December weatherish?

The other week we had a severe frost. I had to capture the frost on a few things.

fuchsia

lavender

magnolia

And this is what I saw this week in my neighbourhood!

forsythia

daffodils poking their heads up

Oh I do love living in England! Okay, the daffs may not blossom for a few more months. BUT it is the hope and the promise of Spring for me!!

(Where I am from, Daffodils come sometime in April or even May!)

December?

In the front garden

A Cyclamen...I love these. I have said so before, but I still do. These ones you get as pot plants aren't meant to be put outdoors, but I find they are quite happy.
Especially this year when we are not having winter yet.
We are meant to be getting sand from the Sahara this week though! It does this in the Spring/Summer, but I don't recall it happening in December.

Yesterday, my legs decided they had enough from the weekend. So, I read a book all day rather than try to get them to do anything else. I haven't done that for ages. And it was actually just the type I like. A charity shop find a few years ago that I had never read. Black Trillium And now I will have to find the sequels. Not so easy when it is an older book.

January - bangles for family

And finally the last 2 bangles I made in December...these for family.
These two were based on white with a touch of gold.

blue

pink

January - showing the rest of the bangles I made in December

Just about ready to return from my break - with fresh ideas for the New Year. These are the last three secret Christmas presents I made for my friends from the bangles.

purple

pink

green

I was experimenting with the idea 'What colours work with turquoise?'

"And the Bead Goes On and on..." 21-31 December

2014 - Week 52 Daily Beads

I hope your New Year is full of rich blessings! These are the last of the beads for 2014. I will be developing ideas for 2015 in the next few days. Come back and see what is up on Sunday!

no.355


no.356


no.357


no.358


no.359


no.360


no.361


no.362


no.363


no.364


no.365


And to grow on?
extra-1


extra-2


And all of December's beads.

December days - 31

I am taking a break from blogging. So I am showing you those secret Christmas presents I made for my friends from the bangles.

burgundy

I was experimenting with the idea 'What colours work with turquoise?'

December days - 30

I am taking a break from blogging. So I am showing you those secret Christmas presents I made for my friends from the bangles.

red

I was experimenting with the idea 'What colours work with turquoise?'

December days - 29

I am taking a break from blogging. So I am showing you those secret Christmas presents I made for my friends from the bangles.

sea blue

I was experimenting with the idea 'What colours work with turquoise?'

December days - 28

Normally you would find the week's bead project on the Sunday post. But I will be showing week 52 with the ones for last few days of the year. Probably on New Year's day.
I am taking a break from blogging. So I am showing you those secret Christmas presents I made for my friends from the bangles.

deep blue

I was experimenting with the idea 'What colours work with turquoise?'

December days - 27

I am taking a break from blogging for the next week or so. So I am showing you those secret Christmas presents I made for my friends from the bangles.

burnt orange/peach

I was experimenting with the idea 'What colours work with turquoise?'

December days - 26

I am taking a break from blogging for the next week or so. But in the meanwhile, I can finally show you those secret Christmas presents I made for my friends from the bangles. Bangle no.1 was a prototype. So, these start from no.2
I will show them one at a time.

Yellow

I was experimenting with the idea 'What colours work with turquoise?'

December days - 25

The other day I returned from being out and spotted this clump of moss the magpies or starlings had cleared out of the guttering (looking for some lunch!) It looked like a little Christmas tree, so I went back out with the camera.

If I was doing a little fairy garden like they do over at the Magic Onions, this would definitely be a good beginning!

What do you think? I am calling it a 'Benchmas Tree'.

Have a lovely Christmas!

December days - 24

And yesterday I finished the last of the baking...finally got it out of my system!

A savoury crunchy mix made with cereal and nuts Worcestershire sauce and seasonings.

and A Mince pie tear and share...all the mini mince pies piled into a pie pan. I have been wanting to do this for a long time. I have a recipe card I picked up somewhere with the idea. And of course, I didn't look for the card to see how it was done. Just went by the memory of the photo on the card. Not sure how easy it will be to separate them. I used ready made mincemeat with apples and several glace cherries cut and added.

And another experiment. Trying out a Panettone in my bread machine. It wasn't fully cooked nor did it rise as I thought it would. I finished it off in the oven. At the very least it will be a rich fruity loaf.

December days - 23

More baking of cookies

Russian teacakes requested by a Certain Young Man. (Also called Mexican Wedding Cakes depending on which book you look at.)

And the simplified version of Oatmeal Raisin Cookies and Chocolate Chip Cookies...instead of dotting spoonsful of dough on endless baking sheets, you put the whole mix in a pan/glass baking dish and then bake. Then they are cut into squares. The Oatmeal Raisin needs to be cut while still warm. But the Chocolate Chip needs to cool first.

Oh, and this week's loaf of bread is rye with sunflower seeds.

December days - 22

More baking done. Fancy biscuits I made on Friday for the table at the shops and the Candlelight Carol service.

Gingerbread and Sugar Cookies...the easy way.
A few without icing for those who don't like icing.

One year I decided all the rolling out and cutting took too much time and energy, neither of which I have to spare! (These days it is all about the length of time my legs can stand!) So, I put little spheres of dough on the baking sheet. I can get a whole batch onto 2 baking sheets. Unlike 3 or 4 Gingerbread men to a tray! They come out nicely rounded on top and flat on the bottom.

And then mix up the icing to a cream-like consistency and dip the biscuits top down into the icing. and then dip into a small container of sprinkles. Set on a pretty tray and there you are!

I am hoping to get some other batches made today - special request from A Certain Young Man. I will update this page when I do.

"And the Bead Goes On and on..." 14-20 December and December days - 21

2014 - Week 51 Daily Beads

no.348


no.349


no.350


no.351


no.352


no.353


no.354

December days - 20

This morning a few of us from our church had our annual 'Mince Pies at the shops'. Just greeting people, saying hello and inviting them to come sing carols with us Sunday evening at our Candlelight Carol service.

Not so many children shopping with parents this time, but the balloons were still popular. Here Jackie and Eric are trying to work out a system to keep the balloons from tanging in the wind.

My husband manned the helium tanks, so well done to him tying the balloons in the cold. (The little nozzles for making it easy didn't seem to fit the balloons we had and they were loosing air too quickly. So we had to rely on hand tying.)

We have experienced some different types of weather over the years...Very Cold, Very Rainy, and so on. Today was Very Windy which seemed to hurry people along a bit more.

But we moved around to the Christmas music my husband set up and kept warm. Plus we were offered a wonderful cup of tea or coffee by the workers in the newsagents behind us.

These photos were taken on the sly, so I didn't manage to capture the little tree, plates of biscuits and mince pies.

December days - 19

And the pumpkin pies...

baking

and baked!

Now, where is the cream?

Someone asked about all the pumpkin baking...
Over the past years I have been in England it has not been easy to get pumpkin - except at Halloween, and then they are rather weak. Not much colour or flavour. Once in a while I would find tinned pumpkin at Waitrose. As you might know, tinned pumpkin is very thick. So, I would mix a tin in with the cooked down pumpkin to come up with good texture and flavour.

Actually, I still have a tin of pumpkin I found one year, but never used it because it was ‘precious’! Finally I realised it was easier to get Butternut squash, so I have usually got one or two to bake for Christmas. But now that my husband has an allotment, we get quite a few large pumpkins. Last year we had around nine. But I hadn’t got into the habit of using it much because of all the ‘precious’ years. And then he brought home as many again this year! So the last few weeks I have been experimenting with ideas for soup and other pumpkin things (which were too extravagant before) so I could use up the frozen pumpkin from last year.

The tinned pumpkin still has a sell by date for sometime next year. So, maybe when the busy season is over, I will do a search for some challenging or exotic idea of pumpkin and use it for that! For now, I will stick to the familiar and nostalgic along with a warming winter stew/soup now and then.

December days - 18

Yesterday was a Pumpkin day in the Christmas baking to-do list.
I baked down 2 of the big pumpkins and a squash on Monday.

I had also peeled them, so today I whizzed them up in the food processor. The squash was made up savoury (butter, salt and pepper) for dinner. Remainder of the squash is in the blue bowl.

1 pound went into another 3 pumpkin breads which will either be gifts or go in the freezer with the one from the other day.

1 pound went into a batch of Pumpkin Chocolate Chip cakes. (meant to be cookies, but putting it into cup cake papers to bake is a lot easier.)

3 freezer bags with 1 pound of pureed pumpkin each were put in the freezer for future baking days.

and 2 pounds went into a big bowl of double batch of pumpkin pie mixture.

By that time my legs and feet were protesting mightily, so I will do the pies today. Should make at least 4. They are easy to freeze or take to share with friends.

Not sure when, but I will cook down the other 3 pumpkins one of these days, too.

December days - 17 and the final ALAW Burnt Letters

Second ALAW set for 2014 v-z
At last caught up with the Burnt Letters.

And the Burnt Letters up close...

info about the technique and concept here and here.

And now to do the presentation is left. I do have an idea of sorts.

But for now, here are all the Burnt Letters together.