How to make a cake...

Step one: put all the ingredients on the counter so you can take a photo for your blog.

Step two: Don't notice that you have got the wrong Betty Crocker packet out of your pantry (you have picked up the brownie one instead) and just go ahead and pour the packet into the bowl.
Step three: question why there is brown and white chocolate drops in a cake mix.
Step four: Look at packet and give yourself a mental headslap.
Step five: Get other Betty Crocker packet out of pantry and exclaim how alike they look, and how anyone could get them confused. Betty really should do something to make them not look so alike.
Step six: Decide to write Betty a letter to let her know of your excellent ideas about product packaging.
Step seven: Cook brownies because mix is already in the bowl.
Step eight: Empty right packet into bowl and mix with ingredients you had to forage and put together yourself (ones that didn't come in the packet!!!, perhaps another letter to Betty?) Dear Betty, is it really that hard to put an egg or two in the packet...
Step Nine: talk to sister and mother on the phone while your cake is cooking and get two sets of advice. Sister "take out after 40mins, or at least check cause my oven cooks quicker than says on packet" Mother "don't open oven until the time it says, peeking is not good for cake" Cakes must be shy of their cooking process.
Step Ten: Go with sisters advice. Open oven after 40 mins to discover it is well and truly cooked and well and truly sunken in the middle.

Step eleven: Cry. Say to self "see this is why you don't cook, you are always a failure, even with Betty's help"
Step twelve: devise cunning plan to ice the cake upside down so that the top looks perfect. Also decide to put on sprinkles to distract the eater from the burnt bottom(previously known as burnt top)

Step thirteen: Feel pleased with self at cunning deception.
Step fourteen: Feed to students, who are all very pleased. Then clever Amanda sees through my deceptive ways and says "is this a Betty Crocker cake Miss?"

Dinner from some other world

Last night I went to Logan Brown for dinner. For someone that does not love creating culinary experiences (good or bad ones) I sure do LOVE eating them! It was like I had been transported to some new world last night. One where good, exciting food and flavours are abundant, one where people take pleasure in creating food. I wish I could be like that but you can't change who you are. I tried but my desire to create new dishes was a brief tumultuous affair which only left me more aware of what I was lacking; as did last nights delicious meal.
A side note; the best part of my meal last night was seeing Bennett's face each time a meal was brought out. He exclaimed in wonderment and delight, with eyes as wide as saucers, when they brought us our bread at the start "Has this just been baked?" to which I replied "Yes Bennett, not all bread comes in a plastic bag"

The drama cake or cake drama.

Sometimes you have these moments when you are teaching when you feel like everything is going right. The lesson is going smoothly, you are loving the students(in the good, platonic way), everyone is engaged(even you) and you can actually see the students learning something. My day is not full of moments like this, but this week I feel like it has been heavily swaying this way. I have been so excited by my Year 11 Drama class (they are my undisputed favourites) that I have told them I would make them a cake for class on Monday. What the hell was I thinking!!! I have never baked a cake in my whole 33 years on this earth. I was so pleased with their enthusiasm about their scripted scenes (they are doing parts from Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Nights Dream, A Woman of no Importance, and The Importance of Being Ernest) and their acceptance of doing revision once a week for their Drama exam, that I foolishly said I would make them a Drama cake. The Drama cake is a living, edible metaphor for the Drama techniques, elements, conventions and technologies - which they have to revise for their exam. I think my Drama cake may be such a disaster that it will be a cake drama.

So long holidays...

I am putting off going to bed tonight because that makes it seem like the morning comes quicker. I am only dreading the early morning get up tomorrow, apart from that painful experience I am really looking forward to going back to work tomorrow. Sure I have not done all the work that I should have done in the holidays, sure I will have to drag myself out of bed at 6:50 every morning, sure I will have to eat at set times instead of grazing all day. But I have missed my students and I am really looking forward to seeing them again, and I am really excited about seeing my year 11 Drama class and getting to work with them on their scripted scenes; I am so excited to see what they will do with them because they are an amazingly positive and creative bunch of lovelies (they are also my form class, so I may be a little biased about how lovely they are, you can't help but love your form class)
I also really love the 3 other amazing people in the performing arts department. Sam is amazingly organised, motivated, motivating and inspiring. Renata always sees the positive side of things and makes me want to be a nicer person. Brent is crazy funny and always makes me laugh. I get to sit next to the best people. This is a bit gushy isn't it? I will return to my non gushy self soon, I promise.

