Xmas Crafts

So this should be the post where I belatedly talk about my new years resolutions but have instead decided to focus today on the belated photos of all my Xmas makings.

First of all it wouldn't be Xmas without all the presents. So here is a round up of all the ones that I managed to get photo's of (with all the excitement I completely forgot to take a few snaps!)

First of I made this Picture/ Notice Boards:

Two like this for my sister and a third for my best friend made from sewn together scraps of some very pretty Chinese fabrics. These were all my own design and I'm really quite proud of them although the rubbish picture quality (there hasn't been any good photographing light in a while) doesn't really do it justice.

Next, for my Mum, I made oven gloves as like me she likes to bake. 

The inside of the pockets is line with a pink spotty material which you shall see later.

Next was a peg bag for my Grandma made from some awesome fabric that my mum picked up cheaply at a market in Mallorca. 

Both of these creations have been adapted from patterns found in this Cath Kidston book.

It also wouldn't be Xmas without all the cooking and me and my Mum decided to cook in style this year and we both made aprons!

Mine is on the right! I also made one for my Gran's Xmas present - it was made from the same fabric as the oven gloves with the pink spotty fabric as the contrast and together we made one for my Aunt exactly like my Mum's but with pink edging instead of green. The pattern is from this awesome book.

And now some actual baking. Back in October I cooked three Christmas cakes (1 big and 2 small) and here they are all decorated.

The small ones were presents for the grandparents but the big one was all for us greedy lot!

Snowed In

Ok so maybe snowed in is a bit of OTT but we did have quite a few inches of the white stuff yesterday. Enough to put a halt to all public transport going anywhere near the homestead and for both my mum and my sister to be sent home. However my dad's boss decided that the office should clearly stay open as the buses were still going passed the office window (he works in the city centre) and she didn't see what everyone was worrying about which meant we had to launch a rescue mission to fetch him.

The snow stopped yesterday evening and public transport seems to have got itself going to an extent. So, fingers crossed, I will make it to the jobcentre in a bit.

On a happier note - the prospect of being snowed in led too much baking. We stocked up by making food supplies including ginger cupcakes, welsh cakes and strudel. So we're in no danger of having a low food supply.

Deck the Halls

It's nearly Christmas!!! And yes I'm getting a little bit excited. Three more presents finished yesterday, cakes need to be decorated and delivered and my wall hangings need to be finished and delivered.

And now to get you in the Christmas Spirit: A Christmas Tree!

WTF?

So I haven't blogged in a whole week and now I am blogging and still no epic dinosaur story. Unfortunately moving out of my house and applying for jobs has meant that I have had no time to blog or finish the dinosaur story. However you will be glad to hear it is nearly finished.

Anyway today's blog is a WTF post. And that has a double meaning. Clever, huh? I'm going to write about a couple of things I've seen that deserve a WTF award (and make me question the sanity of the human race) and also the WTF stands for the fact anyone reading this will be asking themselves this by the time I finish. I apologise if I make you're brain hurt!

Firstly this: (I am referring to the toys not the rather busty lady in front)

Despite the obvious horn what exactly have do Unicorns and Narwhals have in common? And since when have they been locked in some kind of legendary epic battle with each other for the last millennia? And they have magic battle horns. Why? They say that computer games and TV are encouraging violence, well what about this?

And they didn't really think this through, did they? Unicorns live on land and Narwhals in the sea. How do they have epic battles? And plus Narhwals live permanantly in the Artic where I don't think there has ever been a unicorn sighting. Then there is the obvious fact that UNICORNS DON'T EXIST or at least it's unlikely that they do exist anywhere other than my head.

My second WTF award of the day goes to a product from the Kings of WTF JML.

Now I get that it's to make bumps or something in your hair. But it might just be me but it seemed like a bad choice of name. When I first saw it I thought it was two different words and one of them wasn't 'bump'. Yes, I read 'bum pits' which sort of turns them into more of a painful torture implement. Owwww.

Ok it really was me, wasn't it?

Oh well moving swiftly on.

Something to distract you and make you forget I ever said anything.

CAKE!!

I got a cupcake stand for my birthday so I just had to make cupcakes. Mocha flavoured ones with coffee buttercream frosting to be precise.

An edible interlude

The promised Best Dinosaur in the World Story is nearly ready; the pictures have been drawn and scanned on to the computer and are being coloured as I type (well not literally as I type as I can't do two things at once, well I can just not everything). And will be posted, all being well, in the next couple of days. 

Anyway to keep my blog updated while its in preparation and because I have no other ideas since my time is mostly being devoted to watching the World Cup here is some edible treats for you to admire (or laugh at!) 

First off as my parents came to stay last weekend to celebrate my birthday I baked a cake:  

It's a plain sponge with cream cheese and white chocolate topping and filling. It's all filled with raspberry jam and decorated with fondant icing circles. It was very yummy and received a full seal of approval from the parents and the best friend. 

I also made a meal for them when they arrived which clearly needed a dessert. When I was growing up my favourite dessert that my mum used to make was Lemon Meringue Pie so I decided to try and recreate it. My mums recipe comes from somewhere bizarre and as I wanted to keep it a surprise I used Delia's recipe; can't go wrong with a bit of Delia! I think it's pretty good for my first attempt: 

Now I've made myself hungry so I'm going to feast upon some dessert myself.

