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Fritter/Rosti/Patty - The Way To A Baby's Heart

My grandson is now a novice toddler!

When his mum goes to work at the weekend he comes to us for the day and he is really exploring some food delights. He loves picking figs and apples straight from the tree and sampling some of the green leafy things but for breakfast he just loves a patty of frittery goodness that he can self feed and explore the texture of. 

Here are some combinations, they are quick, easy, nutritious and a family pleaser for everyone. 

1. Grated zucchini, corn kernals, cheddar cheese with besan flour, coconut flour,

2. Grated potato (moisture squeezed out), grated cauliflower, spring onion, flour

3. Grated pumpkin, grated apple (squeeze out the juice) mozzarella, falafel mix  

Add an egg or two and enough milk to make a rosti/fritter type batter and fry in either olive oil, butter or dripping as the style suits.

The pieces are easy for him to manage for basic chewing, lots of texture and taste to explore and he gets plenty of fine motor skills practice.

There is no limit to the combinations.

Personalised Tree Decorations

Welcome someone new into the family with their very own place on the Christmas tree.

You've seen these hearts in the past here and here

I stamp names onto fine scraps of linen or cotton using a permanent ink.

Sewn directly on using running stitch and two strands of embroidery cotton.

This is also a nice way to remember family who have died too. They always have a place in our hearts and we especially remember them at Christmas time.

Be at peace one and all.

A Blanket For Every Age

We are ever so delightfully otherwise engaged around these parts with the new grandchild

but

ER-HEM!

Could I please direct your attention to the beautiful blanket beneath the stunning babe.

This was made by my sister-in-law following the squares from my "Knit With Me" series.

This was a serious of posts that I did featuring various knitting stitch panels.

She has applied herself with far more discipline than I have and completed several of these sampler blankets for close friends and family members in various colourways.

Her nephew is a very lucky boy and I treasure that this will be something that he can keep with him all through his growing years.

I imagine him at 5 yrs cuddled up with it in front of the TV

I imagine him at 14yrs with it across his lap as he finishes a school assignment

I imagine him at 17yrs at the rowing or the football 

I imagine him at 20 yrs with it on the back seat of his first car

I imagine him at 30yrs with it wrapped around his own child......

Photo credit goes to Tegan and is entitled "Sleeps Like a Cactus" (good grief)

Home Made Nappy/Diaper Change Salve

This is a perfect salve for nappy change times and cradle cap and one you'll want to pin. It is made simply from the garden using the super healing properties of common plantain. Used with calendula, another wonderful skin healing herb also found commonly in most gardens and chamomile incorporating the anti-inflammatory properties, this salve will soothe, nourish, heal, cool and promote soft healthy skin.

Gather fresh leaves of plantain before the energy of the plant goes into seed head production. After dew has dried is the best time as the herbs need to be absolutely dry before they go into the oil or you risk rot in your infusion. 

The leaves can be simply bruised/crushed and placed straight onto bites, stings, rashes or sunburn as an immediate remedy making it an excellent first aid.

Place the leaves along with the calendula flower heads and chamomile flowers into a large glass jar and cover with olive oil. Place somewhere warm, my kitchen bench catching the last of the Indian summer warmth is perfect, and turn gently from time to time to make sure the oil is mixing through the herbs. Leave for a month to infuse.

After a month of infusion, strain well through filter paper or a cloth lined strainer.

Measure the amount of infused oil and grate 10% in beeswax.

For instance if you have 800ml of infused oil, grate 80g of beeswax. This gives a nice manageable set to the salve but it melts so readily when applied to warm skin.

On a very low heat gentle combine the oil and grated beeswax till melted. 

Remove from heat. At this point I also add a few drops of vitamin E oil to extend the preservation.

Pour into clean glass jars or pots and cover straight away and leave to set.

Label and date.

A great gift for new babies.

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Best practice is to use a clean stick or spatula every time but that is not entirely practical at nappy change time. We simply use our right hand for wiping and cleaning and then our left hand to take a single scoop from the pot thus keeping it from contamination. You wouldn't want to wipe a bottom and then transfer that back into the pot.

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28/06/14 - We had a salve making session at our Living Better With Less group this month and you can find additional information in the link here from some general Q&A that came up.

The Crafty Bits for the Shower/Party

I would not have believed how simple these effective poms are for decorating. We kept the colours in theme and they are very light in weight to hang which is important. Being a garden party there was no shortage of great points to hang from including the underside of the shade umbrellas, gateways and garden arch.

Here is a you tube link that shows pretty concisely how easy it is.

Old silver trays were purchased for a couple of dollars each and coated with blackboard paint. Their beautiful scrolled edges and engravings made lovely signs for the garden and I'm sure they will come in handy again and I may even use them on the market stall. Some were screwed straight to garden stakes to point the way and for hanging signs we drilled a couple of holes in the top and threaded with garden twine.

Leftover hessian/burlap from Christmas was used on the invitations, party favour bags and wrapped around milk bottles of flowers to keep the theme running through. Lots of up-cycling and recycling.

