Fancy some Sugru; or, a giveaway by any other name

Do you know what Sugru is? I know, it sounds like a game, except it isn't really, but actually I have had some fun playing around with it, so maybe it almost counts as a game.

I first came across Sugru (hack things better, as they say) when I went to the Power of Making exhibition at the V&A (which you can read about here). Sugru is quite amazing stuff which you can use to mend or modify all sorts of things, and when the nice people at Sugru sent me some to play about with, and offered to give some away to my readers, well, who was I to say no?

And in fact, mending things apart, I think I have found the perfect stocking filler or budget present for the chaps in your life. When the parcel arrived and the silver package dropped out, the chaps in my life all exclaimed excitedly 'What's that?', 'Can I have some?', and 'Wow, that's amazing!'

I promise you that they never normally say that about the contents of the parcels that arrive for me.

Luckily it comes with a book of hints and tips

The Sugru website is full of pictures and ideas of how you can mend and adjust and improve things with this innocuous-looking material which moulds like modelling clay, and then gradually becomes firm, but in a plastic rather than brittle way. The big advantage is that it sticks to shiny things (unlike most glues which never seem able to stick together the things that you want to mend).

Being a complete girlie, I liked the way it comes in a selection of bright colours, and in spite of being a girlie who gets the Head Chef to do anything in the form of mending and maintenance which does not involve a needle and thread, I decided to improve my world on my own without any male interference.

Tidy wires - the Flylady would approve

And I am so pleased with myself - look what I made.

Girlie desk

A little hooky shelf on the back of Hippolyta to hold those annoying leads which are in daily use, but trail messily on the desk, viz Ipod and camera wires.

I find the sight of muffins most comforting

And I even made a nifty-thrifty little stand to hold my very high-tech portable speaking apparatus while it is charging. I would like you to admire the little wedge I made at the back so that it won't topple over.

Where have all the muffins gone?

(The Head Chef and the General had rather more boyish ideas which involved mending an aerial and something to do with a plug, but being a girl I wouldn't understand that.)

I think I will be buying some Sugru for the awkward nephews and difficult uncles (not personality-wise, of course, uncle, if you are reading this, which is not at all likely) for Christmas - it seems to me the perfect present for any of those chaps whose wants are either silver and matt black, and when asked can't think of anything they want except a BMW, a Macbook Pro, or some inordinately expensive power drill. Sugru seems to hit on all fronts - silver package (they even do a boys' version in black and white, no colours), a bit techie, and very compatible with tools.

So if you would like a nice shiny silver package of Sugru of your own, to play with or to tuck into your man's stocking (that didn't come out quite right, but you know what I mean), just leave me a comment below. No conditions, post anywhere - I'll heave one of you out of the sink next week, or maybe I'll feed you to the dogs, and see who comes flying out of the bowl.

Pumpkins rock

Colour is a funny thing. I would tell you that I am quite consistent in my likes and dislikes, have always been drawn to mixtures of red and blue in the kitchen, and on the clothing front various shades of teal are in the ascendant. I absolutely do not like orange, I would firmly assert, and as to anything with a hint of neon, how could you even suggest it?

So how did I find myself knitting my a pair of socks, with heels and toes and rib in Electric Lime, and vibrant Opal Fruit stripes down the legs?

Why did I pick such colours to glow in my stash of tasteful stash of misty blues and greens with a hint of dusty mauve? What on earth was I thinking? Yet drawn I was to the bright lights of lime and pink and orange, and I really enjoyed having such manic colours on my needles.

And now I have just finished my Electric Rock socks, which speak to me of sunshine and pumpkins, and glow quite magnificently as I stand in my stockinged feet. I don't think that I have ever knitted quite such a joyous pair of socks, which peek out between blue jeans and black Converses in a rather anarchic way which makes me smile to look at them.

Almost to the instant that I posted them on my Ravelry page I received an appreciative comment about the colours, and I just wanted to say to you, why not take a risk with colour?

Choose something that is the complete antithesis of what you think you like and see what happens. You could end up dressed to match the pumpkins just like me.

Why does the yellow hose sneak its way into every garden photo I take?

And for those of you who want some socks just like mine, the yarn is the appropriately named Skein Queen Squash, a lovely yarn to knit with and very soft on the feet, in Electric Lime and Olive Snook, pattern from Ann Budd's wonderful sock book. Go on, be brave!

Natural pest control

Don't tell me that I don't keep my promises - a little venture into the realms of pest control is the order for the day, but for those of a nervous disposition I have respected your delicacy and have chosen a picture of Mrs Speckledy to start with and have saved the gory details for a little later.