Redecorating

You might have noticed the blog looks quite a bit different to how it was last time I blogged (unless you have never been here before and then you can't really judge on how much different it looks but trust me it's different; yesterday it was pink). I've been wanting to make my blog look more exciting for a while and finally I have had the time, so ta da here is the shiny new blog. Hope you like! Although I will warn you I have the attention span of a gnat and get bored easily so don't be too shocked if somewhere down the line it suddenly changes again with no warning! 

The process was a lot more simpler than I thought it was, perhaps that's because I have discovered I am actually a computer genius. Well I say the process was simpler, I mean the bit that involved actually putting the layout on to my blog, choosing the damn layout was the hard thing. 

I decided I was going to go through the website I had found and favourite all the layouts I liked. Two hundred and forty two pages later I gave up and went to review my 'shortlist'. My shortlist of over forty different layouts. This led to several more hours of flicking between them and being ruthless. Until my final shortlist numbered eight. This is why the blog could change at any minute. 

The choosing was hard. I had to keep several things in mind; I couldn't just pick one I liked, I had to make sure it would suit the content of my blog which is pretty damn random which made that part particularly hard. Then I had to consider whether it was user friendly and make sure that it didn't provide too many distractions so that people would actually read my blog rather than stare at the giant cow that takes up half the screen. There was even a pirate map layout: 

How cool is that?? But I decided people (by people I mean me) would probably want to play with the map instead of reading (updating) the blog and plus it might give the idea that I only ever blog about pirates or something. Maybe I'll crack it out for International Speak like a Pirate Day. It can be seasonal like the host of Christmas layouts. 

Talking of distractions I was quite excited by the prospect of a Ninja background: 

But again I decided people (me, again) would spend way too much time trying to work out if the this skilled assassin was in fact a Ninjew. Surely he must be surely only a Ninjew would be skilled enough to perform such a daring leap across the night time sky? Also people might think I was some kind of ninja or something and would be a little disappointed to hear that I possess no ninja like abilities at all. Apart from the ability to wear a lot of black. 

Sadly there were (in the 242 pages I looked through) no dinosaur layouts so this blog remains distinctly dinosaur free. But I promise to crack on with the dinosaur story very soon. To make up for the lack of dinosaurs I could have had layouts that looked like facebook or twitter, layouts with giant cows, flowers and scantily clad women (what kind of blog do they think this is?), ones that looked like books, notebooks and houses. There was no limit to the imagination and creativity. But for now I like the one I have even though it was classes as a 'kids' layout!

Do you remember earlier I said I was a computer genius? Well I am. This assessment is based solely on the fact that I managed to change bits of my HTML code all on my own with no help!

My choosing process was further complicated by my best friend sending me links to this website. Read it. It's hilarious. And it's about cake. Especially this one. Although that link isn't for the faint hearted! 

Epic Craft Post

Ok so I didn't keep my New Years Resolution, but who does? Anyway I have been a busy little bee with uni work and lots of crafty things. So here is an epic craft update with lots of pictures as this does claim to be a picture blog after all!

First off, I don't think I posted this at Xmas, here is the Xmas cake I made (well helped make!) but I decorateed it all by myself! For my first solo attempt at Xmas cake decorating I think it went pretty well. Especially my discovery of edible glitter!

I've also started in two bags. One for me and one for my best friends birthday (which was in January so yet another 'I owe you') I only have a picture of the one I'm making for me as the other one is in fact a pile of fabric still as I've only cut pattern pieces out. These should both be finished during the Easter break when I can use my better sewing machine that lives at home with my parents. I only have a mini one here which is good for making plushies but not s good for bags. But thanks to my Mums xmas present I have inherited her old sewing machine which I can use when I go home or if I'm really good I can use hers which has lots of fancy stitches! Here is my bag:

It's made up of 4 different fat quarters and a fifth will make the base and strap. I like how the chinesey and japanesey fabrics fit in with the shape that reminds me of a Far eastern boat!

Keeping with a Japanesey theme I made this card for my best friend who had an interview for at the Japanes embassy for a job teaching english in Japan for a year.

As I said it was best friends birthday in January so I made her cupcakes. This also meant I could use some of the very pretty cupcake cases I had given to me! Here they are:

Sticking to a cupcake and birthday theme it was my sisters birthday last week and I made this cupcake card for her!

I have also added a new craft to my collection - knitting. Thanks to the loom my lovely friend Talia gave me for Xmas. I've made two hats on it and have a third one in production. Here are my first two attempts:


And last but not least here is the cross stitch I have recently finished. I have no idea what to do with it now! If I frame it I'll have nowhere to hang it so I want t do something different with it.I had thought about putting it on a folder which I could use to keep patterns in but any suggestions are more than welcome!

I think thats all of my recent projects now! Apart from a little black cat plushie which I made for a fancy dress costume (I was a witch!) which I forgot to take a photo of before sending it off to Kent to its new, rather wonderful owner! It wasn't very well made so I think the lack of picture may be a good thing. I also have just started on my last xmas present - a plushie (but I can't tell you what yet!) which I need to have done by the 12th March when its wonderful owner comes to pick it up!

I shall try not leave it so long that I have to do such an epic blog post again!