A Little Stitching Progress

Hello everyone.

D here again. Mum feels a little unwell, so this week's blog post will be brief. 

She has been working on her cross-stitching project, which she started a few weeks ago. It is an abstract design with a worded message. As you can see, the first word is 'happiness..."

I am looking forward to seeing how it turns out. 

The daffodils that Mum is growing in the greenhouse also look lovely.

Whatever your plans are for the coming week, we hope you enjoy them.

Have a good week as we head into March.

D x

Queen of Hearts

Hello everyone. How has your week been?

In our small corner, last week was a half-term holiday from work for D, and we had a fun week together.

As we celebrated St Valentine's Day this week, we had a ready-made theme for the first part of the week. After D's very yummy heart cake, she made red velvet brownies from her favourite cookbook. Only three pieces are left now, which is a miracle, and they will be gone by the end of the day!

While the flour, sugar and butter were still close to hand, D also made some shortbread for us to munch. We still had some of the red fondant icing from her cake and used this to cut out hearts to decorate the tops of the shortbread. Hence, this week's blog title is 'Queen of Hearts'.

Continuing the theme of love, I made some small felt envelopes with added hearts to decorate the twiggy branched tree in our living room. They have joined the felt and fabric hearts I made last year.

As you can see, I have made more progress on the cross-stitch project, but I'm still keeping the design under wraps for now.

D and I have been continuing our reading of Shakespeare plays, have almost finished Henry VI Part 2, and are ready to watch the rest of the 'Hollow Crown' film version. 

While we had a lot of fun together this week, we also met up with our friends. I had lunch with my best friend from school, and we had a lovely chatty time together. 

Look what D got up to—afternoon tea with her friend. There was no doubt lots of chatting there as well as the tea and cake!

We both wish you all a lovely week ahead and the weather is kind to us all.

Take care.

B and D 

xx

Hearts and Cake

Hello everyone!

D here today, and I would like to share with you some things I have been up to this week.

On Friday, we had a staff challenge where we had to work in teams and bake a cake based on a chosen theme, and you all know how much I enjoy baking!

Since Valentine's Day is coming next week, I suggested my team do a Valentine's Day-themed cake. We went with a Red Velvet cake with cream cheese frosting and decorated it with red and white fondant hearts. Unfortunately, the frosting was a bit too runny, but overall, I was delighted with our team cake.

It certainly tasted wonderful!

I have also been planting some garlic in my little garden patch. As a cook, I often use garlic, and it felt like an excellent idea to grow it myself. I also intend to grow spring onions, radishes and beetroot here.

Mum and I have also started to chit some potatoes ready for planting in a few weeks time.

It is half term next week, so Mum and I will be up to mischief, no doubt. 😊

Whatever your plans are for next week, I hope you enjoy it.

D x

All About the Fruit

Hello to you all.

I hope you have had a good week and the weather has been kind wherever you are. It has been warm enough at times this week for me to get outside in the garden, which is one of my favourite things to do. 

I found this lovely small clump of snowdrops just poking their heads above the ground early in the week. Unfortunately, when I looked a few days later, all the pretty white heads had gone - nibbled away. When I looked on Mr Google, I was surprised to learn that snowdrops are high in sugar, so maybe a night-time critter had a sweet tooth for them this year.

Or it could just be slugs, of course.

This week has been about the fruit in my garden, preparing the ground and pots for the season ahead. I pruned our apple tree to keep it manageable and planted some rooted gooseberry and black currant plants into pots. We also had two more large gooseberry and black currant bushes that had been taking up a great deal of space in raised beds, which we have replanted in pots with fresh compost.  

The last fruit that found a new home this week was the rhubarb: the wooden raised bed it was growing in had disintegrated over time, so a new place to grow had become essential. I split the plants and discarded the oldest parts before replanting them in a larger plot.

I have several other jobs I want to get done in the garden this month. Still, if the weather is unkind, I can continue to work in the greenhouse preparing for seed sowing time.

Meanwhile, indoors, I have started a new cross-stitch project. It was the final item currently in my craft box. I shall be working on this over the next few weeks, but I thought you would like to see the start and keep you guessing as to what it will be.

Have a great week ahead, both inside and outdoors.

See you next week 

B xx