Another recipe from the Commonsense Cookery Book. These were very successful. Next time I’ll add a lot more dates, the recipe said 1/3 cup but I think maybe 3/4 would be better. I love dates. :-)
I’ve also been sewing. I’ll post some pics tonight, the rest will have to be after Xmas, as they’re gifts.
Today I hope to finally get my Christmas cards in the post, I’ve been very tardy this year.
I rarely bake so I thought I should mention it. :-)
White Wings now have gluten-free flour which has been designed to simply replace the flour in any recipe. This makes life so much easier. One of the reasons I stopped baking was because when you cook gluten-free you have heaps of failures, so after a while it’s just not worth the bother.
I got the recipe from this site:
http://katieskitchen.wordpress.com/2007/10/07/gluten-free-vanilla-cupcakes/
It says it makes 18 cupcakes but in fact it makes 30. You can even get gluten-free icing mixture now which is so much easier to work with than pure icing sugar.
Gluten-free scones.
I used the scone recipe from The Commonsense cookery book.
The first batch I made I left in the oven to brown, they didn’t, they just ended up a bit hard to chew. This is the 2nd batch they were much better.
I know these don’t look fantastic but they taste great. When it comes to gluten-free cooking it’s a whole new ball game. It’s all about the texture & the flavour rather than the appearance.
Lucky me, I won a bag pattern on Linda’s blog.
http://flourishingpalms.blogspot.com/
The hardest part was choosing which pattern I’d like!!!
http://www.pursestringspatterns.com/
There were so many lovely bag patterns to choose from. :-)
I ended up choosing:
Annabelle
Thanks Linda, it’s inspired my first New Year’s Resolution. Next year I’ll be having some giveaways on my blog. :-)
This mug rug is even quicker & easier than the first one I did the tutorial on.
Cut a 6 1/2” x 9 1/2” piece of medium weight iron-on pellon. Cut strips of your chosen fabrics 6 1/2” x anything from 1 1/2” to 2 1/2” wide.
Lay the pellon glue side DOWN.
Lay your first strip on the pellon.
Lay your 2nd strip of fabric on the 1st, right sides together. Stitch.
Flip the 2nd strip over & continue adding strips in the same way until the pellon is covered.
Trim the rug back to 6” x 9”.
Cut an 11” x 8” piece of fabric for your backing.
Centre the rug on the backing & pin in place.
Turn the rug over & iron to glue the pellon to the backing, remove the pins.
Turn back over & bind as shown on the original tutorial.
(I’ve reposted it below).
BINDING
Cut a 5/8” square our of each corner to cut back on the bulk.
Turn the binding in half, then half again over the front of the rug. Pin in place.
Turn the corner over 45 degrees.
The pin is so I could take the photo as I didn’t have a third hand. :-)
Fold the hem in half.
Finally fold it over again & pin. You might have to fiddle a little to get a neat corner but it doesn’t take long.
Hand or machine stitch the binding in place & enjoy your mug rug. :-)
Two more I need to choose backing/binding for.
You’d never think I had a sewing room, lol. I’ve taken over the dining room table to make a few things for the verandah area we’re working on. I’m just cutting squares for a tablecloth for the cane coffee table.
They’ve changed the system overnight, all the trees were on 1 page, now we are on page 6 of 7.
Thanks!!!!
I actually missed last week’s colourful Friday post, & teal is one of my fave colours, coz I couldn’t find the camera, grrr!!!
Oh well, at least I have for the final colourful post of the year.
I’ve already shown my Chrissy deckies on my blog but I’ll show my tree again & ask if you like my tree to please visit this site & vote for it:
http://www.lifestylechannel.com.au/christmas/ratemytree/browse.aspx
It’s under J. Quigley, Langwarrin. It’s probably quickest to find it by hitting ‘control f’ & typing in Quigley.
This is dd Emma’s tree. They moved into their new home just last Saturday & the first thing she did was put up the Christmas tree. That’s my girl!!!! :-)
Some pics from last year, it was our 18th Christmas in the old house.
Our Lemax village & my little tree, the deckies are all handmade from swaps with friends.
My favourite Lemax building.
Our lovely old piano, we sold it before we moved.
Hopefully it’s has lovely deckies on it in it’s new home.
I tend to go through stages with Christmas. Some years I love it & others not so much. This year is a love year. Finally we are living close to dd Emma after being 1000kms away for 8 years, we have a lovely new house to decorate & new shops to do our Christmas shopping in. The one thing that would make it perfect would be having ds Simon here too, but he now lives in Canada so popping home for Christmas is not so easy. We were lucky to have him home for a surprise visit in January, the first time I’d seen him for 2 years!!!!
Thanks to Robyn for hosting ‘Colourful Fridays’ I look forward to it resuming in the new year. :-)
Btw, my fave Christmas carol is ‘The 12 Days of Christmas.’
I love checking out crafty blogs & I’ve made a few things I’ve found.
I love working with felt, it doesn’t fray & is so easy to sew. I use 100% wool or wool blend as it lasts well & doesn’t rub like acrylic felt does.
These cute little owls are quick & easy to make. I found them on Jessica Levitts’ Juicy Bits blog.
http://juicy-bits.typepad.com/juicy_bits/2009/12/131-give-a-hoot-for-the-holidays.html
I found the directions for these little brooch trees here:
http://www.purlbee.com/felt-christmas-tree-pins/
I might make a few more in different colours.
