indoor hunting

I felt like I should have been more excited, and more prepared for Easter than I actually was this year.
But the constant pouring rain all day on Easter sunday put pay to any sort of springy outdoor pursuits and summed up the mood of this week so far.

After several long days and nights of coughs, sniffles and high temperatures from the two littlies and utter exhaustion for us it’s a wonder we even pulled off any sort of Easter joy. But we did. Kind of subdued and bleary eyed but lovely none the less.

An egg hunt was quickly diverted to the indoors…because the Easter Bunny really doesn’t like to get his paws wet. I made the bags the night before and thank goodness for Sukie Iron-On transfers because they can prettify anything quite quickly and if I’m honest I’m getting a bit obsessed with them, so watch this space...

A bit of Easter crafting, an afternoon film, a roast, a crumble and an abundance of chocolate.

Happy Easter!

love letters

Last summer, when we were over in sunny California, although it might sound a bit crazy bonkers, but there were some days we just tired of frolicking on the beach.

Some days {or at least for a bit of the day} we just wanted to stay at home and make stuff. Or colour stuff in. Or cut out stuff and glue stuff. I guess we just kind of missed the British weather, a bit, maybe, kind of…or at the every least we missed having a rainy day indoors kind of day.

So we’d scour our 'home away from home' for anything we could use for our crafty pursuits.

Hidden away at the back of a kitchen drawer was an abundant stash of disposable wooden chopsticks.
Just begging to be dolled up they were. We used them to make flags, and tissue pom pom stick type things and puppets and twirly ribbon twirler whatsits and all kinds of things.
AND we made these message arrows. Which are just a bit super easy and kind of fun to do I think. They just popped into my head thinking about Valentines Day tomorrow so thought I’d share.

T O    M A K E
Using the chopsticks as a base {but straws or wooden skewers would work just as well}, and papery bits for decoration {wrapping paper, magazines, envelope liners, wall paper, photocopies etc}. We cut two triangles for the tip and two feathery type shapes for the tail, which we stuck with glue to either side of the stick.

Decorated with all sorts of things, ribbons and tape cut from nice shopping bags  {the sort you get nice shoes and clothes in, not so much a Tesco’s plastic bag}, washi tape, sequins, buttons, feathers…..etc, etc…. the more preloved the better.

Use special words and letters cut out of magazines and catalogues, yes, a bit like a kidnappers ransom note, but it’s all true love baby!

sunday scraps

Not to be confused with the usual sibling scrapping that can occur from a sunday with nothing to do and nowhere to go. Ooohhh, let’s just ponder a while on that last bit…..nothing to do and nowhere to go………… Ahhhhhhh…….Nice.

The sunday just gone was that exact sort of day. Bliss. It’s been a while since we’ve had such a day. 

A typical day of iffy weather. Which meant an expedition of sorts was completely out of the question but for a quick jaunt in the garden for a go on the swings, a bit of mud pie making and the planting of the first tree in our new improved garden - but that’s a whole other blog post.

So, it occurred to me a while ago that the paper recycling was becoming a mountain of epic proportion every week. And a lot of what was being recycled was actually quite nice papery bits. That could be used for cards and gift tags and garlands and well, all sorts of things really.

I seem to get a lot of catalogues through the post. Actually, loads. Some are very uninteresting but some of them, well they are like little magazines in themselves. With stunning images and layouts. It seemed a shame not to reuse some of the pages, as too when throwing out those free calendars you get with magazines { such as Mollie Makes etc }. I don’t buy so many magazines of the papery kind anymore. I’ve become hooked on the digital versions* of all my favourites that I can peruse with ease on my iPad. I think this is why I’ve noticed the beauty in all these free catalogues.

So anyway, on sunday. Our lazy, blissful sunday. While the nippers enjoyed a bit of communal colouring in, I enjoyed a bit of sunday scrapping, armed with a couple of paper punches { mainly scalloped circles }, a stash of willing papery bits and a cup of tea. 

I’ve been doing this for the past year or so now so what began as an envelope full of paper cutouts has now grown into a box.  I could probably stop now as I have plenty but I must admit to finding it just a wee bit addictive. 

