My families favourite banana bread

My family love banana bread. I've tried a few types of them, but this seems to be their favourite.

SOUR CREAM BANANA BREAD

170gms butter
3 cups of sugar (I've used both white and brown)
3 eggs
6 very ripe bananas
450gm sour cream (I just use a 500gm tub from Coles)
2 tspn vanilla
2 tspn ground cinnamon
1/2 tspn salt
3 tspn baking powder
4 1/2 cups plain flour (I have made a g/f version and it was ok too)
1 cup chopped walnuts (optional)
Coating (optional)
1/4 cup sugar
1 tspn groun cinnamon

USE A BIG BOWL FOR THIS AS IT MAKES A LOT OF MIX
1. Cream butter and sugar together (I normally cheat and melt the butter and mix together)
2. Add eggs, mashed banana, sour cream, vanilla and cinnamon and mix well
3. Mix in salt, baking powder and flour

If using the coating, grease tins with butter and coat with topping mix.
I use a joined bakers double bread tin for my mix and split between the two. If using small loaf pans, you will need 4 of them. I have also made this in my muffin tins and I made 80 ish of them.

Cook in a 150C oven for rouhly an hour if using 4 tins, hour and a half if using two and about 30-40 mins if using muffin tins.

This freezes really well. I'll be back with the photos once the loaves are out of the tin. Today I am making 2 batches as friends are now paying me to make this for them

A few changes

I've been blog surfing and a lot of people are changing the faces of their blogs, so I thought as things have changed a lot around here I might do the same.

So this place will probably look a little odd for a while till I sort out what I like. If you don't like it, please tell me

My first Insa Skirt

I am not a great sewer. I can sew but normally you can tell I've made it and it looks, well made by me ( very much unlike my knitting).

this is my first Insa skirt. I made it with a dark stretch denim and a light cotton print that I got from my Nan when she was cleaning out her stash to move. I totally adore the print and I have more but need to find something to make for me out of it.

I also did a ruffled hem on the underskirt and I was a bit of a cheat. I overlocked all construction seams and then top stitched them down rather than sewn then overlocked then top stitched. The over skirt elastic gathers appear a little uneven. Some have dropped a little more than others and some pull up higher. I think next time I'll do a longer piece of elastic even though I did it only 1/4 shorter than the distance as per the pattern.

I am hoping that she likes it

Don't look if you are squeeeemish

Dont look if you have a weak stomach
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This is what H did to himself last week - in pain much son?????

So shortly we are going for xrays on his arm. It was badly broken and he has pins and full arm cast. I can't wait till he goes back to school

But I am an angel Mum!!!

Yeah right Bodhi

Score

This is what I found at an op shop locally for $1 It's a metre length and roughly 120cm wide. It's a cotton drill I would say it would have been a decorator fabric as it is unbacked.

It's labelled "An exclusive print by Gummerson Fabrics Snow White Walt Disney Productions"

I contacted the company and the girl said it would be at LEAST 20 years old but she didn't have access to the data base that went older than that.

Have you ever wondered??

What on earth happened during the day when you are laying in bed at night???

I did that last night. I think I must have gone through the day on auto pilot. I often wonder why I can't remember what happened during the day.

But I've worked it out. I block most of it out as I don't like the mummy I was during the day. Yesterday was a full on day. Kids home, fighting and carrying on, needing to attend to a million and one things and me being tired to boot.

Today I am making plans to enjoy the day with the boys and my god son. I am going to get off of the computer in a moment and go and do the chores I NEED to do before GS arrives for the day, and then enjoy the day. We might go bike riding or go to a movie or just do something fun and try and make it a memorable day, one I can remember when I go to bed. One where I like the mummy I was and the kids are appreciative that I have been fun and spent time with them

ARGH!!! School Holidays

A few minutes ago it was lovely and serene in my house. Both boys were happily playing independantly.

Then all hell errupted. The found each other. B is now laying on the floor chucking one like a 2 year old with kicking and fist thumping.

H is yelling like a possessed banchee (is that how you spell it).

It's day one of the holidays. Two more weeks to go. I wonder who will be more ready for school to go back - me or them?

Home Alone

My Nanny has been living with us for six months after splitting up with her husband at the grand old age of 80. This was her third marriage and she's definitely a card to say the least.

Recently Nan (or Great Nan to the boys) had an operation and just after she moved into her own Department of Housing Flat about 3 mins drive from us.