We also placed a couple of tall Fowlers bottles in my gumboots and filled them with cut agapanthas and placed them at a gate but I didn't get a photo but I mention it because it was a very effective idea and simple to do.

There were guests from many walks of Emma's life and we definitely needed name tags so we simply cut carrot shapes from bright orange paper and folded some narrow strips of green tissue and cut it finely but not quite through to the base so that it created a feathery look and then sticky taped them to the back. People either used small safety pins or pegs to attach them.

Disclaimer: only poor quality silver trays of dubious and debilitated surfaces were harmed with blackboard paint in the creation of this production.

My Basic Soap Recipe

I made soap for the return thanks favours.

The soap ideally needs 6 weeks to cure and harden so it will be just right when the baby is born.

Here is my recipe:

I used 2000g beef tallow for moisturising quality and bar hardness

1000g olive oil for creaminess and lather

250g coconut oil to give cleaning but not enough to be too stripping

1235g distilled water

443g lye

48g of blended essential oil (lavender, lime and bergamot).

After removing them from the mould and cutting into bars I stamped them with a set of alphabet cookie "stamps" that I purchased from Avon a while ago. You can stamp with rubber stamps too but these cookie stamps being rigid give a great impression.

We then followed the invitation theme through to the the thank you packaging.

Special Activities For A Baby Shower

"Wishes For Baby"

was a lovely activity that Alana organised for Emma's baby shower. It gave guests the opportunity to pen some words of love and support that were very powerful for Emma to reflect upon later. Alana printed up some sheets with words like

"I hope you learn........"

"I hope you ignore......"

"I hope you never forget......."

allowing guests to fill in the blanks.

I set up a small table and just two chairs down the back of the garden in the cool shade of the apple tree where guests could reflect in quiet time and consider their wishes.

Emma covered a lidded box and created a slot for people to post their completed wishes so that guests had the freedom of complete privacy to write what they really felt and wanted to share with Emma and her baby.

She will draw strength and encouragement from them in the months and years to come and she may even want to scrapbook them as momentos of this time.

Another really special idea Alana came up with was this canvas. She painted the tree trunk and branches with the borders giving people at the shower the opportunity to make a thumb or finger print with green ink and write their name on their unique "leaf"

It is another beautiful touching momento of the shower that we are able to look back on. This tree contains "leaves" from every chapter of Emma's life; family, friends, carers.

 She will remember this day as not just a party but also as a celebration of love and support and embrace from some of the very important people in her life. Just as the leaves of a tree help to nourish, support and breathe for the tree, so too do all these people represented on Emma's special tree. This is a tangible reminder of her support network for times when she may need help and encouragement. I'll be pinning these ideas to use at another opportunity for sure.

We also played some silly fun games too of course.

Don't say "baby" or you lose a peg. The person with the most pegs at the end of the day wins.

Estimate the circumference of Emma's tummy and cut a piece of string, closest size measurement wins.

A blind baby food test - guess what the ingredients are. THAT was very interesting!

We also had ice cubes with babies frozen inside and the first one to melt and their baby to be "born" won a prize.

In theme with our garden setting and style our prizes were decorated cartons of home laid eggs and baskets of home grown vegetables. Also garden trowels and home saved seeds in home made seed packets. I could have sworn I took photos but I must have forgotten in all the excitement.

Peter Rabbit's Food

I'm not going to bore you with the entire menu list but I did think there were a couple tips worth mentioning if you are wanting to theme along these lines.

The fresh crunchy vegetable platters were popular starters. I managed to get a couple of mini cabbages from the girls at the growers market that I go to and this was an ideal size to put the Tzatziki dip in. Alana cut the top third off and then cut and also used a tablespoon to make a cavity big enough. We had a corn relish dip in the capsicum half.

Here she is, the gorgeous Alana, with her mini carrot cakes frosted with a cream cheese and maple syrup frosting. They were divine! But the decorations were so fabulous. She made carrots, mini peas in pods and rabbits from marzipan. They were sooo cute.

We also got the idea for these little cheesecakes from Patches Of Heaven but I worked out a recipe and will include it below because this was soooo easy and I will definitely be doing this again for other crowd catering functions. The little tubes are about 75ml and I got them and the mini spoons from a caterers supplier. This "recipe" could be adapted and changed in so many ways and I love that there is no waiting for things to set and each layer can be made and spooned in. I found using a parfait spoon was the perfect spoon for this job. This recipe uses a number of very Australian ingredients (as in the packaging style and sizing) so if you live overseas you will have to do a bit of research to find your equivalents.

Layered Mini Cheesecakes

makes 30 x 75ml tubes

1 packet of gingernut biscuits (cookies) crushed

place as the base layer in the tube

Whip together 1 packet of Philadelphia cream cheese 

and 1 tin of condensed milk

with the juice of one lemon

place a layer in the tube atop the biscuit

Roughly blend 500g of mixed frozen berries 

with a couple of tablespoons of icing sugar

and a tablespoon of grenadine

so that you have a lumpy sauceish fruity layer

don't process it too finely as it is about texture as well as flavours.

