Friday, December 28, 2012

Tee-hee-hee


 
Let's just say, life is sweeeeeet....

Sunday, December 9, 2012

Ooops....

 
Twinkling Star
 
So. I made a pledge to write every month without fail. Ah well, I failed. Here's to Christmas and Santa chocolate spoons and bars and mugs full of fun. Mahlimae toys and water colours. Margie Kirk's Tiger-Tiger designs and a really cute Christmas tree from my back paddock.
 
 Old Poppa's Cupboard

 
Chocolate Spoons & Oviearth skin care
 
 
Underneath your Christmas Tree....

Monday, September 17, 2012

The gifts that keep on giving

My Lucky Man
 
For gifts for special occasions, we like our gifts to be useful. Throughout the year I tally the number certain things mentioned as being 'nice', 'handy' and especially if they get an 'ooohhh', then whatever gets to the most mentions wins. We seem to have refined our methods these days and baby we've been doing well.
For years, birthdays, Christmas and Mothers' Day, I would get a cook book and a CD, regardless of what suggestions I had made, subtly disguised as general observations. It took me a while to realise that my disguises were a bit too subtle. But I've got to say, I do have an amazing array of cookbooks and we have a mightily impressive CD collection. So now I always have lots of music to listen to while cooking a myriad of dishes, most recently using the Fathers' Day tagine and our new beaut paella dish, both purchased at our fantastic fruit and veg shop, Cygnet Larder. Love that shop.
 
 YUM!!!

 
And now we find ourselves heading towards Christmas, so my closing word to this blog is
 
hammock

Friday, August 10, 2012

Voice Crushes

A friend on Facebook listed an article about Bjork & David Attenborough and whether the pairing would work or not & it go me to thinking... My mum and I both like Bjork and many years ago we discovered we both had voice crushes on Sir David. When she was a kiddy, she would run home for school every Wednesday to catch Sir David's latest adventures on the wireless.
And so the story goes on, I have voice crushes on Sir David, Pierre Van Dorme (can't spell his name, but he's a French friend of David's who has the same deep throated accent as Daniel Auteuil, oooh, I just have a whopping all-encompassing crush on him. mmmmmm.....)
Back to the voices, then we have Rob Snarski from the Blackeyed Susans, well, just take a moment to listen to this
http://youtu.be/5L2PZTsB_dk

And last, but definitely not least, Peter Gee, News Reader Extraordinaire,with moments in the car when the news comes on and I say, "a bit of shoosh, Peter's on." "Ahh mum!"

We have entered the Hobart Fine Food awards for the past few years and each year at the awards dinner, Peter is there. I get to listen to him for hours and then wrap my arms around him for a quick cuddle & photo opportunity. This year we won't be able to make it. My mum and dad's 50th anniversary is on in Sydney, which is very exciting, but it means we will miss out on Peter. But here's to you!




(Cygneture will be closed from Saturday, August 11 to Thursday, August 23rd)

Monday, July 9, 2012

And the Winner is....

Woo-hoo! We have not just one winner, but TWO!!
Very pleased, this weekend I lost a follower, which brought me to 12, interesting play on getting me off the dreaded 13, not one I was expecting mind you. But we then gained two new followers. Yippeeee!!!! Ed & Jeanette, I can drop them up to the next market if you like, or just come in for a cup of tea sometime, and Melissa, please come in when you're ready. We're open Thursday to Sunday.

By the way, last Saturday we had the best Salamanca market since Easter. Coincidence? I think not!!! A warning for both of you, I'm not a regular writer, although I am improving and I would think the person who dropped me probably thought the blog was just downright boring.......

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

upping the ante

Alright, make it an origin bar and an SHP (salted caramel). Just get me off this number. I'm gettin' desperate!