* My favourite digital mags are; Donna Hay Magazine, Martha Stewart Living, Mollie Makes ‘Gathered’, Country Living , Gardens Illustrated and Selvedge.

I admit it. I am a Mag Hag.

out with the old cake, in with the new...

Happy New Year…I’m not sure how it can be that we are hurtling towards the middle of Feb….I still haven’t packed away the Christmas decorations yet..!

The past couple of months have been a veritable cakefest of buttercream layered proportions.

All of my immediate family {husband aside} have birthdays in December or January. It’s exhausting, to say the least. Especially as this time round, two of those birthdays were sorta special ones. A 40th and a 70th. Mine was not the 70th {although it’s beginning to feel a lot like it was}.

The kids are less than two weeks apart and with birthday cakes and parties to prepare for it’s a bit of a stress …

The little lady had requested an Ariel cake. 

I made a vanilla sponge cake {Peggy Porschen recipe} for the bottom tier and a chocolate sponge {Brooklyn Blackout cake recipe from The Hummingbird Bakery} for the top tier.

I’ve never really had a lot patience with the decorating bit of cake making, it all just seems like too much hard work!!! Only to then be eaten…

Last year I left the beautifying of the cake to the very last minute. 

Having spent the entire evening stitching an Aurora costume for the princess potty birthday girl,

frantic and covered in threads, I called out whimpered to granny of the icy north {who, luckily, was just in the kitchen} at about midnight to see if she could take over the rolling out and laying on of the incredibly important pink fondant icing.

Earlier, in a haze of supermum big headedness, I had just assumed that at some point I would take on the persona of Jane Asher, and that I would find myself {obviously not at some ungodly hour} daintily sculpting figurines of all the Disney princesses my little poppet was so enamoured with out of fondant icing…

But in reality, I found myself, at about 2am ish, creeping into her room in the dark dead of night searching for small plastic figures that I could plonk on top of the cake.

I lucked out and found Sleeping Beauty with the three fairies…I got away with it. 

But this time round I didn’t have granny waiting in the wings, so I just had to bite the sugar paste bullet, as it were.

It helped enormously that this year I didn’t have a costume to make, and that the husband took the kids out to the aquarium for the day. 

What began as a neccessity to cover up some cracks and lumps and bumps in the icing, ended up becoming a tour de force of sugar paste sculpture. And the thing was, once I relaxed, took my time, realised that simple shapes and strips of fondant could be simply twisted and shaped  to look like seaweed and coral, that little balls of white fondant and shimmer powder could look like bubbles and simple circles could be placed to look like a mermaid tail scales …..

I   HAD   FUN!   I   REALLY   DID!!*

Although it hadn’t occurred to me, that when it was all finished, it would require a fork lift truck to shift it….

I really didn’t plan on creating such a beast of a cake. It just sort of happened. With 35 kids coming to the new 5 year olds party, I panicked. I thought, 

‘What if there isn’t enough cake…?’

I don’t know what I was thinking….We were still eating that cake two weeks after her birthday.

In fact right up until I had to start making the next kids birthday cake….!

Alfie’s rainbow sponge dino cake.

If you invite dinosaurs to a party, they will come.

{and when you put little party hats on them, they just instantly look so happy!}

* But won’t be rushing into creating another quite so soon...

these simple shapes

These simple shapes are all about my creative space at the moment. And they came about quite unexpectedly.

In the midst of making some curtains for the little mans bedroom, I wanted to brighten up the white Ikea fabric I was using with a bit of a prominent border. Something bright and modern that would compliment the elephants breath walls and white and oaky bits of furniture.

The fabrics I picked out as contenders were just not going to be long enough. Mainly being fat quarters or off cuts. Oh dilemma.

Then I spotted { and fell in love with } a cute diy patchwork teepee whilst flicking through  Crafting a Meaningful Home

Instantly smitten with the idea of creating a patchy bit of decor on the bambinos drapes - I know, American term for curtains. So much better though, don't you think? Sounds so fifties too. Yep, think I might start calling them drapes - and thus, a new obsession was born in the thimbles household. Ace!

