Nuts nuts everything is nuts

Eating peanut sauce while planning my nut allergy research project
and feeling ... Well ... A bit nuts!

Dessert tasting plate

Mmmmmmm

Enough chocolate self saucing!

Time for osso bucco! Enjoy.

Chocolate self saucing!

Twice this week I have found myself baking and devouring puddings! You
r what u eat?

Sieze the lunch!

Took the opportunity for a lovely inpromtu lunch today at watsons bay.
Why not!?

Testing mobile post!

Long time no post!

Well it feels like ages since I last blogged ... the last 6 weeks have been very ... well ... very.

Baby Naomi turned 1 and I became obsessed with the new parent right of passage - a party with an elaborate cake that she will never remember but that cause quite a lot of stress for us! It all went well but I felt the relief lift off my shoulders the next day. Add to this uni studies, working (a little bit) and Hubby Mark on the job hunt merry-go-round again and I wonder why I feel anxiety.

I had a nice hot bath today after a Thai massage this morning and dug out my copy of Alain De Botton's 'Consolations of Philosophy', took a deep breath and hoped to be consoled. I read the chapter on frustration ... and realised that my hope to be consoled is an example of where I keep going wrong. "We will cease to be so angry once we cease to be so hopeful". Not quite sure what I should do instead ... need to keep reading!

How many times can one read ....

Pearl Barley and Charlie Parsley are friends ... really great friends!!

This is Baby Naomi's new favourite story and she cries when we get to the last page and wont stop until I start reading again!

All hail ... the piccolo latte!

Over the years my relationship with coffee has grown and developed like any true friendship. I can't remember my first taste but I do remember experimenting with vanilla essence in plunger coffee in my teens.

At uni I discovered the old fashioned stove top metal percolators and then during the dark corporate years found myself chugging instant and drip filter (not sure which is worth) just because that's all that was on offer.

My winter in Manchester UK saw me move to Ali McBeal style enormous lattes, keeping me warm on the icy walk to work. And after travelling as a 30-something backpacker I vowed to enjoy the simple luxuries on my return home - this meant no to instant forever more!

A stint of corporate travel to India saw my tastes move to espresso shots & long blacks (never trust Chennai refrigeration) - which was also great for the waistline. But there is something comforting about a large, warm, creamy, double-shot latte.

Since I have been working from home as Mum I have embraced my small but fabulous espresso machine to make my morning latte (Toby's Estate works best), going out for another in the afternoon & accepting that my baby belly will just have to stay as I cannot give up my milk!

But ... newsflash ... something has changed on the coffee scene recently. I don't know how & I don't know when ... but the Piccolo Latte has arrived ... and it is perfect. Its a mini latte - the taste is as strong and creamy as a double shot large latte only its quicker & less fattening! And the take-away cups are just so cute too! Not sure if its a Sydney thing or even just a Bondi thing, but I would highly recommend the Piccolo to the most picky of coffee snobs & all other coffee lovers too. Yippee!

wow time whirlwind

Wow ... one of Baby Naomi's favourite 'words' up there with Uh-oh.
Also how I feel when I note the date of my last post. Unforgivable really.

But so much is going on I am just going to have to perform a brain dump stream of consciousness blurb to catch you up!

Wake up ... feed ... change nappy ... make food ... feed ... eat ... design bed management software ... play ... walk ... make food ... feed ... change nappy ... clean ... look for new house ... sleep ... wake up to crying ... find dummies ... make food ... feed ...cook ... clean ... passover dinner ... try to learn epidemiology ... make food ... feed ... change nappy ... look for new house ... eat ... too much red wine ... too much coffee ... design bed management software ... play ... walk ... make food ... feed ... change nappy... fly to Melbourne ... exhausted ... too much red wine ... too much coffee ... make food ... feed ... change nappy ... clean ... look for new house ... try to sell hubby's shoes on ebay ... get caught.

And that's really only the half of it!

Champagne - twice in 1 week!

Yay! Three months since my last champagne posting we are back on topic. It was with great pleasure this week that I was able to review 2 of France's finest:

Bubbles 1 - G.H. MUMM 1999 Brut Millesime

Occasion - the engagement of our best man to the love of his life! Mazel tov.

This champagne was amazingly soft, buttery and delicious. It danced lightly on the palate and floated gently to the head! I immediately wanted another bottle to check if anything could taste so ... well ... floaty!

Bubbles 2 - Veuve Clicquot Brut

Occasion - the sale of our unit to an offshore investor currently cruising on the Queen Mary - cheers to you Mrs N!