Monday, July 2, 2012

Very superstitious

Those of you who know me well enough, know that I'm very superstitious. I currently have 13 registered followers on this blog, can someone get me off it pleeeeasssee???? First up gets a Cygneture origin bar. Pick-up only, so Kitty Lynch, Carmel Burke, Edward Ward, Danielle Klinge and all your foreign friends & associates and all of my foreign  my friends and associates, you are exempt unless you turn up on my door. Please take this as a loving invitation to turn up on my door any time you like.

Also, Edward, you have a significant package developing in your lovely wife, so a significant package is developing over here to celebrate too, with musical notes and pink booties for girls & little sailing ships for boys (actually, either way the bub will gets both just to ensure non-gender-snootiness)
Ms. Lynch, you'll get what's coming to you, when I get my act together. It's the perfect time for posting to Europe, north of France at least. It's cold & wintry here and summer over there. As I said, perfect for posting...

Speaking of winter's chilly fingers reaching out for us, we had the Lantern Parade here to celebrate the pagan side of Cygnet



Snowman (obviously)

 Crowds gather
(good time to catch up with people you only get to see at Christmas Parade and Lantern Festival)

 Ceremonial Teapot


Ceremonial Teapot on Fire



My little man and his mates


A MASSIVE THANK YOU to the Cygnet Arts Community for another great parade this year. Yet another reason I LOVE LIVING RIGHT HERE

Thursday, June 21, 2012

For Karen

Special request on photographs for Karen









Sunday, June 3, 2012

Winter, websites and good intentions

We've been busy little bees these last weeks, David has started a Cygneture Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/Cygneture-Chocolates/318099721599927 
and we have been working on our website. Hopefully we'll finish the draft this week and send it off to our trusty friend, Richard Mitchell from Jump Shots, to update for us.

Salty Sea

The past two weeks have been taken up with making salted caramels for the Bruny Island Cheese Club offer. Nikki excelled and David lovingly folded boxes. Thank you, you two.

The delivery will take place tomorrow, while on our way to Cradle Mountain for a few days. Good Fun to be had by us. We'll be heading up with friends, to meet more friends, my kind of holiday. We have packed plenty of goodies collected at Cygnet Market today, Ed & Jeanette's pork pie, Cathy's almond shortbread and Cam's date & hazelnut loaf. No Sunday bubbles for us tonight, we're having an AFD, saving up for tomorrow night. 


My Thoughtful Spot

Our garden is looking lovely at the moment, thanks to a long warm summer & autumn, and to Alex Sini who has been helping us to reclaim our plants and flowers. It is again a lovely place to be. Our house faces east so the sun comes up over our pretty front porch, where we sit and have endless cups of tea in the morning.

In the afternoons and evenings we retire to the back of the house and change our beverage selection to bubbles, beer, wine or cider, depending on who is visiting at the time. Lately we've been having a few mini bonfires to welcome in the cooler evenings while we listen to the footy teams training down the road and the cattle lowing up the hill. Tomorrow night we will be listening for possums and wombats. I hope. Now to the kitchen, dinner is needed for two over-excited little cherubs.



Mmmm...my resolve is weak....

And so we realise that I have little or no will power, but really it is over-rated, isn't it...

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Eggstremely good fun

Magic Mini Mouse at MoMa
After an eggstremely egghausting Easter, we come to the end of another eggstraordinary eggsperience, that being MoMa. it was a pleasure being involved with this one.
From the delightful staff, the amazing produce of the stall holders and the crazy Mini Mouse tents with matching beanbags, how can you go wrong in such a place.
Mark W Eather's Chirashizushi

Rhu Bru

Thanks to the market we are now playing around with Rhu Bru concentrate in caramels and have started making Frogmore Creek Ruby Port Origin Bars for Meadowbank Winery in the Coal Valley, with some pinot skin experimentation happening as we speak. Stay tuned for updates on success versus failure... in fairness we never really fail, we just change our minds to suit the result.


