Adventures In Brewing

well, goddamn me, where has the time gone? i think facebook is sucking the life out of me. Plus i am being busy with my now 3 weekly jaunts to the gym and some general lazing about to be fitted in. still, i am working on the backlog of exciting mundanity in the bustle of ilarwill and maclean

so here we are over a month ago now, james has a new toy for father's day. i bought him a brew kit to satify his yen for flat warm english beer (let's see how that pans out when the temperatures ramp up to 40, hitting 35 regularly at mo). He got going on it eventually, with over-enthusiastic help from our daughter. i was able to source a kit for english beer and the pack contained also recipes for brands of beer.
however, james reckoned that with the first brew, prudence was the safer course and just went with the generic english bitter.

Caitlin took over really early on and has since been enquiring when her beer will be ready....










the whole process was relatively straightforward, especially if you are only taking photos of the moment. the majority of the mixing up took place in the bathroom, leaving a lingering odour of hops with some brief forays in to the kitchen for reasons i forget now. then the cask was put into the shed to work its magic....

unfortunately, just after this, we endured a surprise cold snap so after a few days of scratchy head, beard tugging, we (ok, james) lugged the cask back inside where it made a fetching addition to the living room, right next to the wood stove. gave the farmhouse that extra touch of class we both felt.

Zara has recently built a big deck out back so obviously we had to christen it...her dad, Dale, showed up with some fresh prawns so Z and I sat outside with pink champagne. On Dale's advice, James trotted home and collected a beer to sample (this being about a week or so after it was bottled from the cask) and we all had a try. the opinion was 'green, but good' so James is looking further ahead and is now preparing himself to have a go at some more complicated recipes....

Father's Day, Aussie Style

Just to get it clear straight off, that is NOT James fishing.


Mik has recently bought himself a Ute and Zara for father's day (which is the first Sunday in Sept here) had bought him a pass to all the National Parks. They decided to make the most of this and planned to go the Black Rocks beach, just south of Evans Head, in the national park of Bundjalung. and they invited us to come along, which we duly accepted.

it was a bone jangling ride through the park once we turned off the highway onto the unsealed road, leading to a drawn out conversation along the way about the 'necessity' of buying a Ute for ourselves.

we had arranged to meet them there as we had not got off to such a quick start as them in the morning, distracted by a cooked brekkie. it was therefore with just a little trepdation that we kept driving for about half hour along this unsealed track with Caitlin adding to the joy by asking every 5 seconds if we were there yet.

eventually though we arrived at the barbecue area they had described, with the hippies milling about after a party that they had also described. we parked up and made our way over the sand dunes and were happy to spot Zara's large green bag she had left in conspicuous spot to reassure us that we were on the right trail. the tide was just going out, so we made our way over the black rocks (coffee rock) to a lovely little sheltered spot next to rock pools and staked our place there. we were, i'd like to point out, the only ones to be seen on that stretch of beach.

we all got into the water, with occasional glances back at the kids to make sure they hadn't been swept away or fallen off the rocks in a climbing misadventure. the waves were pretty fast, esp for an inexperienced midget like myself and i gloriously managed to be 'dumped' by a wave just by trying to jump over it!! i think i swallowed a copious amount of salt water on the way which created interesting tummy feelings!

james had a hoot on the boogie board as you can see!

we had a nice wander up the beach and i loved being able to look back along the expanse of beach and only see our 3 sets of footprints snaking back to our camp.


hunger soon set in and we collected up belongings and kids and returned to the barbecue area to cook up yet more suasages whilst the 3 children ran about collecting a variety of bumps,bruises and cuts. reluctant to let the day end here, we all agreed to meet back at Maclean and hit the dirt trail again...luckily more peaceful as Caitlin was worn out!












we rendezvoused with Mik and Zara at the river side (Phil joined us for a beer too as he had popped by to drop off a crate of ale for James) where we sank a couple of beers and watched the sun set over the river.

then it was off back home, to relax on the sofas, feeling warmed through to the bones by the day and full of sunshine and fresh air.

the whole album is here

First Day of Spring

after a hard day's shopping for furniture in Coffs Harbour on the Friday, we decided to push ourselves even further with a hard day on the beach on Saturday...





Zara and i were at the gym by 8.30, window shopping in surf shops in Yamba by 9.30 and collecting various husbands and broods by 11 to go to Broomshead Back Beach. we took it pretty easy, the water was still a bit nippy and only james was staunch enough to go in the water to get his boogie board wet. when he was out there, a guy passing us on the beach told us of a pod of dolphins where james was boogie boarding. we waited to see if james would spot the fins and panic. luckily james' extreme myopia saved him from making a tit out of himself like i would undoubtedly have in the same situation.

after tearing ourselves away, we went up to the park at Broomshead and let the kids play on the swings etc, and fired up the coin operated barbecue. james trotted across the road to the store and came back with some beer that we just HAD to drink (it was only 2.8% but very nice with it too,it's a bit of fave these days)



then it was the long trek home for a lingering beer on the deck as the sun set and the kids bounced themselves silly on the trampoline.

after Zara, jacob and matilda left, poor ole caitlin had to console herself with snuggling up next to mummy, cuddling Boo and watching Dr Who

all in all. a truly awful day.