The most wonderful time of the year

Christmas madness is upon us. I looooove Christmas. Adore it!
But due to poor planning on my husband's and my part we also have our children's birthdays in Nov and Dec. Plus my family has followed the trend so add another 4 to that between Nov and Feb.

It makes for an incredibly busy and expensive time of the year.

This year marks the first year my eldest has really been aware (and therefore into) birthday parties. 'It has to be at the riding bikes park mummy'. This was non-negotiable. Luckily the park has a community hall. Even better it only costs $10/hour to rent it. Given Auckland weather around this time of year (it's raining as I type) I wasn't keen on having 16 kids in my little house. So $40 outlay and some chips and wee people food. Entertainment will hopefully be the bikes and the park itself. If it's wet, balloons inside will hopefully suffice.
There is a barbecue, full kitchen with dishwasher and tables and chairs. Everything I need to keep it stress free.

If you are stuck for party venues I recommend looking into this option (assuming your kids are old enough that you can't get away with a small family gathering). Friends of ours were amazed at how cheaply they were able to rent the local community hall for their area. The bonus was there was a play centre attached and the play area was open for them to use. There are fantastic options that come cheaper than McDonald's or Lollipops if you do a bit of searching around your local area.

This year I don't have to host Christmas so that removes the expense of extra food. Present shopping for the kids has already been done months back during sales. This may be the last year I can do this as I suspect next year Miss 4 will have set ideas about what Santa needs to bring. Grown up pressies are proving to be a bit more of an issue. Mainly because my handy present list I used every year was stored in my old phone that got drowned by an errant cup of tea. (Moment of silence).

I've already been caught out with shopping without a list. A visit to some local shops last week resulted in a baby shower present, a birthday present and.... no Chirstmas presents :S

If you are crafty and need a bit of inspiration my new fun place to hang out is Pinterest
Instead of creating endless bookmarks of things that inspire you this allows you to 'pin' it with a picture to a virtual board. Think of it like a cork board on your computer. Lots of very crafty people share great ideas on here. Fantastic for those of you wanting to go the homemade route this Christmas.

I'm also carefully scanning the local papers for Christmas Events. Tree lightings, Carol services, markets; there's lot's of fantastic things starting to happen now.

Oh and for those of you wondering Kale does bolt. Apparently you just need to blog about it to set it off ;) But that's ok because strawberries and snow peas are already happening in our garden. Christmas and summer produce - who could ask for more?

Playing Coffee Roulette

Anyone who knows me knows I'm a coffee nut (or should that be bean?) . Like any coffee nut I'm pretty picky about the product. Especially when it costs upwards of $4 for a cup. It seems New Zealander's really aren't that fussed about good coffee - or else why are there so many terrible baristas (I use that term loosely) out there?

Now I'm no expert but if you get a sour watery coffee or one that tastes like someone has stubbed their cigarette out in it then it's no good. That's $4 of undrinkable coffee. Plus the cost of fluffies (that's steamed milk in a demitasse cup for the unitiated) for the kids.

I was lucky enough to be gifted an old coffee machine a year or so ago by friends of mine who had upgraded. It was small but it was beautiful and I loved it. It even came on holiday with me. Sadly it died this year and so I was left with the option to buy a replacement or play coffee roulette with bought stuff.

I managed to get a Baby Gaggia off TM at half the retail price of new. A very dirty, never been cleaned machine but still a good price. I did have to buy the cleaning brush, backflush disk, tamp (it came with a plastic one) and cleaning solution for it. Plus since I don't have a grinder, I have to buy coffee for it every week(To all the coffee drinkers shuddering at the thought of pre-ground; I know! I know! But I haven't been able to convince my non-coffee drinking hubby that we need a $600+ grinder -yet). Unlike my old machine she's a bit fussier and doesn't like the 'supermarket' grind. It has to be finer for my baby. So it costs $12-15/ week for the coffee but I get 7 or more cups from that.

So is it cheaper? Possibly not at the moment. Depending on how long the machine lives it may well be though. Is it better than bought stuff? Well it's better than a majority of it. I know a few places to get awesome coffee around here but only a few.

Consistent coffee every morning is worth the cost to me. Plus my cafe doesn't charge for fluffies :)

Labour Weekend

So this post is a bit late but of course Labour weekend is traditionally the time that the garden gets planted for summer. We didn't break tradition here.

The Kale are still in. I'm not really sure if/when they should come out. They haven't bolted so I have wee Kale topiaries around the boarder of my vege patch. Zucchini are in as are capsicum. I decided to try tomatoes this year - I've never had any success before but I thought we'd try a few cherry tomato plants and see how we go. I've planted a row of carrots but they have yet to germinate so I may have to redo that. Six snow pea plants are in too.

From my mum's seed stash (from last year's garden) I have planted broad beans and also rocket. That certainly lived up to its name germinating in a couple of days.

I have room set aside for more tender stem broccoli. I haven't managed to locate any yet but I am very keen to replant after last year's results.

The strawberry plants from last year have been fed and since then they've just thrived. There is already a decent sized, albiet green, fruit on one of them. The kids will be stoked!

In the herb garden I've planted parsley, basil, coriander (hoping it doesn't bolt as it isn't from seed) and a jalapeno pepper to keep the ever present mint company.

The onion and garlic are still happily growing. I'm really looking forward to the harvest. Already I can see that the onion stems are thickening. I have both white and red planted and the red stems are such a gorgeous colour near the base.

Really looking forward to this summer. It looks like it's going to be a good one.