Fun in the Sun at MoMa

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Special Easter Request

Photo 1: Mushroom Glade, these come in a little box with large and small mushroom & mini eggs
Photo 2: Comes in a variety of sizes, according to the jars.
Photo 3: Comes in alcoholic & non-alcoholic
Photo 4: Large with 2 fried eggs, small comes with 1 fried egg
To the lovely people I met at MoMa last week, here are the photos, I should have taken your details, sorry! These are all available at shop & MoMa this weekend. Please call on 0408970440 if you would like to reserve any.

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Thing Two

Box by Eirlysa Lawrence

And so. And so...We have our lovely new boxes, originally desinged by Richard Mitchell at Jumpshots in Hobart and sketched by Eirlysa Lawrence from Cobweb Designs in Cygnet. Printed by Flying Colours in Launceston. We have managed to keep it Tasmanian and rid ourselves of the burden of plastic inserts and gloss finishes. Now when you're finished enjoying our chocolates, you can use the box to light your next winter fire or take out the insert and give it to your 7-year-old, if you are lucky enough to have one, so he can store his Pokemon cards in it. Perfect sizes and everyone is happy.
As such, our boxes now come in sizes 6, 10 & 18.

Monday, February 27, 2012

Exciting new things for our Shop

Thing One
The chocolate stork is bringing two exciting new things
We like these two things, Thing One & Thing Two
The first is Zokoko which will arrive this week
The second, our boxes all sparkly and new
I went to Zokoko in Emu Plains in Sydney last October with the hope of stocking their chocolate bars and other products in Cygneture. We made a decision to get past summer, to avoid the heat. I would have had it delivered last week but thought better of chancing delivery before our hot weekend and oooh, I think Zokoko (the goddess of chocolate) was on my side with 38 degrees each day!
A little bit of Zokoko:
Zokoko makes chocolate from cacao bean to chocolate bar. They work directly with growers to import the finest quality beans and use vintage, artisan equipment and traditional methods to roast, mix and mould the chocolates in small batches.
A little bit from me:
YUM! Worth waiting for and worth coming back for, again and again and again and again and.....
As for Thing Two, that's coming!

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Are you glad you came?

January, an interesting time of year for me.
It all started back in 1975, January 31st. I was born.
I arrived in Sydney 20 years ago today. A week later was my first day in an Australian school. I caught my first wave on a boogie board that afternoon and three years later, I started dating my husband (late January). I started my last job in Sydney, that I really enjoyed, in January & left in January, 5 years later. I left because I moved to Cygnet, yes, again, in January, on the 18th. I took over the lease of our shop in January last year. So here I find myself, 20 years after stepping off the plane, with two beautiful children, a lovely man on my arm & happy as can be.
Every year my mother asks me, 'are you glad you came?' This morning in my driveway, I messaged my sister with , 'are you glad you came?' From the time it took me to drive from my house to the post office, I got a message from hubby saying, "Kitty (mum) just rang to ask, 'are you glad you came?'" & in between I'd rung her to ask the same question & she told me how she had just rung my sister to ask her the same question & her reply was, "I was just thinking about that. 'Twas a momentous occasion. We left Ireland in -2 degrees and arrived in Sydney to 36 degrees. Am I glad I came?
Oh yes.

Monday, January 2, 2012

Sunday, January 1, 2012

happy new year

Resolutions begin
end of day one
1. give my daughter a new bed. Check. She's been sleeping on a fold out couch for about 6 months. Now she's in a purple paradise.
2. spend more time with the kids & less time at the shop. Spent all day at home today, first day in 3 weeks. Check. (At least until this weekend when we get hit with the Cygnet Folk Festival)
3. don't twitter while drinking. Check. Easy, I'll just blog instead & watch Rana take a few more wickets. You beauty. He's done it again
4. find out if Rana's married
5. if Rana is married, find out if Brett Geeves is. He's pretty funny.
6. remember I'm already married
7. and that my husband's a pretty nice guy
8. and the kids are just lovely too