Because I Want to be Nominated for Mother of the Year.

Well, not really. (And yes, another post to do with 'awards'.)

There have been many a time when I don't actually deserve that award, you can ask Monet herself. ie. No hat and sunnies for child, when out and about some days.

But one reason I deserve the nomination is because I seriously can prepare my daughter with lovely afternoon teas. I try to get her through to dinner time after lunch with a nicely prepared afternoon snack.

A few weeks ago I began making her 'little platters' of some of her favourite things.

I love making platters of food for people to enjoy, I guess it is still part of my 'working life' in me. I used to work for many years, in the deli department of the supermarket chain Safeway. I loved it, well, it would have been the best job if it wasn't for customers. True. One of the main jobs I had was to prepare the platters for customer orders. I guess I have a 'knack' for those things and I got to use my design degree for something *snigger, snigger* Years later I worked in the Bakery Department (even made it to Bakery Manager *woo-hoo*) and made and decorated the customer orders for cakes.

So, I enjoy making platters, which is the reason for this post.

And Monet enjoys eating them.

And I enjoy preparing them.

See, I still have that 'design' element in me, afterall.

An Award

And Melody's 'Dip of The Year' award goes to....

Yumi's brand Sweet Potato and Cashew Dip.

Congratulations.

(It was a toss up between this one and their Sun-dried Tomato and Macadamia, but this one won out in the end!)

Which 'Dip' deserves your 'Dip of The Year' award?

End of an Era

Before we moved up here, the three of us lived in South Melbourne and *loved* it. It was a great suburb and had everything we wanted. Our apartment was close to Lyndon's work place at the time, a 15 minute walk into the city center, opposite the Royal Botanical Gardens, The Shrine, park lands, close to a local shopping strip and the fabulous and famous South Melbourne Market.

It was also close to numerous fabulous pubs.

One of our favourite places to meet our good friends on a Sunday afternoon, was the famous 'Bell Hotel'. I read with sadness today that Billy Bell, the owner, is pouring his last beer tomorrow. I know Lyndon and his mate John will be sad to read of this and want to be there.

(Photo courtesy of The Age website)

They used to brew a few of their own beers on site, but now only one is home brewed. We had some good meals there and downed some refreshing ales. Monet also read a lot of books at this pub, in fact, I think this was one of the first places I had given Monet a 'scrapbook' of collected postcards/photos/pictures i had put together, where it occupied her no end.

Another of the hotels frequented by us in South Melbourne was 'The Railway Hotel' which has been a location for the new Steven Spielberg epic mini-series, which has been filmed both here (Mossman mainly) and Melbourne. It will be a great mini series to watch as we know both locations pretty well. (It won't be shown until 2009 in Australia however...)

South Melbourne is a terrific old suburb, but is only one of many of Melbourne's great suburbs. For me, it rates alongside St. Kilda and Malvern, two suburbs I lived in over the years and loved for my own special reasons.

I remember crying, probably bawling in fact, when we packed up and cleaned our South Melbourne apartment, headed for Cairns. I wasn't crying for the fact that we were moving 'away' to a strange new place and leaving behind family and friends, I think I was crying as we were leaving our life as we knew it, in that great city apartment with the fabulous city views in a terrific suburb.

Do you 'like' where you live?

By George, it's a Gorgeous Gorge...

Last Wednesday Monet and I took Nanna Marianne up to the gorgeous Mossman Gorge, about 60 kilometres (or so) north of here. It is part of the Daintree National Rainforest, so it is nice to know it is protected land because it certainly is one of the most prettiest natural things you will see...

Monet was a tad grumpy (again) but I think it might have something to do with her being too hot and bothered (you have no idea about the humidity up here until you experience it yourself) and she thought she was first going to the playground at Port Douglas. (Mossman is about 10 kilometres past Port Douglas). I spent most of the walking track carrying her (she was refusing to walk) so I swear I would've poured out a kilo of sweat. Urgh.

But I didn't mind. And it seemed Monet didn't either after a while. She cheered up when she spotted a 'Bush Turkey' and got to have a seat with Pickles (the love able bear!)

As we drove out of the car park, well, what do you know, we passed an ice-cream van which was headed to the car park. Always the way. We could have had an ice cream each as it would've been well deserved. Instead we headed to Port Douglas and had one there!

That was after a play in the playground at The Point and lunch at Mango Jam.

Gee life can be hard sometimes can't it? Especially when you return and go for a swim in the pool.

So, when are you coming for a visit?

Drives to Escape the Heat...

Last weekend (not the weekend just been) it was the hottest Cairns day in over 5 years. It was hot. Really hot. Sticky hot. Walk-out-the-front-door-and-can't-breath hot. It explained Monet's constant grumpiness over the weekend. Poor love was pretty hot, even though we spent time in the pool and in air conditioned comfort of Lyndon's work car.

One of the best ways to escape heat is to go touring. So we did.

Saturday we visited Cairns Crystal Cascades, not that we could be bothered walking that far. (There is a 1.5 kilometre walking track to a big water fall, otherwise a 3 kilometre round trip)Monet was being stubborn and refused to walk or participate in anyway. Her "tummy" wanted to go home. She can be funny when she's grumpy. I try to keep my sense of humour in 'trying' times. Can you spot the smirk on Monet's face? Maybe not, but let me tell you that she was one grumpy child. Nanna will vouch for that, I am sure...


