It's a small world afterall

Big thanks to all of you who visit me here. It's lovely to be back. I had a great time with our precious guests. It was simply wonderful to be able to catch up, reminisce about old times as well as create new memories with them, what a memorable time we had!
One of the places we visited was a "Miniature World" set in a beautifully designed garden with a quaint house full of character with tea rooms open to the public, I just loved the way everything was done. There was also a hedge maze and mini golf course which I didn't get to take a photo of, it would've been good to have done so as there was a look-out you can go up to to get the bird's eye view, but I was too busy down in the maze trying to work my way through. Apparently the whole garden came into being due to a couple's passion - husband's passion for gardening and wife's for old-fashioned tea rooms. It was a bit wet the day we visited, it was enjoyable nonetheless. Without further ado, here are some of the photos I took which will give you a better idea. Hope you'll enjoy the tour.

The EntranceThe Door to the Rose Garden
Part of Rose Garden
Azaleas and Camellias
Some other parts of the big garden and miniature displays

I'll be back, I promise

I was so blessed and touched by you sweet ladies who left a message to say you missed me and to see if everything is fine with me. (Hugs and kisses, Donna Lynn and Cielo) Yes, I'm doing fine. I've been having visitors stay at our house and have been very occupied and so I haven't had time to do a new post. Thanks for your love and concern, I really appreciate it. I'm so heartened to know that you ladies care. I will definitely get back here and do a new post when things get back to normal routine again. It won't be long, I promise. In the mean time, these are just some shots I quickly did in the garden a little while ago.

Tribute to Mum

I took these photos last year to pay tribute to and honour my mum. I hadn't ventured into Blogland yet at that time, so I'll show a few of them here this year seeing that Mother's Day is only a few days away.
Roses, lace, dresses, hats, pearls, fragrant soaps, ......... these are some of women's favourite things.My mum is like a friend who understands, who prays for us, who taught me Godly values and many practical things in life. Her tenacity and hard working qualities are an example to me.

Mum was the one who taught me "Ice cream is not for breakfast", she taught me how to type, sew, smock(not smoke) and do cross-stitch embroidery. Mum was always the fastest typist in the world when I was little, she used to type all dad's business letters and it was such a familiar sound and scene when mum would just tap tap tapping typing away on the typewriter some time during the day. Mum is a great orchid gardener, she used to grow these amazing and exotic looking orchids. I also remember doing some cushion embroidery projects with mum and she would be the one to finish off projects for me which I'd started but never finished.
Mum believes in prayers, she's a prayer warrior and she prays without ceasing for all of us. Once I had pre-term painless labour which was rather worrying as it was intense and continued for quite some time, then as sudden as it came, it stopped and everything was fine again. I found out later that mum was woken up out of her sleep that night and felt the intense need to pray for me, so she did, she prayed and prayed until she felt that she could go back to bed again. We compared notes and I asked her the time and date, it was exactly the same time when I had the preterm labour attack that she was praying for me. She's encouraged me to believe God and contend in prayers and we've seen God work miracles in ours and many others' lives.I learnt a lot of things just by watching mum do it. I learnt how to cook by standing next to mum while she was cooking. I learnt how to clean by watching mum clean. Her philosophy still resounds clearly in my ears, "If you clean your kitchen every time after a meal, you won't have to do a big clean up". She's also a great believer of cleaning while you cook, so you don't end up with a big mess. I have to say mum was and is right. I do that too today. People often ask me if I cook around here, as they don't see dirt on my stovetop.The best part of all is I've got a friend in mum. She's one of my best friends. My mum comforts me when I don't feel great. She's always encouraging and she lifts my spirit up with words spoken in faith and love. I'm now striving to be that kind of a mum to my kids. I'd love my kids to call me their best friends when they have grown up.Also I baked and decorated this gateau(which is cake in French) the other day. It's for all of you mums. It looks like a lady's hat when served on this cake stand. I think it looks very feminine, it's oh-so-berry-rosy too! I want to take this opportunity to wish all of you sweet lovely mums a truly blessed and happy Mother's Day. May your lives shine and may God smile on you! Have a sweet sweet day on Sunday.

Edit Thanks to all of you sweet ladies who left your lovely comments here. Some of you have requested the recipe to the above gateau which I'm more than happy to share, here it is:

First, you bake this "Floating on Air" Sponge, you can get store-bought unfilled round sponge, but this recipe is so easy and homemade sponge definitely tastes better. It doesn't even ask you to seperate an egg and it's fail-proof. It's also very good for all your other desserts which call for a sponge, or some which don't necesarily need one. For example, we have this sponge with stewed pears (peeled, cored and sliced) and hot custard for a simple after dinner winter dessert.

Ingredients for Sponge:

4 eggs
3/4 cup Caster Sugar
1 cup self-raising flour
1 tablespoon cornflour
4 tablespoons boiling water
2 teaspoons butter

(1) Beat eggs with an electric beater in a medium-sized bowl until frothy.