Whip 300ml of cream

Top off the layers and add a berry on top for decoration.

The idea is that the guests can dig spoon through the layers with their mini spoons and get creaminess and tart berry flavours with gooey cheesecake richness and the crunch of biscuit.

My friend Kat has also used a gingernut base with cheesecake flavoured with orange zest, elderflower concentrate and rosewater and a blueberry compote on top. She is a divine master baker but you see what I mean about adapting the recipe. You could even do a tiramisu themed layer or a tropical style with coconut and pineapple....

Lots and lots of good things to eat, most of themed around produce from Mr McGregor's garden; cucumber  sandwiches, asparagus rolls, mini quiches and chicken, celery, walnut rounds and all washed down with icy elderflower punch.

Huge thanks to the girls helping me and to all the people who surprised us with platters too!

Mr McGregor's Garden Party

I'm on the home straight to Grandma-hood; seven weeks to go and the baby shower is done and dusted. Boy does Pintrest come into it's own for party planning!

Emma's girlfriends wanted to go with a garden party and chose a Beatrix Potter theme.

We started building ideas on a Pintrest board here

We took some inspiration and sent out the invites. 

And got the garden ready....

for what turned out to be one of the hottest days of summer!

Emma purchased several silver trays from the local op-shop for a couple of dollars each and coated them in blackboard paint providing plenty of signs for us to work with.

Craig schooshed the garden and tidied the rows

I can see Peter Rabbit has been here and Mr McGregor has left his hoe in his hurry to chase him!

Even the lettuces going to seed look enticing.

Thanks also goes to my Mum for lending us her Beatrix Potter critters for various parts of the garden lending a lovely story book feel.

I missed getting a lot of photos in the hustle and bustle of the actual shower event but it really did look lovely with every corner of the garden flowering.

Woodland Stories Inspired Nursery

I have been helping the youngest daughter prepare the nursery these past couple of weeks and she has been inspired from the many books that she enjoyed in her childhood.

She started with some Beatrix Potter fabric; a couple of panels for quilt covers and some metres of a smaller classic print. The plain cotton weave was not ideal for curtaining but instead of using lining fabric etc we sewed them as panels onto some coordinating ready made ring top curtains. This was by far a cheaper option than purchasing the lining and the large eyelet rings and it saved us a lot of sewing.

The nursing chair was given to her by our good friends who re-upholstered and recovered it in coordinating vintage blanketing. You may remember from previous posts they had a business called Resurekt and they did some really funky furniture. A cane chest by the side will store extra blankets and be a handy place to sit a drink when she is feeding in the middle of the night.

It was very easy to coordinate the theme with fresh blue gingham from my stash which edged the quilts and was also made into a cot flounce around the base. We used a gathering stitch to give moderate fullness and sewed a header on top just like a waistband on pants or a skirt. We then used adhesive velcro to attach it to the cot base, making it easily removed for washing.

The room is a small single so this existing chest of drawers will hold a change mat on the top as a change table as it is a good height. Changing time supplies will be stored in the top two drawers. It was given a freshen up with white paint and some ceramic rose drawer knobs.

The salvaged shelves were definitely a little worse for wear and even after a thorough scrub still looked a bit sad. We found this lacy runner in a vinyl type material in a haberdashery shop that was sold by the metre and advertised as being "easily wiped down". We bought a couple of metres and by cutting it up the middle we found it fit the shelves beautifully, providing a very frugal and effective renovation of the scratched and worn shelves. Left over paint from the drawers was applied to some op shop frames to house some Hopping Wood greeting cards found at the same shop featuring the art work of Rene Cloke. 

A bargain priced "last on the roll" panel of piggling bland from Beatrix Potter stories was hemmed and turned into a wall hanging.

As was a Foxwood Tales panel from my Villeroy & Boch days of retailing. You may have also noticed some Foxwood Tales tins in the shelves, they'll come in handy for bits and bobs too I'm sure, like cotton balls, buds and teethers. 

The Peter Rabbit panels were edged with blue gingham and backed with the same fabric as the curtains. We were chuffed to find some cosy satin edged blankets at Target in a similar creamy coffee colour that went well with the scheme; even more tickled though to find out at the checkout that they were on quit clearance and priced at just $4 each! We will use motifs left over from the curtains to appliqué onto the blankets.

We are very happy with the results along with a few frugal finds and the treasured gifts from family friends. Our new addition will be surrounded by Beatrix Potter and the tales from Mr Macgregor's Garden, Brambly Hedge, Hopping Wood and Foxwood Tales and of course, some classic Pooh.

I wonder, when this grandson of mine is grown and having children of his own, will books be a thing of the past? Naturally the stories will remain but I do so hope that page turning and hard backs are part of his children's lives too.

For now we enjoy the summer and anticipate the coming of autumn...