primroses are used instead of the marzipan balls. Some cakes also have a larger marzipan ball in the centre representing Jesus as well. The cake I purchased was of the smaller and easier to carry variety so it was simply decorated with patterned marzipan with six icing primroses of top.

Sorry the photo is a bit on the blurry side but I had to include it. The range of Easter eggs in Betty's were just gorgeous. The flowers were made of fondant and attached with a dot of chocolate on the back. After all we had spent this morning already our budget did not stretch to a Betty's egg as well, so a blurry photo will have to suffice.

I used to buy quite a few souvenirs when I travelled but these days I seem to limit myself however the thought of owning THE Betty's cook book was too much. I can justify the purchase however, as I can, hopefully, recreate the Betty's experience here at home - well that's my excuse and I am sticking to it ;P

A Big Pay It Forward Apology

2010-04-05T23:34:00.000-07:00

This post is to say thankyou to Julie of KC’s Court for her lovely ‘Pay It Forward’ gift; the only problem is that it was supposed to upload nearly three weeks ago. I created the post and set it for delayed publication but I must have done something incorrectly so it never made it to the World Wide Web – I am so terribly sorry Julie.

Julie’s parcel contained some locally made chocolates, which I ate before the hungry horde arrived home :)

a hand-made lavender filled heart, the colour scheme of which will suit my bedroom perfectly;

a crotchet brooch and some sweet butterfly beads;

and a packet of Julie’s cards which depict copies of her cross stitch patterns.

Thankyou so much Julie for all your hard work, I really appreciate your lovely gift.

Strawberry Shortcake Party

2010-03-09T01:00:00.000-08:00

It was B3's birthday party on the weekend and she wanted a Strawberry Shortcake Party. Fortunately I already had plenty of pink party supplies from my Party Cupboard.

I bought all pink, white and red lollies/sweets for on the table and in the party bags.

This is my new Maling bowl. I absolutely love Maling lustre ware and wished that I had a bit more of the pink colourway to use at the party. Oh well, I'll just have to throw myself on that grenade and buy a little more ;P

I made the jelly so it was reminiscent of a strawberry - you know, red on the bottom and green on the top. I think I need to get out more!

I made vanilla cupcakes and strawberrified them too; just in case any children did not like the chocolate birthday cake.

B3 actually wanted a 'dolly varden' style birthday cake; the one where you place a doll in the middle of a large, froofy cake skirt. There is a Strawberry Shortcake hard plastic doll available which would have been large enough but unfortunately she was not available on the Islands so I had to make do with a Strawberry shaped cake.

This was sssooo easy to do. I just used a heart shaped tin and a double batch of cake mix, as the tin is quite large. I sliced off the top of the cake to give it a flatter surface and got busy with the piping bag. I try never to make red icing due to the quantity of food colouring required. If you don't add enough you end up with a very dark pink. I did not pipe the icing all the way to the bottom edge of the cake as I knew I wanted to place fresh strawberries around it and the berries would have become quite sticky covered in icing.

B3 was very pleased with her party and had a lovely time. She especially like the fact that she got to keep the cake topper and add her to the ever increasing collection of Strawberry Shortcake paraphernalia which is slowly taking over our home. Have a Berry nice day!

Daffodowndilly

2010-03-08T01:19:00.000-08:00

She wore her yellow sun-bonnet,

She wore her greenest gown;

She turned to the south wind

And curtsied up and down.

She turned to the sunlight

And shook her yellow head,

And whispered to her neighbour:

‘Winter is dead.’

Words by A.A. Milne

Photos by me, the lanes around St Saviour's Reservoir 7th March 2010

Walking the Lanes

2010-03-07T09:49:00.000-08:00

Our Sunday walk saw us head to the lanes around the St Saviour’s Reservoir. The sun was shining for the first time on the weekend for a long time; I didn’t realise how much I had missed it. It was a scorching hot 5.5*C. On the drive to our destination we passed people on the beach building sandcastles and walking the dog (you can walk your dog on all Guernsey beaches until some time in May when the swimming beaches become ‘off limits’ to our little furry friends).

The wonderful Japanese Zen garden of a freshly ploughed field awaiting the arrival solanum tuberosum or the humble spud to you and me.

Daffodowndilly are popping up everywhere to chase away the Winter chill in our hearts.

The peppery, sweet smell of gorse wafts along on the wind; it is one of my favourite Guernsey aromas.

All the gorgeous yellow Spring flowers are clearly evident, beaming away from the hedges like little bits of the sunshine fallen to earth.

The view across Vazon Bay. I wonder if the surfers have braved the sea today? The Guernsey Die Hard Surfer Boys surf all year round. In Winter they don full body suits which include gloves, shoes and a hood, so the only thing that separates them from the Creature from the Black Lagoon in the frost-bitten circle of face you can see peering out from the insulated suits.

We passed Le Hechet Farm where the delicious Guernsey Farmhouse Ice-cream is made.

