Octonaut Kelp Forest Birthday Cake

I love making and decorating cakes, so set myself the task of making a good looking but yummy tasting cake...ie no fondant for my daughter's 3rd birthday party. 

I have nothing wrong with fondant, I've used it before and it makes fabulous cakes. But I hate eating fondant and so do many people I know. I didn't want to be stuck taking home 3/4 of a cake I wasn't going to eat.

I may have cheated slightly and used a premade double sponge cake because I ran out of time with working the 4 days leading up to her party. 

I used a basic butter cream recipe for the icing, and smoothed it with a hot knife. Thank you google for that trick! The boulders were done in a similar method, with added cocoa powder to make the icing brown.

The 'sand' is blitzed up sweet biscuits with a little butter. To stop it falling off the plate, I made a quick sugar syrup and painted it on the plate before topping with the biscuit mixture.

The kelp forest is made from white chocolate, melted and tinted green with food colouring. I piped it onto baking paper using a piping bag and nozzle [a ziplock bag with a small hole cut would do the same thing]. Before it hardened I dropped small silver and blue dragees [aka edible ball bearings] on to some. 

I left it to harden and then peeled them off the paper before pressing into the iced cake. They were rather delicate, with a fair few snapping when I tried putting them on the cake, so make lots of extras!

 A dusting of edible glitter and a few more dragees on the 'sand' completed the cake!

I was very happy to say it was a total success at the party, all I went home with was a plate with glued on biscuit crumbs on it!

Embers Octonauts 3rd Birthday

My darling daughter Ember turned 3 on the 11th and we had an outdoor Octonauts themed party at the beach!

The weather in the morning was a little off looking but by the time we got there, the sun had come out. The wind was also out in force, so not many decorations were put up. Hubby had a brilliant idea of setting up our tent for extra shade, which was used a lot as it got quite hot.

 There was lots of Octonauts and ocean themed food. An Octonaut themed cake. Pizza sea stars, a Gup A fruit salad, octopus dips, kelp pudding, egg laying turtle jellies, octopus frankfurts and of course fairy bread! No party is complete without fairy bread!

We didnt organise any games, as there was a playground, the beach and a park all around us. The kids had a blast just playing around and eating food!

My friend's daughter is learning face painting and did a wonderful job of transforming all the kids into mainly tigers and butterflies! Ember chose to be a tiger. RAWR!

And of course presents to open [and wrapping paper for mum to chase before it blew away!]

Beachcombing and Snapping Shrimp

 The warm sunny days have set in, giving us a whiff of summer during mid spring. Today was especially nice, so down to the beach we headed for some fun!

It was low tide when we got down there, and the beach has lots of rocks. Perfect for beachcombing! 

As all good beachcombers, we made sure to leave all rocks back where they were found and left behind nothing but foot prints. Any living creatures we found, after observing them for short periods, we released back where they came from.

Paul showing Ember some marine worms in the sand

Exploring the rockpools

We found a number of marine shrimp species, even a few large females with eggs!

Little marine shrimp

Female shrimp with eggs hiding in the rocks

Cool looking seaweed/sponge

 We found a few cool and unexpected bits and blobs!

An unidentifiable sea blob! Appears to be alive...

Crabs are always fun to find...

Little crab

 Unfortunately the crab numbers at this beach are rather low, probably from people letting kids cart them off to keep as "pets". We did find a few but no where near as many as you'd expect or that I remember from adventures I went on as a kid at the same beach. It used to be that you could turn over any rock and find one or two under each rock!

Furry crab!

Baby fish!

Lots of little fish get trapped in the shallow pools of water when the tide goes out. We found a lot of juvenile Flathead [or 'Froggies'] and managed to catch a few for a closer look before releasing them again. 

Now you see him!

They have a unique way of hiding, by burrowing under the sand so only their eyes are visible! See if you can spot him in the below photo.

Now you don't!

Our favourite discovery was a couple of Snapping Shrimp. 

I was in one particular rock pool and I heard a snap, which I thought sounded suspiciously like a Snapping Shrimp. Sure enough, after carefully moving a few rocks I found some!

A close up of the Snapping Shrimp

These guys are pretty cool critters! They have one oversized claw, which as they snap creates air bubbles which reaches speeds of up to 97km/h! It's strong enough to knock out and sometimes kill small fish. The pressure wave from the snap is so loud it registers up to 218 decibels. This makes them one of the loudest animals in the ocean. Pretty impressive for a shrimp only about 4-5cm long!

Snapping shrimp. See how large it's snapping claw is?

They also feature on Ember's favourite TV show, the Octonauts, so she was thrilled to meet a creature from the show! 

Ember releasing one of the Snapping Shrimp we caught

We also managed to get a short video of one snapping it's claw. Please excuse all the background noise, Ember wanted to release him! You can hear the audible snap it makes a few times though.

Beachcombing is a fun family beach activity, but please remember don't take any living creatures home. Most places you can't lawfully take anything from the beach and besides they belong in the rock pools for everyone to enjoy! 

Always carefully put rocks back where you found them, as they are the homes of shrimp, crabs and other creatures. The last thing you want to do is crush the inhabitants.

Rainbow Hail

A few months back Adelaide was hit with some pretty awesome storms, which bought with them a fair bit of hail. A fifteen minute hailstorm covered the ground in a thick blanket, turning everything white!

Ember was so excited to see hail for the first time, so we donned some rain coats and went outside! The rain left plenty of puddles to splash around in!

