Big birthday cake

Them chunks there on that there cake be chunks of Mars Bar! Who do you think bought the cake? All that cake for just the two of us - no problem.

Kinnitty, Co Offaly

This long weekend took us to Kinnitty in Co Offaly. A county neither of us had visited before. Kinnitty village has the usual to offer - a church, a small shop and 3 pubs. We visited the church and the shop and stayed out of the pubs for a change. We were staying in the fabulous Kinnitty Castle just outside the village and it was a great weekend. The castle is now a 37 room hotel and it was like nothing I have stayed in before, each room is different and I think we lucked out in our room as it was very unusual - I've taken photos below. The bathroom was in one of the turrets of the castle so it was round in shape and the bath was bang in the middle - J thought he had died and gone to heaven when he saw it. The bar has a 24 hour bar and they had trad music in one of the bars on both nights over the weekend. I thought this may have just being for St Patrick but they say it's like that every weekend. The bar last night was buzzing, starting off with just one musician and in no time at all there were 6 people with instruments entertaining us.

The story goes that this castle is haunted and as I downloaded the photos today I swear I could see something strange in one of them, J thinks I'm gone mad but I'm really convinced - can anyone see anything odd about the photo taken in our bedroom over the weekend?

Connemara

Our 30 something weekend brought us to Connemara this year. (Our 30 something weekends that are fast approaching 40 something weekends!). We had a great turnout and stayed in the Renvyle House Hotel which is really in the middle of nowhere and while the drive up there on Friday night was a little daunting we had a fantastic weekend full of laughs and catching up.

The Gibsons get the honour of organising 2009.

Banana ice cream

I just had to share this recipe with everybody. I saw it on TV over the weekend and it looked real simple to make so I scribbled down the recipe and made it tonight. It's quick, easy and delicious. Perfect. Here goes (this makes enough for 2):

• chop 2 bananas and place in freezer for at least 1 hour (I had bananas already frozen as I use them for smoothies and these worked well but I did need to leave them thaw for a bit)


• quarter teaspoon vanilla essence


• 2 tablespoon caster sugar


• 100ml buttermilk (approx - I added a little more)


• Place all in a food processor (I used a smoothie maker) and blend

And that's it. YUMMY. Try it. Go on.