Mrs Speckledy is trying to hide

The first thing to tell you about natural pest control is that Mrs Speckledy and Mother Blackrock do not like the caterpillars of the cabbage white butterfly - you can tell from their expressions and the way that Mrs Speckledy has gone to hide in amongst the raspberry canes in case the Head Chef tries to force one down her beak.

Mother Blackrock is just not interested

Mother Blackrock is more inclined to stand her ground and indicate her feelings by an expression of complete disgust at the sight of the nasty green creatures, before stalking off in a superior manner.

Rejected by hens and nowhere to hide

In fact, the most efficacious method of dealing with such creepy-crawlies is to send the Head Chef into the garden to pick them off by hand. We did try Enviromesh one year, but the combination of a windy site, and a certain racketiness about the installation meant that we watched the cabbage whites fluttering gaily about inside the enclosure all summer. Better to wait until the caterpillars are so large and virulent-looking that they are visible even to the middle-aged naked eye.

Nasty green slimy things

As to the small green caterpillars of the sort found in purple sprouting broccoli and calabrese, you need not bother with pest control if the consumers of the produce are ladies of a certain age whose near vision is not quite what it used to be. I had eaten copious quantities - a plateful, certainly - of broccoli, all the while thinking superfood, how nutritious, etc, before the younger members of the family, food inspectors all (in case someone has sneaked some chickpeas or lentils or other foreign or proscribed items into their supper) burst out in hysterical unison that the said superfood so eagerly consumed by their dear mother was teeming with small green caterpillars. So really, if you want to get rid of small green caterpillars, just feed them to a sensitive, long-sighted vegetarian.

Mrs Speckledy and Mrs Blackrock are, however, very partial to ants and the teeny tiny slugs to be found in the soil, so do make sure to get some of their ilk to rake over your earth come the winter - but remember to shut them out again in the spring because they do like scuffling up seeds and plants as well.

Soup in a basket

But all is not green and crawling in our little plot: we have delights both seasonal and unseasonal. On the latter front the Head Chef is still harvesting tomatoes to go with the salad leaves from the polytunnel. And we still have a few marigold flowers left to garnish a salad if the fancy takes you.

There are delicious juicy apples to be gathered - Gala, and Golden Delicious and Cox. Our B&B guests are still enjoying fresh apple juice for breakfast - one of the most popular things about the Head Chef's most excellent breakfasts.

There are quinces to be turned into paste and jelly, and generally admired for their beauty. Our trees tend to crop biennially which makes us appreciate them all the more in the copious years.

And walnuts cascading down from the enormous tree, which was pretty large when we arrived here, but certainly waxes fat on the, shall we say nitrogen-enriched, soil in the WET system.

We have been using the walnuts in a delicious recipe for stuffed peppers from Eat Well, Spend Less by Sarah Flower. (The Head Chef was quite sniffy about this book when I bought it on one of my late-night Amazon forays - you know, the 'we need to economize, let's buy things to help' idea; he prefers lots of big glossy pictures and let's not read a recipe, let's make it up as we go along.) And it's not often I say this about a cookery book, as they usually end up just sitting on the shelf, but it is definitely worth the grand sum of £6 or so which I spent on it. It is absolutely packed with really useful, everyday recipes and a complete antidote to the 'what on earth are we going to eat today' feeling, when your mind goes blank and inspiration seems a long way away. And unusually for this sort of thrifty cookbook, there are lots of interesting vegetarian recipes, rather than a token two or three old stalwarts that you have come across many a time before.

I actually prefer Sarah Flower's Eat Well, Spend Less to Gill Holcombe's How to feed your whole family a healthy balanced diet with very little money . . . I do have the latter, but I must admit that it only occasionally finds its way off the shelf as I find the recipes less inspiring, and there seem fewer of them, although plenty of people disagree with me on that one.

So plenty of handy hints there - how to feed extra protein to vegetarians and chickens, and how to feed a family on a budget, too. Thrift personified, that's me!

Comfort and joy

I find that there is so much joy to be derived from making things for babies - as I sit on my sofa in my sewing and knitting corner I can be transported into a world of reverie, not only imagining into existence something cosy for the little newcomer but also re-imagining the past of my own big babies who have so recently deserted me.

An appley quilt

Sitting stitching, I find continuity in a world of change, and in the room where once I sat with my arms and hands full of baby and toddler and yearned for some time and space to think, I now sit in the quiet and stitch some comfort to enwrap another little soul marching into the future.

