Friday 30 July 2010

a 3yr olds imagination

Gingerbread

I've tried many recipes over the years, but this one is my personal favourite...a soft sticky,sweet cake that lasts for a few days without drying out...easy too


RECIPE
preheat oven to 160C, grease and line one 1lb or 2 1/2lb loaf tins


8oz soft brown sugar
2oz butter
1 tablespoon treacle (or syrup for a lighter sponge)
8 fluid oz milk

put the above ingredients in a pot and heat till sugar dissolved then leave to cool

in another bowl put...

8oz plain flour
2tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1tsp bicarbonate of soda

once sugar/milk mixture is cooled pour it into flour mix, mix thoroughly and pour into greased and lined tin/tins

bake for approx 1 hour or until when you stick a knife in the center it comes out clean

leave to cool slightly in the tins before tipping out and cooling completely on wire rack

Wonderful served as a thick slice with butter and a cup of tea...also great served with warm custard.

Enjoy

Cheesecake

The chocolate cheese...minging as it was...inspired a cheesecake making


Easy enough recipe.

line a 7-8" cake tin with tinfoil (makes for easy removal if you dont have a spring side tin)

smash up about 200g of digestives...depends how thick you like your base...easiest way is to empty them into on of those clear freezerbags and bash with a rolling pin...you can roll the pin over it to bash up and smaller chunks and if you hold the bag by the handles and give it a shake any lumps tend to rise to the top making it easier to get rid of them

to the biscuit powder add about 30grams of melted butter...i say about 30 as sometimes you may need a little more depending on your base thickness (ie how many biscuits you originally bashed lol)...mix well, you'll know you have enough butter in when if you press down it just holds together

empty the biscuit mix into the lined rin and press down evenly with the back of a spoon (or your fingers if you really want)...personally i just do a base,some people like to push it up the sides too, but that's up to you. Pop it in the fridge to let it set slightly while you make the filling.

The filling is soooo easy it's unreal. But you do need an electric mixer or whisk...or a handwhisk and a nice helpful friend with amazing biceps :-D


For the basic filling empty 200g of full fat soft cheese into mixing bowl, add in about 2 heaped dessertspoons of icing sugar. (i try not to work in tablespoons as most people dont have them anymore). combine cheese and sugar then add in 1/2 pint (250mls) of double cream...i didnt say it was healthy lol...and whisk.

Make sure to scrape the cheese off the bottom of the bowl so it mixes fully as it does tend to stick to the bottom, but keep whipping until the mixture holds it's shape...think Mr Whippy icecream softness...but be careful not to overwhip as it will turn to butter suddenly, once it gets close turn the speed down or better yet move to hand whisk at that point so you can feel when it's ready.

Empty the mix onto the base and smooth out...pop in fridge till ready to serve.

Now for the experimant bit. Above is the recipe for the basic cheesecake...but we all have our favourite varieties.

The picture of the one i made is a Choc Chip Cheesecake...all i did was grate chocolate and mix it through the filling before emptying it on the base...then a little more chocolate grated on top for decoration...you could also add in a couple of drops of mint flavouring and green colouring and make a mint choc chip cheesecake...cut an after eight in half on the diagonal and serve a slive of cheesecake with a swirl of cream with the after eight half placed artistically in it

If you can get the tins of Carnation Caramel (the cheats way as we always got the tin of condensed milk and boiled it in water for about 4 hours to get the same stuff lol)...you could put a layer of that between the base and filling and/or a thin layer on top.

the traditional topping of mandarin orange segments and grated chocolate is another option.

summer fruits are great too...be it just strawberries or the raspberry/blackberry/strawberry frozen mix. the frozen mix is great  as you can take out just enough for what you need, put in a microwavable bowl with a little icing sugar and a splash of water or orange juice, warm until the berries have defrosted and serve a triangle of the plain cheesecake with a little berry sauce thing on the side...add a mint leaf for that proper arty farty look LOL

The list of varieties is almost endless and only limited by imagination...cheesecake is wonderful

:-)


Wednesday 28 July 2010

eviltedi's gamerscore

About 2 years ago hubby accidentally got this score


So he had to even it up, got 55555 at one point...we took a pic but i cant find it at the moment. Anyways, after that we thought...hold on...all the 4s,all the 5s...lets see if we can work out all the 6s and...



