Autumn

It's been such a long time since I posted anything on here but it's been such a lovely autumn over the past few weeks I thought I'd finally get round to posting some pictures of what we've been up to lately....

We've been working on finishing off the patio area at the back of our house, helped abley here by George and ducky.

I tried to go courgettes from a plant my mum gave me. As far a I knew courgettes were supposed to be the most productive plants ever and I figured I would end up with a great glut, but no it wasn't to be, my courgette plant only managed one little courgette! Rather than stir fry it or whatever you do with just one courgette I decided it would be best off as a cake. It was yummy.

We had a lovely sunny day out in rowallane, far sunnier and warmer than most of the actual summer days!

There have been many pies and I have used my enamel dishes at every opportunity! The top one is pork and apple with a creamy calvados sauce and the bottom one is fig, pancetta and goats cheese. They were yummy too.

We had another sunny day out in castle espie looking at the ducks, and a wheel barrow of course.

We had nosy neighbours.

And occasionally Belfast city centre looked a bit like Paris.

We had fun exploring the newly cut field on yet another sunny day.

And inspected the new decking.

We crowned the winner of our first annual sunflower growing competition. (I came last)

I made a lot of jam and chutney!

(Some free downloadable labels will be up soon on the shop)

We had some froggy visitors when we put down the new stones at the back of the house.

I spent a couple of days in the autumny loveliness of stranmillis college for work.

And I treated myself to a new scarf which is as big as a blanket, but what with all the sunshine this autumn I have been roasting wearing it!

We also had a Halloween party but I'll save that for another post!

Summer holiday...

It seems like pretty much everyone in our house has been sick for all of 2015 so far, but last night things started to look up, the sniffles and coughing subsided a bit and there were even a few smiles to be seen. Plus on the weather front there was definitely a glimmer of sunshine and blue skies so I couldn't help but start dreaming of holidays and camping! It's still a bit cold for any overnights in the camper just yet but it's definitely not to early to start dreaming and planning!

Here are some pictures from our summer holiday last year to get us all in the mood!

We took the campervan up the north coast, starting in portrush for the airshow. It's on every September and well worth a visit - airwavesportrush.co.uk

The views from the walk down from the campsite into town are pretty nice.

The harbour at portrush.

Saw this lovely car parked and couldn't resist taking a pic!

Some planes...

Having some refreshments!

I love the red arrows and can't wait to see them every year. They were excellent as always!

The next day after the airshow we headed towards our next campsite which was in Bushmills and stopped off to have a look round Dunluce castle on the way.

Although we were only travelling a few miles each day we always made sure to stop for tea along the way.

We also visited Ballintoy harbour which looked lovely in the sunshine. It's very popular with Game of Thrones fans as it is the setting for the Iron Islands in the show. There is a lovely cafe here too.

The camper parked up in Ballintoy.

We then took a trip over the Carrick a Rede rope bridge which is managed by the National Trust. It was much lest rickety than I remember! 

Although it was September, the weather was amazing and the sea looked positively tropical.

All cosy in the camper.

There were many spectacular views from our various tea stops.

The next camp site we stopped at was in Cushendall and the spaces were pretty much right beside the sea, which was excellent!  This is the view during the day.

And this is the amazing scene at night, the moon was very impressive indeed.

Finally we stopped in Carrickfergus, where we had a tasty picnic lunch and had a look round the famous castle.

And of course finished off with the obligatory cup of tea and a French fancy.

All in all we were only a way for a few days but we packed so much in it felt like ages! The north coast is beautiful and there really is so much to see and do although we were very lucky with the weather.

Now to start planning some trips for 2015!

And then there were three...

The past six weeks have been somewhat of a whirlwind as in April we celebrated the arrival of our first baby! 

Baby George!

I promise that this won't become a baby obsessed blog but there may be some baby orientated making projects to come...

Also as I am pretty crap at blogging regularly this may become worse, although as we are out and about doing interesting stuff with the baby at the moment maybe I might actually get better at it!  Who knows, ah well I will try my best.

Christmas...

After four years of hard work and regularly saying that we’d be in for Christmas, we actually meant it this year and finished off the new bit of our house enough that we actually were able to be in for Christmas.  It was very exciting after such a long time day dreaming of what it would be like.  Putting up the Christmas tree in the corner of our new room made all the late nights of painting, hammering and general constructing all worthwhile.

So what better way to try out our new kitchen than by cooking our first ever proper Christmas dinner?  Our original plan was to have everyone (potentially 17 people - eek) but we ended up with just ourselves, my mum and dad and my sister and her fiancé, and of course Yossi the cat, which to be honest was probably a lot more sensible for a first go!  Maybe next year we’ll try again and have everybody!

Here are some pictures from our Christmas day, all taken by my husband.





Beautiful (and tasty) gingerbread house made by my sister.



Christmas flowers, with berries that everyone thought were fake but were very much real - a bargain from Lidl the Saturday before Christmas.



The ham, cooked in coke with a glaze of Golden syrup and mixed spice.



The turkey, it was 8lbs which was plenty for the six of us with some left over for sandwiches etc but I think next time I would go for a bigger one as the leftovers are just too yummy.



The Christmas table.  Crackers are from Paperchase - they had lovely baking bits and pieces in them like measuring spoons and a honey server thingy.



I made some mulled wine and also some non alcoholic mulled punch which were very tasty while we were waiting for lunch to cook.



Sitting down to starter of smoked salmon on wheaten bread with a glass of buck’s fizz.



The main course, very tasty even if I do say so myself - my mum did say my roast potatoes were delicious too, I was well chuffed.



A hopeful Yossi looking for leftovers.





An after dinner game of scrabble.





General cosiness.

All in all it was a lovely day.  I was very proud that I managed no to poison anyone and actually had lunch vaguely around lunchtime (2.30’s not bad!)

The house felt really cosy and it really was just how I imagined it would be all those other Christmases when we were still working hard to get the place finished.

I’ll take some more pictures of the house in general now that the Christmas tree is down to do a bit of a house tour post soon.

Happy new year everyone!