A fishy time!

It's been ages since I even logged on to my blog...I'm not sure just what I've been up to because it certainly hasn't been gardening or sunbathing.....the weather here is rubbish ( & that's the polite way to put it!) Even I was amazed to find that it's over a month since I was here.....Oh dear, I'm just not a good blogger!
I've been enjoying a fishy time in the workshop recently & it has made a welcome change from the sweet things (although I have been making a few flans too!)

Lobster has to be my favourite food of all time....just making this made my mouth water & I would have killed to have the real thing to eat!

Then there were the Moules Marinière....in prep &....

with crispy frites!
On the "sweet" side I've been having a fixation on flans!

A gooseberry flan.......

A plum flan........

& a peaches & cream flan!
OK, I think I've managed to keep you updated for the minute & hopefully it won't be so long before I pop in here this time!

No magic mushrooms in here!

I got quite excited this weekend as we had two whole days of sunshine  it was actually quite warm! Not exactly sunbathing weather, but lovely for getting on with some of the "tidying up" after what seems to have been a very long winter! Too good to be true though & as usual it hasn't lasted long & now we are back to grey skies & a damn cold wind.......when will Spring get here....I'm getting so sick of waiting!
At least I didn't feel guilty being in my workshop when it was so depressing outside & had a good time, as well as the odd case of swearing when the little 'shrooms either didn't work as I wanted, or even worse, fell on the floor & led to me spending a lot of time crawling around trying to find something that had taken me nearly 10 minutes to make!
Not only do I have my little basket filled, but I also have a pan of edible fresh mushroom soup that I made with the "real" mushroom I used for the photo! So, all in all, quite productive!! :-)

Some patisserie for a friend & teddy bears having a picnic!

Phew! These little confections were definitely a challenge, but one I really enjoyed facing up to & I have to say that, even though I'm not a great fan of "fancy French" patisserie style, I actually quite like the way they turned out! I hope my mini friend likes them too!

 

At the same time, I had a request to make a Teddy Bears' Picnic cake again & even though I'm never very keen on re-making a piece because, for some reason, they never work out the same twice (which is why I don't "get" copiers as I can't replicate my OWN work, so how the hell can someone copying do it.....), I wasn't prepared to let my mini friend down so said "Yes!" Actually, for once, I have to say that the 2nd cake is actually better than the 1st!

Then I got a catalogue in the post from Lakeland - a big kitchen/cooking store here in the UK & on the front cover was the most gorgeous Easter cake they had made to advertise a rather expensive air pump spray set for producing graduated colours on icing...well....the cake was so pretty that I just had to reproduce it in inedible miniature! Thank you Lakeland for the inspiration!

A few Heirloom tomatoes & a question....

I'm still in the veggie mood at the minute, although in between I am slowly working on an order for cakes &  I mean slowly...perhaps it's the January blues, but I seem to be working more & more slowly at the minute.  It doesn't really help the work rate when I have given up smoking in the house, so I am "downing tools" too often to pop outside for a smoke :-)
Anyway, between sitting outside in the rain or snow in a coat & with an umbrella.....if anyone could see me, I must look like the local nutter...some would say that that is exactly what I am!.....I have managed to fill a basket that has been sitting looking accusingly at me for a couple of weeks now.....

Now I have a question! Does anyone actually read blogs these days or has good old FaceBook ruined them as well? I'm finding that more & more people just don't bother with groups or blogs anymore, but seem to be forever posting on FB.......why, I wonder...when there's absolutely no real support, interest or help from FB. How many of your "friends" are people you actually know & how many of them can you turn to for a little advice on a project you are working on?  I do know that the friends that are to be found on www.cdhm.org are always willing to help with a mini problem, so why is it that it seems  everybody prefers the anonymity of FB.....is it because it's easy? OK, that's my "rant" over for now....but I really would like to know why.........

Just a few veggies!

Well, Christmas & New Year seem a distant memory now.....not that I'm complaining....it all goes by in a bit of a blur for me (& not because I'm in a permanent alcoholic haze either!) so it's always good to get back to normal, although the house always seems too quiet when the family all leave!

Of course in typical UK fashion, we didn't have any snow at Christmas, just rain, rain & yet more rain, but we have it now...just a little bit late!

I should be thinking about making Valentine & Easter pieces but instead, I'm thinking of summer & harvesting all these lovely fresh veg!  Yeah, right, I should be so lucky....last year my poor vegetable garden was more like a swimming pool the whole summer & to venture into it at all, I almost needed flippers....even the runner beans that usually grow through anything, failed miserably. I think I was lucky to get around a dozen beans from 6 plants! So these little offerings are some of what I hope I'll be harvesting this year.........

A New Year & A New Direction!

Does anyone else feel like me...that they just don't know where the time goes (a great Dylan/Judy Collins song!)? I can't believe that the last time I actually had the time to blog was over a month ago, not that I really have time right now either, with a houseful of family (11 of us, I think!), a joint cooking in the oven & the veggies to get preparing, while the men are in the local rugby club discussing the important things in life that will no doubt get sillier & sillier as the pints are consumed!

A girl needs a little bit of peace & quiet though & before I start the marathon of feeding them all, here I am with my laptop, some nuts & a LARGE gin & tonic, making a very quick blog post...if nothing else, just to let you know that I am still alive & kicking......just!

I have had absolutely NO time to get my clays out to make food as the making of the real thing is almost all consuming with so many hungry people in the house  BUT since my visit to the desert in March I've had a couple of schleich kitties sitting on my workbench waiting to get a nice wooly coat. They started life as conjoined twins, but after a few operations with my scalpel to separate them & a little bit of clay to give them new tails & the odd new paw, they were ready to "get dressed"!

Scraps has been a little naughty & raided the wool basket, getting himself wrapped up in wool in the process!

While Tiger has been even naughtier & has pulled over the goldfish bowl when no-one was looking but is sitting next to it trying to pretend that the overturned bowl, with fish flapping in the water has absolutely nothing to do with him at all!

I can see that there will be more little animals getting new coats in 2013!

A Christmas Commission!

At Last! A finished Christmas cart...there were times when I didn't think I'd actually ever get it finished! I seemed to be making & icing cookies for weeks & was at risk of severe eye strain in the process :-). I do hope my mini friend who commissioned it loves it as much as I do....but then, if she doesn't then I get to keep it myself because I don't think I'll be making another of these in a hurry!

Ta Da..complete, but difficult to photograph!

Cookies, cookies & more cookies!

A choccie Santa, gingerbread men & gingerbread house!