Redcurrant Fool

With my massive crop of redcurrants I realised I needed to do something with them. I'd never really cooked redcurrants before as they are quite pricey if you get them from a supermarket. I figured a fool would be easy.

So I cooked up my berries with a little sugar and a tablespoon of water. They looked delicious so I took a sip. YUCK! They were soooo sour. I had to add quite a lot of sugar in the end. Another thing I learned was that redcurrants are mostly skin and pips. When I sieved the mixture I was not left with much!!!

Anyway I added this to greek yogurt and cream whipped together and finally used my posh martini glasses. Hooray! I thought they looked nice decorated like this. Stupidly in my delight I forgot about the sourness of the raw berries and popped one in my mouth. I believe my lips formed what is known as a 'cat's bottom' shape. Nice.

The fool itself was delicious. Now I just need to figure out what to do with the other 2lbs of berries....

Chickens!

Hurrah hurrah am preparing for my lovely new additions to the family: chickens! Finally I've bought a coop which we put together last weekend. I now need to paint it, build a run and get all the other bits of equipment we'll need.
Hubby couldn't complain at the price of the coop as it was a total bargain - £32 off eBay and it's brand new! So I've bought some lovely blue paint and I'm going to paint it, make a sign for the door and add a few other additions and we'll nearly be ready.
Am planning to get the chickens in August as that will give me time to get everything sorted out but the weather should still be fine enough for them to settle in nicely before the winter. Yipee!!!!

Belly button woes

Having complained for months that I wasn't showing any signs of being pregnant, the bump has taken it upon itself to grow rapidly. These photos were taken last week and even since then the little one has grown massively.

I have become quite preoccupied with the state of my belly button and am keeping my fingers and toes crossed that it doesn't 'pop' out. I felt a bit better comparing my bump to my dear hubby's but even his is starting to look pathetic in comparison!

What have we been eating?

It's been a while since I posted a picture of something I've cooked for us to eat. This photo is of our lunch yesterday. It was a 'what needs using up in the fridge' kind of lunch. So I mixed macaroni with ham, roasted peppers, spring onions, parsley (from the garden), creme fraiche and parmesan. This concotion was then piled on top of little gem leaves and topped with a quarter piece of boiled egg. You can never have enough eggs, I say.

June and the longest day of the year

Already we've reached the summer solstice. Amazing. It seems like only a few days ago it was the shortest day of the year! The baby's had its 21+1 week scan and it was really fab. Shame the pictures never do the images justice but it meant a lot to us.

Our garden has gone into overdrive and I've been able to put fresh flowers all around the house and you'd never know I'd even picked any when you wander around the garden. Shame the weeds have reached almost waist-height.

I've been back at work for 3 weeks now and I'm beginning to find it really hard again. I just feel soooo tired all the time. It doesn't help that work has been ultra-stressful and so I've not been able to sleep for any extended period of time. As everyone knows the less sleep you have the worse everything appears.

Fortunately my bump is still tiny by many people's standards so it's not causing too many difficulties yet. I've had to 'invest' in many new clothes as I didn't realise how close-fitting my wardrobe was until it was no longer possible to wedge myself into them.

May Bank Holiday

It's a lovely bank holiday weekend. Today I watch my Dear Hubby (from now on to be referred to as DH) set up the washing line in concrete, rearrange the sofas, tidy the spare room, put together the baby's bed and put together flat-pack furniture. What a hero.

I, on the other hand, have been reclining on various chairs and sofas throughout the day offering "helpful" advice to my DH. He's been loving it....

On the baba front I am convinced I can feel the little critter shifting about in me. I'm only 15 weeks and 4 days and the handbook says it's unlikely to be felt til 16 weeks plus - more if it's your first. Oh well I am happy thinking I can feel it so who cares. Spent quite a lot of the day trying to figure out what baby things I'd like to get first. However, with the purchase of my first house with DH money is not something appears to be hanging around. It's all boring stuff but needs to be bought in the end.

Have had to skip lots of chapters in the baby handbook as they scare the wotsits out of me. I know it already so I don't think I want to know any more about that stuff right now. Or perhaps ever. I mean, whatever happens will happen anyway so how much do I really need to know?

And it's all over...

It's all done. April was a.... interesting month. Our wedding was amazing and went really smoothly. I can't thank everyone enough who attended.

There was the house move too, 6 days afterwards. That was great. Busy but we're so glad we're here now.

Then there's the baby. Starting to grow an ickle bump but nothing that anyone else can notice. Just makes my jeans hurt. Then it turns out I'd been doing too much and got pretty scared last weekend and at the beginning of the week thinking the baby was trying to abandon ship. Saw the doc and luckily it turned out that it was more a warning than actual abandonment. Hurray.

Well, sort of. It has resulted in me spending ALL day EVERY day lying around doing nothing. No one I say that to is remotely sympathetic. I've had comments like "oh you poor thing!" dripping with sarcasm and many an envious comment. Seriously, if you've just moved into a new house, are surrounded by boxes and then you're told not to unpack or lift a single one of them but to sit surrounded by them, see how fun you find it.

Daytime tv is utter rubbish. There's a reason to get well soon. Fortunately I've been soooo tired that I have been sleeping all day and all night every day so there's no time for getting too fed up of the tosh that's on tv. I could never sit at home and watch that sh*t all day. Oddly, I'm not feeling particularly better. It's like there's a fog over my head. My lovely other half has diagnosed that I have clearly slept too much. Whatever. I wish we could swap bodies and then he'd be sorry.

Anyway I am really happy that it's May. Only a few weeks til we go on honeymoon to Nice and it really couldn't come soon enough!