This is just about the most perfect evening stitching for telly viewing. So simple. Although I have had to endure the Mr humming the theme to Blockbusters while I arranged and rearranged the hexes...

I have a few more to do I think, then I will most likely spend far too long fussing with placements before neatly, oh so neatly, stitching them all together.

I'm loving the mint and tangerine hexes. So springy, eh? My goodness do we need springy colours and beautiful brightness in old Blighty right now?! Rain and grey clouds be gone, I will have no more of thee...

I custom sized and downloaded the hexagonal template from here

Linking to My Creative Space

adorable

Positively ages ago, I cut out the pattern pieces for the Miss Adorable Frock {from Sew La Tea Do by Pip Lincolne}.

Anyway, as usual stuff happened, like new babies and new houses type of thing and so the pattern pieces remained just that...in pieces.

I found them just recently and decided I'd better make them up into the pretty cute dress they were meant to be. 

The little miss is now four and the dress size was up to 3. I figured it may well still fit but erring on the side of caution before precious time spent at the sewing machine, I made a decision to keep the back open with just a single button fastening at the top. A bit like a smock. A bit like an art smock, even.

I also divided the single large pocket into two smaller pockets and trimmed with ric rac. 

I was quite pleased with how it turned out in the end.

The little fella is now just old and steady enough to sit himself at the art table with his big sister and have a go at colouring.

He loves it.

It's just adorable to watch them both sat there first thing in the morning creating their little masterpieces.

{linking to my creative space}

lemony snippets

Just before Christmas, Mr H gave me a lemon tree for our 5 year wedding anniversary.

Just after Christmas I thought I might have killed said lemon tree

I moved it around the house trying to find the perfect little corner for it to flourish in blissful lemony harmony.

It ended up in a prime spot by the back doors, a veritable sun trap.

But then I got a bid giddy with a surprising bit of sunshine in January, and thinking we were headed for spring {delusional} I moved the tree outside onto the deck.

When the temperatures dropped and the so very wintry snow flurries began, I quickly carried it back indoors. To the cosy warmth.

However, the very next day ALL the leaves fell off, tumbling to the floor like a bit of a dead thing.

Ooops.

So anyway, after much panicking, a bit of better late than never watering and a few gentle whisperings of encouragement to the last remaining and clinging on for dear life leaves and buds, I can confirm that our little lemon tree is back from the brink with a bountiful bursting of new greener than green leaves and a veritable bouquet of new blossoms.

We've quite enjoyed following the progress each morning, me and the little lady. Counting the flowers and newly uncurled baby leaves. Our little lemon tree is positively flourishing

Ok, not that flourishing! 

We are certainly not at the point of enjoying our own lemons, as it were.

But feeling in a bit of a springy lemony sort of mood and with a friend round for dinner on saturday night. I whipped up some lemon posset and served in some cute flower tea cups bought years ago from Laura Ashley.

This is sooooooo lemony and creamy { and I halved the recipe as it was just the two of us } that I'd be inclined to reduce the lemon juice quantity next time. And just a few spoonfuls of this dessert is more than enough. 

I dusted with icing sugar and served with raspberries and wafer curl biscuits.

keeping warm

I seem to be forever freezing at the moment. And always on the go with this, that and the other.

So it's kind of indulgent to completely ignore all domestic faffing of an evening and lounge in front of the tellybox with some yarny type of doing. 

At the moment I've been on the hook, as it were, with the almost finishing of this granny square blanket started back in the dark ages and also a bit of bow making, for what exactly I'm not too sure. This started as a brooch but then seemed to grow a bit and then quite fancied itself as a maybe hat. But we shall see. 

I've been watching, Call the Midwife, Mr Selfridge, Ripper Street and Dancing on the Edge.

It's coincidental perfection that most of these are on a sunday, as that is indeed the best evening to curl up, keep warm by the fire and fuss about with some type of knittery and a compelling period drama!

knittery bits I will one day finish # 1

pinky pinkiest pair of pink leg warmers that ever there was....

