Belmondo Shawl

Another quickly completed project comes off my needles - The Belmondo Shawl.  The pattern is on Ravelry.  I used Rowan All Seasons Cotton.  The pattern says I need to block it, I'm not sure I will.  I could have done with the longer sides being longer, not the length form middle to tip.

My head is filling with design ideas for a few dresses, tops and maybe a skirt or two for Mary-Jane.  I've been jotting down ideas and sketches.  I've not yet done any serious number crunching or identified any yarn, but there are suggestions mulling around my head.  I have continued working on 22.5.2 Shawl, mainly to finish it off and to give me some thinking space for my designs.  I certainly don't want to rush into doing them without thorough planning and clear ideas of what I want the finished thing to look like and, of course, what yarn I am going to use.  And then there is is the joys of learning to do a pdf document to publish the pattern.

Spatula Licking and Park Life

Mary-Jane loves to help me bake.  She loves to wear her pinny, especially when mummy is wearing hers.  MJ also has her very own Minnie Oven Gloves, although she is not allowed to go near the cooker when it is on.  She also likes to have a bit of a run around when she is baking!

There are always perks to helping Mommy bake - one of them is licking the bowl or spatula.

This afternoon the weather wasn't too bad - no wind and no rain, so I suggested that we take a very tired Mary-Jane to the play park for some fresh air.  One of the ironic things of living in the country is the lack of safe space to walk a toddler.  I may have mentioned before - there are two roads by us, the back has less traffic on and no path, the front has a path for half a mile in one direction, but the road is very busy - it is the main road to Sellafield.  Not an ideal road to walk a toddler who has no road sense.  Anyhow, I digress.  We went down into village to the play park, as expected it is an ideal spot for Mary-Jane to run around, burn her energy off and have lots of fun and fresh air.

Mary-Jane discovered 'the bouncer' and loved it. She could see saw without anyone being on the other end.  She did insist at one point that I played with her on the bouncer.  It was more of a mini work out for me - I couldn't exactly sit on the bouncer (think of the physics of it!) so I had to pretend to sit on it and then squat up and down, holding on to the handles - fun really!

This is the park I used to walk to, and push Mary-Jane in her pram, then sit on the bench and knit, in the first few months we moved here.  It is also the site of the old village school, now demolished, the new one being a quarter of a mile away.

 

This morning I met a friend, H, for morning coffee at The Hungry Parrot in Gosforth.  I thoroughly enjoyed it and was very relaxed when I came back to the house. I am getting to value my meetings with H and our conversations.

Butter Bean Crumble

Butter Bean Crumble

A quick, light-ish lunch for 1 or a side dish for two. 

• 1 can butter beans (about 400g predrained or so)
• 2 pieces of brown toast, in crumbs
• 1/2 200g pack of flavoured Philly

1. Rinse the butter beans and put in a pan of simmering water to cook for a few minutes
2. Toast the bread then process it into crumbs
3. When the beans have simmered for around 4 minutes, take off heat and drain
4. Mash approx 1/3 of the butter beans with a fork.  Mix this with the philly
5. Combine the mashed beans with the whole beans gently, then place in a shallow heat proof dish
6. Top with the toast crumbs, then put under a hot grill to flash grill a bit more, till it browns to taste.

Feel free to play with the recipe, it's a gentle flavour. I have added a sprinkling of paprika when combining which works well.

Lemon Curd Butterfly Cake

Within the space of 24 hours, I fell on two recipes for Lemon Curd Butterfly Cakes.  I was hooked, I had to make a batch.  The results were good.  HK took the photos, I think they are very professional.  he is quite getting into photography.  I said what I was looking for in the end image, and he worked the magic. I had my little Assistant Baker helping me, she thoroughly loved baking them as much as I loved baking them with her.

Lemon Curd Butterfly Cakes

Makes 12-14

• 175g butter
• 175g caster sugar
• 1 tsp  vanilla essence
• 4 eggs
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 175g plain flour

Filling

• 250ml double cream, whipped
• 100ml lemon curd
• icing sugar for dusting

1. Preheat the oven to 180c, gm 4.  Put the paper cases in a bun tin
2. Cream the butter and sugar until pale, light and fluffy
3. Add the vanilla essence, then add the eggs one at a time, mixing well
4. Combine the flour and baking powder then combine this with the batter
5. Divide into 12 - 14 cases.  Bake for 15 minutes until light golden brown and well risen, then leave to cool
6. Cut off the tops of the cakes, then cut the tops in half to make the butterfly wings
7. Combine the whipped cream with the lemon curd, just enoguh to give a marble effect
8. Pipe the cream onto the cakes, place the wings on then dust with icing sugar.