For me, Veuve signifies contract signing as it was the traditional way my work celebrated deals back in the naughty 90s. Its big and brash and bright (like its orange box) and makes you feel like shouting 'yahoo'! So it was the perfect choice for finally settling on our sale.

Its official - I can cook but can't bake!

In the last week I have cooked up some simple but delicious meals. We've had cottage pie (for us & bub), organic beef sausages with tomato salad and corn, t-bone steak (ok hubby did bbq these so i cant take full credit) with israeli salad, persian fetta and brown rice & last night's yummy chicken tikka masala. Baby Naomi also was served some very tasty salmon with potato & carrot mash, steamed zuchini and a kind of bolognese made from chicken mince.

However, on the baking front, I attempted some cookies and they were so bad I couldn't even bring myself to give to the homeless guys at the beach. They went straight into the bin :(
The funny thing is that Hubby Mark doesn't even have a sweet tooth so I am just baking for the fun of it ... or maybe the challenge? I love pottering in the kitchen, dirtying every dish in sight ... but I would like to be able to eat the results of my therapy occasionally!

Time space continuum leak!

Not sure what happened but its March! The mornings are noticeably cooler and although the sun is still hot around midday, the air temperature is coming down to meet the water temperature, with both hovering around 20 degrees in recent days.

With summer over life is getting busier. I have started doing some work from home (which is what I should be doing now) and picked up another subject at uni (more about that later).

But we still have found time to enjoy of course!! I am loving Centennial Park at the moment and find myself there a few times a week now. Last weekend we hired bikes and took Baby Naomi on her first ride. She loved it ... for the first 5 minutes. We are not sure if it was too scary after that or if the unsightly helmet was just ugly and annoying but she made it pretty clear enough was enough. Suitably complicated manoeuvres followed to return bikes (Hubby Mark rides back, drops off bike 1, gets car, picks up bub, i ride bike 2 etc) ... but it still was a very enjoyable afternoon!

New Shoes!

Thanks so much to Mum & Dad for birthday money! Its so exciting to go shopping guilt free and buy something I really don't need but have covetted for a while. I have recently developed an obsession for 'Sambag' (www.sambag.com.au) - a Sydney shoe boutique specialising in handmade ballet flats (still made in China but they assure me its a workshop of 12 guys rather than a factory).

After driving past and staring longingly for months it was great to be able to go in and buy a pair! I ended up chosing the 'Grace muted snakeskin ballet flat in black with matching grosgrain ribbon trim and bow'.

I think its the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Happy Birthday To Me!

On the 22 of this month I turned 33! Eeek.

My day was lovely - a quiet Bondi Sunday. We went out for breakfast and although we couldn't get a table at our regular local spot we ended up at the Ravesi Hotel for fancy pancakes complete with view. Oh la la. Later in the afternoon we went out for sushi and a wander through the markets. Then Unky Dan came over and we had chocolate cake - with candles! Yay!

The evening was an extra treat. Bubbe Esther babysat and Mark & I went to our first movie in 9 months! Ironically we splurged on Gold Class tickets, reclined in plush seats, sipped wine and slurped $20 icecream ... all while watching Slumdog Millionaire. Hmmmm.

I did very well on the pressies too, scoring books, DVDs, smelly things, pretty things, money and .... a video camera (on order so stay tuned for our foray into movie making coming soon)!

Going ... Going ... Not Sold!

All day the excitement and anticipation was building. After months of cleaning and buying fresh flowers for open for inspections, our auction night had finally arrived. I was so nervous I stayed home. Baby Naomi was in bed and I had a beer in one hand (no red wine left in the house!) and my phone in the other. Hubby Mark called from the packed auction room where the hum was audible even over the speaker phone (or, in hindsight, was it just static?). Suddenly there was a buzz at the door - 'We're here for the auction'! After sending a rather frantic sounding couple up to the real estate office and re-settling bub (bloody buzzer) I returned to my lotus pose and waited for proceedings to begin.

'Who will start the bidding on this immaculate Bondi beach pad - it ticks all the boxes'. Waiting, waiting, waiting. NO BIDS!

Over 100 groups have tromped through our place, they turned up at the auction and yet sat with arms crossed and did nothing. GFC? Too many 'hot auction' reality tv shows? Who knows ... Now its up to our agent to negotiate with the highest non-bidder apparently!!

It feels so strange being so out-of-control of the situation. Its like waiting to give birth, although admittedly my part in that was a tad more important than the current 'vendor' part.

So we wait, and enjoy Bondi a bit longer! Might go for a swim :)

Sniffles

I have a cold. Sniff sniff. I was a bad patient before I was a mum ... but now being sick is even more difficult than before! Naomi doesn't care if I'm sick ... she still wakes up at 6am kicking and squealing with delight - Yay another day! Doesn't she know that every now and then its nice to feel miserable and spend the day under the doona? Maybe its because she has a sleeping bag? Damn you SIDS safe sleeping! And what's worse is that I can't even take any good drugs because I am still breast feeding. Woe is me. Sniff sniff.

