The Modern Housewife

I had a light bulb moment this morning, mummy needs to book in "Me time". My light bulb moment occurred as I was about to have a shower and I realised that my leg and underarm hair was nearly a groomeable length. The leg hair I could handle, I mean after all it is winter. But the underarm hair, I actually screamed and jumped back with shock. OK to much information you're thinking, agreed but I needed you to realise that when you are a mum sometimes the simplest of things fail to get done. The problem is, that on the lengthy list of things to do each day kids are first priority, Hubby second priority (what he has the ability to take care of himself). The house is the third priority and Mummy is the last priority. On the majority of days mummy gets jumped off the list to another day (aka just dropped off the list altogether). Why does this happen? Mothers these days are highly educated intelligent people who have temporarily dropped their careers to take care of their...

I just made the yummiest soup using veggies from the garden and whatever was in the fridge. Minestrone is the perfect soup to keep people healthy and warm in these cold days of winter. Now I am not normally a fan of Minestrone soup but after watching food TV and looking at the good old Edmonds recipe book I attempted to make one. This is what I did and yummo, it was exactly what my sick body felt like. Ingredients: Some oil to fry onions etc in 1 large onion 2 cloves garlic 1 leek 3 small funny looking carrots (ok so my carrots have not grown very big in the garden this year) 2 large potatoes Half a cup cabbage cut thinly 4 leaves of Silverbeet 1 tin of beans, any but just not baked beans (well you could try but not sure how that one would work) 1 tin of tomatoes Chicken stock ( or if you are like me and don't have any, a couple of packets of maggi onion soup etc) What to do: Chop up all of the vegetables. Fry the onion and garlic, in oil or butter ...

How do you feel when you see a child that is all snoty with a cold at kindy, music or other activities? Do you take your children out when they are sick? In the past I have always hermitised my daughter and I when either of us is sick. As I don't like going out and getting other people sick. Especially because my daughter is super cuddly and kissy with other kids and I would hate to have her smear her snot all over another child's face. I on the other hand don't really mind if other children are slightly sick at kids activities etc but do mind when they are fully, green snot hanging out of their nose, sick. With my second child having arrive in January I am now in somewhat of a conundrum . I now realise that with two children there is a huge likely hood that at least one of us will have a snotty nose at any given time during the winter. So the question is; to go out or not to go out? Having been in solitary confinement (ok trio confinement) for the past 2 weeks w...

Ever since I got into this environmental kick I have been looking for alternatives to cleaning and beauty products available today. Ok I am no environmentalist by any means. I like to think of myself as a suburban environmentalist, I mean I care, but not enough to pull a muscle over it or anything. When I first started getting all environmental, I tried all of the new "Green" products in the supermarket and health stores, trying to do my bit. Yes they were good but also very expensive, often more so than the normal products available . At that same time I was listening to a talk back radio show with Shannon Lush  a cleaning guru. She was my hero, she could get stains out of anything and mostly using trusty Baking Soda and Vinegar. This started off my "what can I do with Baking Soda" kick. I tried using Baking Soda a lot of different ways and eliminated the ones that just didn't work for me. Three years later I am still using my favourites to clean, shine and d...

I remember on long road trips my parents would give us the "back in my day" speech and tell us how it was when they were young. They described that there was no TV and when they did get TV it was only in black and white for a long time. "Wow no TV" we used to say but how did you survive, what did you fill your days with. This got me thinking, what will I tell my children in my "back in my day" talk, what has changed over the years since I was young. I realised that it is going to be a dam big talk over multiple road trips, as so much has changed. They are going to think we are sooooo old when I tell them that when I was little not only were there no cell phones our phones didn't have buttons on them and when it rang we didn't just pick it up, we had to wait to see if it was our ring, as we were on a party line. If we called a business, there would be no automated voice telling us what to press or say, we actually got a real person on the line a...

I have fond memories of all the dinner parties my parents used to host. Preparing food days in advance, the whole family pulling together to get the already spotless house clean and tidy. The best crockery was brought out and cleaned. The silver was shinned up until you could see your face in it. Tables were placed together in order to squeeze 12 or more people in. The nicest table clothes were pulled out along with their matching napkins (no paper napkins in sight). My job was to set the table with the best of everything. Now was the time to test my knowledge on which piece of cutlery goes were and in which order. Crystal wine glasses were pulled out of the display cabinet, I tell you it was a magical time. Once the guests had arrived and kids had been shown off we were all shuffled off to a separate room with our chippies and TV. These dinner parties weren’t just a slapped together meal, it was often a four course meal. With soup for a starter, always rich and creamy. My favourite ...

Environmental rant of the month.... How things have changed. In my parents generation if something broke you got your trusty screwdriver out and fixed it, or if you really had to admit defeat you took it to someone to get fixed. These days if something breaks you merely throw it in the rubbish and buy a brand new, WAY better, one. In the process filling landfills and messing with the environment. Back in the day you could buy quality goods that real people had made with materials that normal people can tinker with and fix. For example my parent’s fridge lasted, if I remember rightly, 27 years (pretty sure that one was replaced on their 27th wedding anniversary and not because it was broken). One of their original pot sets has lasted years, and to prove that point I have now inherited it and it is brilliant. I remember at my granddad's house, his teapot handle fell off so what did he do, he screwed a goat horn onto it and it lasted the rest of his life. In my mum’s day, when you...

Namaste Yes this is my new thing, some of you may think it’s weird, what a choice and why. Well to explain it, my husband is Fijian Indian and his whole family speak Hindi. My husband understands it and speaks a little but mainly smart arse Hindi. So my reasons are that I want our kids to understand and speak Hindi, as I want them to retain their culture. More importantly I want to make sure that when Hubby’s family is talking in Hindi that they are not talking about me. Quite often I am at family events (with older family members that don’t speak English) and I try to look like I am listening but....... after 2 hours of trying to listen to a language you don’t understand I am sure the best of you would tune out. So I start watching Hindi television, which to be honest is pretty dam good, again, I just wish I could understand it. My mother in law is very good at explaining things to me, but still I struggle. I spent many hours learning from CD’s a few years ago, when we owned a...

Today I decided to do something with my life. Not that I haven't done something with my life already. As I have two wonderful kids and a lovely husband, a great house and basically everything I need. But now that the kids are giving me time to think, breath or whatever..... I think I should do more than be a business analyst. I mean what the hell is a business analyst anyway its just a name given to any job that doesn't actually have an exciting job title, like astronaut, biochemical engineer, exotic dancer you know the ones. So I decided that I need to find a new niche. Something that I am good at, something that is my special talent. Now usually with a special talent you don't have to go looking for it, its just there. Like a friend of mine is a great sewer and has created her own business sewing groovy little kids clothes. Another friend creates websites and does a dam good job of it. A lot of other friends are teachers which I consider the ultimate calling. I tried that...