Cadi's Koigu Kerchief

I was gifted a skein of Koigu KPPPM by Cadi.  I fell for the yarn and the colours.   I wanted to make something that really showed the colours off, something that was fairly simple and straighforward, with out being too simple.  I had a go at two other kerchief's.  Then I was inspired by one pattern to design my own.  I will write up the pattern, post it here and link it to Ravelry.  Not tonight though unfortunately, time has already ran away with me.  It is worked from the tip upwards, with a border of five garter stitches then a yarn over.  The center piece is an Aran Braid, which I thought appropriate with it being head wear.  It is completed with an I-cord cast off.  It made me think of the first time I was introduced to such a cast off and boy, did I think it was complicated and over my head.  So, in hindsight, Sarah, you were right, it is a simple, smart and effective cast off edging.

 

I'll see if I can get HK to take a photo of me wearing it.  I have enough yarn left over to hopefully do a hair band as well.

I have started another 22.5 degrees shawl.  This time definitely for me.  I am using Ice Yarns Bamboo.  It is a 50% bamboo and 50% cotton blend in variegated pinks.  I'm using 5mm circulars and it seems to be knitting up fast so far.  I've had the yarn for a good few years now, so it's a good Stash Buster project.

 

I have started watching James Martins United Cakes of America.  I am enjoying the series and the cakes, needless to mention!  He visits bakeries across America, then adapts the cakes and recipes to give them his own twist.  These recipes are available free online.  So far I have printed all but one recipe.  I am trying to be good and only print the recipes as I see them.  I am not busting a gut to make any of them at the moment.  It is nice just to be introduced to different cakes and see how the 'work', rather than just look through a recipe book.  I shall very very soon have to find a file or some place to keep all these downloaded recipes.  The small shelf where I tend to push them  is getting more than full.  No doubt HK will have something to say about that - it's just a case of where on earth do I store such things?!

Sunny Day and Forward Garden Plans

I think my chest infection is breaking - at least I really hope it is.  This morning I was hacking up loads of crud.  Nice.  I have two days left on the anti-biotics.  Lets hope they completely do the trick.  I have tried to soldier on and keep busy and not give into it.  As each day passes though I do feel more and more weary.  Today I drove to Carlisle and back - nearly a 100 mile round trip - for a WI Home Crafts Committe Meeting.  It was an enjoyable meeting, in which I actively participated.  And now I am jiggered - a very early night is on the cards.

 

We have had beautiful sunshine all day today.  The only downer being that all the way back I was driving into the sun.  Fingers crossed for the same sunshine again tomorrow and we might be able to spend a bit of time outside in the garden.  HK is gearing himself up to do the veg plot, and hopefully the soft fruit bed.  This will take much more doing as it hasn't been tended for at least three years.  I shall put the brakes on to my mind from whirring and driving me nuts about all the things I could do, make, bake, pickle and dry with the things that we plan to grow.

 

I am getting on apace with my Kerchief.  It's looking good, the yarn is being well shown off.  It may only need maybe two or three inches then I shall do an I-Cord finish.  I want to try and use as much as the yarn as possible.

Raspberry Curd Yoghurt Cake

Raspberry Curd Yoghurt Cake

• 225g butter
• 400g caster sugar
• 3 eggs
• 280g plain flour
• 1/2 tsp bicarb soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 or 3 tbsp raspberry curd
• 200g natural yoghurt

1. Preheat oven to 170c, gm 3.  Grease and flour a 25cm springform tin or 25cm bundt tin
2. Sift together flour, bicarb and salt, then set aside
3. Cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Beat in eggs one at a time
4. Mix curd and yoghurt together.  Alternatively add flour and curd yoghurt until just incorporated
5. Put mix in tin and bake for 60 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean.  Leave in tin for ten minutes then turn out to a wire rack to cool

Notes

• You could use lemon curd instead, or any curd. 
• I found this to have a subtle raspberry flavour, not a full on one
• If adventurous, I suppose you could try any flavour of youghurt, as long as the quantities are the same - make the cake your own!