THIS WEEK I AIM TO.....

do lots of baking, more spring cleaning and try to get over a horrible headache that I have had for days.

I am still knitting my dishclothes and am definately getting faster.

I cooked a banana cake with the left over bananas from the market on the weekend and made lots of sausage rolls to freeze for the kids. I also stewed the apples from the market to freeze, ready for pies.

I have not run this week due to my head hurting but am hoping I will feel better tomorrow to do that.

So that's my rundown of this week, maybe I'll share some photos in my next post.

MARKET DAY

As you probably know if you read my blog, I try to buy organic and local wherever possible.
I didn't succeed on either account today with my market shopping. There is very little local produce available at our markets at the moment so I had to buy from a supplier that came from about 300km away.
The produce is still picked fresh but as it is not organic I wash any fruit and vegetables in an organic wash.

I'm not sure how much your produce costs in the stores where you live, but ours can get quite pricey down here.
So here is the good news, this is what I picked up for $15.50.

2kg Pink Lady Apples
5kg oranges (I love to juice)
1kg brown onions
1kg bananas (just right for banana cake)
1kg tomatoes

It is so worth it to get to these markets if you can, oh, and the re-purposed bags I made last night (blogged at my other blog) worked perfectly. I think I'll make some more today.
Have a great weekend
xxxSue

BUTTER VEGETABLES

What are you eating for dinner?

I thought I'd show you what I am having.

Cooking away.

Yummy, butter vegetables and rice. I used the recipe for butter chicken and just replaced the chicken with vegetables. I'm loving Indian food atm.
Butter chicken is a deceiving name as it's suprisingly low in calories.

Have a great weekend
xxxSue

MY MOUNTAIN WAS CALLING

and I had to respond.

After having 2 weeks off any real exercise due to a corked thigh from karate, I was desperate to run up my mountains.

What a beautiful spring day up there, well expect for the gale force winds which are really bad now that the council in all it's wisdom chopped down all of the trees. Don't get me wrong, I think the pine trees whould have gone years ago and native trees planted in their place, but they took the lot native and all and have not re-planted. It's so sad as it really is a beautiful natural area.

The beautiful native birds were out as were the flowers and the butterflies and so were the swooping magpies protecting their nests and the swarms of bees. All in all a great run.

My heart-rate watch stopped working so I have nothing to record there and I did the 4.2km in 49 minutes. Pretty slow for me but I did walk a bit and continually stretched my quad. Towards the end my leg was starting to hurt but I think the physio wrap kept any further injury at bay.

I'm certainly feeling energized now and must go and get ready for work.

Thanks for coming and reading :)

I'M BACK

I'm sorry about the lack of posts over at this blog lately, things will be changing though. I did try to post over the last 2 weeks but we have had an amazing amount of internet problems that are thankfully fixed now.

My patch is growing beautifully and this week I will be harvesting beetroot and broccoli. I will be trying out a new recipe for preserving my beetroot and blanching then freezing the broccoli.

Over at my other blog a while ago I started knitting (this bug seems to hit me every winter yet I never seem to finish anything). Well, it took me 3 weeks but I have finished my first dish cloth, only 13 more to go. The idea behind knitting cotton dish cloths is that they are kinder to the environment as you are not throwing out sponges or bought cloths. They are cleaner as they are washed every 2nd day, hence why I need lots and no nasty germs have a chance to breed. They are small and I can practice my knitting and it doesn't matter if I make a mistake.
I am making cloths in other colours for cleaning eg bathroom cloths, so they do not get mixed up.

Do you like my laughing broccoli? He smiles at me when ever I'm doing the dishes.

This week I received these 2 books in the post. I have wanted Amanda's books for ages so finally decided to buy them. They are beautiful books full of down to earth knowledge from a most amazing woman. I have been reading her blog for a couple of years now and I love her simple way of living.

I laughed when I turned the pages of Amanda's new book and came across this beautiful project, look familiar?

here is mine made a few weeks ago...