Needless to say we were then on the hunt for another single point achievement and a couple of months or so later we got his score to this point



Can you guess what's coming next ?

YUP...after much more gaming the next milestone was getting close...searched through things to find a 1 or 6 point achievement...CLONING CLYDE !!! I got that one AGES ago and got the 200 points, but 'Tedi only had 79 points on it so far. In that game was a 16 pointer...but there was an 18 point that would unlock before it...thankfully tho there was a 12 pointer to "even" it back up

After much Frog Clyde jumping on that fecking Flushed Away level to get faster than the Par time the 18 blinked....went to cheat menu, switched on Mutant Clyde...16 blinked...connected 2nd contoller,opened up a versus game in split screen and the 12 point blinked...score at that point was 88828 !!! EEEEK much excitement...60 points was all that was needed. Back to Crackdown and Crackdown 2 and a couple more achievements.

I went shopping...needed some bits and bobs (got the chocolate cheese) came back home and he'd JUST unlocked the last one for....



WHHOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOO!!!!

Now to look for a 99999 :-)

Chocolate Cheese

Yes...you DID read right...CHOCOLATE flavoured cheese


I like chocolate...a LOT....I like cheese...a LOT

This was...errr...interesting.

Texture of cheese...not the cheap rubbery cr*p but the texture of a good quality one that melts away and leave a slight covering on the inside of your mouth.

The taste tho is kinda weird...a bit like cheesecake, not totally horrid but on it's own is missing something. I must get some digestive biscuits tomorrow as i think that's what it needs....like a cheesecake needs it's pastry or biscuit base.

Personally...i think I'll spend the next £1.50 on getting Savers digestives, Savers soft cheese, a tub of double cream and whatever left over on chocolate and make a full sized chocolate cheesecake instead

More Dolly Pics

Well she now has the name Lucy, and i have been reliably informed that she is getting well loved.

In her very bright stripey dress






And in her Blue Pinafore dress with her own little dolly...little dolly has a dress that matches her one above. The reason for this is cos her new owner (who is 3 years old) has a very similarly coloured dress that she really likes...so they can all be colour   co-ordinated LOL









On other makes...this lot is the unsewn bits that make up a knitted car (see red car further down the page)...i've just realised i don't have a fully made up pic of the blue one, but it's tucked up in bed with a 2 yr old and i don't fancy disturbing him to get it LOL

Tuesday 27 July 2010

27th July re: Hockenheim

I originally answered most of this to a friend over facebook, but i'll elaborate a little more here thanks to space lol.

A little view on what happened on Sundays German GP after Ferrari basically,but without physically saying it, asked Massa to move over and let Alonso by...


Martin Brundle makes a good case


http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/formula_one/8856345.stm

DC also said the team orders rule is impossible to police...EJ also makes a good point, team orders are against the rules now so Ferrari should be punished for it.

We all know team orders happen, 2002 Ferrari did it as blatently as the world has seen (for those that don't remember after the last corner and on the finishing straight Rubens Barrichello LET Michael Schumacher past as he had been ordered to by deliberately slowing down), hence their fine then and the rule being brought in. other teams were and still are much more subtle about it (oops we took an extra second or so to put your tyre on and change the angle of the back wing slightly)...we know it happens but we also know it's usually not blatently implemented as much until the end of a season when the mathematical points needed come into effect...ferrari have done so poorly at the start of this season the ONLY chance they have now IS to push their leading points driver...in this case Alonso was 21 points ahead before the race started so he got priority.

What they SHOULD have done was let Domenicali give the "order", and preferably in some pre-agreed code words...Rob Smedley should never have been put in that position and you could hear in his voice over the radio that he did NOT want to give that information.

$100,000 is feck all as far as a fine goes...an average ferrari road car costs more than that...but that (according to Mike Gascoynes Twitter feed) is the maximum the stewards can give financially...ferrari have accepted it and are not appealing, maybe cos history dictates that if you appeal you are likely to get a harsher penalty...so anything else is now down to the WMSC...who now HAVE to give some sort of reprimand as ferrari have basically been given and accepted a guilty verdict. They HAVE to give some reprimand or EVERY team will start using "your team-mate is faster" as the move over code. If they decide to scrap the rule...well lets just look back to turkey, if Horner had been allowed to tell Webber that Vettel was "faster" then Vettel would have 25 more points and currently leading the drivers championship, with Red Bull leading the constructors...as an example.

