Today started off on a good note with a hearty breakfast of porridge, followed by a pot of tea (the teapot, incidently, was a present from me to Fergal, (but really from me to me!!); it is enamel and not only gives me delight to look at it, pours beautifully too! I’m so looking forward to picnic-ing with it)

Paper, paper everywhere… (as usual)

My middle boy, (who tends towards the cute side) was telling me how he would just love a hot scone with jam. 

So how could I resist such a plea? (don’t they look “perfect”? And tasted rather good too!!)

James’ baptism is next weekend- I’m crocheting a quick little cap; and the shawl: I’m keeping that to have something for Ginnys Yarn Along on Wednesday. I had to deviate somewhat from the plan (was there a plan? Really?) 

These little fellows are flitting to and from our window all day…

Our smallest cutie spends his changing time transfixed by the movement a few feet away:

If ever you wanted or needed to know the basics of cooking, sewing, general home-making; this is your bible. My well-thumbed copy is regularly used, and, following a dream about her scones, I made them exactly to her recipe (well, I doubled the quantities…)

As would be expected, they were perfect (funnily, I find, this is an outcome that happens when one actually follows a recipe rather than winging it)

When my children eventually fly the nest (although they regularly threaten they will never leave) this will be the book I give them a copy of. Recently the book has been re-published, find it here, and in the meantime, do go and make these scones….

Tea Scones

200g flour

1/8 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking powder

50g butter

25g caster sugar

1 egg

A little milk (approx 2 tablespoons)

Sieve flour, salt and baking powder into a bowl

Rub in the butter until it looks like breadcrumbs, then stir in the sugar

Beat the egg and milk in a small bowl and add to the mixture (you can keep back a little to use as a glaze if you like) Mix to a soft dough, adding more milk if necessary.

Turn onto a floured worktop and knead until smooth underneath.

Roll out to at least 1 cm in thickness and cut into rounds.  Place on a greased tray, brush with egg and bake in a fairly hot oven 215′C/ 425″F, Gas 6 for about 15 minutes. Cool on a wire tray.

Mincemeat ”Parcels”

(These are also very delicious made with apple, sprinkled with sugar… oh, yum)

For the pastry:

(I always make a lot of pastry and keep it wrapped in the fridge- keeping it chilled does wonders for pastry)

250 gms cold butter, cubed

500 gms flour

ice-cold water

In the food processor I whizz up the butter and flour until like coarse breadcrumbs (you can also do this by hand of course  )

very slowly drip in the water until it just comes together. Keeping it in the bowl, I cover it with buttered paper and leave it in the fridge for at least an hour (It keeps for up to a week)

The Parcels:

Roll the pastry out thinly, then cut out circles (I used a lovely wide coffee cup)

Into the centre of each circle I put a teaspoon of mincemeat or finely chopped apple (if using apple, sprinkle with sugar), wet half the edges of the pastry circles, fold over the circle and with a fork, press down all along the edge. Spike the top with the fork and into a hot oven for 15 minutes. Enjoy hot!!

Muttley did his best to squeeze into the inner sanctum of the yard (no way hozay, until you or Pebbles are sorted so we don’t have millons of puppies)…

karate suits whitening-up in the sun before the class tonight…

friends (who are great bakers!) over for tea and fresh cream swiss-roll…

Preparing vegetables and potatoes with the sun on my back, a dog on my feet, a girl by my side and Muttley howling at how unfair it all is…

Granny Cat hardly moved all day (except when the sun moved and she followed it diligently)…

I’m not getting any time to paint these days, so I’m doodling at every opportunity… while eating breakfast, lunch… on the phone… I’m filling notebooks unconsciously, looking forward to when I’ll have an hour or two to *paint* ((sigh!!!))

We had a lovely day filled with friends and boys making lego and stop-motion movies (latest boy-obsession in our house):

(He even has a Youtube account where he posts his movies!!: Lego Ted: Free-running )

I bought these roses to celebrate the day- I just can’t wait until our garden is full of flowers- and the first daffodils bloomed on his birthday-

these little miniature ones are always the first up!

Today, our friends Tara and Pat (the bat-man) came over; they are making a willow dome for their local school, and we were happily providing the willow as it badly needed cutting (in between the hail showers)

and we were finding it impossible to get to (the other sally garden needs some serious cutting too)

Our small men helped greatly, and within a hour or two, there was a large trailer of willow,

sporting some beautiful silvery catkins

(took us a long while to convince our small girl that they weren’t: “slugs! urgh!!”)

While the men chopped willow, Tara and I drank tea and crocheted- Tara is using up her stash of bits and pieces, making a gorgeous, bright and colourful square, that will some day soon become a blanket for their caravan, and inspired me to do the same (I’ve been trying to decide what to start- I wanted to work with double knit (DK) and a large hook, so I could crochet rounds of granny squares for hours at night without having to think much!!)

We gathered a basket of considerably un-inspiring yarns, but, once I interspaced each colour with white, it didn’t seem so awful, and actually looking fairly coherent:

I recently followed a link from Attic 24 which lead me to Masons who are selling this pack of completely gorgeous DK acrylic yarns…

I think I will have to invest, as I’m not sure how long my gakky yarns will last, whether I will end up with a small baby blanket (poor baby!!) or something more substantial…