Hanging out with the kids
So why was I so busy last weekend? We had Jac’s niece and nephew, Savannah and Max, over for the afternoon and a sleepover. We spent most of the time playing Wii Sport tennis and de Blob. If you have a Wii, you really should check out de Blob – it’s a fantastic relatively new game (see the official de Blob site here, and links to reviews here). It’s currently my favourite game – the music is jazzy and funky, and I can’t describe how wonderful it feels jumping around as “de Blob”, exploring the huge levels, painting everything in sight in vibrant colours and psychedelic patterns. If I only had the time, I’d be playing it for hours and hours. Well, the kids and I did play for hours and hours last weekend. Max got very excited and kept edging closer and closer to the telly – especially during tennis, all swinging and lunging – in the end, Jac stuck a piece of masking tape on the floor as a marker: “Get back behind the line, Max!” :)
While the kids and I played, Jac was busy in the kitchen getting dinner ready. We started with this platter of fruit (strawberries and oranges), vegetables (green beans, mushrooms, cucumber and baby roma tomatoes), cheddar cheese and dill pickles.
Jac set up our Simpsons hot dog maker so we could have hot dogs for dinner. We bought this on special from Target sometime ago. It steams the wieners very effectively (there’s a matching yellow lid that encloses the wieners in the steam – not pictured), but the metal rods don’t get hot quickly enough to heat the buns through – and when they do get hot, they aren’t very hot at all. The bun in this photo is purely for display purposes only. :)
Jac and I had two hot dogs each; Savannah and Max had one each. These were my two: one just with tomato sauce, the other with mustard and tomato sauce. The last time I featured hot dogs, Ryan left a comment about eating ketchup (we call it tomato sauce over here! :)) on hot dogs being a “cardinal sin”. Well, most people here in Australia wouldn’t hesitate to eat their hot dogs with tomato sauce – but have a read of this forum discussion if you’re interested in the “controversy”.
For dessert, we had vanilla ice cream with strawberries and hot caramel sauce. Jac bought the caramel sauce on her recent trip to Margaret River. You microwave it until it gets hot and gooey – you can then pour it over whatever you like. It was fantastic – we all enjoyed it. The slight tartness of the strawberries was perfect with the sweet, fudgey sauce. After all the playing and all the eating, the kids slept soundly through the night, which was pretty much the plan. ;-)
On Sunday morning, Jac fried bacon and eggs for breakfast, and we ate toast with strawberry jam and Vegemite (not together! Though I do have a friend who eats toast spread with butter, strawberry jam and Vegemite all together). After showers and a few more rounds on the Wii, it was time for Jac to drive the kids home. It was a fun and delicious weekend.