Last year, during a brief infatuation with ballet I started to knit the little lady a pinky pink pair of leg warmers. They didn’t take too long to knit and gave a warm contented sort of bliss in the making of.

Shortly after the harmonious clackety clack of the needles had started to dwindle so too did miss Ellas ardour for the love of dance and quite unexpectedly one day the mere mention of pointing ones toes in the good/naughty way invoked a tantrum of epic proportion and a steadfast refusal to comply.

Reluctantly, I hastily put away all things ballet including the so very nearly almost finished pair of pinky pink leg warmers.

The other day, during a tidy-sort of my new workroom {star jump  star jump!} I found the forgotten leg warmers hidden at the bottom of the bulging “knittery bits I will one day finish” bag. And so, quite unprecedented, and even shocking my self let alone those around me....I finished them! Yes, done and dusted. Tick. Voila. Hooray!

Do you have knittery bits you need to finish? I’m looking forward to a stitchy gathering with friends this weekend and I’m hoping to sup tea, eat cake and stitch together an enormous pile of grannies from long ago! 

starry

I was almost on the point of turfing out the broken and deformed bits of crayon at the bottom of the little lady’s pencil tin. 

I say tin, but ’skip’ would be a far better description judging by the amount of pens and pencils with Disney Princess labels I find scattered around the house. Those little nubby ends of crayon that fill up the pencil tin or, more likely, get wedged into the base of a lego block...well, they annoy me.

Anyway, I remembered seeing on another blog {forget where} an idea for melting down a collection of broken crayons in a cupcake case and making them into new, multi coloured novelty crayons...clever.

I used  some star shaped silicone moulds and melted them in a low oven {about 140 ºC}for about 10 minutes until all melted. 

I’m wondering if this technique would work for scraggy soap ends?? Because they annoy me too. Hhhmmmm...

easy like sunday...monday...tuesday... morning

....or whatever day it is??!

Hoorah for bank holiday weekend confusion....!

There hasn’t been much of the ‘easy' about anything recently.

But, long, tiring story short - we are home! Finally.

With the painters, the builders, the tweakers, the fixers, the decking guy, the endless delivery men....and so on, you get the drift....

Anyhoo. Some friends visited at the weekend and one of them asked if we had actually relaxed and enjoyed the new {old} house yet. And it dawned on me that the answer was disappointingly, ‘No, not really’.

There are still boxes to unpack, rooms to titivate, pictures to put up...and not to mention the looooong list of soft furnishings and upholstery bits I want to have a go at. But anyway, we’ll get there.

Moan over, being back home is bliss. 

The amount of extra space we have is totally fab and the new kitchen is better than I could have ever imagined and my new workroom ??... {squeals with delight!!!} definitely more on that later ....umm...when I have put everything away and done the most mega of sorty sorts that ever there was {am slightly alarmed with the amount of fabric and haberdashery bits I have eccrued over the years}. 

I can’t wait to finally have everything put in its place then I can flounce around in a very Martha way, cooking up lovely things and daintily stitching and making pretty pretties ......because obviously, with two small children, I have so much free time.....{ sigh.....}

And so, whenever there is chance of a few minutes of bakey goodness wafting about the spankily new kitchen, well, then it makes me do a little happy dance and all feels right with the world 

{my world }. 

Pear Pastries {original recipe, Nigel Slater}

1. Using a sheet of ready made puff pastry 2. roll out the pastry on a lightly floured surface until fairly thin { a few mm } 3. Using a pastry cutter or small bowl or glass, cut out discs of pastry { I used 98mm cutter }Place onto a lined baking tray and 4. using a smaller cutter make a circle indent onto the top of the disc. 5. prick the centre circle with a fork { this stops it rising }. Thinly slice pear/apple or any fruit really, and place on top of the centre circle. You could perhaps do this in a decorative or pretty way, if perhaps you don’t have a hungry cat winding round your ankles or a baby grizzling with teething pains....Any how, it all tastes the same really....