Lucky for me I have a fab Hubby ... my Valentine's Day present was sleep!!!

Traditional birthday lunch

Mum & Dad came to Sydney this week for our semi-traditional February birthday celebration lunch. Last year we had a lovely sunny long lunch at Balmoral Bathers. This year we went to Balzac in Randwick - which turned out to be the perfect choice for a rainy day and very pram friendly too. Great service and delicious food (Sardines, waguyu beef, duck, mmm) ...and you've gotta love the complementary soup in espresso cups and pre-dessert sorbet shot glasses too.

This picture of the restaurant is a strange one but fitting, as we were seated on the other side of this partition. (I really need to improve my blogging equipment so I can take some pics of my own!) Naomi was an angel baby as usual and fell asleep 10 minutes after we arrived, waking just in time for dessert.

A milk arrowroot a day ....

Is it bad to give Baby Naomi a milk arrowroot biscuit every day? My mind is spinning with her dietary details ... she looks so cute munching on them I can't resist!

Arty Baby

Today Baby Naomi & I had a fabulous morning at the MCA! It was an unexpected invitation from Cousin Bronwyn which saw us zoom into town and in a blink of an eye be transported from dirty nappies to ... well, modern art. Naomi's favourite was Sunley Smith's enormous film projection of furniture being dragged behind a car driving along a dirt road. I thought it was a bit obtuse but she did make a good point about the notion of forward motion being vital to the work, as it is to her pram.

The highlights for Bronwyn were the Yinka Shonibare exhibition (big time commentary on cultural imperialism) and getting to ride in the secret goods lift thanks to lady with baby in pram!

Janice no more ...

It is with a humbly bowed head and bruised heart that I type these words ... I have been dumped! Yes, while I was busy basking in my celebrity conquest, Janice was evidently busy shaking off the numerous Facebook remoras that had attached themselves (ourselves?) to her profile. Janice has gone underground and is no longer my friend.

As 'anonymous' commented on my last post, maybe I should spend more time thinking about my real friends ... like Shazza :)

Janice Petersen Newsflash!

We are now friends! Well, on facebook anyway. Still, it's one step closer to finding out where she gets her outfits! Stay tuned ...

Not the B-O-X!

We think our cat has Stockholm Syndrome! Every couple of days now, whenever we have a real estate inspection, poor Banister the Cat is bundled into his B-O-X and taken for a drive - a process which he find most traumatic from beginning to end. Hubby Mark also found it pretty traumatic the day Banister's claw pierced his skin like an earing!

Today however, after the morning's inspection, we had left the B-O-X out in the courtyard. When Hubby Mark picked it up to put it away he was shocked to find a 7kg furry paperweight inside. Yes, Banister had curled up in his torture chamber for a nap!

Beach Pad Anyone?

Our apartment is on the market! After 7 years in Bondi we have decided its time to move, for a number of reasons. Although our apartment is great, a third bedroom would be very useful (study, guestroom etc). And as much as I hate to admit it, its just not as fun around here listening to parties lying in bed hoping Baby Naomi doesn't wake up rather than being out amongst it. The beach is just a tease (I still haven't really figured out how to go swimming with Bub yet) and although the local drunks are very nice and stop the traffic for me & the pram some days, other days they hurl abuse or just pass out in my path so its a little erratic!

Anyway, selling is exciting but quite hard work as it means lots of cleaning and dashing out of the house with Bub and Cat whenever our agent calls with a new prospect.

Yesterday a guy came for a second look with his parents from Bowral, so lets hope mummy & daddy cough up!

Janice Petersen Newsflash

Janice is on Facebook! I have requested her friendship (with a message assuring her I am not a stalker) but am yet to hear back. Stay tuned ...