And lots of hail drifts to explore and eat! We collected up a bowl of clean hail and Ember decided it was very much a delicious snack, ate the whole bowl and demanded more!

I also collected up a container full of clean hail and popped it into my freezer, much to the amusement of my family and friends. I had plans for it!

Rainbow hail!

This idea came to me a few years ago after attending a party which had sno cones there. For those who who don't know, sno cones are cups of shaved ice which are drizzled with a coloured flavoured syrup. You then use a spoon to eat the icy confection.

Instead of sugary syrup, I made it slightly more toddler friendly by using food colouring. Obviously hail can only be collected when there is a hail storm, but shaved ice should work just as well.

Be aware this gets very messy VERY quickly! We did it inside, but it would probably be better to do this outside set up on the lawn to avoid staining anything you dont want ruined.

What you need:

• A toddler in old clothes
• A container of hail or shaved ice, packed down lightly and frozen to hold its shape.
• Food colouring*
• Salt [normal preferably but rock salt will work]
• A tray, spoons, little containers
• Paper, white fabric, paper towel
• Jug of water

1. Set the block of hail/shaved ice up on a tray. We put paper and paper towel under ours to contain the mess a little bit.
2. Set up food colourings and other items and anything else you can think of.
3. Let toddler play and explore!

*I used the little pipette food colourings you buy in a pack of four, which I refilled during the activity from larger bottles using a small syringe. This saved wasting too much food colouring.

Salt sprinkled over sections of the ice will make it melt faster than the rest of the ice.

I left Ember to her own devices mainly [just intervening when food colour was at risk of going everywhere], it was fun watching her explore and experiment.

We did some hail paintings using the now very coloured block of hail.

When she finally got bored of it a few hours[!] later, I had a play using some white fabric. I broke coloured sections of hail off and spread it across the fabric, allowing it to melt into a multicoloured pattern.

Food colouring comes off the skin pretty well, although Ember did have a green sole of her foot for a few days. It normally will stain the finger nails/around the nails but within a week it was all gone!

I'm looking forward to the next hail storm to collect more and do it again!

Home Grown Imagination...The Flock!

Welcome to Home Grown Imagination!

Anything goes...learning, gardening, curiosity, soap making, mud pies, sewing, camping, cooking, catching bugs, 4wding, craft, chickens, photography, a bit lot of fur and slobber, a goat and two dogs, plenty of dirt and lots of love!

It has taken me awhile to finally think up a name to combine my multiple and slightly neglected previous blogs and the essence of our family. Boy it was a hard process! I will be combining all my old blog posts here soon too.

Anyway, introductions!

We are a family living in South Australia, craving a simpler life closer to nature in a technology soaked world. Both my husband and I grew up as relatively free range kids and are aiming to raise our daughter similarly. Our goal is to eventually move to an acreage and become self sustainable but at the moment we are stuck in suburbia.

I'm Rachel, aka Ravyk. I'm a qualified vet nurse and student remedial massage therapist amongst other things! I suffer greatly from compulsive creativity and have too many hobbies and not enough space or time for them. Currently my hobbies include, sewing, gardening [veggies], making soap, bath and body products, cooking, photography and I foster wildlife. I have a habit of bringing home strays. I love the outdoors and would much rather be camping under the stars than being in suburbia. I'm a 'magpie' and love hunting op shops, salvage yards and hard rubbish piles for stuff to restore, build, etc.

Paul is my awesome husband! He's runs his own IT business and loves camping, 4wding and everything outdoors. The more remote the better! When he is not fixing someone's computer, he's dreaming up future trips or modifications to his Landcruiser. He would dearly like to relax on the couch most nights, but in reality he's probably being jumped on by Ember! He is very suspicious of any boxes I come home with.

Ember is our amazing daughter. She's a spirited child who loves animals, the outdoors and anything that involves making a mess! Turning three this year, she's definitely a handful and amazes me everyday with her ability to learn and discover the world [also her infinite ability to make a hurricane style mess in approximately 3 minutes]! I am loving exploring and seeing the world in a different way.

Then there is the menagerie. Yeah...this tends to fluctuate a fair bit, with my habit of bring home strays, so I'll list the permanent members for now.

Spot is a cattle dog x that I rescued in Dec 2008 from a pound in the ACT. He's the biggest couch potato in the world and is a notorious bench surfer with a stomach made of cast iron and possibly a black hole. He's eaten a list of stuff as long as my arm. He's afraid of water, although he is much better now. Pat him and he's your friend for life.

Peggie is a terrier x who came to us via my MIL,who got her from a couple travelling around Australia. She loves car trips and camping, nothing like curling up near the campfire! She adores children and playing chase with them. Sticks and balls are no match for her! She chases them down and wrestles them into submission. Any body of water must be lain in, no matter how small or dirty.

Billy or Mahhh as Ember calls him [or McPesty as I do often], is a goat. Yes I have a goat on a suburban block! He was bought into work after being found wandering in suburban streets. After not being able to locate his owner, I kinda kept him. He thinks he is a chicken and sleeps in the coop with them. He's pretty friendly and loves a good scratch behind the horns! He likes to destroy my fruit trees, in particular my mulberry.

My chickens...my flock fluctuates a lot. I keep and breed only heritage breeds due to my love of different colours, patterns, eggs and personalities. I hatch eggs every spring to add to my flock or to sell. Currently I have a number of breeds, French Marans, Araucanas, Wyandottes, Australorps and Light Sussex. They free range everyday and are my bug patrol. They love to poop on the door step for unsupecting Paul to step in!