I'll bake a cake soon, promise...

It's been a long time, I'll admit it. Life in our household has been pretty hectic, but what's new!

We have had a house guest for a few weeks, Anton's sister the lovely Ema and we have been busy, busy, busy.  There's been trips to the beach, the park, into town (RWC don't ya know), out to the burbs for coffee at the Kohu road factory (you should visit here- just not on a Sunday or a public holiday - we've tried both and it was closed!!!), numerous donuts from the bakery up the road, Kelly Tarltons, the zoo and more-PHEW! Is it any wonder i've been absent from the blogosphere and missing from the kitchen??

That being said, Christmas is around the corner and that can only mean lots and lots of baking.  This year i'm going to hone my baking skills and get Harriet to help me with the decorative elements- she's so talented in that department. So don't give up on me, from now on i promise there'll be one baking post per week.

But not till next week.  Till then, here's some photos to keep you entertained... (As if the photo at the top wasn't entertaining enough!)

Turns out Juno is a big fan of the beach, we couldn't keep her out of the sand...

Self portrait of the Birthday girl's foot, sporting a brand new sandal

Baby sister getting amongst the birthday balloons...

Working on my Kate Sylvester wishlist, with sartorial advice from the four year old...

Return of the Mac

Actually, it's just me..It's school holidays...we're doing a lot of watching...Smurfs..Charlie and the Chocolate Factory...more Smurfs...and Season 4 of Gilmore Girls! Fantastic. I know I haven't posted in about a month and there's been a lot of stuff happening, although shamefully not anything very adventurous on the baking front. There has been lots of food though..and lots of birthdays, a prizegiving, an overseas holiday...so I'll just give you a few pictures to blend that month into a nice little montage.

Manly yo-yoes

Mila cooking in her playhouse

Kate's birthday chocolate pie with white chocolate apricot truffles...a bit rough looking

Red velvet cupcakes with mint chocolate cake pops for James' friend's 9th birthday

My birthday shoes

Birthday breakfast

three geeky girls

Birthday lunch

Birthday dinner...

Prizegiving at the League Club

Found a picture of my cousin Matthew...

James' airport breakfast

Lunch in Darling Harbour

M.I.A

I've been woefully absent lately i know.  I don't really have a good excuse, just general laziness after work, and, to be truthful, i've been a bit on the apathetic-side when it comes to baking.  I'm trying to lose the last of my post-baby weight and cakes and biscuits are not helping my cause!  That's not to say i haven't been baking them though....

Above is a pic of the chocolate date cake and lemon yoghurt cake i made for the boys at work. I've also made them a batch of chocolate chippies, which seem to have been the most popular so far.  Tomorrow it's my birthday so i'm taking in gingerbread cupcakes with a caramel frosting and some chocolate crunch.  The gingerbread recipe is one of Harriet's- 'moist spicy gingerbread' and it's really good. The caramel frosting is kind of like russian fudge- yum yum (goodbye diet)  The chocolate crunch is my grannie's recipe and is one of my go-to baking items.  Sometimes i think Mila and Anton would be happy if they never had to see another piece of crunch ever again but its just so easy and forgiving to bake and it's the one thing i always seem to have the ingredients for, so i'm always in favour of baking it!

In other exciting news.. my friend Viv gave birth to a gorgeous wee baby boy on the 16th- Luca Waller.  He's a real cutey, you can definitely tell he's a boy, in fact i think he looks exactly like his dad. He's smaller than both my girls were at birth so i felt a bit nervous about holding him at first- it's unnerving having somebody else's life in your hands. And he's quite a jerky fella too- wee little arms and legs moving all over the place.

I don't have much else to report- that's the problem with working all week, it really interferes with your social life!

Below is my life over the past few weeks in iPhone photos- thank you work phone for documenting my boring life :-)  Has anyone out there been up to anything noteworthy?

Kate xx