They use up the leftover egg whites and make meringues which they sell at the local farmers markets and at the Hedge Vege just outside the farm gates. For £1.60 per bag we bought some to give us strength on our strenuous amble :)

An entire hillside of daffs just waiting to burst into bloom.

I love that the people who made this granite drain took such pride in their work that they bothered to put the date it was made. And why shouldn’t they be proud as here I am 112 years later photographing it. They certainly put the slightly less grand Aussie drains to shame, just because it is functional doesn’t mean it can not be beautiful and well made.

What a lovely way to spend an hour or so wandering the sun-warmed lanes on a fabulous Spring morning.

The Little Chapel

2010-02-26T01:46:00.000-08:00

We have lived in Guernsey for two years and seven months and we still had not been to see the famous Guernsey attraction, the Little Chapel, so one afternoon, while it was fine, we did just that.
The Chapel is believed to be the smallest chapel in the world; being just five metres long and only three metres wide.

B1 kept looking closely at all the broken plates. He was genuinely concerned as he said that they had broken up lots of plates just like the ones I collect and he seemed to think this was not the right thing to do; maybe he thought his Mum needed some more - NOT!

The Chapel was started in March 1914 by a monk called Brother De'odat. Apparently his aimed was to create a a miniature version on the grotto and basilica in Lourdes in France.

The Little Chapel is actually the last chapel in a sequence of three chapels built by De'odat. The first was built in 1914 but demolished almost immediately after its completion.

The second Chapel stood until 1923. In 1923 began work on the Chapel's present incarnation.

In 1939 Brother De'odat returned to France due to ill health and entrusted the Chapel's completion to Brother Cephas. If you look closely at the sides and edges of the spire you can see the famous Guernsey Ormer shells decorating it.

Brother Cephas continued to work on the Chapel until his retirement in 1965.

Broken china, Ormer shells and pebbles cover every conceivable surface of the Chapel.

More Ormer shells and some cockle shells have also been used on the ceiling inside the Chapel.

This last photo is for my Dad. If you enlarge it you can just see the words 'Douglas Isle of Man' under what I assume is the Manx Coat of Arms. This is quite amusing considering the 'friendly' rivalry for Banking business between the two Islands today.

So there you have it the 50p tour. You can find the Little Chapel situated on the grounds of Blanchelandes Girls' College located at Les Vauxbelets, St Andrews, Guernsey. It is open all year round and entry is free.

Snowdrops at White Gable

2010-02-25T04:16:00.000-08:00

On Sunday afternoon we took the Bumble B'eers to see the snowdrops at White Gable in St Saviours. We have gone each year for the past three and they are always worth the trip.

There are a few yellow and purple crocus dotted here and there amongst the snowdrops; such bright and happy flowers.

The trees are yet to bud but it won't be long now. Mr Bee loves going to see the snowdrops as he says it signifies the beginning of Spring to him.

This is what White Gables used to look like in its 'Snowdrop Hay Day' .

There may be a few less blooms these days but it does not detract in the slightest from its lovliness nor the smile it always brings to my face. Sometimes you just need to stand back and apprecaite how wonderful the world can be.

What to do with half price Christmas decorations

2010-02-20T07:07:00.000-08:00

The last time we were in Australia (Christmas 2008/2009) I dragged my sister along to the sales and stocked up on pink and purple Christmas decorations. Just between us I think my sister thought I had lost my marbles as I was scrabbling around through all the baskets, boxes and piles looking for the sparkliest, glitteriest, pinkest and purplest ones I could find.

Truth be told it is far cheaper to buy Christmas decoration on sale to use for present wrapping than it is to buy a ready made bow.

I managed to find quite a large bag full but they have not sat idle in the depths of my gift wrapping cupboard (yes, I know, sad but true, I do actually have one of these - with three children, it can add up to quite a lot of parties throughout the year).

Ta da! The little girl who will receive this present (this very afternoon in fact) will love that she can keep this spandangly little number and hang it on her door, drawers, bed etc. Sorry about the photos but the light at the moment, and for the past few months for that matter, has been dull to say the very least so the flash needs to be used. It does show how sparkly they are though doesn't it?

B1 is at a party now (two parties in one day is not uncommon in this house!) but he whisked his present away before I could take a photo. I used light blue paper, overlaid with white flowery doilies and finished off with pale pink ribbon for that one - I didn't have a decoration to match.

I sometimes buy packets of big, rainbow, swirly lollipops and tie them on instead. I have been know to use Matchbox cars (for little boys parties) and I did go through a fairy wand stage (for little girls) as well. I suppose now that B1 is getting older I will have to work our some way to tie a packet of Match Attax cards to the front of gifts :) For my Australia friends, these are Football (which is correctly called Soccer) collector cards which the kids can keep in special books, trade with friends or they can actually play a 'game' with them. They are the latest craze at the Bumble B'eers school and like all good crazes have now been BANNED :P

This second gift is for a party B3 is going to in a few weeks but I was in a wrapping frenzy. What can I say? When a girls got to wrap a girls got to wrap!

