The life of Tina--how is it going lately? Mmm, things are here and there. I think that somewhere amidst my travels, I lost my excitement button. I don't seem to get excited about much anymore! Some extra effort will be added (as per the previous post) to be positive and upbeat.
Positive point number one--we can go swimming in our backyard! A few weeks ago, after a particularly filling evening at my favorite Spanish tapas restaurant, Encasa, my belly was feeling overloaded. It was one of those days where a food hangover ensues the next day. Now, physical activity has somehow made it to the bottom of my to do list and I was feeling a bit guilty about it, so we made a pact to go for a run on Saturday morning. Our new neighborhood is particularly hilly (as can be expected in the harbor) and our little loop from our building up to the local park, out past the point, down past Dawn Fraser pool and a short way along the "board walk" is pretty tiring. We looped twice (with a giant set of stairs at the end!) and decided that our exhaustion plus the heat needed some relief with a quick hop into the ocean. So Marcus danced his way up the staircase from hell and I trudged/half-assedly skipped behind and made our way home. Then we descended our own staircase and faced the ocean at our toes.
There's no sandy beach in our backyard, though, let me help you put a clear picture. When we go down the staircase, there's a big grass landing at the bottom. This landing is three to four feet above the ocean level (at high tide) with thick sandstone enclosing the yard area from the ocean. At one end of the area there's an old, ladder encrusted with oyster shells and rust, rendering the ladder useless. So when you want to go for a swim, there's no toe dipping water adjustment. Oh no, you have to jump all in! (I hate that--I'm a toe dipper from way back!)
Standing at the top of the sandstone, I contemplated the sailboats, willing my body to get overheated to the point where I could make myself jump. After about five minutes, I finally heaved myself overboard and the water was delightful. A bit frightening, because the water was dark and I imagined all kinds of frightening Australian water animals coming to attack me. :) But with enough water time, that will go away. We went swimming again the next day, so that helped (though the little jelly fish swimming close to the surface before we jumped in the second time was not comforting!).
Our new place is continuing to be a place of joy, and coming home is still one of the highlights of my day.
Other fun stuff--Thanksgiving! This year we spent Thanksgiving with my two American friends and their Australian boyfriends. The food was excellent and as traditional as we could possibly make it. We came up with a traditional dish list and split it between the three couples (girls). Yours truly claimed the ham, deviled eggs, punch, cranberry sauce, and two pies. Now, although I am a lover of baking, I had never attempted this pie business. It was a new challenge that I stepped up to immediately!
I scoured allrecipes.com and found the highest rated pumpkin pie and crust recipes and...I made a pumpkin pie from scratch!!! This is a big accomplishment since pumpkin pie comes from a can as far as I'm concerned. But not this year, oh no! I went out and bought some butternut pumpkins, threw them in the oven and made pumpkin puree. That was step one. Step two involved making pie crusts, not a quick process (at least not the first time!). And I had meant to use shortening (or kopha, as it's called here) AND butter, to get spot on crustiness and flavor. But I totally forgot about it when I printed out my recipe and ended up going for the crusty crust using kopha.
Now, I had been discussing pie baking with some of the gals at work, and they insisted that blind-baking is the way to go (half-baking the crust before putting in the filling). I decided to give it a go and followed their directions of putting rice on top of the crust to prevent bubbling and misshaping. What they neglected to tell me was that you should put baking paper in between the crust and the rice! So I spent a good third of my crust-baking time picking pieces of rice out of the crusts. (Though this was successful as I didn't crunch upon any rice kernels when I was eating the pie!)
Anyhew, the pies turned out lovely, the couples got along swimmingly, and we may be on the verge of creating our own little American family in Australia. The comfort, familiarity, and friendship offered in this small circle is exactly what I've needed.
Positive point number one--we can go swimming in our backyard! A few weeks ago, after a particularly filling evening at my favorite Spanish tapas restaurant, Encasa, my belly was feeling overloaded. It was one of those days where a food hangover ensues the next day. Now, physical activity has somehow made it to the bottom of my to do list and I was feeling a bit guilty about it, so we made a pact to go for a run on Saturday morning. Our new neighborhood is particularly hilly (as can be expected in the harbor) and our little loop from our building up to the local park, out past the point, down past Dawn Fraser pool and a short way along the "board walk" is pretty tiring. We looped twice (with a giant set of stairs at the end!) and decided that our exhaustion plus the heat needed some relief with a quick hop into the ocean. So Marcus danced his way up the staircase from hell and I trudged/half-assedly skipped behind and made our way home. Then we descended our own staircase and faced the ocean at our toes.
There's no sandy beach in our backyard, though, let me help you put a clear picture. When we go down the staircase, there's a big grass landing at the bottom. This landing is three to four feet above the ocean level (at high tide) with thick sandstone enclosing the yard area from the ocean. At one end of the area there's an old, ladder encrusted with oyster shells and rust, rendering the ladder useless. So when you want to go for a swim, there's no toe dipping water adjustment. Oh no, you have to jump all in! (I hate that--I'm a toe dipper from way back!)
Standing at the top of the sandstone, I contemplated the sailboats, willing my body to get overheated to the point where I could make myself jump. After about five minutes, I finally heaved myself overboard and the water was delightful. A bit frightening, because the water was dark and I imagined all kinds of frightening Australian water animals coming to attack me. :) But with enough water time, that will go away. We went swimming again the next day, so that helped (though the little jelly fish swimming close to the surface before we jumped in the second time was not comforting!).
Our new place is continuing to be a place of joy, and coming home is still one of the highlights of my day.
Other fun stuff--Thanksgiving! This year we spent Thanksgiving with my two American friends and their Australian boyfriends. The food was excellent and as traditional as we could possibly make it. We came up with a traditional dish list and split it between the three couples (girls). Yours truly claimed the ham, deviled eggs, punch, cranberry sauce, and two pies. Now, although I am a lover of baking, I had never attempted this pie business. It was a new challenge that I stepped up to immediately!
I scoured allrecipes.com and found the highest rated pumpkin pie and crust recipes and...I made a pumpkin pie from scratch!!! This is a big accomplishment since pumpkin pie comes from a can as far as I'm concerned. But not this year, oh no! I went out and bought some butternut pumpkins, threw them in the oven and made pumpkin puree. That was step one. Step two involved making pie crusts, not a quick process (at least not the first time!). And I had meant to use shortening (or kopha, as it's called here) AND butter, to get spot on crustiness and flavor. But I totally forgot about it when I printed out my recipe and ended up going for the crusty crust using kopha.
Now, I had been discussing pie baking with some of the gals at work, and they insisted that blind-baking is the way to go (half-baking the crust before putting in the filling). I decided to give it a go and followed their directions of putting rice on top of the crust to prevent bubbling and misshaping. What they neglected to tell me was that you should put baking paper in between the crust and the rice! So I spent a good third of my crust-baking time picking pieces of rice out of the crusts. (Though this was successful as I didn't crunch upon any rice kernels when I was eating the pie!)
Anyhew, the pies turned out lovely, the couples got along swimmingly, and we may be on the verge of creating our own little American family in Australia. The comfort, familiarity, and friendship offered in this small circle is exactly what I've needed.
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