in the middle of our street

I love that song, when I hear it and I think of my husband and all that he loves.

I think of all the kids whom I have feed at my table over the last eleven years and I think I am that mother in that song. I want to leave good memories, I want all those whom pass through my home to feel cosy and warm. My place has that feel even if it's not always that way when we are just the six of us. There is shouting, there are endless timeouts, there are battles over food, there is bickering and goings off to the garage to get away from each other. But ultimately it always comes back to glow.

I live at number 8. It's not a wonderful house: Its weatherboards clad and the tiles are three deep. I don't the have a picket fence and beautiful light-filled rooms with gleaming floorboards, or the minimalist cube extension, nothing that I see in Inside Out magazine.

I live in an OK rental house which we pay too much for. At present it has too many issues to even list. I will not have anything better than this place any time soon, prices in Melbourne are ridiculous.

Previously we were always able to move somewhere a little better than where we'd been before. Prior to living here we lived at number 10, right next door, with the white picket fence and gleaming floorboard. It was cute, it was great for us.

We had to move when our third born was about six weeks old. My landlord was moving in, I remember crying when she called. I was breastfeeding with the phone in the crook my of neck and I just cried and cried. Partly because we had to move from the cute place, but more because we had to leave the street. The landlord was brilliant, though, she gave us so much time and latitude she knew it was going to be difficult for us with such a tiny baby.

Then the house next door came up for rent and we knew the place well before the old owners had sold: We'd had working bees to break up concrete, we'd helped re-plant the front with natives, there had been multiple sleep-overs, our kids were sleeping in the bunk beds that the number eight kids had outgrown. We also knew about its problems. Even though it was more than we were paying for a better place we thought well lets try to get it, we wouldn't have to move out of our wonderful street and we would be spared huge moving costs. The space is larger (we were trying to be positive) but has some pitfalls, it's difficult to clean and has more than a few problems, a couple of major ones which the real estate would later just pretend didn't exist.

So I am still on this street and have been for ten years now. I love that kids can travel between houses, that we take kids off the others hands, that we are there for each other in good times and bad. They ride bikes together have water fights and jump on the communal trampoline, we older folks eat and drink and laugh and cry together.

The newish kids at number nine held a lemonade stand recently to raise the funds for a LEGO purchasing co-op with our kids. It was a lovely afternoon and the kids were thrilled to have made $10. My commie husband was also thrilled by their initiative.

This to me is community this is the sort of place we all ought to live in. I don't necessarily want a better house I want my neighbors to come with me if I ever have to move out. They are my community and my network, and I love them.

my party with a 20's twist: part two, food

useful purchases (plus a tart), by ines brenneman.

I love everything about cooking for a party.

I love the shopping for your ingredients, especially if it involves something I've never used before,like smoked paprika, gold leaf, and saffron. In this case I even needed a paella pan. The wonderful Spanish deli I went to had an enormous one, it would feed a hundred, imagine that.

I love the books I accumulate along the way with sticky notes and pages of recipes and the plans I scrawl out over endless cups of tea. The friends that sit around with you and listen to your ideas, the way they try and reign your ideas back a little, they keep reminding you that the aim is that you have fun. The same friends that come around the night before to prep with you.

I loved most of all the communal cooking. It felt very Like Water for Chocolate.

We had corn-chip crusted crab cakes with lime and mango mojo, sticky pine nuts and artichoke, gazpatcho (which so looked like vomit I couldn't serve it), fire-roasted peppers with caramelised onion and goats cheese quesadillas, manchego (this sheep's cheese was so good, my husband would not stop making "love ewe" jokes) served with membrillo quince paste, belinis, empanadas (these were beyond good, it took two people to keep Aaron off them), and of course paella.

Oh, and of course, the cake! It was a chocolate almond from Julia Childs, with chocolate butter icing.

Did I go to far?

musk (1 of 2)

glorious decay, by various brennemans.

We were away this weekend.

We hadn't been away, even for a night, since Circe was born. She's eighteen months old, I think we really needed to get outdoors. And we especially needed to have Circe see the wide open spaces, smell the crisp country air, and to sleep somewhere other than her own cot.

We were invited out to Musk,a small town just outside Daylesford, by our neighbour. We'd been there before a couple of times(each time with the new-season's spanking baby in tow) when there had been a house to stay in.