Unfortunately, she really wasn't ready to be on her own again and I've been spending a LOT of time moving her and checking on her. She is quite capable of living on her own and looking after herself, but yet here I am worrying about her as if she were my child. I guess it kinda is like she is my child. While she lived here I cooked and washed for her. She did the washing up for me (god love her that was wonderful).

But now I am here on my own with the kids most of the time as DH is at work. I miss her terribly. There is no one here to watch kids for 5 mins while I go and buy milk/bread/etc at the shop round the corner. No one to wash up and wipe the benches for me. I didn't realise how much she did contribute here and how much I would miss her.

Or the kids for that fact. Henry asked this morning if Great Nan still loved us cause she didn't want to live with us anymore. He had tears in his eyes and was genuinely heartbroken. How do you explain that everyone needs their own space and as much as Great Nan loved him, sometimes he was just too noisey and rambunctious for an 80 year old woman.

I guess it'll take a while to get used to it, and a while to get used to the new routine of visiting Nan around school times and taking her to get her errands done.

Until then, I feel like I am very much home alone with no one to talk to other than the kids (and that isn't fufilling me right now)

Cooking links

My friends have been pestering me for my recipes for stuff. Apparently my cooking isn't too bad. (Pete keeps telling me that things I make are not safe for the children to eat and proceeds to make off with the container to demolish them himself)

Any ways this is my rough recipe for my white christmas rocky road. Don't skimp on the ingredients, especially if you plan on feeding it to me, as I can tell homebrand marshmellows and crappy white choc.



Packet of white choc melts
Packet of white and pink Pascalls Marshmellows
packet of red and or green glace cherries
roughly 1/2 to cup coconut
packet of softish lollies - i like fruit rings with the sugar on them
If you feel like it - some rice bubbles

Melt the choc till really runny, chop up all the other bits - you need to roll the marshmellows with the knife to cut them the easiest way. Combine it all and place it into a tin that has been lined with alfoil (make sure that this is crease and bubble free other wise you'll be picking it out of your rocky road). Press gently down and chuck it into the fridge till set. Remove from tin and chop it up as you please.

And make yourself sick eating it ;)

Some knitting of late

I've been doing a little bit of knitting lately. Mainly because I found I was getting very worked up and unable to unwind. I have always used my knitting as a kind of therapy and since I have picked it up again, I am having trouble putting it down again. The house is suffering to some degree as a result.


This is a blankie for the lovely little Rainbow Beetle Junior AKA Phoenix John (PJ). I did a swap with Mel for some woolies and stuff in return for one of her wonderful carriers. I have picked the fabric and Mel's been busy getting it done. In return she asked for a beautiful blanket to be held as a treasure. So this was what I made her. This is the photo sans edging and blocking. It did end up a big bigger once washed as that yarn tends to relax - like a LOT!!

PATTERN: Ten Stitch Blanket
SIZE: Babyish
YARN: Patons vintage hues - I think I used about 10 balls maybe in a number of colourways - bascially what I could still get my hands on after my stash balls
NEEDLES: 5.5mm Bamboo DPNS - I found these light and easily turned as you do a LOT of turning with this project.
EDGEING: Two rounds of single crochet with 6mm hook.



THis is my me sized version of a wonderful pattern called Bloom by tiKKi - or the wonderful Georgie. I loved knitting this and it's super comfy. I have not yet found anyone to take a decent photo of me in it - so I am not sharing. I did include short row bust shaping that is not normally in the pattern, as I am rather well endowed and I needed to fit them in.

PATTERN: Bloom
YARN: Bendigo Woolen Mills Rustic 12ply
NEEDLES: 6mm circs
MODS: short row bust shaping in the front - I think from memory I added 8 short rows. I didnt write it down as it was super late when I was doing them.




I think I am getting a bit of my knitting mojo back again. I lost it and at the time I was struggling mentally. Very much struggling. But a little bit of yarn zen seems to help and I enjoys it too
I've been doing a little bit of knitting lately.

Man its bloody hot

Its currently 42 degrees and with a nearly 40km'hr wind. My poor trees are drooping. I have barely ventured outside.

Thank the heavens for A/C cause no one is out in the heat today. Most workers have knocked off.

I know I like summer but right now, I can't wait for winter.

And I've barely done any knitting cause it's just too darn hot to have yarn on you. This is something that rarely happens to me.

I am just praying that today is not another black day with fires and people loosing their lives, cause it very much has the potential to be like that here