Mardi Gras

I know, not yet.  But this ornamental facade on a building near my house made me think of all the prep people are doing to finish their floats in time for next month, and that if we were in New Orleans, this fleur de lis wouldn't be a dull dismal sludgy grey colour, at the very least it would be purple, gold or green.

Bring on the Hurricanes!

Kitchen creativity

Plenty left over for lunch tomorrow!

Okay, so my future does not belong in food photography.  But I was pleased with the way this hearty winter stew turned out, so I thought I'd share how I did it.

1 medium onion, chopped finely
3 cloves garlic, chopped finely
4 carrots, peeled and chopped however you prefer them (we like rounds)
2 chicken breasts, chopped roughly
2 mini chorizos, chopped in rounds
1 tin butter beans
1 tin chick peas
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon sweet smoked paprika
1 portion of chicken stock made up with enough water to cover
also would have been nice with some chilli flakes thrown in, and/or fresh ground pepper - the chorizo and stock is salty enough

Serves 4, without extra veg, or stretches to 6 with extra greens on the side - possibly further if you do potatoes or chunky bread.  I think spicy wedges would go nicely with this.

Fry off your garlic and onion, and chuck in the carrots, along with the spices.  Then add the chicken and chorizo and give it a good fry - you can do this in a separate pan and drain off the excess fat, which is what I would have done if I wasn't in a hurry at 7am this morning.  Once the meat is sealed, the stock can go in, and lastly add your tinned veg.  If you like tinned tomatoes, you can have them in it, too, or some red wine would be nice and wintry too, but it is lovely just in the stock.  Give it about an hour to an hour and a half on 180 degrees C, or gas mark 4 or 5 ish.

Enjoy!

Stuck in a book

Oh this book is such a treat. Bear with me because most of this post won't make much sense if you aren't from Salford, or Manchester, or 1978. Don't let that put you off the book, though, it's a must read for any fan of popular culture, youth culture, the DIY/punk ethos, or the film 24 Hour Party People.

I keep grinning away to myself at snippets of Tony Wilson's ridiculous banter, a mention of the Town Hall pub in Eccles, St Mary's Hospital, where it is claimed that proper Mancunians are born, and the confirmation, in print, that Mick Hucknall was never there.

To counterbalance this, I am sad that the gig was at the Lesser Free Trade Hall, as I have only sung on stage (with my school choir in the Sting rainforest musical, Yanomamo) in the actual Free Trade Hall. Now it's a hotel, anyway. And I'm sad that Tony (Wilson) and Martin (Hannet) and Ian (Curtis) are no longer with us to reminisce. And I only have 20 pages left to read :(

Stirling sunrise

I was running a little late for work yesterday, but I didn't mind so much because I watched a glorious sunrise from the train. This shot was taken on the approach next to the rugby club, just before the river.

A treasury for twilight on Tuesday

Click through here



Here:

Thoughts about words

I love quotations, I have a few favourites that I keep meaning to do something crafty with and then forgetting about.  I have a particular fondness for the unlikely sage, Nicola Roberts, who rightly points out that 'Beyonce wasn't built in a day', and plan to embroider this onto fabric for our soon-to-be-redecorated bedroom, just above my mirror.

Today I finally got around to reading Saturday's paper and found this new (to me) quote, from dramatist and screenwriter Shelagh Delaney, who is revered in my home town of Salford and many other places besides.

Editing my fabric collection

Is there any more soothing an activity than rooting through the fabric collection on a Sunday afternoon? This vintage geometric print is bang on trend but I'm working on a smaller scale project and the sizing is all wrong. Its time will come, I'm sure.

I've decided to reinstate the sale in my Etsy shop as it was doing so well. There'll be 40% off across the entire shop until the end of January, when some unsold items will disappear for good, and the new ones I've been working on will take their place.

I'm also attempting to do a post a day this year but I'm sure once I'm back in work on Tuesday, this might start to get a bit unsustainable. We'll see.

Line up

No, my house isn't on fire, I think I must need to clean the lens on my phone camera.  I'm trying to do a quick post a day to take advantage of the fact that my phone and iPad both have cameras and it's pretty convenient, the only problem I'm finding is that most of my crafting is done by night.  While it's been sunny in the day time since the start of the year, I've been wrangling a toddler so taking photos is at best inconvenient, or when we're out and about, can be a bit dangerous.  This is a last set of notecards in this style and colour, which are on their way to London as I type. 

I don't have any more of this particular card stock left, but I do have more cards already made up in a postage stamp and security envelope patterns, made with this lovely grey card that came from deadstock in Arizona.  I'll have to get the security envelope bunting ones in the shop asap - another thing for the 2013 to do list!

Front page!

So I curated another Etsy Europe front page.  I would be delighted to own any of these items, but I particular love the handmade notebook, the fake tattoos and the silver book.  Lovely!

I love the constellation leggings, too, but would also need someone to buy me the pins to go with them...

Happy New Year

The general consensus seems to be that 2012 was rubbish.  Already, 2013 is shaping up to be a better year.  The sun came out.  I cleaned the cat wee smell out of my car (Kipper stowed away last week, luckily I noticed him before I got to Asda, went straight round the roundabout and dropped him home again).  I hit 250 sales on Etsy.  And I made a new batch of thank you cards to pop in with future orders.  Hurrah!