The Cairns Crystal Cascades is about a 20 minute drive from our house, through the hills on the outskirts of the city sprawl. The area is very pretty.



Sunday we decided to head to the tablelands, the area behind the mountains which surround Cairns. It was a long drive, we were gone about 6 or 7 hours but at least we escaped the heat as it is always cooler in the tablelands...

Our first stop was to visit the awesome Cathedral Fig Tree, just near Yungaburra. It is hard to photograph so it doesn't look as powerful as it does when you are standing directly in front of it...


And before you ask, Pickles the Bear, came along for the tour.

Lunch was at the strangely quiet old pub at Yungaburra and then we headed to Millaa Millaa Falls, about another 40 kilometres south.

Even though we had visited the falls before it was still as picturesque as I remember.

Pretty spectacular, but I was annoyed by the lady who was wading in the water in front of the Waterfall, which messed up everyone's postcard perfect photo shots. No consideration I tell you. At least I managed a few shots without her torso in the way.

We went home via the Palmerston Highway to Innisvale and back home north to Cairns.

We were home in time to have a dip in the pool and down a couple of 'coldies' before dinnertime.

It was a long day which involved a lot of driving, but it was nice to show Marianne around this part of the world and have air conditioned car comfort. Gotta love that. Nothing like a drive to escape the heat.

Food Glorious Food

If there is one thing Monet, Lyndon and Nanna Marianne have in common, it is food. The three of them 'love' food. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy eating too but I am not generally the type of person who thinks of what they are going to eat next...

Monet is a shocker. She's always asking me for something to eat. She'll have her breakfast and within half an hour she'll be asking for her lunch. And get her and Lyndon together and I'm in trouble. Food, food, food. And when they eat, I don't know where they put it. Me? I eat and it goes straight to my tummy and shows. Typical.

Marianne loves her food too. Not snacks, just meals. But then, I like a good meal too and if I enjoy a meal you can be guaranteed that I'll be talking about it for the next 48 hours. Like I did yesterday, along with Marianne and Lyndon.

Friday evening we visited a new restaurant in Trinity Beach named 'Blue Moon Grill'. It is about 3 months old I guess and I know that every time we've been past it seems to be 'chocha'. There is no indoor eating space - all the tables are outside under large sails, so I wonder how it will go when the 'wet' starts. Anyway, we thought we'd try it out so I booked.

Well, the food was fabulous to say the least. A fabulous menu with lots of tempting meals, all using local fresh and organic produce, with reasonable prices and over 60 bottled beers to choose from! (We love that!) Marianne and I had dessert too which were called Banana Spring Rolls, and talk about delicious!

We ate very well last week, including going to the Novotel in Palm Cove twice for Buffet Breakfast (which we got for local rates - just about half price), Thai takeaway twice (our local is THAT good), lovely fish and chips from the guy up the road, Italian from Lunico's at Trinity Beach which was yummy, lunch at Port Douglas and lunch at Mondo's in Cairns. There Marianne and I had one of these each...

How tasty does that look? Mexican Fajitas.

It is nice to eat well for a week and not use the kitchen! As much as I do honestly enjoying cooking I guess it is equally as enjoyable not to use the kitchen too.

What was the last lovely meal you had? (Mine was grilled Spanish Mackerel on a bed of asparagus risotto served with a cucumber and pineapple salsa on the side! Delicious.)

Until Next Time...

Monet and I dropped Nanna off at the airport a little over an hour ago, after her 8 day stay.

All I can say is 'Thank God!'...HA! Only kidding!!! As if I would say that about Monet's lovely Nanna.

We had a great time with Marianne and I know she had a great time with us, well, at least that is what she said. I bet she'll be glad to go home and not watch Kid's television and not have to read books out loud to her Grandchild! She'll also be glad to get away from this heat and humidity which began late last week. (You seriously have no idea!)

We did a bit of touring around, a bit of shopping (Esprit in Cairns Central will miss Marianne dearly), swam in the pool most days and ate heaps, which meant I didn't cook at all as we ate out most nights or ate Thai takeaway!

Monet didn't want Nanna to leave which honestly breaks your heart to see a little one who doesn't understand such concepts of 'visiting'. She wasn't happy taking Nanna to the airport (Lyndon is at work so it was I who had the task of dropping Nanna off) and she kept saying on the way home that she wanted Nanna to stay. I solved the problem by stopping and buying a Chocolate Freddo Frog and Dora Drink. Monet liked that. But now I have just heard her say that she wants Nanna here.

Marianne, thanks for a great 8 days. We had your company and spoiling us! You will be missed and not just by Monet...

FLASH!

I might as well have slept with the light on last night. Our room was constantly lit by the lightening outside that zig-zagged across the night sky.

It started around 8pm, was going full flash by 10pm and still going strong at midnight. I have no idea when the lightening stopped, but I do remember waking briefly and thinking "its still going!"

It went for a good five hours. Five hours! Only a few rumbles of thunder but so much light flashing, it was amazing. But it is the norm up here with storms.

The first week we moved to Cairns we had a thunder (or should that be lightening?) storm that lasted over eight hours. EIGHT HOURS! We couldn't believe it. And its not just a zig-zag flash...wait 30 secondes....BOOM, (like in Victoria for exapmle) but rather flash,flash,flash,flash...flash,flash,flash.

Tropical storms. Gotta love 'em.