Dog Training

Suki was a little bemused at being tied up and "taught" to shake hands. Which seems to involve her letting Ginger Rose pick up a paw and wave it around. But so long as there was food involved, she was happy.

It got seriously cute when Ginger Rose started teaching The Little Prince the fine art of dog training. This involves holding onto the dog treats not spreading them over the ground.

Suki didn't mind at all. And has now been trained to sit and eat from the children's hands.

Crochet

With the colder days, it's time to play with craft again! Briar Rose crocheted and decorated this cute "doll" for The Last Baby.

It's very soft and he clearly enjoys playing with it.

Tonight she started work on a crocheted bag.

And I started work on a crocheted blankie for The Last Baby :).

Rescuing the lamb

How cute is this? Ginger Rose has just learnt how to climb this tree and has just loved playing out a variety of scenarios that require her to "rescue" the lamb (out on a limb to the right).

This scenario ended with her climbing down and knocking the lamb out of the tree with a broom.

Autumn Earthbox

After a hiatus while Lachie was growing and newborn, I'm ready to start growing food again! I've planted up the Earthbox with some winter seedlings - broccoli, cauliflower and brussel sprouts.

There are still some potatoes, onions and spring onions left from last season.

We are intending to landscape the garden extensively, so I'm concentrating on container gardening. Hence chives in a slightly too small pot.

Chocolate Aubergine Cake

FIL has been growing aubergine. We've been using them in bolognaise sauce, but couldn't resist trying this fantastic cake recipe from the drooling vegetable:

Chocolate Heartache Cake
Ingredients
400g aubergines
300 dark chocolate
50g cocoa powder
60g ground almonds
3 eggs
200g runny honey
2tsp baking pwoder
1/2 tsp salt
Cook the aubgerines in a covered bowl in the microwave for 8 mins. Drain and skin them and puree the squishy stuff. Add the chocolate to the warm aubergine and drool while it melts. Whisk everything else up in a different bowl. Add the chocolate-and-aubergine mixture to this and mix well.
Pour it all into a 23cm diameter cake tin (ideally loose-bottomed) and bake in the oven (180c / 350f / gas mark 4) for 30 minutes. Let it cool in the tin for 15 mins and then stick it on a cake rack. Eat.

It was divine! A little undercooked in the middle - next time I'll use a slower oven for longer - but still delicious.

Pictured above with the standard Thermomix mud cake that only the Ginger Ninja really enjoys. I bake a large one every so often and freeze it for school lunch boxes.

And the dough tasted as good as the cake.