SPRING is in the air - Kings Park Wildflower Festival 2011

It´s the 1st of September and the start of Spring in Australia.

The weather is warmer, the flowers are starting to bloom...

In Perth, Australia´s largest wildflower show,  the Wildflower Festival begins at Kings Park and Botanic Gardens, and runs until the 28th of September.

The Festival is a great opportunity to see wildflowers in bloom, to buy native plants, to join free guided walks, to listen to free music concerts, to meet artists, to hear talks from horticulturists, to learn about the art of tree pruning, propagating plants or how to care for your grass, to learn about the birds in the park...

There is something for everyone, so get yourself to Kings Park and enjoy a family day out.

For those not in Australia, Kings Park in a 4 square kilometre (over 1000 acre) park located on the edge of Perth´s central business district. It´s a mixture of grassed parkland, botanical gardens and natural bush.

Because it´s situated on a hill you have a panoramic view of the Swan River and the Darling range mountains, as well as of Perth´s city centre. It has over 300 native plants and over 80 species of birds and well as plants from various other countries.

It´s the largest inner city park in the world, larger than New York´s Central Park which is 3,41Km2.

It numbers over five million visitors a year, being one of the most popular destinations in Western Australia.

So come visit!! You will be pleasantly surprised.

Here are some photos to whet your appetite!!

Wildflowers

Green Kangaroo Paws

Feeding the ducks 

Duck family

River Swan behind me

The city  centre as seen from Kings Park

The happiest refugee - a book

I just finished reading a very inspiring book called - The happiest refugee - written by Anh Do, a well known comedian in Australia. 

The book is about Anh´s life story from the moment when at the age of 2 he stepped aboard a wooden boat -  9mt long by 2,5mt wide - carrying 40 people to flee Vietnam after the war.
On their 5 day trip, they were twice raided by pirates who stole their food, jewellery and boat engines. They were eventually rescued by a merchant German ship who delivered them to a Malaysian refugee camp.
In 1980 his family was taken in by Australia under the Refugee plan.
His Dad thinking that they were going to Austria, had previously been collecting warm clothes and blankets at the refugee camp, and they were quite surprised with the 30ºC heat when landing in Sydney.

He always had a survival spirit in him, and at the age of 14 he started breeding tropical fish to sell and help his family. Later he had great success selling American-Indian artifacts at craft markets.
Wanting to earn a lot of money to help his mother, brother and sister (his Dad had in the meantime left them), he studied for a Law degree, and at the same time studied for an Arts degree.
When offered a job in a law firm which required a 65 hour a week working schedule, he decided to do stand-up comedy for a few hours a week instead, as he never really liked the competitive nature of the people who practiced law. So he had to work very hard and do a lot of gigs, to earn the sort of money he needed to buy his Mom the house he promised to buy her.
In conjunction with his brother Khoa Do, who is a film director and professional speaker, he has starred in some of his movies, was named Comedian of the year in 1999, has taken part in various TV comedy shows, came in second place on "Dancing with the Stars" and does a lot of motivational speaking engagements.

The book touches on everything:  from war, pirates, courage, language difficulties, racism, alcoholism, divorce, comedy, tragedy, hope and love. One minute it makes you laugh, the next minute you have tears in your eyes. The funniest part of the book for me was at his engagement party, when his whole family show up at his fiancee´s house, who lived in a very rich Sydney suburb. His Mother and uncles are carrying the traditional Vietnamese barbecued pig, but when they see the size of the house, his Mother panics and wants to go and buy an even bigger pig, as the metre long pig is surely not big enough to impress the future in-laws.
She feared that the bride´s parents would think that Ahn and his family weren´t rich enough to take care of their daughter in the manner she was accustomed to.
Another funny moment is when they have to slice up the pig and the Vietnamese women cannot find a meat cleaver in the kitchen cupboards. Having tried various knifes unsuccessfully, they look for a heavy object to force the knife through and settle on a frozen chicken for that.

Their dad´s motto was "There´s now and there´s too late" and that´s how Ahn has lived his life.
Have you read a book that has inspired you?

Footnote: Anh´s brother Khoa was named "Young Australian of the year" in 2005 for his leadership, compassion and will to inspire Australians on issues that affect the community. He is very involved with under-privileged youngsters, especially in the Vietnamese community in Sydney.

Daffodil Day

This year marks the 25th year Daffodil day is celebrated in Australia. It´s a national fundraising event to help cancer research, prevention and support services.
This year Daffodil Day aims to raise $9,5 million across Australia, with over ten thousand volunteers raising money through the sale of daffodil pins, pens and key rings.

At the GP clinic where I work, we also had a little box with things to sell which the Cancer Council had sent us a couple of weeks ago. One of my colleagues, Emily had the lovely idea of baking mini cupcakes with yellow icing, which we had on the counter. Patients could have one and most of them made a small donation to the Cancer Council. It´s a good initiative and easy to participate and of course we had a different day, brightening the waiting room with our yellow clothes and yellow balloons.

I wonder if this initiative is celebrated in other parts of the world?
Don't you think it´s a lovely idea?

Emily and I wearing our yellow clothes

Emily´s mini-cupcakes

Box of pins, pens and key rings for sale

THE LIEBSTER BLOG AWARD

I had a nice surprise when I checked my blog this afternoon on my return from work.                                       Piglet in Portugal , a recent blogging friend, had awarded me the LIEBSTER AWARD.

                                                   Thank you Piglet for the lovely thought 

The Liebster award (“Liebster” is the German word for friend or love) originated in Germany.
The aim of the award is to bring more attention to blogs with fewer than 200 followers, that people think deserve some additional attention.  

These are the rules in accepting this award.
1. Show your thanks to the blogger who gave you the award by linking back to them.
2. Reveal your top 5 picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
3. Post the award on your blog.
4. Bask in the love from the most supportive people on the Internet – other writers.
5. And best of all – have fun and spread the karma!
6. Right click on the award image and save it to your hard-drive and then upload it to your blog.
 Don’t forget to add it to your sidebar….


The easy part is accepting the award the difficult part is choosing 5 other bloggers to pass the award on to.
So please pass it on to the next 5 deserving bloggers!!

1 -  http://withoutcomplexities.blogspot.com/   - a blog about an American in Cape Town, South Africa

Lovely Light

2 - http://emaleecrochet.blogspot.com/     Emily, a young crochet fanatic from Perth, Australia.



3 - http://www.imbusyprocrastinating.com  -    Hollie, blogs about her ideas and projects in home decor blog



4 - http://whosayscoeliacs.com/    - Debs shares her experience with living and working with coeliac disease and shares Gluten free recipes. 


5 - http://www.amandaalessi.com/       - Amanda is a young designer from Perth who I met when we both did our blogging course.


 

Panacota with Rhubarb Compote

As per the previous post - On my mind - weekend renovations, this Sunday our friend Tony came around to help hubby with the laundry plumbing.

While they toiled away, I started preparing lunch and close to lunchtime our son  Michael went to get our friend´s wife to join us for lunch.

I made stuffed chicken breasts (a Jamie Oliver recipe that I had recently seen on TV) ,white rice and Eggplant Parmigiana.

For dessert we had Panacota with stewed rhubarb, Gluten free Apple cake, and an Almond cake brought by our guest.

(forgot to take pic of the whole pudding in serving bowl)

Here is the Panacota recipe as everyone loves it.
(Recipe given to me by my sister in law Grace).
Below is the recipe for the Rhubarb compote.

 Ingredients:

 800ml low fat fresh cream

 250ml milk

 90 gr sugar

 1 teaspoon coffee essence (I usually use vanilla essence)

 1 tablespoon Philadelphia cheese (or cream cheese)

 100 gr white chocolate

 4 teaspoons powdered gelatin

 Boil the cream with the milk and add the coffee essence and sugar.

 Remove from the heat and stir in the broken pieces of chocolate, making sure it dissolves well.

 If it doesn´t put the pan over very low heat for a couple of minutes until it´s all dissolved.

 Out of the heat add the gelatine that has been previously dissolved in half a cup of cold water.

 Stir well and pour into a pretty serving bowl and let cool before putting in the fridge to set for 

 about 4 hours before serving.

 When serving pour over the warm Rhubarb compote.

 (You could also make a topping using 100gr of frozen berries, three spoons of sugar, 
  bring to boil and pour over dessert).

                                             _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 

 RHUBARB COMPOTE

 3 stalks of rhubarb cut into small pieces

 1/2 cup sugar

 2 teaspoons mixed spice 

 1 teaspoon cinnamon

 3 tablespoon sugar, extra

 Put rhubarb and sugar in a small pot and cover with water. Cook over medium heat for 

 about 10 minutes or until tender. Take from heat and stir in the mixed spice and cinnamon 

 and the extra sugar. Spoon over the Panacota while still warm.

Enjoy it!!