Beacause I tend to ramble.... key words in the post below have been highlighted to allow for quick scan-reading for the lazy.
Saturday...
saw a bit of shopping for the imminent arrivals of our newest family members, two little Devon Rex kittens.
I also took the chance to head to Bunnings to get the gardening supplies I've been wanting to get for a while. Oh... and Rhys wanted a catnip seedling kit so that went in the trolley too. All up, pet and gardening goods totalled $140, a lot of money for me to spend in one hit these days.
Once home I gave my potted basil a much needed transplant into two ceramic pots. They were so root-bound I felt ashamed for having neglected them all this while. I am wondering how well they will survive transplanting with, admittedly, plenty of torn roots in trying to separate them. I opened and started the catnip growing kit. I then raked up the back-yard after Rhys had mowed and collected the liquid fertiliser from my worm farm. Phew! But it was a good day to be out and in the sunshine.
Some laundry, washing up and a clean of the shower thrown in there somewhere.
Sunday...
I quickly made a food plan for the week then hit the local market and supermarket for the fortnight's groceries.
Sometimes I find it amazing how quickly money adds up. $20 here for a set of decora containers, $20 there for some women's multi-v tablets, $10 here for some bread flour and $5 for peppercorns in a mill and suddenly I'm up at a $98 supermaret bill! I haven't seen a shopping bill that high for a while and I became skittish as I watched the tally rise. But I reminded myself that everything in the trolley was needed and it was just unfortunate that I had to buy them all at the one time. The total between the markets and supermarket of $125 is still less than my budgeted allowance for food for the fortnight so all is well.
Once home I put on the breadmaker, made some gnocchi, made some cookies, experimented with how to alter bought natural yoghurt to make it more to my tastes and started my first attempt at making yoghurt.
Unfortunately this morning show my first yoghurt attempt to be a failure. The consistency was was more like those delicious yoghurt drinks you can buy and when I began to strain it through muslin I realised that any yoghurt solids remaining wouldn't be worth the amount of milk wasted in the attempt. I must have done something wrong. I think perhaps it was too cold overnight so the bacteria's process was halted. I'll buy some more milk later this week and try again but this time early in the morning to cure in the warm oven during the day. Anyone have any tips for making it work better next time around?
On the other hand the cookies, my own recipe creation, were a raging success - at least with Rhys who I had to smack away from the cookie jar. I fear to look and see what damage he did late at night once I was asleep!
Also, my gnocchi attempt was successful. I use the term 'successful' rather loosely as though the result was pretty darn delicious once baked with a cherry-tomato and white wine sauce it didn't seem worth the amount of fiddly, time consuming work involved in making the gnocchi.
Vaccuming in the late afternoon finished off the day nicely.
Such a lot of weekend business!
