"No slab for you!"

Almost a slab... probably tomorrow it'll happen - fingers crossed anyway - but still quite exciting nonetheless!

And our brand spankin new car! wahoo!

Rain, rain, go away

Popped past the block today as I was in Riddell seeing our Doc. It had just finished pouring with rain so I didn't expect to see anything happening on the block today. But I was wrong, there was a truck there with the timber for boxing in the slab. The builders were sitting in the truck waiting for the rain to ease.

Hopefully we'll have a slab by the end of the week.

Moroccan Roast Vegetable Salad

My friend and I recently tried some salads from a 'fast food salad' shop in one of the food courts at Highpoint.

Oh My!

The two salads that I had for lunch were soooo yummy. I had the Moroccan Roast Vegetable Salad as well as the Pumpkin, Feta and Beetroot Salad.  As soon as When I got home I googled it and found a few different versions of salads with the same name - so I decided to make up my own version and with the hope that it will be as tasty as the one at that I had for lunch.

1 zucchini
1 red capsicum
1 red onion
1 medium sweet potato
1/2 butternut pumpkin
1 parsnip
4 carrots
2 400g cans chick peas (drained and rinsed)

Dressing:
2 tbs Tahini
1 tbs lemon juice
4 tbsp natural yoghurt
1 tsp cumin


Roast Capsicum and Zucchini:
To roast the red capsicum I followed this recipe (as I hadn't roasted either before). Capsicum smells divine after it's roasted and I was sooo tempted to just eat all the capsicum and not put it in the salad at all. Roast zucchini recipe here (but I didn't use the garlic).

Cut other vegetables into bite size chunks and roast at 180.  I like to put a big bit of butter on the vegies when they've got about 15 mins to go and stir it through. Turn up the heat to 220 for the last 5 to 10 mins to get the crispy, yummy caramelised burnt bits. I roasted the red onion (I chopped it up first) for about 15 mins, but you could leave it uncooked.

Dressing:
Mix tahini, lemon juice, cumin and yoghurt together.

Add all vegies to a big salad bowl and add dressing. I only used one can of chickpeas, but next time I'll use two cans and perhaps put some garlic in the dressing too.


It didn't taste like the one I had, but it is still really yummy - I just have to try to wait till it's tea time to eat it.

And now I've joined the ranks of those who blog recipes - bahahahaha

Off I go to do the dishes, and I will try not to eat any more of the salad....

Pipe Dreams

Yay! Pipes are done! Meter box is standing there on the block! Yippee!

Screw Piles

We went up to the block yesterday, and they've put the fence around it as well as putting in the screw piles.

Screw piles have been put in due to the fill that they've put on the estate.  Basically they're big long steel screws that they screw down into the ground into the original ground level to anchor the slab to the ground.

Not sure when the developer is going to put in our right side fence. The real estate agent says that it wasn't done 'due to inclement weather' but they've done most of the fences in the estate - and we've had not many inclement days really. The only fences that haven't been done are the fences where there is a big slope (which there is at the back of our block) - we think that they don't know how they want to do the fence so it's in the too hard basket atm - once the builders fences have been taken away they need to get our fence up.

After we had spent time at our block we wandered around while eating ice-creams. Riddell really is a beautiful town.

The sod has been turned

Hooray! It is finally happening. Building has commenced!

On Tuesday our site scrape was done.

And we're official. We have a builder's sign.

Today it was pegged out for plumbing.

Two and three doors up are ready for slab pour.

World Mental Health Day

Today is World Mental Health Day. 

"Anxiety comes in many forms. Over 2 million Australians are living with it and most don’t realise it. A tight chest, racing heart, questioning everything, confusion and even hot and cold flushes are classic symptoms of anxiety. Australians need to be aware of these symptoms and understand that anxiety is manageable and treatable." Beyond Blue

It's not something you can just snap out of - if only it was that simple... Check out Beyond Blue's website for more details on how you can get help, or how you can help others who are suffering from this silent illness.

take two....

Our site cut is now re-scheduled for the 15th and slab by the end of the month - weather permitting of course - and as long as the bank don't play anymore tricks on us again... here's hoping

Amazed that the porta loo hasn't flown off to Oz in all the wind that we've had over the past few weeks.

The first site cut has happened on the estate a few doors up from us - they're building with Dona Homes. No other signs of building on the estate yet.