The rule cannot be fully policed, the pitwalls would start talking in code and we as spectators would end up being left more and more in the dark about what was REALLY being said...if they scrap the rule then blatent orders will obviously start being used and we could well see the end of team mates racing one another, and the number 2 driver will only really be there to hold up rivals and wipe up the points left over...

We obviously don't know the finer points of Massas contract, it is feasible that it's written in there that if he's told to move over he has to

I don't agree with how it was done...Massa deserved that win as he drove better...if Alonso was faster and wanted the win he shouldve used his driver skill and overtaken like anyone else...we now just have to wait and see what the big bosses will say...at least Jean Todt has taken himself out of this equation as no matter what he believed he would be seen to have bias (his son is massas manager too).

I think they've reacted to the public outcry tho, and they'll see what the general public consensus is and use that to decide what to do


Anyway...i may edit this further as i don't think it fully glides from point to point and tangents and comes back a few times...but there we are for the moment

Now to help hubby get a couple more Crackdown achievements...

Thursday 22 July 2010

22nd July Finished Dolly

This is actually the biggest thing i've done in a while...both in physical size and amount of knitting.

Still have to sew up a pinafore dress and an outdoor coat...need to get buttons for them too...but the main doll herself is finished.

I'll pop up a better photo once the batteries recharge, but in almost finished state with wipes packet for scale

Wednesday 21 July 2010

21st July More Car Knits

Been busy again.

Very close to having the big doll for the friends wee girls done...the dreaded hair is next on the actual doll ! But once that bit is done it's be finished in no time.

Couple of piccies tho...

This one is Brians steering wheel, it's a little bit smaller than Gregors (who owns the hand giving scale lol) but both boys are sleeping with their respective wheels at the moment. Not sure whether thats cute or sad LOL. Please don't ask for a pattern, this was a crocheted tube, circle and minitubes and I can't remember how many stitches.


The other make over the last few hours has been a little knitted car.



It's only 4 inches long and yes caused more arguements. So a blue variety is in the making for so both boys can have one each.
Hopefully I'll have the big doll nearer finished in the next night or two...more mini-me plans are in place LOL

Monday 19 July 2010

19th July

And here we have a mini-me...using the Stitched Self pattern I mentioned earlier. She's the dolly partner to a bigger dolly using the Jean Greenhowe twin dressing up doll pattern...big dolly only half done, but mostly just sewing up now.















On another note we have Gregor's new steering wheel. Maybe he'll stop using the tiny orange plastic ring he's been farting about with for the last few weeks or so LMAO

Don't talk to me about front wings

The Red Bull Racing Wing-gate debacle might have mostly calmed down by now, but Vettel, Webber,Horner,Marko and Mateschitz have no idea how easy they have it being short of just one PMSL

Yeah I AM joking...theirs is a multi-million industry...I'm just whinging about £1 cars

So what do I mean? Well we have 2 small boys, both adore cars, both are quite hard on toys. I would love to get them collectable items for the future but I know they would want to play with them and unwittingly destroy them...so the local £1 shop had something close

A "Ferrari", a "Renault" and a "McLaren" were bought for each kiddie (total cost of £6)

  
But boys will be boys as the saying goes....within 24 hours we had...



Long story short, after many broken wings (cue Mister Mister music) and a bit of doctoring to make the space we now have...



Yes that IS a little lego soldier in the "McLaren" and Peppa Pig in the "Ferrari", and only one front wing...

The downforce would be really sh*t on these cars LMAO

19th July

Yeah, i know, i've lapsed again LOL

Been busy with accident prone kids,trying to fnd things to do for them in rainy weather and still knitting things

Currently making a doll for my friends wee girl...doll also has a doll using the knitted self pattern found here

knitted self blank

Many thanks to Deadly Knitshade for her pattern...i can see me using it a few times more...maybe even attempt it with the suggested 4 needles LOL

In other news the RBR forum has been interesting...Unicorns and other hillarities have evolved from trying to lighten the odd thread...unless you've read it this will mean nothing, credit to Alex and C80yd for the artwork


Thursday 1 July 2010

would you like a bag with that? 1st July 2010

You're standing in the queue with a pretty full basket, get to the till and they rapidly scan the items then look at you incredulously...