6. Melt a large knob of butter and stir in 1 tsp vanilla bean paste or a large pinch of ground cinnamon { optional } and using a pastry brush, 7. brush the melted butter mixture over the edges of pastry and across the top of the fruit. Sprinkle a spoonful of caster sugar over the top. 8. Bake in a preheated oven at 220º C for about 10- 15 minutes or until golden brown and puffed up. Allow to cool slightly then dust excitedly with icing sugar.

With the left over bits of pastry - roll them into long sausage shapes then twist, brush with melted butter and cinnamon, dust with a sprinkling of sugar and bake with the other pastries to make really yummy cinnamon twists. Miss Ella ate the lot!

Just a bit yum, really.

I haven’t made these for ages and had quite forgotten how super easy they are to conjure up!

Note to self - always keep a pack of ready made puff pastry in the freezer ready for any morning where a moment of Supermama illusion making is needed.

diamond creams

No self respecting {royal} granny is ever without a bag of peppermints stuffed in her pockets ready for any eventuality and occasion ....erm....apparently. Although grannies are getting younger these days and it’s out with the winceyette nighties and in with the spray tans and vajazzles......eeek!

I haven’t made peppermint creams since I was much younger than I am now.....I had forgotten how easy they are to do - basically edible play dough. So perfect for little princes and princesses to make too.

In a nod to the forthcoming jubilations I turned these into {very } rough diamonds and blinged them up big time with an exuberant sprinkling of edible glitter, which really does get everywhere!

Diamond Creams

250g sifted icing sugar {plus extra for dusting}

1 lightly whisked egg white  {powdered egg white works a treat too}

A few drops of peppermint extract

With the icing sugar in a large bowl, slowly mix in most of the egg white and peppermint extract until all combined into a soft and sticky dough. At this point you may need to add more icing sugar until the dough can be kneaded by hand.

Place dough on a chopping board smothered in icing sugar and roll out to the desired thickness {1cm is good}. Using a sharp knife dipped in icing sugar cut diagonal lines across the dough in one direction and then repeat in the other direction forming ‘diamond shapes’.

Place on a lightly oiled {vegetable oil or similar} sheet of greaseproof paper. Brush with a light coating of the remaining egg white and sprinkle with edible glitter. 

Leave to dry out for several hours or over night. Should keep well in an airtight container.

Have a most jubilant weekend! x

chocolate cheerio cakes

We’ve recently spent some quality time at our local Little Cooks cookery classes. 

The little lady has delighted in putting her pinny on and doing some baking! And of course there is always the added bonus of scoffing your creative culinary delights which you just can’t do with a finger painting!

In fact we’ve been doing a spot of baking at home too, although there really isn’t the space here so have had to wing it somewhat with me whipping up a dough mix or cake batter in the kitchen and the little one completing the most important task of rolling and cutting cookie shapes or spooning mixture into cake cases at the dining table. 

But this suits my neurotic baker ways and helps keep kitchen trauma to a minimum!

Anyway, despite having a stock of cookie dough batches in the freezer for rainy day cookie baking {gosh, doesn’t that make me sound organised...?} I decided today that we would make chocolate crispie cakes because I remember them so well from my childhood, and well, they really are totally simples and just a bit yummy, aren’t they?

Although we don’t eat Rice Crispies in this house.....or Cornflakes for that matter....so Cheerios it had to be!

This is how we made ours.....

Chocolate Cheerio Cakes

100g milk chocolate

75g Cheerios

50g unsalted butter

4 tbsp runny honey {or you could use golden syrup}

50g dried blueberries {or similar}

Melt the chocolate, butter and honey in a bowl over a pan of simmering water until smooth and all melted.

Mix the Cheerios and blueberries in a large mixing bowl and pour the melted chocolate mixture over. Mix until all combined.

Spoon into cake cases and chill for about 40 minutes...or not...if you can’t wait, then scoff immediately and revel in your rebellious ways and sticky fingers! 

This is easy and fun for children to make, except, of course for the melty chocolate bit which should be done by a grown up.

Washing up can be fun too.....although best done in the garden and always a good idea to check everything before putting it back in the cupboard!