Matcha

Last week, the final week of the holidays, I did a lot of marking (I'm not finished yet). To keep me going I had to do some baking and eating. I have been looking for matcha (Japanese green tea) in Wagga without success so made sure I remembered to buy some in Sydney. I made white chocolate and matcha cake and matcha shortbread, pictured above. The cake was unspectacular and, I think, less than the sum of its parts. It tasted perfectly nice but I couldn't taste the matcha. The shortbread, on the other hand, was delicious. I also made some matcha and white chocolate friands to take to our church's Big Day Out and they were also scrumptious, with just the right amount of green tea flavour. The green tea custards I made with the five left over egg yolks were not good.

On Saturday we drove out of town towards Narrandera, following a map to Bulgary Station. I had no idea what Bulgary Station was, except the chosen venue for what is kind of like a church camp except that we don't stay overnight. Bulgary turned out to be an amalgamation of farms owned by an American corporation and leased by some friends at church who farm it. The house looked like it was from Out of Africa.

I forgot to take photos inside but it is very grand. Marble bathrooms, extremely high ceilings, doors and windows from floor to ceiling and wide open spaces. There were around fifty of us there and we weren't crowded. John Rowse, a missionary in Tanzania, taught us about God's grace and the kids had their own programme, out in the guest accomodation. After lunch the boys (of all ages) played cricket. Andrew took a brilliant catch but I wasn't watching because we were sensibly sitting in the shade, chatting.

It was such a great day. It is always lovely to have a day to spend time with members of all three congregations - we were all there from tiny babies to the opposite end of the spectrum.

Monday was my first day back at work but turned out to be far more complicated than I could have imagined. I was due to go to another State Library seminar, this time on seniors, but Andrew also had to be in Sydney for work. I ended up spending all afternoon after church on Sunday packing school bags, uniforms, writing lunch orders and packing PJs and toothbrushes (OK, I forgot Toby's toothbrush), before driving the children to three different places to stay the night. Thankfully, in the absence of family, we have lovely friends who took a child overnight and dropped them to school. After school Narelle picked up her four children and our three for a very busy afternoon and evening until we arrived home from Sydney around 8.30.

After that very long day I got up early again this morning, rode my bike into work and was showered and ready to leave for Albury by 7.55am. Tomorrow, for the first time in weeks, I'll actually go to my library.

Several years ago, through Tricia's blog, I came across a lovely blog written in France. Linda is an American, married to a Frenchman, living in Paris and Provence. She takes delightful, whimsical, beautiful photos of magical places and I do so enjoy visiting France via her blog. She has a giveaway at the moment making her blog especially worth a visit. Happy blog anniverday Linda, keep up the good work!