A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU ALL.

SHIRLEY :):):)

Home Made Art & Beautiful Light Fitting

On the weekend I managed to pick up a couple more frames to put some photos in to add to our collection of Home Made Art.  All these photos are from flowers in our own garden.  The large pink flower has native bees that were visiting it at that moment in time.

 Here is a beautiful light fitting that I picked up at 25% off, we have hung it over our dining table, to nice to resist!
 
Have a wonderful week.

Shirley :)

Inside a Beehive

Thought I would let you see inside our bee hive, we had to go into them yesterday for a routine check to inspect the health of the hive.

A photo of the hive opened ready for removal of the frames for inspection.

Here is a photo of a frame from the brood box, all the brown cells you can see are the capped brood (bees ready for hatching).  The bees do not store their honey in this area.  The box that the bees store their honey in is called a super, these are separated from the brood box by a queen excluder which allows the worker bees to pass through but not the queen or the drones (male bees).

Cheers Shirley :)

SE Qld Summer Storms

Here in South East Qld we are starting to get our usual Spring/Summer storms.  The last two Saturdays we have been woken by loud thunder and heavy rain at around dawn.

This is what started to roll in this afternoon.  We just got heavy rain but I did here that some suburbs got small hail.

Here it is a little closer, we could feel the rain in the air so it was time to get inside.  We had three storms this afternoon in succession.

 No more storms are predicted for tomorrow or the next few days, time to clean up and prepare for the next onslaught!

Have a great weekend.

Cheers Shirley :)

Monday's Baking

Yesterday I made two delicious slices one an old favourite Raspberry Jam Coconut Slice and a very rich Chocolate Brownie.

Makes 20 pieces.
Ingredients
2 cups plain flour
1 cup castor sugar
125 g butter, chilled, cubed
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup raspberry jam
2 cups desiccated coconut
Method
Preheat over to 180C, grease and line a 3 cm deep, 24cm x 30cm lamington pan
Process flour, 1/2 cup sugar and butter to resemble breadcrumbs, add 1 egg and vanilla, process to form a dough.
Press dough into base of prepared pan.  Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until light golden.  Spread jam over warm base.
Whisk remaining eggs and remaining 1/2 cup sugar together, stir in coconut, spread over jam. Bake for 25 minutes, or until golden.  Cool completely in pan.  Cut into pieces, serve.

Ingredients
150 g unsalted butter melted 
1 1/4 cups sugar
3/4 cup cocoa
1/2 cup plain flour
3 eggs
touch of vanilla extract
Method.
Melt the butter, add to the sugar and cocoa, mix until combined, add vanilla extract
Beat in eggs, add flour
I also added some chopped walnuts (optional)
Bake in a lined tin at 150 C for about 30 minutes.

Delicious.                                                           

 

 

Have a lovely day
Cheers Shirley :)

Spring Viewing

                  Here are a few shots from around the garden.

 

Notice the Spider

Purple Cauliflower

Grapevine Shooting

 

 

Flame Tree Flowers

I hope you enjoyed this glimpse of what is going on in our garden.

Have a great day Shirley :)

Mandarin Lime

I headed down to our local garden nursery today, just love wandering around to see what is new.  I found this

Of course I couldn't resist something as unusual as this, I simply had to have it to add to my dwarf fruit trees that I keep in large pots on my deck.

The label says it bears fragrant white flowers in spring followed by attractive fruit with many culinary uses.

The fruit peels off to reveal 6-10 easily separated bright orange segments with a few greenish seeds.  The fruit is deep red-orange and looks like mandarins, but tastes like limes.

It is said to be hardier that other limes and can be grown in a pot to maintain a manageable size.

The Lime is very juicy and can be used in marmalades, drinks and many recipes where a strong citrus presence is required.

I am looking forward to seeing this little tree produce, it looks very healthy so hopefully towards the end of summer I will be able to sample its fruit.

Cheers Shirley :)