Quickest Pizza In The World

Honestly I'm not lying - it's 25 minutes from you entering your kitchen to the pizza entering your mouth.

You need:
4 parts plain flour
1 part butter
a splash of milk

Heat oven to 200°C. Mix flour with butter - I usually grate the butter straight from the fridge into the bowl. Add a splash of butter and mix with a spoon until you have a little dough ball. Make small handsize rounds and place on a greased baking tray. Add topping of your choice. Put in the oven for 10-15 minutes. Remove, cool, eat.

Normally I would have been more creative in regards to the topping but today it was all about speed, so the one on the left is red pepper pesto and grated cheese and the one on the right is green pesto and tomato slices. What more could a little boy want on a Friday evening? (Well actually a lot more but for the time being he is quite happy with this.)

N.B For these two I used 100g of flour and 25g of butter.

Slaving Away

I'm busy finishing all those shoes and a whole load of crayon rolls I'm working on, here are a few finished ones - I'll let the photos do the talking.

What's That You Say?

Luca's vocabulary is coming on leaps and bounds but he does tend to repeat words .... A LOT. So here are, in descending order, his favourites (he has said some of these in his sleep, but I won't count those):

10) Bubbles ... after he was given a bubble machine last week, about 25 times a day
9) Mama Dada Guca ... in various combinations. Often it is just Maaaaamaaaaa
8) Up .... so he can press the button on the coffee machine, operate the toaster, open the door, lock the door, look inside the microwave, look out the window, open the fridge, look inside the fridge, you get the point
7) Bread .... after he has said 'up' enough times and is now sitting on the kitchen top next to the toaster
6) More .... after he has been popping slices of toast endless times in the toaster
5) Cookie ... after he gets bored of bread
4) Horsie .... for no particular reason
3) Milk ... this becomes a favourite by late afternoon
2) Noddy .... always in combination with the latter, in Luca's world one always comes with the other

and at

no 1) Oh no ... About twice every minute, which on a basis that he is awake for 12 hours, makes this 1440 times per day.

Oh no! Oh yes.

Rich Pickings

It's already Saturday and I haven't blogged at all this week - it's been such a busy week with orders coming in and family visiting that I've hardly had time for anything else. Except today when the weather was lovely and it actually felt like summer again. Our fruit trees were mostly bare last year but it looks as if it's going to be a whole different story this year ... in fact I think I'll need to think about storage for all those apples soon. If you're in the area, stop by and I'll send you on your way with a kilo of apples and pears. I will spend tomorrow browsing my books looking for appropriate recipes.

Remember I mentioned those personalised T-Shirts? Well they seem to be flying of the shelves, I think I'll choose a few more fabrics this week for them to have more varierty. Here are a few that have gone out this week:


I've also had to source for a new fabric for a third crayon roll that would go with the two star fabrics so these three will be going in the post on Monday:


I haven't done my usual Etsy trawl this week but I have ordered a hoodie for Luca from this lovely lady at kitschycoo, she makes fabulous children clothing and has a sale on at the moment so go and have a look whilst I retire to the sofa with that bowl of plums.

The Pink Room Is No More

Wow, what a busy week-end it has been! And it involved a lot of paint. The little man and I made our way to Homebase on Saturday morning and for a while it looked like the room was going to be painted in 'White Apple'. But for the simple fact that the colour had run out, the room is now painted in 'White Apricot' and it's lovely. The final touches were applied this morning and I think I might actually move my little sweatshop in there because I like the room so much now.

So whilst the man of the house was busy painting upstairs, I decided to tackle a different project in the kitchen - for weeks I had planned to paint the blackboard in the kitchen with magnetic paint and it was finally done yesterday. And with all this painting going on around him, Luca decided to get in on the action and paint my hands. At least that was easy to wash off, it could have been far worse, given that painting is one of his favourite pass-times a the moment.

Obviously we couldn't get through the week-end without the few odd tears so here is Luca discovering a hole in his sock for the very first time:

Checking that the sock monster hadn't bitten his toe off:



and all was well in the end.

And whilst you're reading this I am working on some new designs for lovely personalised T-Shirts so hopefully I can show them off here tomorrow. Now that's what I call a reason to come back!

The Comfort of Hot Buttered Toast

Is there anything more comforting than hot buttered toast? I am not sure. Yesterday the little man and I had a few moments in the morning that ended with him spending a bit of time in his 'reflection corner' and once he had calmed down he came back into the kitchen and we shared a few slices of hot buttered toast.


Now we're off to the DIY store to chose paint - the family committee decided last night that 'the pink room' in our house will now longer be pink but painted in a different colour. I'm thinking of a pale green maybe? So whilst we're away have a look at this house ... what do you think - mad or genius?

Heat Wave Predicted For This Summer!

Heat wave? What heat wave!? It seems like winter out there! It's mid-week, the little man decided that nap after lunch was a no-no so to pass the time a little quicker, we went to our favourite cafe for a little it-should-be-summer-but-it's-awful-outside treat.