Day two of trademen

Today is the day the new fire should be installed. I was woken bright and early by the ringing of the door bell. My goodness, I thought as I jumped out of bed and tried to make my hair presentable, the tradesmen are here well before they said they would arrive! Oh ye of little faith! But never fear fellow readers your faith in tradesmen and their uselessness will soon be restored. It was in fact a delivery man, delivering a package for the tradesmen, who turned up when he said he would and not a minute sooner.
What does one do when tradesmen are working away in your house? (apart from blogging of course) How much small talk does one have to engage in? Does one have to offer tea and cookies like you are a hostess? Or should I just offer to show him where my panty drawer is?

Keeping your undies safe

Today was a very trying day for me. The people who have come to replace our broken fireplace arrived to finally fix it today. Let me start by saying it was an incredible mission to get someone here to replace the fire, tradesmen it seems deserve their reputation for being useless (I won't bore you with a thorough detailing of their uselessness, as that would make this a very long post) Anyway, the told me they would arrive today between 9 and 10 and when they did arrive at 9:58 I guess they were technically correct. I had planned to go out at some point today (leaving my undies to fend for themselves in my drawers against the tradesmen, who we all know, thanks to Target, are prone to a little undie caressing Sitting at home all day is the kind of thing that sends me a little loopy, I become like a caged animal, pacing backwards and forwards with no real purpose in life. Sadly this was not to be. Firstly I had to help the gas/fireman repairer find the gas meter (is that not your job I asked myself? shall I ask him to do a bit of my marking?) Then he told me there was a major leak in my main gas pipe, said with much raised eye brows and sense of dread in voice. "oh dear" I meekly replied. So the rest of the day was dedicated to him fixing the leak in my gas pipe and not the fire. At one point he marched into the house with the removed broken gas pipe to show it to me. "This was your pipe" he said, again with the serious voice and and sense of dread. I think I was meant to apologise for the state of my pipes or something...Anyway the joyus end to this story is that because he spent the day fixing the pipe the fire, which is in parts all over my lounge is not installed and will have to wait until tomorrow...another day of protecting my undies from the undesirable tradesmen...

Lazy

I don't consider myself a particularly lazy person. I am a working, single mother whose house is always clean, so I can't be too bad. However, today I found that I was only getting around to eating my breakfast at 12 noon. Is that the act of a lazy person? I will admit holidays do bring out a certain lazy, can't be bothered attitude in me, is that lazy? or am I simply doing what holidays were designed for? This morning I didn't wake until 9:30; in less than a week that will be during first period (or spell, if you are Wainui inclined) After waking at this lazy hour I spent the next hour and a half reading, still cuddled up under my duvet. I then arose for a leisurely shower, not the rushed kind I have on a school day, and then slowly ate breakfast. All of this may not sound excessively lazy, but to someone that is used to rushing around like a blue arsed fly it feels it. The other small thing that makes me feel like I am being really lazy is that I have a mountain of marking to do. Is it lazy not to do it during the holidays? Is is really a holiday if I have to do work?
Before I leave you to ponder this deep and thought provoking question I will leave you with two things. First, feel free to check out my son's blog which I have only just discovered (it is a secret which I happened upon, it is called okatoONLINE) and here are some pics from my recent holiday...

New Post

I really have been very lazy. Holidays are time for laziness. I have been indulging in utter laziness this week.(and perhaps some past weeks if Richard and Douglas's posts are anything to go by) Next week when I am back in Welly it will be time to indulge in marking and planning...perhaps indulge is not the right word here,more like wallow sadly in marking and planning.
This is going to be the end of my post today as I am sitting in the sun after a day spent at the beach and I am feeling very sleepy...