I have no idea why i've only just realised...

that it is incredibly difficult to be and stay positive and insightful when you are stressed. Alas, i am back at Uni, 2nd week in and im feeling the stress and pressure build up already. It's not so much the workload at present (in saying that thought it is effing huge already, 'scuse the french) it is more so the prospect of what i know is coming up. Numerous assignments, plus reading fifty billion pages a week (and noting them at the same time) and then there's the Drug Calc's test in week 4 (in 2 weeks time!!!!) which we have to pass with 100% before we can move on and all the rest as well. Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

I might take this chance to mention that i am no good at maths, never have been, never will be. Im more of a creative spirit, don't do numbers! So, i've been trying to brush up on the basics and then grapple the idea of the various formulas to work out how many mg of a certain drug i need to give to a patient if the tablet dose is 250mg and they only need 125mg etc etc you get the jist.

Needless to say, i've had a tension/stress headache since before i went to bed last night, it is now 7pm the following day and its STILL here and i'd love for it to p*ss off!

Oright, back to the books *sigh*

Oh, and just a little reminder why im doing this (for me and for you):

'Action is the foundational key to all success'
Pablo Picasso

I love cooking!

It's my 'thing'. I love everything about it... the choosing of recipes and meals, shopping for the ingredients, the produce, the preparation, the aromas, i just love it all the whole process! Nothing makes me happier than to use fresh, local ingredients to create healthy, wholesome meals for my family. The kitchen is definitely one of my favourite rooms in the house, when i am cooking i feel happy and positive, everything i am striving for in life. I am going to start adding a few photos of meals i've made every now and then and i'll hopefully be able to include the recipes too. Enjoy!

This was our dinner tonight, nothing out of the ordinary for us, we love salad and we love to share! Zucchini, Pumpkin & Bacon Slice with homemade Garlic Bread and a salad plate.

For the garlic bread, i used a brought french stick and filled it with a mix of butter, garlic, chives and continental parsley - delicious!

This is my basic Zucchini Slice recipe, i've just substituted some of the zucchini for pumpkin this time.

Zucchini Slice

Ingredients (serves 15)

• 5 eggs
• 150g (1 cup) self-raising flour, sifted
• 375g zucchini, grated
• 1 large onion, finely chopped
• 200g rindless bacon, chopped
• 1 cup grated cheddar cheese
• 60ml (1/4 cup) vegetable oil

 Method:

• Preheat oven to 170°C. Grease and line a 30 x 20cm lamington pan.
• Beat the eggs in a large bowl until combined. Add the flour and beat until smooth, then add zucchini, onion, bacon, cheese and oil and stir to combine. Pour into the prepared pan and bake in oven for 30 minutes or until cooked through.

This is a dessert i made a couple of weeks ago to take to a friends for dinner, alas me and one of my boys didn't make it due to him being sick but the tart made it and it was a massive hit!

  

Strawberry & White Chocolate Tart

Shortcrust pastry

Serves 10
Cooking Time Prep time 10 mins, cook 25 mins (plus chilling, resting)

250 gm	(1 2/3 cups) plain flour
190 gm	unsalted butter, coarsely chopped, chilled
1	egg yolk

1	Process flour, butter and a pinch of salt in a food processor until fine crumbs form.
2	Add egg yolk and enough chilled water (about 3-4 tsp) and process until mixture just forms a dough (2-4 seconds).
3	Turn pastry onto a floured surface and lightly knead with the heel of your hand until the pastry comes together.
4	Form pastry into a disc, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate until chilled (2-3 hours).
5	Roll pastry, using a rolling pin, on a lightly floured surface to 3mm thick.
6	Brush excess flour from pastry with a pastry brush, then use pastry cutters to cut lining for individual cases or roll pastry backwards over rolling pin to lift pastry and line large tart case. Refrigerate for 30 minutes to rest.
7	Preheat oven to 200C. Blind bake pastry until golden (15-25 minutes), then cool on a wire rack.

Note Makes forty 4cm tartlets, six 12cm tartlets or a 25cm tart.

Tart Filling

1 block of good quality white chocolate (cadbury dream or whittakers is great)

1 tub of sour cream

Fresh strawberries or raspberries

Melt chocolate over water bath, stir in sour cream and whisk until smooth. Pour into cooled tart shell and refrigerate until firm (approximately 2hrs). Top with halved fresh strawberries or raspberries.

Enjoy! This is now one of my favourite desserts, it's so quick and easy and versatile!

Until next time...

 

Emotions.

Wonderful, sometimes embarrassing and frustrating but essential to our being. I've discovered this week that it is extremely hard to think and process information as well as make decisions when your emotional, whether you are frustrated, in despair, angry, upset or damn right furious, you just cannot think nor can you or should you try to or make decisions!

Once the storm blows over and you take a few breaths, calm down and can think clearly the situation never seems as bad as it did when you were in the thick of those raging emotions and let me tell you it is so much easier to see how everything WILL work out rather than crying, growling and waving your arms in the air saying (or writing) angrily 'that there is no way possible it can happen'.

In saying that, im feeling positively calm and only a little anxious and emotional about what this semester will bring, not only in terms of the workload at Uni but also the stress and coping and the fact that i most likely won't get as much time as i hoped to spend with my precious little men.

My biggest little man is off to school in July and in the perfect world it would have been lovely to spend as much time as possible with him over the next two terms but alas that more than likely won't be happening and we'll just have to 'suck it up' so to speak, stay positive and i will keep reminding myself that i am doing this for our future, to make those dreams come true.

'Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.'
 Ralph Waldo Emerson

'Reach high, for stars lie hidden in your soul. Dream deep, for every dream precedes the goal.'
 Ralph Vaull Starr


'Your living is determined not so much by what life brings to you as by the attitude you bring to life; not so much by what happens to you as by the way your mind looks at what happens.'
 John Homer Miller

Im happy.

It seems life is going just how i want it to right now and even better im happy. My Uni holidays are coming to an end (4 days to go and counting) and i've enjoyed nothing more than to have a taste of and remember what it used to be like being a stay at home mum, and i would be lying if i said i didn't miss it but on the flip side im strangely looking forward to getting back into the routine, challenge and craziness that the University life brings.

The boys have been sick once each over the past few months and it's been awesome to spend some one on one time with each of them while the other was at child care, it's not something i've had much time to do since Kyan came along almost exactly 18mths after Izaak. Today was one of the rare days i've had to spend some one on one time with my eldest little dude and it was quiet but humbling all at the same time, it was bliss and what made it even more special was when this afternoon, we both lied down on my bed and read our books, just lying quietly next to each other not saying a word, that was until the Mr got  bored and started giving me snuggles and telling me he loved me and then he loved me SO much - melted my heart. These boys are so special, i love them with every tiny molecule of my being...

When im feeling organised and in control im so much happier, calmer and a lot more patient and reasonable. This is how i am feeling right now, even with the first semester of my 2nd year of Uni looming... i have my work books, new pens, plans to get my textbooks and car parking first day back and hope to head down to Uni on Friday to get my new Student ID card (with 2 boisterous young boys in tow im not sure how successful i will be but we'll see).

I have a relatively easy meal plan for each night next week which i created on purpose and i've accidentally filled my freezer with delicious healthy leftovers - sweet and spicy chicken fried rice with brown rice, spaghetti bol' meat with lentils added to make a shepherds pie (i'll just add a few more veggies), a sausage and veggie casserole AND leftovers from tonight's meal of what is essentially homemade baked beans - smokey chilli beans! 

I am ready, so ready to do this! I can't wait to see what this year brings... so until next time, i'll leave you with this positive, inspiring passage about success that i love (and im sure next time i blog it will be coming from a lot less calm me LOL, well im hoping i don't get too stressed too quickly):

"To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded." 


Ralph Waldo Emerson.

So it seems im not very good...

at this blogging business. It's been a month since i last blogged hmmmmmmmmmm...

So one thing that i've been thinking about a lot lately and reassessing constantly is my choice in how and what i choose to feed my family. I try my hardest to buy locally grown, in season and fresh produce. Im getting there slowly, we buy meat from the local country butcher who purchases their produce locally, along with biodynamic/organic milk and yoghurt which is made locally and although there is not always time we try to go to the local farmers market often.

I love the feeling of know im feeding my family the best and freshest produce i can :) although i must admit it's not always budget friendly - this is my dilemma! I love cooking, i think i will start blogging some of my cooking adventures... this a one step closer the the positivity i speak of in the name of my blog - cooking is an outlet, which then means im feeling positive.

Until next time... which hopefully won't be so few and far between!

It's been awhile...

but im back! All the Christmas and New Year hoohaa has died down and we're slowly getting back to some kind of normalcy and routine, it's nice. 

It's raining today, has been for most of the day and is refreshing to say the least... but while we have water falling from the sky and are embracing it, our fellow Aussies in QLD  do not need nor want the rain as they have water washing away their towns and houses causing chaos and destruction and evoking the most raw emotions, ones i never thought i could feel.

I never considered myself an emotional person. I was bullied in school both primary and high school, my friendships never lasted- im too trusting and like to think the best of people but ALWAYS end up getting hurt in the end. During those times in school i was the 'tough' one sticking up for myself and almost never shedding a tear and well now, say boo to me the wrong way and i will bawl. I never used to cry at the drop of a hat like i've (almost) done so many times in the last few years...

I think im going to blame it on my boys, but in a good way... i love being the emotional person i've grown into now and i think it is the hormones of pregnancy and the pure, heart stopping love i feel for my children that has caused the new (well not so new it's been a few years) more emotional me. Sometimes it's not so great but it's all taken in my stride and i deal with it...

I tear up when i hear or read labour and birth stories, when one of my own or one of my friends children do or say something that takes my breath away, when someone tells me how proud of me they are for what i am achieving,  when my friends and loved ones are hurting, i hurt too, when i know all i've done is been there for, loved and trusted but still get hurt and especially when i see the raw and heartbreaking devastation and hear the terrified and broken voices of the surviviors of the floods and when i heard, read and saw the devastation caused by the 'Black Saturday' bush fires... it feels like my heart is breaking and then the tears flow and don't stop.

The QLD flood survivors and the unfortunate losses of life, the motivation for this post, i am sending love, courage and strength to get through this horrifying time xx

It's beginning to feel a lot like...

CHRISTMAS! I have made a pretty good dent in the Christmas shopping, some in store but most online (so convenient), the boys and i decorated the house with a few things last weekend and the plan was to put the Christmas tree up and decorate it this weekend as the tradition has always been to do it the first weekend in December. I however, had a very productive day while the boys were in childcare today and decided that seeing as it's the 1st of December, i would set the tree up and we would decorate it after dinner, and then i would try to get a good photo of the boys for the calenders this year. This is how it went:

The tree... not a bad effort i thought!

Aaaand the photo: these are three of the best out of about 25 that i took!