We Dont 'Do' Coffee

Last night I met my gorgeous friend Carolyn (aka Fuzz) for a rare dinner date, while Hubby Mark stayed home with Baby Naomi.
Naomi was not asleep when I left so I was immediately less than relaxed. And I had a little bit of guilt hanging overhead ... not about leaving daddy + bub ... but because the restaurant I had booked was a new uber-cool venture now thriving in the same space where a friend's restaurant had failed.
But all my tension evaporated when I stepped through the old wooden doors of The Rum Diaries! The place has been completely transformed and feels like an eccentric Havana supper club. The decor, Carolyn's stories and a fantastic Mojito immediately relaxed me and we had a fantastic evening. Delicious food too (tapas fusion)!
Looking around, it was certainly a bit of a Bondi beautiful people scene, but the staff were so friendly and unpretentious that I realised .... this place was actually cool, not just trying to be cool!
So, even when at the end of the night upon ordering coffee, we were told 'Sorry, we don't do coffee' - I was not put out. Instead I thought - yes, that's cool. It makes perfect sense ... of course they don't. Cheese plate and another cocktail anyone?

http://www.therumdiaries.com.au/

Lunch at Bodhi

Its summertime in Sydney-town and to help ease Hubby Mark back into work mode, Baby Naomi & I visited the office & then had lunch at Bodhi, a vegetarian yum cha restaurant in Cook+Phillip Park. It was lovely sitting under the huge canopy of Moreton Bay figs (close enough to bodhi trees!) with the breeze coming up from the harbour. We didn't try the vegetarian fish, but the BBQ non-pork buns were pretty close to the real thing!

Who is Janice Petersen?

Last night, while watching our Tivo recorded SBS World News ('News from home, if you live in the world' - ??!!) the usually super elegant Janice Peterson didn't realise the camera was still on her and did a quick straighten up of her hair. It wasn't much, but this slight glimpse of Janice thinking she was off air made me wonder about her.... and where she gets such great clothes!
It seems Janice is a hard woman to research ... so far all I have found is that she is (surprisingly) from Woy Woy on the NSW Central Coast and she loves sport and photography. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Janice_Peterson)
I will have to continue my research re Janice's fashions ... Stay tuned for the next Janice bulletin.

New Mum Angst

Feeling a bit angst-ridden today. I have been doing the mum thing for over 7 months now but things change every day so I still feel like such a novice. Today Baby Naomi gagged on gristle I had failed to notice in a lovely pureed lamb stew I had made. Hubby Mark has admitted to being terrified of choking so between us, the scene was quite dramatic! We also visited his 90+ y.o. Booba who had the following golden oldie pearls of wisdom for me (everyone's an expert on babies it seems!):
- what's happened to all her hair (while licking her fingers and pawing Naomi's head)
- she is looking around because she has never been here before (not true!!)
- its a pity she can't hold a biscuit (why?)
- is she having orange juice (again .. why?)
- her teeth are coming (pretty safe bet)
- is she saying any words (she is 7 months old!!)
- don't let her stand up too much she will get bow legs (great - another thing to worry about).
I have a clinic appointment this week with the wonderful community nurses at Bondi so I hope they are ready to hear all about it!!

New Who?!

There is a new Dr Who!

Although not a huge fan, I felt tingles of nostalgia when I saw a news story on the new Dr Who. The previous Drs (and there have been many) were flashed up on the screen and I realised that they were not only time lords ... they were time capsules!

I loved the 3rd and 4th doctors - Jon Pertwee & Tom Baker ... a snapshot of the 70's and early 80's. The 5th doctor - Peter Davison - also looked familiar but it turns out this is because he also played Tristan Farnon in the series 'All Creatures Great and Small' - also a childhood fave of mine.

As for Drs 6-9 .... no idea. Then came Dr 10 ... David Tennant ... whom I found strangely sexy while I was pregnant and confined to the couch watching random TV programmes such as ... well ... Dr Who!

So - good luck Dr 11 - Matt Smith. May the 2010 generation love you as we loved your previous incarnations!

Happy New Year!

Each year I wonder - Does the way we celebrate new year's eve reflect the year to come, or just the current moment?

In case the former is correct, I have developed my own little tradition for NYE. Each year I treat myself to a bottle of fine French champagne - a different one each year. Admittedly this very civilised dabbling only began once I hit 30. The earlier years of wild dance parties and feral bush raves had faded into a smoke machine haze and I was more than happy to spend the same amount of money that used to get us through a whole weekend on one bottle of bubbles!

So ... which champagne houses have been covered to date? Moet & Chandon was my first love and kicked off the tradition in 2006 ... and having toured the caves of Reims it will always be a favourite. 2007 began with Winston Churchill's favourite - the formidable Pol Roger. This I found a bit sharp ... probably best quaffed with cigar. 2008 was telling in that I had no bubbles and indeed spent NYE in bed at a beach side caravan park - pregnant!!

And 2009? What a night. Amazing fireworks from superb Sydney harbour vantage points, family, friends, my hubby & baby girl (who insisted on staying up!) and ... a bottle of Bollinger! Sweet like honey but balanced perfectly by the brut dryness, delicate bubbles and a wonderful not drunk but floaty sensation after a few glasses!

Whether the night's celebrations are a sign of the year to come, or just reflective of where we are today - I like 2009 already!