the kindness of others

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daily rituals Dear ……..,

I frowned a little bit when I opened the package. Frowning seems to help with remembering, and while I stood in the post office I was wracking my brain trying to think whether I’d bought a book recently. I hadn’t bought a book though, and yet here was a book still sitting in my hands.

A beautiful book, that just reading the first paragraph within the sleeve had me smiling and knowing I was going to love it. I frowned again, trying to think… now who could have given it to me?

To Brydie, from Brydie.

I made some phone calls and sent some messages. None of those people had sent me this book.

My finger traced the front cover and my heart felt fuller, as I tried to think of who it could be. On a week that had felt rather overwhelming with all that motherhood and life had to offer it came at a wonderful time. Who would be so kind and thoughtful? Whose such generous kindness had I been the recipient of?

I didn’t know and it looked like I wasn’t supposed to know. I filled the coffee pot, got my favourite cup out, settled the little people and opened it up. I loved it.

Truly inspiring.

Both from the beautiful book and also, from the kindness of others.

With an enormous amount of gratitude, thank you.

Brydie. xxx

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FRANZ KAFKA, frustrated with his living quarters and day job, wrote in a letter to Felice Bauer in 1912, “time is short, my strength is limited, the office is a horror, the apartment is noisy, and if a pleasant, straightforward life is not possible then one must try to wiggle through by subtle maneuvres.”- Daily Rituals, How Artists Work.

loving photography, every pixel

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sunrise

I”m having a quiet love affair with photography at the moment. Every little pixel of it. I’m loving the fact that I’ve been lucky enough to live in a time of digital photography. To be able to take 400 photos of the same thing and then to just quietly delete most of them later on in the day is a wonderful thing. Compare that with getting 400 photos developed at the local chemist and paying a small bag of gold in order to do so- lucky indeed.

To take a picture, try and tell a story within four small corners is a challenge and one that I really am loving.

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What are you loving at the moment?

“Often life’s pleasures pass us by simply because we don’t take a moment to focus on them… Make a point of noticing everyday something that uplifts your spirit or tickles your heart… Stop to breathe in the joy of this moment and then tell someone about it. Share your joy and revel in it. When your joy is savoured, and then shared, it is magnified…” ROBIN GRILLE

* There have been some odd sunrise colours lately due to terrible bush fires in the surrounding areas.

The Better Block

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Changes happened this weekend in Clovelly Rd, Sydney, Australia. Small, community inspired changes with a hopefully massive impact. Going from this…

clovelly better block

to this…

clovelly better block

The first Sydney Better Block project was the occasion- a community driven event that from everyone’s accounts, was a huge success.

cityhippyfarmgirl

The inspiring man behind it all, Phill Stubbs.

Clovelly Road Better Block– transform a street for a day. The aims are to: 
– bring the community together 
– encourage people to re-imagine their street 
– invite them to add their ideas 
– show civic leaders the need for action 
– get improvements made permanently 
– inspire others to push for change in their street. 

clovelly better block
clovelly better block
Our goal after the event is a permanent liveable street. We will be going back to Council with market research from the Better Block day and pushing for permanent changes. In fact we’re keen to see this rolled out at the other little villages on Clovelly Road. 
 
Our vision for 2025 is to connect the villages on Clovelly Road and create a green corridor that runs from Centennial Park to the Pacific Ocean. (Yes it’s a bold vision, but if we, the community, don’t really think about our street, who in government will?)
– 25/10/13 CLOVELLY BETTER BLOCK MEDIA RELEASE
clovelly better block

Blink and you would have missed the very popular burrito’s- a sell out!

clovelly better block

Making the block, “greener, safer, more human“

clovelly better block

Everyone’s favourite green man, Costa.

clovelly better block

‘The “Better Block” project is a demonstration tool that rebuilds an area using grassroots efforts to show the potential to create a great walkable, vibrant neighborhood center. The project acts as a living charrette so that communities can actively engage in the “complete streets” buildout process and develop pop-up businesses to show the potential for revitalized economic activity in an area. Better Blocks are now being performed around the world, and have helped cities rapidly implement infrastructure and policy changes.’           – THE BETTER BLOCK PROJECT

This video explains the concept and how they did it in San Antonio, USA.

