I design and make fancy dress costumes and, along with my partner, am very involved in theatre, both on and off stage. My partner and i both love cooking and entertaining. I've 2 grown sons who also enoy cooking. Have always been interested in cooking and experimenting with new cuisines and foods. At the moment i'm having a great time trying out recipes from some Southern style cookbooks i received from the US. Like many people i would have to say the traditions that surround Christmas are my favourite. We tend to prepare a mixture of traditional English Christmas fare with Aussie extras such as seafoods and salads. There are many years where we create a theme for Christmas and cook accordingly (eg our island theme year saw everything cooked in the ground and it was superb!!) Being involved with local theatre there are many occasions when my partner and I volunteer to prepare the opening night gala supper and we try to create a food theme which supports the musical, drama or comedy presented. We have also catered for various theatre anniversary & christmas celebrations and enjoy the challenge of mass finger food catering. We also spend a 3 day weekend providing full meals and snacks to theatre members who volunteer to work at the annual City/Country Show in our area. This annual pilgrimage means most of our kitchen including microwave is transported and set up in a tent! Many weeks planning, long hours, tiring work but exceptional fun and satisfaction!