Things I missed....

I haven't stayed up to date on here over the last few days, but as you can gather if you have been reading my posts, I have spent alot of time at the stove stirring preserves. After looking at photos from the last few days, I realised that there are a few photos that just needed to be here...so here goes.....

When you have an abundance of herbs in the garden, put them to good use, I make herbed butter with mixed herbs, it's great for adding to a steak while cooking, or to cream a sauce and make it lovely and glossy, and of course, herbed garlic bread. All I do, is allow your butter to soften at room temperature, then chop your herbs, and mix through. Then shape into rolls with grease-proof paper, wrapping the ends tightly with a twisy. Now store one in the fridge for general use, and the rest in the freezer as part of your stockpile.  

 I also cut up mixed herbs or herbs separately and place in icecube trays in single use serves...then fill the cubes with water, and allow to freeze. Label your herbs in seperate bags, and store in the freezer....this way your not always running out to the garden for fresh herbs...Believe me, they defrost like they were just cut.

With all the chopping I have done over these last few days, my knives tend to lose their edge....If I look at a knife, it can become blunt...especially if I try to sharpen it on a steel the way my husband does it. So with my husband at work, I need to find another way of keeping my knives sharp, and this is what I use. You can buy a knife sharpener from your local supermarket or any knife shop...Now I don't pretend to know anything about knife sharpening or the sharpeners; but because of my lack of skill here, I have used a few different ones over time.  I like this type better than others, because it's simple, and it's quick.

 I have also mixed up another  batch of laundry powder...I got this recipe from Down to Earth, this is the blog that inspired me to have my own blog, so check it out, it truly is a remarkable blog.

This laundry powder is sooo cheap, and it's better than the expensive brands.

I did find that I like it better once it has gone through the whizzer....

This is half way whizzed. It get's finer that this, but I ran out of camera batteries at the time.

 Here is a loaf of Herb and Garlic Bread I made in the bread machine. I love my bread machine. See the corner where it 'broke' off...That's what I call a "Cook's Treat".

Late one night while everyone else was tucked up in bed, I had a pair of trousers to mend on the hem for mum, she needed them the next morning, but I couldn't resist taking a few photos.....

Here is a really bad photo (sorry 'bout that), of me using white cotton so you could see the stitch....I also exagerated the last few stitches so you could see the stitch better...but the trick is to just catch a few threads each time, while working on the wrong side.....it's ideal to check on the correct side before moving on to the next stitch, to see if you can see the needle...if you can see the needle, you have gone too deep and the stitch will be seen from the correct side. Withdraw the needle and repeat the stitch until you are finished.

I did pull this out and sew it with black cotton, but just used white to make it clearer on here.

Another big tub of food scraps goes into the bokashi bucket that I made.

I can't believe how much waste has gone in there so far.

Check out the tutorial I made for it. It only took 8 days to be producing bokashi tea for my garden.

Here's another update on my mushrooms...

I have had mushrooms galore, you can too, check out how.

Seedlings had to be planted out, here are some Chinese Cabbage.

I just thought I would throw this in, another way of recycling something....I am in the process of changing over to cotton hankies, instead of tissues, but here is one of the empty tissue boxes being recycled, I store this one on the microwave and it stores plastic bags from bread, veges, and other food bags.

Ready to be recycled for something else.

I cut another log of banana lolly slice today, as the recipe makes a fair bit, I always store a few logs in the freezer or fridge for later use.....Here is the recipe. Oh! Don't tell the kids where the other logs are stored, you won't have any left.

I think that's about it for now, remember, if you like something I have posted or think you might give it a go, let me know...I would love to hear about it, and so would me readers.

Enjoy your weekend....

I'm fishing off Kiama tomorrow, if the weather is good...

so an early night for me

good night and sweet dreams!!