Festive Season Photos

Big One as Mary at her Nativity- Wellies essential for all the walking Mary had to do!

The Girls were so happy Santa had some of his mince pie ( made by Grandma) and warm  milk:

And left presents! Little One with some of her stocking presents-Big One was really into presents this year.



As mentioned in a previous post, Mother- In- Law gave me crochet things in a lovely homemade bag and scissor case:

First attempts at crochet- they might not look like much but its been interesting to learn so far, and even the girls can recognise the flowers as, well, flowers. I even figured out what I was doing wrong without help!

Thanks to Lucy at Attic24 for the pattern.



 

A quick picture of a gift I made to give: we have a Secret Santa thing at work, so I gave my first attempt at a spoontula- I prefer the spatula, but I just need more practice at a spoontula. The handle on the spatula works well, and I like the colours in the wood. I hope they liked them- I had a wobble at the last moment, so gave a jar of homemade mincemeat as well. The value of the gift is meant to be £10, so I feel my recipient got a bargain!

 The snow melted, but the ice stayed behind. the plastic bucket was ok, but the metal bucket split :(

The girls enjoyed playing with the watery bit in this one!

I've been able to get in the kitchen a bit over the last few days:

Some bread from The Handmade Loaf which is really called 'cucumber pickle juice rye loaf'! Well, we'd finished a jar of pickled cucumbers so I had to give it a try. The taste is much milder than a sourdough rye bread, and it rises more ( in this cold weather!) so I think its a pleasant change.

 DH normally makes the tortillas in this house- but we'd run out and he'd gone to try out his chainsaw on a tree that has fallen, so I had a go- no idea where he got the recipe from, he keeps it on his phone. Mostly slightly over-cooked, so not great as wraps but lovely dipped in home-made hummous. Again, something we had run out of, had the ingredients in so I had a go. This was from Delia's Complete Cookery Course (Vol 1-3), but next time I make it I'll omit the cooking liquid at the beginning, and only add a little if needed. I like my hummous scoop-able, and this came out too runny. Oh, and I use tinned chickpeas, much quicker when everyone's hungry!

Finally, some crackers, also from The Handmade Loaf . They puffed up a bit, so I guess I didn't stab them hard enough with a fork, but I'm happy they're edible for another first attempt.

We made some butter yesterday. We had a large tub of cream Grandma asked us to buy that didn't get used for Christmas.We don't usually use cream, and if we did  it would be for something that'd last a few days- not great for cream already passed its use by date.Anyway, lots of vigourous shaking later, it turned into butter and buttermilk. The buttermilk works fabulously in scones according to Delia's Complete How To Cook, and I left the butter unsalted. I'd share a pic but, as we finished the shaking at Grandma and Grandad's, the scones were made there ( and eaten up!) and we managed to forget to bring the butter home. We used some of the butter in the scones, and lovely on baked potatoes.
  One or two of us will go to get it later, so we can make our own batch of Delia buttermilk scones.