Just to make it clear - he did NOT get a treat for not sleeping at lunch time .... His bed recently changed from a cotbed to a junior bed and whilst it all started well (in fact he loved it), it's going downhill at the moment with him going pretty mad whenever we tell him it's time to sleep and he refuses to lie down. I'm not sure who was more traumatised tonight, him or me, but in the end he went to sleep and I went to get a glass of wine so it was win-win ... well for me. If anyone knows how to get through this phase a little quicker - I'm open to suggestions.

Shoes, shoes, shoes

Two more orders have gone out today. The ice cream T-Shirt is now becoming a firm favourite, and two sleep suits will shortly be making their way to Germany - wohoo!



I've also had my first wholesale inquiry, another website that wants to feature my products which is quite exciting, let's see what comes of it.

There is no space in my living room at the moment because this is what you'll find on the floor ...




it makes me dizzy just looking at it. The end result will hopefully be a total of 35 pairs of baby shoes!

With all this work my fabric stash is dwindling and as a little treat I thought I could lift the ban that I had placed on new fabric acquisitions two months ago. I discovered the ladies at Saints & Pinners and couldn't resist ... and the parcel arrived today.



I'm actually planning to use these to cover some cardboard boxes that are used for storage in my studio.

So whilst I have been so busy that I would like the day to have 48 hours, here is my son's day in a few numbers:

- time he woke up: 6
- number of times he wanted to sit on the toilet between 3 and 5 pm: 5
- results: 0
- books read while sitting on said toilet: 20
- litres of milk he drank today: 1
- number of strawberries eaten: about 30
- number of times I had to rebuild the marble run after he knocked it down: 3

Time for bed ... and that's just me!

The F-Word

My other obsession ... food. Or rather cooking. As anyone who has been to my house can confirm I have a rather large collection of cookery books, and I can often be found lying in bed in the evening reading on of the books and then dreaming of all the lovely dishes I will be making.

I often get asked if I actually use all of these books and the answer is, yes, I do, well most of them. Some I would probably not buy again but others are fabulous, and this is my list of top 5:

• Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's River Cottage Meat Book. I often refer back to this when I'm not sure about a specific cut or how to prepare a certain piece of meat.
• Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's Fish Book, for the same reasons
• Nigella Lawson's How To Eat (Pleasures and Principles of Good Food). I always enjoyed food and cookery but I think it was after reading this book that my fondness of all things related to food and cookery became even more pronounced.
• The Cooks Book. It's really the only book you'll ever need when it comes to techniques and classic recipes, all explained by top Chefs but in a language you can understand and with lots of photos
  
• And finally Ottolenghi The Cookbook. I envy anyone who lives in London for the simple reason that you can go and eat their food all the time in one of their outlets, but when you are far from London like I am, you can resort to making their dishes with the help of this book and they are all divine.
  

Since I discovered fabrics I have spent less time cooking (to my husband's dismay) but the last one we bought is this Indian cookery book, by Anjum Anand and even though I had never been a huge fan of Indian food, this one is fantastic. In fact I think we've been having curry every night, something my dear husband is certainly NOT complaining about.

So What Is It You Do All Day?

So this week whilst I was cooking, cleaning and caring for my huband and son browsing through my favourite shop , I found a few new treasures and I've decided to select a few every week for my blog.

I would like to have a daughter just so I can buy her this dress.


These prints are lovely, in fact I have bought two from this shop to go on the wall in my studio.


These tissue holders are adorable, so much nicer than just having lots of loose tissues lying around on the bottom of your bag.


I totally love this Amy Butler fabric, in fact I have some of it myself but haven't found the right thing to do with it yet. This wallet is a great idea.

Somehow I Don't Think This Would Sell

This morning I managed to finish a new design, I had tried out a few other airplane shapes but this one just seems to work best. I always only get a few seconds to take the photo before Luca runs off into the garden or wipes his nose on the sleeve, which I don't think would help selling it. But in any case I don't think this photo would help selling it ...

Luckily he is quickly getting the hang of all this posing malarky.

Friday is 'our' day where we usually have a lazy morning, go to playgroups or the farmers market, and since there were no plans for the afternoon I was very glad when a friend suggested a trip to the beach. It was far too windy and soon three crying toddlers discovered that sand in their eyes really wasn't a good idea but luckily we managed to find a secluded space.

Off to see 'Revolutionary Road' tonight although I fear it might be a little too depressing for a Friday evening?

In Case You Thought I Didn't Have Anything To Do ...

... I now have a blog - hurrah! This morning I have been working myself through a pile of T-shirts to prepare my first craft fair, Live Crafts at Parham Park at the end of August. I know it's still a few weeks away but I've got a lot to prepare and this is what it looks like:

I am very glad I've got my own little sweatshop sorry place where I can do all my sewing and don't have to pack everything away every night.

I have also worked on an order for two sleepsuits and two pairs of the most adorable baby booties, I think I am secretly in love with them and will not want to hand them over.