{recipe} Choc Chip Cookies

Everyone loves a good cookie don't they?

These are the BEST EVER Choc Chip Cookies.

125g butter at room temp

1 cup (200g) brown sugar

1 tsp vanilla essence

1 egg

2 tbs milk

1 cup (150g) plain flour

1/2 cup (75g) self-raising flour

1 cup (185g) choc chips

1 cup walnuts, chopped (or equiv amount of white choc chips, macadamias, or whatever takes your fancy)

1. Preheat oven to 170C.

2. Line two baking trays with non stick baking paper.

3. beat butter, sugar and vanilla till creamy, add egg and milk and beat a little more till combined.

4. Mix through the flours and add the choc chips and nuts.

5. Take small amounts and roll into balls, place on baking trays and press down to flatten a little.

6. Bake for 12-15 mins (depending on your oven).

8. Let cool on tray for about 5 mins...if you can wait.

9. Transfer to wire rack to cool.

ENJOY!

I could tell you that these cookies can be stored in an airtight container for a couple of days, but they've never lasted long enough in this house to get to the storage part.....

linking to

a Beach Cottage

The Frugal Girls

Windows {extension update}

Hooray, we have nearly all of the windows in!

And some potted colour on this sunny Melbourne day.

Have a great day!

Linking to 

A Beach Cottage

Marble Hand

Hi there! Just fiddling with a photo I took the other day of Pickle #2 and his marbles. I've clearly lost mine, so here's some proof that someone in this family hasn't. hahahaha I crack myself up.

Extension Update II

This year has seen a lot of rain in Melbourne, which has slowed down our progress a little. But, we have windows!! Woot, woot!!! Plus a few other additions.

Mr 3P and Pickle#1started knocking out the wall that will eventually join the existing house with the new addition. 

A glass atrium will be the "hallway" the joins the two sections together.

There was a lovely little mouse's nest in between the walls. I think it had been abandoned long ago (probably thought we were too noisy)

This is the view from the atrium, looking out to the front entry and door. Where Pickle #2 is standing will be our lounge room.

I used a bunch of this rubble to fill in garden pots (makes for good drainage)

All of the pickles were given the task to clean the bricks that were removed. They had a blast and worked really hard. We'll reuse whatever we can.

I think working in Spiderman boots makes all the difference...don't you?

My Grandmother would say " You could grow potatoes under those nails". 

This is the frame for the portico at the front door. I'm not sure what Mr 3P is doing, is he reading? Extensions for Dummies maybe? lol

Mr 3P put in about 5 window frames yesterday (no photos yet). We chose double glazed, so the glazier will come and put the glass in later. I didn't know anything about double glazed windows before, but they'll make a huge difference to the costs of heating and cooling of the house and is a much "greener" choice. :)

Hopefully we'll have a plumber do his thing next week, so the brickies can start. Fingers and toes crossed.
Till next time....

Garden in Winter

I've spent a fair bit of time around home these past few weeks, tending to sick kids (big and small). The Melbourne weather has kept us indoors a lot too. So just this week I ventured out into the wild jungle which is also known as my garden...to get close to nature. Thought I'd share a few pics with you.

This seed pod was sitting on my kitchen window sill and I've been starring at it for a week.

I've been googling lemon recipes left, right and centre. Got any good ones?

Would you like some lemons? This tree is bursting with lemons and it's hard to keep up. I've made so much lemonade lately (recipe here), but now I need to start freezing the juice as the lemons are just dropping off the tree.

My first little strawberry plant. It's a Nellie Kelly. I haven't planted it out yet, poor little thing is just patiently waiting in the cold frame for me to get to it.

We planted spring onions years ago and they just keep on a comin'. I love when they start to go to seed and you can see all the little seeds beneath the surface.

I'm not the only one who loves these little guys.

These camellias are my neighbours, they hang over our fence. We had to remove our beautiful camellia tree so we could start the extension. You can read about that here.

When I use my Macro filters, the rocks look a bit like Uluru. well, kinda, sorta, if you squint a little....OK squint a lot.

These are those little Mexican doll flowers that have also gone into hibernation.

My parents gave us this garden bench about a million years ago. We've stained it a few times, but it is very exposed to the elements. I like it's patina...what do you think?

I know the Dandelion is considered a weed, but I've always been a fan of the underdog.......

The wattle just keeps kickin' on

These little flowers grow on a hedge in the front yard. They're about the size of a M&M.

The smell great too!

The bark from this Eucalyptus tree is like soft, thick, paper. It freaks me out to touch it...it's a childhood spider experience I once had.

I don't know what kind of berries these are, but I'm pretty sure they're not edible. Did you ever see the movie "Blue Lagoon"? , whenever I see these berries I think of that movie where they refer to them as "Never wake up berries". Funny the little things that stay in our heads.

We've been getting a little more work done on the extension. I'll blog about it tomorrow.
See ya.

linking to

Kirsty Girl

Night Walkies

It's been over three weeks since I posted anything on here. School holidays and sick kids (big and small) have kept me busy and away from this blog. And I've missed it.
My friend whom I'll call V and I have been very motivated to go for a walk every day, well almost ;)
We decided the best time to go was at night after dinner and dishes were done and all of the pickles (V's and mine) have settled down for "a long winter's nap" lol. It's just so much more relaxing being able to go for as long as you want and knowing that you don't need to rush back to anything, like school runs etc. We took our pedometers and found that in 1 1/2 hours we do about 10 thousand steps....plus lots of talking, which we decided must burn more calories? Right?
I'm too much of a Fraidy Cat to go alone at night, so it's great to have a walking buddy. Our friend Tash joins us from time to time too, we were hoping to eventually have a Forest Gump following....but that hasn't happened yet.
Last night I took my little pocket camera with me. Now I've never photographed stuff at night except for the occasional birthday cake and candle ceremony, so these shots (which I used the night setting) are, well, not great, to say the least. I hope you like 'em anyway.

Me and V ready to go. Night vision goggles "on"

V rugged up to face the 5 degree night.

OK, this IS actually the moon, but I think you need a tripod to get it right. I like it anyway.

The lights from distant tennis courts show how cool and eerie the fog is on our walk. About one minute after I took this shot we heard a strange noise and I nearly ran all the way home. Turned out to be some wildlife, frogs maybe?...but they were freaky possessed frogs...I'm sure ;)

Wow, something not blurry. Wattle doesn't move much at night......

Walkies!!

The path we take runs past a shopping centre, where there was late night trading. What kind of crazy person shops at night in this weather?

If you've ever read this blog before you would know that I like to attempt something a little arty farty. Well, that's what I'm going to call my wobbly night camera skills.

Look at the pretty circles.........

Before you go, why don't you look at the picture and just paws for a moment?
Forgive me, it's late and it's been a loooong day.

See ya soon.