Rain, rain, go away...

Today is a poo day! I'm over it already!

Crappy grey rainy weather, a long term client dropping me via e-mail at the last minute with very little explanation and even less apology, lack of sleep, potential cyclone advisories, snotty-ness and incessant sneezing, inconsiderate smokers, The Man's stupid staff invading our home, looming deadlines, lack of patience... Today everything seems to be too much!

This made me sad...

So, I baked to take my mind off things for a bit.

I made apple muffins from my Edmonds cook book that my mum sent me a couple of years ago.

From Mummy with love...

Instead of regular oil, I thought some locally produced Coconut Oil would make a nice difference so added a 1/4 cup, which I kind of regret. It doesn't seem to have affected the taste too much, but they don't smell like yummy apple muffins... even through my blocked nose all I can smell is coconut oil, and the delicacy of the cinnamon flavour is lost!

Product of Vanuatu

The final product is passable and reasonably tasty, but I don't think I'll use the coconut oil so much in my baking in the future. If I do, I'll use half/half, rather than substituting coconut oil for the whole required amount.

Anyone want one?

Muffin Madness

Summary Sunday on a Monday (again)!

Ok, so my excuse this week is that all of a sudden I have work coming out the wazoo! I'm busily trying to knock over all the pre-paid work from an Australian client, when out of the blue someone contacts me to run some language classes for them! All well and good (and very exciting), but I now have to put together a 10 week language course and workbook for the classes which start next week!!!

All the while we have been fighting third world telecommunications problems here in the past week (where else in the world can a single air conditioner take down an entire telecommunications system?!), so the ups and downs of the internet have not assisted with getting my work done!

Also over the weekend I have been distracted by the greatness of my pickles, after I cracked open this jar of them and got stuck in... DELICIOUS!!!!

Yum yum yum!!!

Anywho... I hope my excuses are acceptable to the general public! And with that out of the way we can now get on with this week's (last week's?) summary...

1. How far along?: 21 weeks 2 days.
2. How big is bub?: According to What To Expect and Pregnancy Lite, bubs weighs in at about 400 grams and is about the size of a spaghetti squash, measuring in at about 20.3 cms.
3. Weight gain?: The weight it slowly coming on but I think most of it is baby and baby related paraphernalia as I'm only about 1 kilo over my pre-pregnancy weight.
4. Stretch marks?: No new ones! I've started slathering on the body butter after showers in the morning though!
5. Maternity clothes?: I've given in! I bought a couple of pairs of maternity yoga pant things and a couple of Bonds maternity singlets when we were in Melbourne last weekend and have taken to shirking my underwire bras in favour of my super comfortable (but very cleavage revealing) singlets! I'm getting incredibly lazy with my clothes! I've always been big on comfort but this is taking it to another level!
6. Sleep?: Still up and down. Some nights are better than others. I keep waking with pins and needles in my arms!
7. Best moment last week?: Feeling Our Monster's kicks getting stronger... Daddy gets to feel them more and more frequently now!
8. Food cravings?: No food cravings, in fact I'm struggling food apathy again and I'm finding it awfully hard to find things that whet my appetite!
9. Symptoms?: Reflux. :o( And MASSIVE boobs! The man looked like all his Christmases had come at once when the lady at the bra shop in Australia said "Hold on a minute and I'll get you the G cup to try on"!
10. Exercise?: Still doing my yoga twice a week... but I'm toying with the idea of going an extra day or two per week.
11. Gender?: A very wise mummy friend of mine said over the weekend, "If the gender was supposed to be the most important bit then babies wouldn't come out head first". Not a bad theory I reckon!
12. Movement?: Every week it gets more and more although I still think we get more movement in cooler temperatures.
13. Belly button?: Working its way to the surface...
14. What I miss?: Thanks to She, I went on the hunt and found me some pasturised Fetta at the local supermarket, so I'm not missing that any more, but I still miss margaritas and, strangely, cigarettes!
15. Labour signs?: Nope.
16. What I'm looking forward to: Getting some of this work out of the way so I can relax a bit more again!

The bump is looking rather cute rocking out in my maternity pants and singlet!

Pickle Goddess

Some people have claimed recently that i'm nesting, but truth be told I've always gone through fits of homeliness and creativity.

Last week I decided to make pickled cucumbers. Back in September I made pickled cucumbers and chokos (or chayote), and they were delicious. The Man's boss loved them. So knowing that he was coming this week to visit, I decided to make some more pickles and do a bit of a suck up job!
Truth be told, I hoped that by sweetening the deal with pickles, I would miraculously reduce the amount of whinging that goes on when he comes to visit!

So last Monday evening I went to the markets in town and bought some delicious, organically grown cucumbers (the chokos are now out of season), and then I set about working along my pickle production line.

The production line

When I made my last batch of pickles back in September I followed this recipe and I found it very straight forward and easy. The pickles were delicious and they kept for ages in the fridge... In fact I still have a jar from the September batch sitting in the fridge now!

This time, I had trouble finding the recipe that I'd used again (stupid pregnant brain) so I just worked off the top of my head and, surprisingly, came closer to the original recipe than I gave myself credit for at the time!

Last time I used pickling spice from the supermarket, mustard seed, dill, and garlic. This time I used mustard seed, dill, garlic, and onion in varying combinations. I don't like spicy food, but in two of the six jars I also added a chilli from my garden, as I know the boss likes them spicy.

After about an hour of hard labour, cutting, heating and packing, I was left with six glorious jars of pickles (and a fair bit of washing up)!

Yum yum x 6!

For the jars I just used old pasta sauce jars that I had been keeping for just this occasion. I put them through a wash cycle in the dishwasher and filled and sealed them while they were still hot from the washing. Between the lids and the tops of the jar I put two squares of wax paper before tightening the lid, to help give a good seal.

I find that these pickles are delicious on their own, as part of an antipasto platter, on a sandwich, or in a salad (especially in potato salad, where they add a bit of crunch and texture)!

After a week of sitting in the fridge, Mr BossMan cracked open a jar yesterday, and promptly declared them to be "not pickled enough" so they have been left to cure for another while.

I might give them another few days and then crack open a jar myself!