A bit of baking

Things have been a little quiet at Dew Drop Gifts, I had my last summer fair a few weekends ago and now to start planning for the Christmas ones. 

I have been totally taken with the new series of Great British bake off, not normally a fan of these programmes I have  surprised myself by enjoying the series so far. This week was an episode on bread, the variety of flat breads sounded delicious and the attempts at the 8 strand plaited loaf were amazing. Then there were the bagels! 

While watching the episode I decided it was time to start some baking, which I love to do but don't always find the time, a poor excuse I know. So this morning I decided to try and make some bagels for lunch- no pressure then to get them right! we would either have a yummy lunch or no lunch at all.

I opted for the lazy option and put all the ingredients into the bread maker, well that is what it is there for after all, and allowed me to get on with other things around the house. 

The bagels were surprisingly easy to make, my evenly dividing the mixture into 12 portions then shaping them into a ring. I found it easier to make a ball shape, create a hole with a finger and then shape the bagel. My 2 girls had a go at making a few too. They were then left to rise, time to put the shopping away that was delivered earlier on. Now for the fun to begin, poaching the bagels. This had to be done 1 at a time as I didn't have a pan big enough. Thankfully no major disasters, although they didn't end up very puffed up. I will have to look into solving this problem.

Eventually after poaching 12 bagels it was time to coat them in the beaten egg and sprinkle with poppy & sesame seeds with 1 onion seed and a few plain. They didn't turn out too bad and in time for lunch. The moment of truth was upon us. The girls and I sat down for lunch with salmon, philadelphia and some humus. With our knives poised for action we tucked in, well they weren't as smooth on the outside and as fat as a shop bought bagel. They were chewy like a bagel and tasted good!

After a semi successful bagel bake I think I will try and do more baking and may be try one bake from each of the episodes of this years Great British Bake Off.

Garden furniture project.

Yesterday was quite a succesful day with the garden table, although I didn't start until after lunch. I managed to sand the underside of the table, I must confess I wasn't too keen on my new ryobi sander the night before - but with a fully charged battery pack it was pretty good. Thankfully the weather dried so it wasn't too cold out in the garage.


2 coats of primer and the first coat of the coloured wood gloss went on, I must say wood gloss is a nightmare to paint with, so thick and sticky. I was quite pleased that the table legs were removable, as that meant that I was able to sand the table legs inside while watching a bit of tv :) Unfourtunatly the ends needed doing by hand. Today was mainly spent finishing off the table legs- thankfully with the sander! Adding the first coat of primer and the second coat of coloured gloss to the table. I am pleased with the results, even if the colour is a little darker than I had in mind. But for £1.50 I can't complain (paint that was on sale due to the colour made was not the correct colour for a client) I am quite pleased with the work done so far, but I am not looking forward to starting on the chairs!! Thankfully this evening I found out that there is company that strips paint of furniture- fingers crossed they will do the chairs!

My half term DIY project

Every year at the start at the summer and at the end in the sales, my husband and I are always trying to find some garden furniture that is at an affordable price and something that is strong enough. We usually fail every year as most sets are quite expensive and not to our tastes. We have both lived in the country when we are children and would like to have a rustic country table for our garden furniture. So with a decision made we now had to hunt for the perfect table, a hardwood table would be ideal but expensive. So a pine table was what we needed. I wanted to sand and varnish it myself rather than buy one, eventually I found the perfect 6ft table and 4 chairs in a charity furniture shop (shown in the photo).

With the children off to their grandparents for half term, my challenge this week is to sand and paint the table and chairs. Today didn't start too well with the rain  which resulted in the garage being cleaned up, space made and the furniture put into the garage so at least I can make a start this week.

With the battery for my new sander (which I had for mothers day) on charge then a trip to a DIY store for sand paper tomorrow should be a productive day.

Teapot Cosy

Not blogged for a while as things have been a bit busy with things around the house, and busy making. Thought I had better get this written before we go on our little family travelling holiday- an afternoon for a very quick tour of London and 1 nights stay, then a very early start to catch the Eurostar to Paris for a 3 night stay in Disney and then on to Paris for 2 nights. My husband and I always said we would go to Paris for our 10th wedding anniversary, but ended up spending it in Turkey with the children. But this year even though it will be our 11th and we will have the children- we will be in Paris!