Because now there wasn't. The neighbours had shifted 50 meters, from a proper two-bedroom-brick building to a slightly-converted shed. Them calling it "the shed" made me not sure how feel about sleeping there, until the offer of a caravan soothed me. But I was ready for the open fire cooking, the raspberry picking, even ready for the composting toilet.

I was not ready for just how cold it was. Or how wet. It rained from our arrival well into the small hours of Sunday.

The rain didn't deter my neighbour from his bonfire. We had noticed the glow well before we pulled up to the property on Saturday. The weather was turning, the afternoon was grey and grim, the fire amazingly orange and huge against the sudden dark of 2:30 pm. Huge, huge and orange, it filled the whole of my view, snapping in the wind.

I pulled half into the drive but stopped and stared, in fear, actually.

Phoenix is our seven year old, and he had travelled ahead of us that morning in our neighbour's car, and has been up to Musk several times without us. He loves it, loves coming back filthy, and my husband tries to avoid washing him, to slip him into bed smelling of smoke so that he can hold on to the feeling.

As I sat open mouthed, feeling the heat prickling my skin from ten meters away, I said to Aaron "Phoenix is never coming here alone again." Me being such a chicken is part of why I love him going up there without us.

Once I'd gotten the courage up to drive the rest of the way in, we were greeted by his bright red cheeks and messy blond locks. The fire makes him a little wild, a little rougher around the edges, I love to see that in him. But it scares me.

Part two, Being there, to come

The long brunch

yoghurt focus, by various brennemans.

We have a long-standing brunch tradition at my place, every Sunday morning. There was a time when people showed up every weekend, but of late we'd had mostly quiet ones. Today's began with some stewed garden plums mum had given me. When halved and stoned you can add what you like, we used Orange rind and the juice of one orange, Cointreau, cinnamon and raw sugar. Some natural yoghurt to go with. A friend had also bought along some stewed dried fruits these too were yummy.

Aaron had already made some lovely simple scrambled eggs on toast with avocado and fried cherry tomatoes for an earlier drop-in of a work colleague. Being a Sunday she'd already done an 8 km walk and was ravenous, she'd even rung ahead to warn us to have something laid out.  When she arrived  I started to fuss with dishes, but Aaron ordered us to take a seat and eat, so we both did.

Some homemade crumpets by more friends went over well. I had made up some banana bread with our glut of bananas.  We are in a panic here for the price of Bananas, we know they are set to rise dramatically when supplies run out, due to the recent cyclone.  So we're eating them with both hands while we can. Two cakes were slowly consumed whist sipping tea and coffee.  Some savoury muffins were also laid out, but I missed out on these so I cannot tell you what they were.

As the morning wore on groups arrived, the front yard a temporary parking place for bikes. It made me think for a moment I really love life right now. How nice to spend an afternoon this way, and to have been fortunate to do it outdoors today was so nice.

It is a well known fact amongst friends of ours that my man poaches a mean egg and, well, there was a little challenge placed upon me today. Thus the pained look on Aaron's face when I offered to go in to make the eggs, see I am an all round better cook than he however he still reigns supreme in the brunch department.

I was going to make some indonesian eggs, there are especially a hit if brunch has fallen into the "-unch" end. However the lack of rice in the house meant I needed an alternate plan. I thought a tortilla with creamy green onion scrambled eggs, bacon cooked with some fresh chilli, just picked garden tomato and avocado. Having everybody basking out in the sunshine in the backyard meant some quiet all to myself kitchen time. That was the real reason I accepted the challenge, not to prove I could make eggs!

I sprang into chef mode: Sandwich press on, two pans going, eggs being scrambled, bacon on, tomato salsa prep... all happening, no interruptions.

The filling was just perfect to wrap in the tortilla and toast till crispy. A squeeze of lime juice just to tickle the taste buds and a dash of sea salt that really bring it all together. It needed a little side salad of greens in lemon and olive oil, to just unashamedly use your fingers and stuff into the hot burrito as you ate and a little dollop of sour cream. There was even some tallying up of how many were had and who could have the last one, I guess that means they were good. I am sorry there are no photos, they were all gone before I could get a shot.

Aaron was short on inspiration for sweets, so he passed parts of the library around and asked for suggestions.

There was a collective shutting of cookbooks when I announced "I think I'll make Brownies." I hadn't realised it but they were deciding on a dessert to end the afternoon on. Brownie and vanilla ice cream it was, much to Eliza and Circe's delight. What a pleasant afternoon we had, I need more of these. I am already thinking next weekend.