For more details on other projects, or how to start your own see- The Better Block

For Clovelly Road’s Better Block Project full media release see here

For a recent article in The Age and The Better Block in High St, Coburg, Victoria.

noodles on the weekend

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cityhippyfarmgirlcityhippyfarmgirl

 a weekend with visits from a wonderful friend from afar

a ride to watch a golden sun sneak over the horizon

treasures found on Garage Sale Trail

coffee for one, but make it two

an inspiring community event

long afternoon park plays

and finally,

finally made it to the night noodle markets

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What are you up to this weekend?

cityhippyfarmgirlcityhippyfarmgirl

a heaving black mass and sour cream chive scones

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 cityhippyfarmgirl

cityhippyfarmgirl

I watched the heaving black mass for a minute. Shuddered a little and averted my eyes, hoping I’d imagined it as I slowly turned back.

Alas, no. There they still were, running the chive gauntlet, acting all busy like. Busy with what you say? Sucking the life out of my chives it seems.

My tiny potted permaculture garden had been doing reasonably well, condsidering all the growing conditions. At a distance everything looked pretty healthy and well tended. Up close, it was a little different though. The mint was munched, the lemon balm looked a touch fried and the chives well…were a black heaving mass. A black heaving mass of which I wanted no part of.

I noticed them, I observed them, I squished them between my fingers, I thinned the chive cluster out a little, I squirted high powered water on them. They seemed to love every second of their well tended honeymoon and bred like bloody aphids. I watched a little more, the ants below ‘farmed’ them, making sure they were ok, feeling loved and nurtured. No more, I muttered, it’s you or me… and quite frankly, well it really has to be you.

I pulled them all out, bar a few sad loners that the aphids weren’t partying on yet. My perfectly balanced permaculture pot was now looking a little unbalanced. But at least the black heaving mass was disrupted and I could once again think about eating chives without wrinkling my nose and furrowing my brow.

sour cream and chive scones

Sour cream and Chive Scones

250g sour cream

250mls water

one large handful of finely chopped chives, (optional black aphids)

1 tsp salt

whisk these ingredients together in a large bowl and then add

2.5-3 cups self raising flour (375-450g)*

mix through with a butter knife

tip out on to a lightly floured bench top and knead quickly with finger tips, pulling it together to a light dough.

Cut shapes, onto a tray and bake at 220 for approximately 20 minutes (depends on their thickness.)

kebab antidote salad- Frugal Friday

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cityhippyfarmgirl

Mr Chocolate ate a very large dripping meaty kebab for lunch and wasn’t feeling so fit and wholesome afterwards.

This salad for dinner was the antidote…

and all was aligned in the world once more.

cityhippyfarmgirl

Kebab Antidote Salad

steamed potato

steamed sweet potato

peas

one bunch of finely chopped flat leaf parsley

dressing

handful of finely chopped mint

1/2 cup natural yogurt

1/4 cup olive oil

finely chopped chilli

salt to taste

handful of raw sunflower kernels

my petite kitchen

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 Bonjour mon cher, bonjour…

Now not knowing more than a smattering of french words, I should probably leave it at that, but due to the fact that in recent times it seems I’ve come over all ‘frenchy‘, I will probably see if I can slip just a little more french words into this post.

And what caused all this ‘frenchness‘ I hear you ask? Actually, I’m not sure. I still have a deep love for all things Italian. I still have an imagined Scandinavian heritage, and now, well it seems there is a heady French call, (at least in my petite kitchen there is.)

cityhippyfarmgirlWhat to do with this little lovely? Chestnut spread, in a tube and brought to me from Paris. It could be absolute garbage, but not to me. (Look at all those cute little french words on there!)

cityhippyfarmgirl

 Petite fleurs, teeny tiny ones that didn’t last long on my usually quite unexciting kitchen bench cactus.

cityhippyfarmgirlGateau a la banane with passionfruit icing. Always a simple bake when there are squishy bananas to be had. I make this cake up in a mixer these days.

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 Parisian flea market finds, bought and brought back for me. I was particularly excited by this one. How many kitchens has this round beauty seen… What had it been used for?