A while ago I had an order for a teapot cosy, with a rough idea of the shape of the teapot I went to work on making a fitted cosy. Only to find out that the teapot is too big for the cosy, I was asked if I could remake the cosy I was handed the teapot that was in need of a cosy so I could make it to the correct size.

This was the original cosy.

The correct teapot on the right.

Starting off the new cosy took a few attempts to get going and I learnt from the first cosy not to use black wool- a nightmare to crochet with! After making some progress the cosy was swamping the teapot, so back to the drawing board again! Finally I got there and after each row I kept measuring against the pot until it was finished. The pattern was altered a lot for it to fit around the top, as the pattern used half double crochet stitches near the top which stood up too much for what I was after. I would like to thank crochet with Raymond for adding the granny tea cosy tutorial to her site.

The end result.

Take care and have a good Easter break, hope you all get lots of yummy Easter eggs. 

Catching up on projects

This week I decided it was time to make the projects I have have been wanting to do for a while, the first to be completed was some decorated pointe ballet shoes for my 2 little ballet dancers to hang up in their room. After a few false starts I managed to get the sequins on in a way that I was happy with- thankfully I gave the superglue a miss!! On completion they still looked quite plain so out came the feather boa. 

                                                         

 Thankfully the girls loved them.

Today was project number 2 and a bit more urgent as I planned to decorate two books for the girls to use as autograph books on their surprise trip to Disney over Easter. The books turned out quite successful and nearly finished, each page has a little stamped picture waiting to be coloured in.

I can't wait to give these to Eleanor and Bethan and tell them what they are for. Only 2 weeks to wait.

Fingers crossed.

Making some good progress with the new tiara and I can't wait until it is finished, I think something made from buttons may be next on the list to make. 

Today I have been feeling quite excited (& nervous) about the April issue of Vogue that will be out on Monday, and working out how I would go and get my copy- do I go via the post office shop on the way to take the girls to school, so they can see (if I had enough time) or after the school run. Only to find that the postman delivered my very own copy of Vogue this afternoon. I was so excited to discover it in the postbox I just sat and looked at the cover for a moment, strangely enough when I went to open the magazine near the back it opened on the right page!

The girls were very excited to see a picture of them in a magazine and can't wait to take it in to show their teachers. I think it will be nice for them to say that they were in Vogue when they were younger, although Bethan may not be too happy later on as she is the one with the flowers on her nose.

Hopefully I will get a call from a bride to be asking me to make her jewellery for her special day.  Fingers crossed.

Exciting Times.

Over the half term I received a voice mail from a lady working for Vogue asking me if I would like to feature in their bridal feature which would be in the April issue. I quickly returned the call to get more details, which sounded very exciting. After an overnight think about it and check of the bank balance (Vogue aren't cheep to add a feature to) I decided to phone back and agree to be in the feature- I would be crazy not to, but I was a bit sceptical as to why they would ask me. They helped me choose a photo which has a few of my items being worn at a wedding- in fact it is my two girls as bridesmaids and the photo taken by my husband, then add a paragraph about what I do.

This has prompted me to revamp my website and start making the tiaras I have been wanting to try out but haven't got round to doing. First up was wire knitting a tiara, this started off being a nightmare following the triangle pattern I had, but 5th attempt in I managed to alter the pattern to suit the wire I was using and made some progress plus two sore fingers and blunt wooden needles! But I must carry on and finish.

Here is a sneak preview.

A little bit of tweeking

Not much to write about today as it has been a bonus day spent with hubby home a day early. I have sneaked 15 mins to have  a play around with the page set up and adding pieces to the layout of the blog. I think I am getting there if a little slow at it.
But one good thing from today was the completion finally of my first crochet tea cosy, it took me a while and a lesson learnt was to avoid crocheting in black wool. I look forward to handing over the tea cosy to the customer tomorrow- I hope they like it.

Finally setting up a blog

Ok so this is day one of writing a blog, the children are out playing with friends so I thought I would take the opportunity to get this up and running. I have just spent forever setting up the layout and discovering how to edit and upload my own photo; thanks to athriftymrs for showing my how to do it.
This blog will be short and sweet as it has taken me so long to set it up it is now time to go and cook the dinner. So watch this space to know what I have been up to, things I have in the pipe line and even a few tutorials.
Thanks for taking the time to read this.