"Would you like a bag with that?"

Okay...do you not see me standing here like a spare thumb doing nothing with my items as i have no carrying device to put them in...of course i have enough pockets to carry half a dozen yoghurts, i can shove the bread up my jumper...need i carry on.

So how do you answer it? I have been polite and said yes please...usually this polite response is due to the person behind the till having the common sense to ask before or just as they start scanning. I have used "yes please,i dont have enough hands/pockets" in a polite tone...that seems to get their goat up the most,being polite.

Then comes the paying...if they have had the sense to ask about said bag early then i get my card out usually before i've put everything in the bag...the payment usually takes a minute or two while they ask about cashback etc...i can put that time to good use and complete the packing.

If stupidity has been a key factor...then i draw it out and pack everything away before i pay or at least drag it out a little as i'm no going to rush it just cos they want to get me away as soon as they can.

So please, if you are behind a till just use a little common sense...not everyone remembers to bring a bag for life...i'm a mum who usually has a buggy to carry stuff, bags are never remembered as i have sooo many other things to do just to get out of the door to get a carton of milk.

thank you for listening and i look forward to not having to resort to sarcastic retorts in the future

food

Children are such fikkle things when it comes to food

The other evening we went round to a friends house for a BBQ...yes it's actually warm and sunny enough for one of those things in Scotland just now

Anyway...G ate virtually nothing, a few cherry tomatoes and i dont think much else, B did eat a bit of burger and a whack of cucumber...funnily enough when the ice-cream came out they both devoured the delectable treats

But that is not something out of the ordinary as my boys will happily much on things one day and dislike them with a passion the next...they always seem to do well at breakfast and the rest of the day can be hit or miss.

G ADORES broccoli...yes broccoli...i cannot go down the veggie ailse in Asda without him asking for it, tomato soup is another love and he will eat a whole tin at a time...yet most meals he will sit there and fuss for ages sometimes picks,sometimes devours sometimes eats nothing...i have decided that if he asks for something before i go shopping then that is what he gets for his dinner, so far it seems to be working and he usually eats quite well those evenings.

Another fikkleness thing...they always want to eat off YOUR plate, even if what is on theirs is EXACTLY the same...and why is it when you give them something they wont touch it (gammon steak)...but they insist that the bits of yours that you slice off and give them is "nummy"....give them it on their plate the next time "ah dont like it" GGRRRR lol.

And try and steal something off THEIR plate and it's a whole different screeching ball game "NO DADDEEE THATS MIIIIIIINE"...well you were not even eating that slice of nectarine and it had been sitting there for 30 mins while you farted about with the toy car on the sofa...he thought you were finished LOL

1st July 2010

Bumps and Bruises

Oh dear,where do we start

Yesterday G and B were play scuffling, G pushed B and Bs nose connected with the edge of the coffee table! thank gawd the corners have rubber protection do-dahs on them.

So little B starts wailing and then the blood starts trickling...wipe and trickle...wipe and trickle...errrr think we'd better get this one checked out.

Trundled to the new hossie (that escapade is another post in itself) and booked him in. All this time he's hiding his face under his hat and thankfully the bleeding had stopped of it's own accord...I have a feeling he KNEW he was going to get prodded LOL. Nice Dr B was on duty that day...evil doctor shoved evil lighted looking thing up Bs right nostril...much wriggling and screeching ensued (Mummy had a good firm grasp with one arm curled round arms and chest the other round the forehead)

Thankfully Doc feels fine with it, slightly inflamed probably due to his cold and thats maybe why it bled so easily...at 2 yrs old a nose is unlikely to break as it's mostly cartilage but it's always better to be safe even though there is really nothing they can do if it WAS broken.

Half a punnet of strawberries later confirmed that little B was fine, but he missed his afternoon nap...6.30pm, an hour earlier than his normal bedtime preperations, and it was too quiet...went for a nosy and the wee mite was fully clothed couried round his teddy sound asleep on his bed.

He wasnt happy that Mummy had to fuss him and change his rump and get his PJs on...well i couldn't leave him in a nappy he'd already had on for 4 hours and hope it would last another 13 or so, and belted jeans tshirt fleece and trainers are not the best sleeping attire. It woke him up enough till i'd got his brother ready too and they had their bedtime milk.

They joys of having boys eh? LOL