If at first you don't succeed

So I have been working on a new design.  I really want a nice chunky earflap hat so decided to bite the bullet and design one myself.  Hmmm, lets say after frogging the whole thing for the third time I really needed cake, preferably chocolate and we had none.  I had to make do with a lot of cups of tea as connecting the earflaps correctly without the garter stitch rows all going out of kilter proved surprisingly tricky!

This hat will be the first of many I am sure, and is for sale on Etsy here pink ear flap pom pom hat.

Ella Muffins aka Banana and Custard Muffins

So the Great British Bake Off is back on tv, which means every Tuesday I need cake more than usual to enjoy eating while watching all the drama in the tent.  This Tuesday also had an even better surprise, the late arrival of my first niece, the first baby in our family since Miss E was born almost 4 years ago.  In Ella's honour I decided to bake once my two children were in bed and as I had no chocolate in the house ( disaster!) I had to ad lib on my usual banana chocolate muffin recipe.  A quick look in my food cupboard of doom and I realised I had a few tins of Everyday Value custard and a banana and custard recipe was born.

I googled to see if anyone had a decent recipe online but all the ones I found involved mixing the custard in.    I remembered a lovely rhubarb and custard muffin my neighbour made with our rhubarb earlier this year and decided to make my ordinary muffins and put a dollop of custard in the middle before cooking.

Here is the recipe I used, taken from Muffins Fast and Fantastic by Susan Reimer.

10oz plain flour
1tsp baking powder
1tsp bicarb
3 large well ripened bananas
4oz white sugar
1 egg beaten with fork
2-3 fl oz milk or water
3fl oz oil
half tin of custard

Preheat oven to 400F 200C GM6

In a bowl mix together flour, bicarb and baking powder.

In another bowl mash bananas well, add sugar.

Add banana and sugar mixture, milk, oil and egg into dry ingredients, stir until evenly mixed and no dry flour but don't over mix.

Fill each case about a third full then add a blob of custard, then top up with muffin mix.

Bake in oven for 20 to 25 mins

A New Arrival

After keeping us all waiting my first niece has finally arrived!  And here she is, baby Ella Rose!

They live a good three hours away so so far I have only seen her in photos but apparently she is very laid back and is spending most of her time sleeping.  

Mr T's face when he saw her photo was an absolute picture, he was very impressed with her head of fluffy hair.  Miss E was a bit surprised that she was a girl as she is convinced that baby girls are born with long plait-able hair!

Here she is with my Dad who now is the proud Grandad to three grandchildren! 

Weekend Treats - Lemon Curd Cake

The recipe is one I had saved from a magazine at least a year ago and I suddenly remembered it so decided to give it a go.  It is basically a 3 egg lemon sponge with lemon curd and whipped cream in the middle and a thickish glace icing made from lemon juice on the top.  It tasted amazing and will definitely be repeated again soon.  The recipe called for"good quality bought lemon curd or homemade" but due to my usual time and financial constraints I had to make do with Tesco Everyday Value lemon curd but no one seemed to notice, or were to polite!!

Autumn Days

With September arriving I always find my mind turns to autumnal food.  We start back with homemade soup, cakes and crumbles.

I made a lovely apple cake from a recipe from this blog.  The cake was delicious and I totally forgot to photograph it before it was eaten!

Now that the children go and stay at their Dad's every other weekend I get a chance to cook my favourites.  At the moment this seems to always involve roasted vegetables, balsamic vinegar and melted goats cheese!

On my quest for damsons to make damson gin we found ourselves in the market.  I was easily persuaded to buy two huge tubs of blackberries for less than £2 and they made a fab blackberry and apple crumble.

Banana Pancakes

Ok I know they aren't the best pictures but they really are the best pancakes!  The recipe for the banana pancakes is from A Girl Called Jack and so simple yet sooo yummy.  I get requests most days and am considering teaching Mr T to make them himself to take the pancake pressure off me!  Jack recommends lemon and sugar or warmed peanut butter but we found them amazing with stewed victoria plums from my parents garden, and the children always choose jam if there is nothing else.

Grown Up Cowls

When my lovely sister came to stay a few weeks ago I managed to persuade her to model two of my adult chunky seed stitch cowls.  They are both knitted in tweedy yarn, the first one blue and the second teal green.  Both are for sale on Etsy now and more colours will be coming in the future.

Happy Home Educating Days

We are making the most of these lovely autumn days to spend time with friends old and new and visit some great places.

If you look carefully you will spot one of my hats worn by a gorgeous little lady!

Chilli Cowl

A custom order of a seed stitch cowl and matching fingerless mittens for a lovely friend.  They are knitted in a lovely tweedy yard in  one of my favourite colours, was pretty hard for me to post them to their new home.

A Birthday Giveaway

I promised another giveaway when my shop turned one and better late than never here it is.  This time I am offering a hand knitted unisex child's brown cowl like this one

Or if you would prefer I am also offering a pink bunny baby hat in 3-9 months size or a newborn brown and white striped elf hat.

Please comment on this post saying which you would like to win, and if you would promote the giveaway anywhere else eg Facebook etc please add an extra comment and I will count it as another entry!

More Elf Hats

 A lovely new colourway for an Autumn/Fall baby hat.  It's knitted in a lovely soft wool mix yarn and the photo doesn't really do justice to the warmth of the colours.

I have also kindly been given permission to share this gorgeous photo Rachel Jefferies took of a super sweet little girl wearing my rose and white knitted elf hat.  Both hats are listed for sale but if you would like a custom order please get in touch via my Facebook page or Etsy.

Very belated giveaway results...

I know, I am really sorry, life has totally got in the way of me drawing results for the giveaway but I have finally sat down and done the random number generator thing and the lucky person who will be getting a berry hat is atlantamomofthree.

I was intending to do another giveaway now that my shop has just celebrated its first birthday, so watch this space, and thanks for everyone who entered the other one, wish I had enough time/hats for everyone!

Beethoven Baby Wristwarmer Mittens

I am in love with this gorgeous new colourway for my baby fingerless mittens! Not so happy with the knot in the middle of the ball though, meant I had to knit two different mittens in two different sizes at the same time to get the colours to match up.  They are on sale now on Etsy here but if you would like other sizes please contact me and I will rustle you some up.

Crosby

I have always wanted to go to Crosby and see Antony Gormley's Another Place and over the August bank holiday we finally made it.  It was an stright forward drive and much easier to park and access than Formby where we have tended to go for the seaside before now.  

The beach was really lovely, the kids enjoyed the big pools and I managed a full hour of uninterrupted magazine reading!  It was really sunny but windy.  Miss E and I came home with wild woman hair and both children had to be carried straight from doorstep to the bath so I could shower off all the sand they had brought home with them!  Hopefully we may get treated to an Indian Summer so we can go and paddle again although I am sure we will be spending some autumn days with bikes and woolies enjoying the sea with a flask of hot chocolate and a piece of cake.

The Christmas Elf

I know it is only just September but I can't resist sharing this gorgeous photo with you of Xander in the Christmas Elf Stocking hat.  How amazing does this little man look, its enough to make even me slightly broody!

I am imagining I will be knitting up a fair few of these in the coming weeks and months ready for First Christmas photo shoots and Christmas Cards.  I have some listed on Etsy but if you would like a custom listing please contact me as early as possible as Christmas is a busy time for knitters!