Pink Princess Party

2010-02-18T05:45:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago B2 told one of my friends about a 'Pink Party' that my Mum had given for B2 and B3 when we went home to Brisbane to visit in Christmas 2008. My friend thought it sounded like a fabulous idea so she decided to have one during the Half Term break. B2 was beside herself with excitement all holidays and would give me a daily report on how many days until the party. Unfortunately on the day B3 was unwell so she spent the day with B1 and Mr Bee but I made sure I brought her home a large piece on pink cake to cheer her up.

I made a Pink, Poofy, Princess cake. Once again I used the old faithful chocolate cake recipe (which you can find in my recipe collection on the side bar).

I also made some chocolate dipped marshmallows. This was the first time I tired to make these and they turned out quite well. Once I worked out the correct amount of chocolate to put on each one the process was fairly straight forward. I did manage to cover myself, the counter top and the floor in white chocolate and sprinkles however.

There was pink food galore. There were seventeen little princesses in attendance; all either dressed in a Princess outfit or something suitably pink. I didn't have anything pink so purple had to do; I did manage to find a purple feather fascinator lurking in the back of my cupboard so B2 informed me that this would pass in lieu of a tiara and ball gown.

There was fairy bread, heart shaped ham sandwiches, flower shaped cheese sandwiches, star shaped nutella sandwiches, pink sweets/lollies, pink rice crispy cakes.....

... a pink Princess cake and somehow a pink fairy cake also managed to sneak in. Both of which are from Marks and Spencers - of course.

The Princesses had their nails painted in all shades of pink, rightly Royal make-up applied, hair styles with glitter spray (two of the servant, helper Mums are hairdressers) and I took along a bracelet making kit. I supervised bracelet making for nearly two and a half hours and was only allowed a reprieve once all the Princess had made three bracelets each; then all the Mums made some too!

I am always on the look out for new and interesting sprinkles for cakes and when these little pink, sparkly cupcakes arrived I was straight over to their creator to ask the all important question - 'Where did you get the sparkly sprinkles?' I knew I was living in a fantasy land hoping for a shop in Guernsey and sure enough they came from mainland UK, ASDA. Fortunately we are going to visit my Aunty Sue in Manchester soon so I already have plans for a quick trip to the mighty ASDA, purveyor of cheap and well washing children's clothes and sparkly, pink and girly sprinkles.

Here is the Hostess with Mostess, the main Princess herself. You should have seen the look on the little girl's faces when they laid eyes on Cinderella; she even had glass slippers, but I forgot to take a photo of those :(

Thankyou your Royal Highness, Princess Nicky, a truly wonderful and magical time was had by one and all.

Grandes Rocques Bay

2010-02-17T06:31:00.000-08:00

I chopped up all the stale bread left over from the weekend and we headed to Grandes Rocques Bay to find a few Seagulls who might appreciate it.

I love the sound of Seagulls. It is one of the first noises I hear in the morning, aside from the Bumble B'eers squabbling over who ate the last of the cereal that is.

In the early morning light in Brisbane you hear the Rainbow Lorikeets squawking as they flit through the eucalyptus. Now that I come to think of it, maybe the Bumble B'eers squawking does have that same high pitched, ear piercing sound as the Lorikeets. I am glad to say they are still little Aussies at heart, or should that be voice :)

Surfer Cake

2010-02-02T09:16:00.000-08:00

It was our school's Principal's 60th Birthday and I was asked if I would make the cake. He is an avid surfer so I was requested to make a cake reminiscent of Vazon Bay, where he surfs regularly, and was supplied with the surfing penguin.

The teacher's were unable to get a plastic surfer dude so the penguin had to suffice - it is not some weird in-joke, at least I don't think it is!

I used my Fail Safe Chocolate cake recipe (found in the side bar in my recipe section) but I made the mistake of baking and icing the cake on the same day. When I went to ice the cake it was too fresh so my surf was very crumb filled. I made some of the sea foam swirl around the pier; you can just see it in this photo. The ocean was supposed to be crashing up onto the beach thus causing the largest tidal wave Guernsey has ever seen for our proud penguin to ride to glory on!

The wave was the trickiest part as every time I tried to ice it large chunks of cake would come away. It turned out OK and I was told they all recognised it as Vazon, because of the wooden/chocolate flake piers which dot the shoreline of Vazon's northern end.

I used blue icing gel and edible glitter to try to give the idea of sparkly, board-worthy surf. It was not the best cake I have ever done but it is not the worst either. I will certainly not bake and ice on the same day again - never, ever, ever :P

High Tide at Cobo Bay

2010-02-01T06:45:00.000-08:00

Cobo Bay 8.49am

This was the highest tide of the year thus far; 10.6 meters if memory serves.