A busy week

Hi all..

It's been a busy baking and making week.

JJ, my other half, went out blackberry picking and on his way also scrumped some apples .. so out with the baking gear and 2 apple and blackberry pies and also 2 apple and blackberry crumbles were made, the rest were frozen for the winter months when a little bit of late summer taste would be the ticket..

Then the jam jars and preserving pan were brought out and the jam and chutney making started, I am not really a jam maker but I was given the recipe by my daughter Laura, who informed me that it was really easy to make and I can confirm that, yes it was easy ....I am glad that I had invested in a jam thermometer as it made realising that you had got to the setting point a lot easier.

Apple Jam

Ingredients

2lb apples

2/3rd pint of water

2lb jam sugar

Method

peel, core and chop the apples

Tie the waste into a muslin bag and put with the apples and water in a preserving pan

Cook apples until they are pulpy, then squeeze out the muslin bag and discard 

Stir in the sugar and boil until the setting point is reached

Remove from the heat, skim, pour into the pots, cover and leave to cool.

Tips    

Test the setting point; put a teaspoon of jam onto a freezing cold plate and see if it sets to your liking

Sterilise jars by boiling them in a large pan whilst making your preserve.

I also made apple chutney and managed to fill the house with the smell of vinegar. I used just malt vinegar which was the recipe but the next time I think that I will either use cider or white wine vinegar as I don't think that it will smell so strong.

As I was in the baking mood I made some flapjack, chocolate buns and cheese scones, another recipe given to me by Laura.. (which you can get from her blog http://laurasbakesandmakes.blogspot.co.uk/)
Laura, I can confirm that they were a success as Matt ate 2 and thought that they were delicious... He had only popped in as he had locked himself out of his house..but that's a long story...  Funny though I swear he can smell my baking from his house...

I have also been playing with my Silhouette cameo machine and made a 3D model of a beach hut from a file purchased from a really lovely lady who designs and sells her own files, the idea is to make a long line of these in different colours and to find a piece of driftwood to make a shelf to display them on ... well that's the idea anyway..

A very long catch up...

Well it's been a very long time since I have written a blog entry..

I have done a lot of crafting since the last update...

Christmas 2012, we decided to have a homemade Christmas all gifts had to be home made, so I got making, knitting, crocheting, cooking and jam/chutney making .. I loved it and would love to do it every year but my ideas are a bit limited..

A few knitted winter woollies, the backpack was the first thing I had ever crocheted 

Chutneys, all prettied up for gifts 

Flavoured oils and mincemeat

I also made a food hamper for both of my kids and their partners and they went down well, lots of goodies included shortbread, fudge and cookies..

In the April of 2013 I had a lovely present given to me, a Silhouette Cameo, which is an electronic cutting machine, just right for making cards and 3d models, I have had a great time experimenting with this and had a lot of disasters and failures and quite frankly it nearly made an early exit through the craft room window, until, through a lot of perseverance, things started to come together and with the help of a couple of great Facebook pages dedicated to the Cameo, I got adventurous and have produced some cards and models that I am quite proud of.

Here a few examples of the end results ...

  

At the end of the year my daughter started a little business hiring out vintage china and she also started to sell vintage items at vintage fairs we decided that tea cosies would be a great added extra to sell with the tea pots, also crochet lavender hearts ..

Then we got more adventurous and also added hats, which were very popular and I enjoyed making them, I was really surprised how people really liked them and got the knitting needles and crochet hooks going at record speed..  

Then we were given the fantastic news that we are going to be grandparents, so you can imaged the needles and hook came out yet again a here are a few of the items I have made so far, only a little sample, as not keep photos of everything..

So I wonder what the rest of the year will bring! I am sure that the crafting will go on and on and on..........