(2) Gradually beat in sugar.

(3) Beat until sugar has dissolved and mixture is very thick and creamy-- about 10 minutes

(4) Sift flour and cornflour together. Gradually fold into creamed mixture. Do this lightly, making sure it's not added all at once.

(5) Combine water and butter. When butter melts, blend lightly into mixture.

(6) Pour mixture into 2 greased, floured and baking-paper-lined 20cm round cake tins. Bake in a moderate oven (180C) for 10 to 12 minutes or until cakes begin to shrink from the sides of the tin and is springy to touch.

Ingredients for cream:

250g punnet strawberries, hulled and diced
1/4 cup fresh or frozen raspberries (or any other berries)
1/2 cup caster sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence
300ml tub thickened cream
2 x 250g tubs mascarpone cheese
3 x Flake chocolate bars, crumbled (I got a 100g box of readily crumbled Flake from the cake mix and home baking goods section, cheaper than 3 Flake bars)

(1) Whip the cream in a large bowl with an electric beater until soft peaks form. Add the mascarpone, vanilla and sugar, then beat on low speed till thickened slightly. (This part only takes seconds)

(2) Add the diced strawberries to cream mixture.

(3) Sandwich about 1/3 of cream and strawberry mixture between the two sponges. Spread evenly. Top and cover sides of sponges with more mixture.

(4) Sprinkle top of the gateau with Flake and icing sugar(if desired).

(5) Garnish with raspberries or any other berries of your choice.

You can of course garnish with frosted rose petals if you like. Simply dip your washed and cleaned rose petals into some lightly beaten egg white, then into caster sugar and you'll have Frosted Rose Petals. Have lots of rosy fun, ladies!

Maggie's Garden Muffins

I found this recipe in the Muffin Bible and the name caught my fancy. "Maggie's Garden Muffins". So I thought I'd try and bake them since the ingredients looked so healthy and I love zucchini, herbs, olive oil, pine nuts and cheese. The fabulous thing is they are all in one muffin.
Since these are Garden Muffins, I decided to help them appear "gardenish" by giving them the company of roses and herbs out of my garden. I think they feel right at home alongside all these garden buddies.
I was delighted to see that even the kids loved eating them, here is how to make them:

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups plain flour
1 cup wholemeal plain flour
1 tbsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
1 egg, plus 2 egg whites
2/3 cup skim milk (I used full cream)
1/3 cup olive oil
1 cup grated zhuccini
3 tbsp finely chopped fresh basil
1 tsp crushed garlic
1/3 cup grated cheese
1/2 cup pine nuts (you have to have the pine nuts, they are soooo good in these!)

(1) Preheat oven to 220C. Grease muffin tins.

(2) Sift flours, baking powder and salt in large bowl.

(3) In a smaller bowl, whisk egg, egg whites, milk and oil until well blended. Add egg mixture to dry ingredients, mix gently.

(4) Mix grated zucchini, basil, garlic, cheese and nuts into the mixture. Fill three-quarters full in muffin tins. (One of the tins I used made small bite-size muffins, great for kids!)

(5) Bake for 20 minutes. It's that simple!

Makes around 10-12 muffins. Edit: Please note that I made a mistake with the amount of Baking Powder, it should be 1 tablespoon instead of 1 teaspoon, which I've changed in the ingredients above. Sorry for the inconvenience caused by this.

Am I the only one here?

I have something to confess. I am a "homemade/homecooked" freak. What do I mean by that? Well, I mean I have this streak in me which likes my food to be homemade rather than store-bought. If I could choose, I'd prefer all my meals to be homecooked or homemade. When I entertain, I like everything to be homemade as much as I can, I know I'm making things difficult for myself, but homemade is definitely better, that's why I say I'm a freak. I'm not saying I don't enjoy eating out, but since we have three kids and we can't afford to eat out too frequently, I cook almost everyday. And since I cook very often, I'm always on the lookout for new things to cook. I love variety, so much so that sometimes my kids ask me when I'll cook a certain dish again, I have to think really hard which one they're talking about as I've only cooked that dish once. Is it just me? Or are there any of you like me out there? Maybe not quite. But what kind of a freak are you? I'd love to hear from you.

Good News! My Garden is Featured!

My garden is being featured in this month's Garden of the Month at the House in the Roses. I want to thank Cielo for all the work she's put into bringing the Garden of the Month into being, and I'm honoured and privileged to be featured in this very special space. I've enjoyed the last two months of Garden of the Month and I'm looking forward to more in the future. If you get some time, please go along to Cielo's blog and click on the Old Inviting Door on the sidebar which says "Come On In....Garden Is Open" and it'll take you there. Please don't forget to come back and let me know what you think. Thanks heaps.