Our Christmas Washing Machine Trauma or How to Nearly Burn Your House Down

  By Helen | February 21, 2012 - 4:44 pm | Casa Costello, Children, Family, Miscellaneous 1 Comment
washing machine repairs

If there was one thing that I never thought my middle daughter would be frightened of it was the washing machine. Violet is hardly a nervous child and lives every moment with huge energy and excitement. She is game for anything but an incident 2 days before Christmas last year has had a huge effect on her. Our washing machine had been steadily getting louder and louder for a couple of months. It started quite gradually but before I knew it, I was thinking twice before putting a wash on when I knew I was going to be working in the kitchen – our machine is kept in the utility room but even so, you couldn’t hear yourself think when it was on. Because the machine was still washing clothes well enough, we didn’t do anything about it. Looking back now, we really should have looked into adding having our washing machine repaired to our pre-Christmas to do list. We were going away between Christmas and New Year so wanted to keep on top of all the party clothes being washed – anyone who has had 3 young children will understand how you rely on your machine. 3 loads a more »

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Idealo Pancake Day Challenge – Pink Pancakes

  By Helen | February 21, 2012 - 6:43 am | Children, Recipes 2 Comments
Heart shaped pink pancakes

Violet is a little bit famous on our playground for her love of pancakes – I’m not exaggerating when I say at least twice a week she comes running out of school to beg me for pancakes for tea – this is all year round, not just around Shrove Tuesday. When I was asked a while ago to take part in the Idealo Pancake Day Challenge then, there was no thinking to be done. The challenge is between a group of bloggers to come up with the most interesting way of having pancakes. Idealo even sent me a fabulous Le Creuset Crepe Pan with which to practice – I never even knew such a thing existed! I will admit that we are a bit conventional when it comes to our fillings for pancakes – yep, its good old sugar and lime juice for us. Occasionally we do go a bit wild though and throw in some Nutella! I make pancakes so often though that I do try to make them look a bit different – if only to make it a bit more interesting for me stood by the stove! This week we have been trying pink pancakes in different more »

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Baby T’s 1st Birthday

  By Helen | February 20, 2012 - 6:36 am | Casa Costello, Children, Family, Parenting, Tara 7 Comments
Tara ONE blog size

Warning: Completely soppy post. I’m going to come out with all the cliches here and say that I can’t believe its been a year already since we met Baby T and what a fantastic year it has been, but who cares? Its true. Life with 3 children has been tough this year but I’m proud that we have managed to enjoy it and every day we are grateful for our 3 beauties. Tara arrived a tiny, perfect little bundle (on her Daddy’s birthday) and is still really petite. She is the fastest crawler I’ve ever seen which means up to now she has no interest in learning to walk. She has always been a placid child, which is still the case – its a good job, she gets taken EVERYWHERE! She is learning how to use her voice though which is brilliant. The most fascinating thing about our year has been watching the 3 girls love each other – Millie and Violet have been amazing. I have not seen one moment of jealousy for the attention Tara has received and they are still constantly wanting to play with her and cuddle her. Every visitor notices how often M & V more »

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Very Hungry Caterpillar Cake – Cake of the Week

  By Helen | February 19, 2012 - 7:01 am | Aardvark Cakes, Birthday Cake, Cake, Cake of the Week, Cakes, Children, Children's Cakes, Family, Novelty Cake, Tara 3 Comments
Very Hungry Caterpillar Cake

There was no choice to be made about what would be Cake of the Week this week – Baby T is One and this is her cake. A Very Hungry Caterpillar cake. It is an absolute miracle that there is any semblance of a cake as this week has been so busy – Why do I always have my babies during school holidays?? Tara’s birthday isn’t actually until tomorrow so I will save the overly emotional mummy post until then (Just wait until you see the picture lined up for tomorrow’s post though!) We are having Tara’s birthday party later today and once again I may have ‘slightly’ over catered. I even went to the lengths of ordering a Costco cake to be on the safe side – When I saw that they have a caterpillar design I just HAD to get it – I even got Dermot’s name put on there too as it is his 34th birthday tomorrow too. I got help doing the board for the caterpillar cake from Millie and my Mum – Its definitely a cake design that everyone can get involved in! Anyway, hope you like it – I’m off to bed to prepare more »

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Tuesdays with Dorie/Baking with Julia – White Loaves

  By Helen | February 7, 2012 - 12:05 am | Aardvark Cakes, Baking, Baking with Julia, Tuesdays with Dorie 34 Comments
White homemade bread

