New Canvases For May

May.

This month, as well as embossing my canvases, I have been incorporating paper cut-out words into a lot of my work. I like the effect.

My favourite new additions for May are these little square canvases. You can purchase them as one canvas with a personalised name on it, or as a pair of decorated canvases in matching colours. Or mix and match.

Pop over to my Madeit and Etsy stores to see the details for each canvas as they are listed.

Two Years On Etsy

On 26 May 2011, 'kaetoo' Canvas Photo Boards joined Etsy. It wasn't actually until early June that I started listing items for sale, but in my head May is still 'kaetoo's Etsy birthday.

Hurrah!

In celebration of 'kaetoo's 2nd birthday, I'm running a 10% off sale. Click this link to pop over to the Etsy store and at checkout simply enter the coupon code BIRTHDAY2013 for 10% off non-clearance stock (that stuff is already on sale). This applies to any custom orders taken through the Etsy store before 1 June as well.

Enjoy.

Weekly Recipe: Bombay-inspired Fish

The Dory fillets that I bought at the market this week were much larger than I thought, so they made two meals instead of one. For the second meal, I made a Bombay-inspired dinner. I marinated the fish overnight in 2 garlic cloves, 1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric, a couple of cloves, 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon, 1 tablespoon tamarind pulp and a tin of coconut milk overnight. The next day I threw in some chopped mushrooms and gently cooked the curry in a frying pan for about 5 minutes, breaking up the fish as it cooked with a spoon.

For sides I cooked basmatic rice, sprinkled a little dessicated coconut on bananas, microwaved a few poppadoms, stirred plain yoghurt through cucumber, and steamed vegetables (yeah, they don't really fit...).

  

Throw it all together with some lime and some mango chutney and there you are. Delicious!

Toddler Play: Shop in the Park

Parks often have a little window and door arrangement and we play shop at these. It's a great place for pretend play and I pay the girls in tanbark pieces. I love the insight into their minds that I get when they are the shop keeper.

Me: "Hello. What is in your shop today?"
Miss 2: "Cake!"
Me: "Oh yum, what kind of cake?"
Miss 2: "Chocolate cake!"
Me: "Great, can I please have a piece? How much?"
Miss 2: "Two monies."

Me: "Hello. What does your shop sell?"
Miss 2.5: "Soap!"
Me: "Lovely. I'll be so clean. Can I please have some? How much?"
Miss 2.5: "Five."

This continues for some time. Miss 2.5 is the more practical one. Miss 2 has a one track mind...

Me: "Hello. What can I buy from your shop?"
Miss 2: "Cake!"
... Miss 2.5: "City!"...
... Miss 2: "Cake!"...
... Miss 2.5: "Safety!"...
... Miss 2: "Cake!"...
... Miss 2.5: "Butter!"...
... Miss 2: "Cake!"...
... Miss 2.5: "Carrots!"...
... Miss 2: "Cake!"...
... Miss 2.5: "Mummy Kate sized clothes."...

Weekly recipe: Potato and herb bread

My sister gave me a breadmaker for my 30th birthday and I haven't looked back. We make all our own bread now, as well as pizza dough and hot cross buns (so far). But earlier this year, that breadmaker broke, so we purchased a new one and have been busy getting to know it. Over the years, I've learned that you have to be very careful to weigh out the ingredients carefully on scales and that humidity has a big effect on bread quality - it's a fine line before you get a rubbish loaf. The extensive recipe book that came with this new breadmaker has been so reliable that I haven't wanted to get too creative. But today I made the first loaf of bread that wasn't directly from the book - a potato and herb loaf.

This is the kind of breadmaker where you add the dry ingredients first (the opposite from our old one), so I started by adding the 1 1/2 teaspoons of yeast, 520 g of flour (oh gluten, where would I be without you?), 2 teaspoons of salt, 1 1/2 tablespoons of milk powder and 20 g of butter (the old machine didn't suggest using butter, but the results are much softer).

I picked 3 tablespoons of chives and thyme from the garden and cut them up and then also added 1/2 a cup of boiled potato chunks.

Next was 340 g of water (yeah, I weigh my water. Short of stealing a measuring cylinder from work, this is the most accurate way of getting the right amount.) and then GO!

Our breadmaker takes about 4 hours, which includes a resting period at the beginning, then the kneading , rising and baking.

Lunch for me! Worked out well.

Toddler Play: Colour Hunt Activity

A great way to learn colour is a hunt activity. Miss 2 and Miss 2.5 have spent a few weeks now finding items around the house according to a colour theme. The game is cheap and mess free, the only hassle being putting everything away afterwards.

I choose a colour for the day and the girls hunt around the house for items of that colour, which they put in the laundry basket. Of course, not all the orange articles, for example, will be the same shade, so there's lots of learning going on. Favourite hunt spots are the play room, Miss 2's bedroom, the kitchen and the bathroom.

  

We negotiate about items that have a little bit of the target colour on them, but are predominately another colour. The game could be extended out to other senses, such as things that are soft, rough, shiny, or smell nice.

Weekly recipe: Beef and mandarin

I went to the market on the weekend and bought salty duck eggs. Love them! I was excited to cook a stir fry with them and excited to post the recipe here. Unfortunately, when I was peeling them I came to the realisation that they were just regular duck eggs and the lady had given me the wrong thing. What a let down. So instead, here is a recipe for beef and mandarin.

Cut up some dried mandarin skin (about 2 teaspoons full) from the local Asian dried food shop (mine is in Box Hill) and rehydrate it in some warm water.

Marinate around 300 g beef strips with 2 teaspoons soy sauce, 2 teaspoons Chinese cooking wine, 1 teaspoon chopped ginger and 1 teaspoon sesame oil for around 15 minutes.

Cut up lots of vegetables or used tinned Asian vegetables. For this effort, I used fresh beans, carrot, red capsicum and mushroom and tinned bamboo shoots and water chestnuts. Cook the meat in a hot wok with a little peanut oil until it changes colour.

Then throw in your veggies and cook them, hard ones first for a few minutes, then the softer ones.

Add a shake of white pepper, the mandarin peel (or leave it until the end if your husband is intolerant of orange fruit, like mine!), 2 teaspoons of soy sauce and a little sugar. Make up a third of a cup of stock and dissolve a little cornflour in it, then add that to the stir fry as well to thicken the sauce.

And serve with noodles. Yummo.