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Old milk bottle finds that were sitting unloved in someones garage. I’m preparing the bottles to be loved again…or should I say amour.
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Linking in with the lovely Madame Celia and her kitchen frolics
Kisses on both cheeks to anyone who leaves comments in French this week.

peddling towards sunlit shores

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cityhippyfarmgirl

cityhippyfarmgirl

cityhippyfarmgirl

Pedalling through the still darkened streets, I keep my eye towards the dark grey sky. Just a hint of light, I still had a good while to go before the sun nudged itself over the horizon. The air is cold, it hits my face and bare arms. I think for a moment of everyone still sleeping at home, snuggled in.  A warm bed has been given up for the cold and for the grey. A cup of tea in favour of a bicycle.

A bicycle peddling towards sunlit shores…

Was it worth it?

Every second.

 

bringing the bread back

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sunflower and linseed

sunflower and linseed

I’ve made a few dud loaves lately.

Distracted, not enough effort, too much effort, unhappy starter, busy…I could tick all of the above boxes. The funny thing was I felt my sourdough hat was sitting slightly skewiff, I knew it and the month that it was sitting a little wonky, well I certainly didn’t produce any of my finest loaves that’s for sure.

Come on girl get it together, where had the magic gone?

I played with a buckwheat starter…ick.

I ate a whole loaf of under proved sourdough, (toasting it three times helped a little, felt it was a tad heavy to subject the kids to)

My teeth battled through over cooked rolls, and I did have a rather long thought process of, hell maybe I’ll just start buying it again.

Then thankfully something flicked, I didn’t have to walk that supermarket bread aisle. The time was right, the starter was eager and the hands willing. My sourdough hat felt straight once more, and with it a greedy need to bake bread.

sunflower and linseed

Sunflower and Linseed Bread

600g active starter

750g strong bakers flour

150g wholemeal spelt flour

75g linseed

75g sunflower kernels

700-750mls water

1 tsp dark malt flour

3 tsps salt

Mix together in your usual sourdough bready kind of fashion. I baked these at 230C with steam for free form loaves or 220C and a little longer baking time in a tin.

lessons in chocolate cake

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chocolate cakechocolate cake

When the lovely Mariana posted her family recipe for chocolate cake recently I decided I needed to give it a crack. Me and chocolate cake still aren’t particularly firm friends. I had fiddled about last year with my sourdough starter chocolate cake (Number Five Chocolate Cake.) I had also mentioned in this post my head start into baking a dry old chocolate cake recipe as a teen.

Being more of a Lemon Meringue Pie kinda gal, it’s hard to get good perspective in such very important matters such as chocolate cake. However, for the sake of my chocolate cake inhaling young family I would do it. I would make the cake, (as everyone needs to have a chocolate cake recipe up there sleeves right?)

Lessons learnt in Chocolate Cake

1. Chocolate cake baked in a square tin sounded like a good idea at the time but when it came time to present it on a plate I slowly realised- out of all my missed matched plates, not one of them were square. Round tin it is next time.

2. Fold that flour into the mixture, don’t over beat it. I know this, and yet I still have moments of forgetting. This was one of those moments.

3. Chocolate cake doesn’t need to have 250g of dark chocolate in it to be a chocolate cake, (hooray for that actually!)

4. When making a stove top icing, ensure the tea towel being used in order not to burn yourself doesn’t catch fire as it rests casually in the flames. (For the record, burnt tea towel smells a bit funny.)

5. When the recipe says “move fairly quickly” when pouring on the icing, do so. It’s said for a reason. If you don’t, it leads to an unsatisfying ‘scratchy’ looking top. Followed by a little high pitched squeal, tiny foot stomp and mutterings of…oh please be smoooooth again.

6. Plopping small squares of chocolate in the middle doesn’t really hide the unsatisfying scratchy looking icing.

7. And finally, really… Not a single other person really cares whether- a) the icing was smooth, b) the cake mixture slightly over beaten, and c) that there wasn’t an appropriate square plate to go with the square cake*. It was gobbled up and declared the best chocolate cake ever. So dear Mariana, I think it’s a hit.

* There was however a slight voiced concerned and furrowed brow with the burnt tea towel incident, (for safety reasons of course.) But I say, who doesn’t like a little excitement in the kitchen now and then.

Mariana’s Forever Chocolate Cake Recipe 

chocolate cake