There’s a new baking group in town across the world and it start today. Old readers of mine may remember years ago that I used to join in with the Tuesdays with Dorie baking group. I learnt loads from the few recipes that I joined in with but business and babies meant that I couldn’t keep involved every week. We are starting afresh with a new book – Baking with Julia and we have a new recipe to follow every 2 weeks. I’m going to do my best to stick with this one – there are loads of recipes in the book that I’d like to crack. Some of them seem complicated, some of them a real challenge but all of them look yummy (and a teeny bit fattening too!) Our first challenge seemed like a nice introduction – White Loaves … until I remembered I have NO luck baking bread. I don’t own a bread machine but think after this attempt I need to acquire one. The bread smells and tastes lovely but is as heavy as a wet house brick – It did improve a LOT with toasting and lashings of butter (I seem to have gone all Enid more »

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Tots100 Book Club: The American Wife – Curtis Sittenfeld

  By Helen | February 6, 2012 - 6:37 am | Book review Leave a comment
Screen Shot 2012-02-06 at 09.54.58

You can’t beat getting into a good book – that feeling when you finish a fabulous yarn and wish you were still in the middle of it, is like a mild grief. I’m certain most readers have experienced seeing someone reading one of their favourite reads and wishing they hadn’t read that book yet. My love of reading takes me back to my early teens when I used to stay awake until the early hours, reading secretly by the light of the street light through my blinds – I was always so grateful that we didn’t live a couple of houses further up the road where they didn’t have a street light. I try to read a variety of genres but seem to lean towards realistic stories and biographies – Like a lot of people, I occasionally feel I’ve got into a rut with what I’m reading. This happened about 7 years ago and I joined a local library book group – I’ve never looked back. I’ve been asked by the Tots100 to recommend my favourite book to another reader – no problem there. I choose The American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld. This book was a real surprise for me more »

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Bakers Pantry – 15 chances to win a month’s worth of biscuits

  By Helen | February 5, 2012 - 10:52 pm | Family, Uncategorized Leave a comment
bakers pantry logo

We love biscuits in this house – truly we do. Its sad how long we can spend discussing our favourite of the moment. My essential item in my hospital bag when I had both Violet and Tara was a pack of digestives! I have been asked to tell you about a new competition run by Bakers Pantry who supply biscuits to your home. There are 15 chances over the course of this week to win a month’s subscription of biscuits. All you have to do is click here Of course, I couldn’t tell you about this fabulous competition without having sampled a selection of the biscuits on offer so Bakers Pantry kindly sent over a box for us to try – that was a surprise when I answered the door to the postman – better than a bill any day! We received seven different types of biscuit which honestly all looked delicious – the types you tend to eat when you are on holiday in a posh hotel. We’ve not eaten them all yet but so far the favourite has been the Chocolate Chip and Cherry Cookies which come in a lovely tin – perfect for a coffee morning with more »

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Animal Print Cake – Cake of the Week

  By Helen | February 5, 2012 - 9:06 pm | Aardvark Cakes, Birthday Cake, Cake, Cake of the Week, Cakes 1 Comment
animal print cake

Not sure what exactly to call this cake – I’m thinking its animal print icing but is it a zebra or a tiger? I had completely free reign on this cake – I suggested red and black as Vicky’s sister tells me that she isn’t very girly so pink wouldn’t do. We decided on a star explosion but the rest was a surprise. I really wanted to do a funky board so was really pleased how it turned out – obviously it had the obligatory bling with the black stripes being sparkly. I had a really good catch up with Gina, Vicky’s sister who used to look after Vi at nursery – Good job she is used to kids – mine were WILD that morning! Last week’s Cake of the Week had a fabulous response – There was a real cutie from Real Suburban Mummy eating her chocolate cake and an entry from Mary Oxendine introducing us to her recipe blog. There was an amazing Twix cake from Jackie Marum which bowled me over -I hope Jackie doesn’t mind me putting a link to her photo up. So what have you been up to this week – I’ve currently got more »

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Cheeky Monkey Creme Egg Creature – Valentine’s Gift

  By Helen | February 1, 2012 - 7:08 pm | Aardvark Cakes, Cake, Crafts, Gifts 11 Comments
Cheeky Monkey Creme Egg Creature

A cheery little fellow and a new addition to the Creme Egg Creatures range. My daughter despairs that you can see the creme egg but I quite like showing what he is made of. We have had several discussions about whether his ears should be on top of his head or at the side – I won with the side. Available giftwrapped for a cheeky Valentines gift!

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Me Right Now – The Gallery

  By Helen | February 1, 2012 - 12:08 pm | The Gallery 7 Comments
A lazy morning in bed

Yes I’m in bed. It’s 9.02 and we’ve been up what feels like a million times in the night with various children. None of them ill but not asleep either. I do know that I haven’t had 2 solid hours of sleep together so when the school lot have left I’ve crawled back to bed. Baby T is now awake though so up I am for the rest of the day, hoping tonight is one of those blissful nights where I don’t move, speak or think for 8 solid hours. For Tara Cain’s Gallery we’ve been asked to send a pic of what we were doing when we read the prompt of ‘Me Right Now’ – so here you go! You didn’t think I’d actually show a photo of me in bed did you?

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