Kinglake National Park

Wednesday was my day off for the fortnight, when Charlotte was in daycare and I could catch up on errands, housework and just anything I've been putting off. For my photography course an assignment we got a few weeks back was to experiment with shutter speed, using the same moving object. My first thought was waterfalls, but living in Melbourne there isn't much around. Then I remembered Mason's Falls in the Kinglake national park, where we used to go as kids for family BBQ's.

To be perfectly honest, I wasn't looking forward to it as much as anyone else who might be returning to a favourite childhood memory. I've only been back to Kinglake a handful of times since the 2009 bushfires, and never on my own. I won't go into great detail, but these cars that were plastered all over the newspapers and television in the days following the bushfires:

These are the cars Shane and I were driving, where we left them and ran.

So there were a lot of memories as I drove up to the area, and down National Park Road to get to my destination. Unfortunately the track to Mason's Falls has not been reopened yet, but I wasn't going to let that stop me getting some great pictures, just because I couldn't get my water shots that I was after.

I took the drive up to Mt Sugarloaf instead to see if I could get a picture of the city

This is with my 18-55mm lens, zoomed in as far as I could go. Obviously not a great picture, probably would have been better if it wasn't so cloudy to get a clearer view.

You can see from the above picture that the trees haven't fully recovered. The old branches are still there, but it doesn't look like they will ever carry new leaves. The trees are getting around this by creating new branches. So the trunks are covered in new growth, with the older damaged bare branches at the top

But I was able to get some nice photos of the new life coming through 

With the zoom lens (first time I've changed the lens over for pictures, big moment for me)

Playing around with the settings. Left = underexposed, right = good exposure

What I'm really proud of, is all of these pictures were taken in manual mode. Now that I've got the hang of changing the settings around as the light changes, I want to get some practice with different lighting conditions, and see how changing the white balance affects the final outcome.

Decorating for the holidays

We don't really decorate much here. The house looks the same unless we are throwing a specific party (e.g. a birthday), or for Christmas. But I have been inspired by Jade and want to add a few small touches around the house for special days like Valentine's day, St Patrick's day, or maybe even Halloween in spite of the fact that it's not really celebrated here in Australia.

If you have a look at eighteen25, the girls are currently in the midst of Spooktacular September, and every day they have different crafty decorating projects to get ready for Halloween. They've just released some subway art, and I think this will make a nice small touch that can be updated as the holidays change. I'm just going to do a small 8x10inch print rather than the big 16x20, and might even have a go at this paper lantern or the chandelier.

Over the weekend I'll put up a post about planning a 1st birthday party, the start of our veggie patch, and some photos that I took while I was out and about yesterday

Where has the week gone already?

When I started this blog I had plans, not exactly grand plans, but plans none-the-less. I was going to have something to write about every day, and put up my post without fail. That lasted 3 days.

Sunday we had a family day, so I figured if I only post 6 days of the week that's still pretty good for someone starting out. Then Monday happened. It didn't exactly go badly, but I work Mondays and Tuesdays (and some Wednesdays), and well, the time I had I wanted to spend with my family. Yesterday the same thing happened, though I did spend quite a bit more time on the net last night than I'd normally like to mention.

I have however devised a plan to have a fully planned out menu for 6 weeks then repeat it, so I will only have to write my master shoping lists once, then as the week rolls around I can just cross off anything I have in the pantry and only buy what I really need, or what is on special that we actually use. When I get the full file organised I'll share it with you all here too

For now though, this is my Wednesday off so my plans are to catch up on a little housework (second load of washing is in the machine as I type), get some practice in on my camera, then come home after getting some photos printed and this fortnight's groceries done with part 1 of my new system.

Best Banana Bread

I got this recipe out of an OLD Women's Health & Fitness magazine. I'm talking 4-5 years ago old. Since I bought some banana's at the bargain price of $6 a kilo, but we didn't get a chance to eat them before they started to go floury, I made a loaf this morning to use them up.

Ingredients:

• 60g butter or margarine
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup of mashed banana
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 cups self raising flour
• 1tsp bicard soda
• Optional - tsp light cream cheese and honey to serve

1 - Heat oven to 180 degrees, line a oaf tin with baking paper. Place sugar and butter in a bowl and beat until creamy. Add the eggs, banana and milk and mix until blended
2 - Sift the flour and bicarb together, then add to banana mixture and mix lightly.
3 - Place miture into pre-lined loaf tin and bake for 50 mins or until a skewer inserted comes out clean
4 - remove from the oven and turn out onto a cooling rack. Top slices with a little cream cheese and honey, or whatever topping you prefer.

Enjoy

Trying to be organised - meal planning

In my quest to be a little more organised, I'm back on the meal planning bandwagon. I actually meal planned 5 weeks in one sitting, but this week has been a little hectic and we haven't stuck to it. The way I (try) to do it is plan til the end of next week, then work out my shopping list til next grocery day. Even though our bin night is Sunday, I work Monday-Wednesday, so groceries are Thursday or Friday. So here's what I have planned til Next Sunday night:

• Fri: Steak, gnocchi bake and veg
• Sat: Beer battered fish and chips
• Sun: Lamb hot pot

• Mon: Chicken Risotto
• Tues: Spicy lamb patties
• Wed: Meatloaf with chips and veg (this in one of Charlotte's favourites)
• Thurs: Baked apricot chicken
• Fri: Baked potatoes with chili con carne
• Sat: Satay Beef
• Sun: Jimmys butter chicken

I should add, we're trying to cook as much of our meals from scratch as possible. I still buy curry paste for when we feel like Thai, and jars of pasta sauce as a base for Italian, but otherwise most of our cooking is from basic ingredients. The above is a combination of recipes from the Baby Led Weaning cookbook, the Aldi cookbook, and Margaret Fulton's satay recipe. My shopping list is from Kikki.K, and  love that it's magnetic so it sticks to the fridge, and it is divided up into categories, so as I'm going through the supermarket I don't have to filter through one big list of everything, I just need to scan one smaller section to get everything we need.

I use Jade's menu planner and hang my clipboards on the fridge with magnetic hooks from Kikki K (I love that shop, but my credit card bill doesn't). The empty hook in the middle is home to a bulldog clip that I keep my bills on so I know what's coming out of the account and when, but I thought for privacy reasons I better not post a photo on the internet that contains my home address.

Hopefully the weather fines up on the weekend so I can share the start of our veggie patch.

Long time reader, first time blogger

Well, I've done it. I'm making my way into the foray of blogging. I have several blogs that I follow, but now it's time to say something myself, and hopefully there are people who want to listen (my husband has to, it was in the wedding vows...)

Who am I? Since having my daughter Charlotte 11 months ago, I'm not entirely sure. I know I'm not the same person I was beore, and never will be, but I can't say that that's necessarily a bad thing. I now put her needs before my own, though that is the case for most parents. I am more organised simply because I have to be. By googling up activities that babies her age like to do I have found many websites that are now bookmarked, some I even check daily, that have inspired me to bcome a better parent. Involved in what Charlotte is doing rather than just sitting on the couch watching her play. I forgo doing the dishes to play chasey around the couch, or get the finger paints out in the backyard.

That's all well and good, but what do I do that's just for me? a few weeks ago I bought my very first DSLR camera, and have been taking an online course to learn how to use it. Properly. In the few short weeks I have had this camera my photos have improved DRAMATICALLY. I still have a lot to learn, but I love having something that is just for me, and something that is challenging me to improve, to think outside the square. So with that in mind, here are a couple of my pictures from this week: