Smell the roses

The garden is a place that you feel close to God. It is great to have an established front garden even if there isn't anything around the back. When we moved in things were a little overgrown so I did a LOT of pruning especially on the roses. Unfortunately the first crop of flowers was eaten by Japanese beetles but our second crop is yielding many flowers. Last week I cut 12 roses and yesterday another 7 with more to come. They smell awesome but don't last more than a few days once picked.

17 days to go

Product of the week - Butter boy

In the food world Andrew has three weaknesses: sugar, salt and butter. Whilst some of you may think that sugar is his greatest weaknesss I think that butter takes the top honour. So when I saw Butter Boy at Bed, Bath and Beyond I couldn't resist buying him. The butter here comes in sticks (113.4g or 4oz or 8 US tablespoons or 1/2 US cup) which is very convenient for cooking. The stick of butter goes into butter boy's torso, his head comes off and then you rub the butter onto your corn cob (or whatever).

Wet weekend

Well it has been a wet few days but it hasn't been raining. Rather we have been swimming every day! Thursday saw us at mom's group for an afternoon swim in the babies pool at Marsh Oaks. Friday we headed over to Leland to visit Mary Lou for lunch and have a swim in her pool (complete with fountains and spa). Saturday we headed to Wrightsville beach to make sand castles and swim in the Atantic which was then followed by a play in the sprinkler with Ava in the afternoon.

On a social front we had a pizza dinner with Darryl & Margaret and a hamburger lunch with Dean & Debbie (with Brianna, Braidyn and Bryn). We also got some gardening done on Friday where we put in some path lights at the front of the house and Andrew worked on the sound desk at church for a few hours. It is the exact same model as the sound desk at Hurstville! We need a rest.

Go the Hawks!

Given all the strange American things we are encountering sometimes I forget that Australian things can be weird too. Take for example this funky tshirt I bought at Genki in Melbourne. It says 'I love footy'. In Australia I used to get the question 'what kind of footy do you like?' but when I wear it here everyone asks me 'what is footy?' And sadly no one much cares when I tell them it means football. Thanks to mum and dad I have been able to keep up with the latest footy news and even watch a Hawthorn game on DVD.

23 days to go

Product of the week - Cheerwine

In North Carolina Cheerwine (the cherry different soft drink) is supposed to be more popular than pepsi to a factor of 10-1 and its been around since 1917. So on that basis we bought a 12 pack that was on special at the supermarket to test it out. What is it? Cheerwine is cherry soda and called cheerwine on the same basis that ginger beer is called 'beer' ie it is not alcoholic. However the taste is something to behold - pretty much artificial cherry medicine flavour and not something you want to take more than a sip or two of. It states on the can "artificial wild cherry and other natural flavours". How can it claim 'other' natural flavours? The ingredients list is scary: carbonated water, high fructose corn syrup, caramel colour, phosphoric acid, natural and artifical flavours, caffeine, citric acid, sodium benzoate, red. So next time we have a party we'll be pulling out this carton but I think only native North Carolinians will be cracking open a can.