Today I finished this baby quilt and together with the satisfaction of completion, another thing ticked off the list, there was also something more. I had had a few uncertainties during the quilt's creation; I wasn't quite sure if it was going to work; I very nearly started unpicking, and even considered making something quite different entirely.

But as I looked at the quilt I suddenly realized that yes, this had worked: I had made a present that was full of joy as well as warmth. What I had in my head had come out in the stitches.

'It's a good job that the baby turned out to be a girl', said Princess Bunchy, 'it wouldn't have been quite right for a boy.'

Serendipity, perhaps, but I did try to make the mix of red and blue, and the mix of motifs ungendered. I wanted a quilt with plenty to look at, a quilt full of the potential for story with animals and plants and matryoshkas stumping through the magic woods.

Matryoshkas stumping through the woods

The squares are 5in finished size (5.5in cut) to accommodate a complete motif from the red and blue fabrics with the matryoshkas and dala horses in lacy squares - these were fussy cut, which was more time consuming, but the only way to deal with this sort of fabric, I think. (The fabrics all came from Fabric Rehab, but so long ago that I can't remember their names - apart from the apples I think they are Japanese ones.)

I did lay out all the squares before joining them because I have come to the conclusion that I am congenitally incapable of random piecing. Such is my love of order and almost symmetry that I can't leave such things to chance.

As with my last baby quilt, I did the binding by turning the backing to the front, and hand quilted in the ditch along the seam lines.

I have come to the conclusion that I really enjoy sitting and hand sewing like this - once again it is something that can be done sitting on the sofa in the evening whilst chatting, and I do like my sofa time. Machining for me is a daylight task, and if I started talking too much I would probably stitch myself to the quilt as an extra bonus.

The sofa is calling me, calling me . . .

Now I can wrap up my little bundle of comfort for the new little bundle of joy with a happy heart at the thought of sending my stitches out into the world - it has been a good weekend.

And next week I am going to tell tales of the most wonderful muffins and the vagaries of natural pest control - I am sure that you are beside yourself with excitement.

Shiny shiny

As is traditional when it comes to the time to pick a giveaway winner, the wind is whistling and wuthering fit to blow bits of paper all round the garden. I suppose that I could have just stepped outside with my bowl and let the zephyrs do the choosing, but I didn't fancy chasing round the raised beds after the winner (especially as I don't have my laceups on this morning (oh no!)), so I took the coward's route and stayed indoors to do the mighty deed.

Not a trace of breakfast in sight

And the upside of remaining safely in the kitchen is that you get to see my beautiful shiny sink (oh yes!). The Flylady would be proud of me - no backsliding here - my sinks have been shiny ever since my first encounter with Her Flyness. And funnily enough, this shiny sink business really is like the broken window syndrome - this morning I left before the Head Chef and Princess Bunchy (not only am I knocking my house into shape, the plan is also to knock my cake-ridden body into shape by going to the gym at an ungodly hour), and returned expecting to see the dregs of breakfast leering at me from the sideboard - and instead, what did I find? A shiny sink smiling beatifically at me . . . The Head Chef hopes that I am impressed; I am reserving judgement.

Admire those reflections

I am getting on much better with the Flylady now that I have bought the book - I find the website slightly frenetic, and became totally confused about where I was and where I should be, and in one of those late-night book-buying sprees (I blame Princess Bunchy and her musical talents - it is always when I am sitting up late waiting for my nearest and dearest to return from some event that I run amok in the halls of Amazon because sitting at the computer is the only thing that will keep me awake) I bought the wonderfully titled Sink Reflections in the hope of demystification.

First shine your sink

And I am happy to tell you that now all is clear and shiny - I am much more at ease with the linear narrative of the written word, all has fallen into place, and I have sorted out my to-dos and my tick lists, my house is clean and I can spend the rest of the day hand-quilting (oh, happy day!).

The tension builds

And so, having made some more cake to fill the holes eroded in the gym (possibly), I can now present you with the winner. I did think about putting the Little Stranger into the sink to do the draw (and I am sure that she wouldn't have minded, as long as something edible was involved, and her definition of edible is comfortingly wide), but then I thought that I would have to start right back at the beginning with the bleach and Shiny Sinks 101, and I have made such leaps since then it would seem a pity to take such retrograde action.

Enter sausage tongs, sink right

So I opted for the sausage tongs instead. As a vegetarian this did involve some heart-searching but I felt that this would introduce an extra element of randomness as I do find them rather awkward to manipulate (not enough practice). It took a few goes, and a few restirrings of the bowl (I kept finding that I had picked up a whole bundle of slips at a time), but eventually I got the hang of it, and here we have the winner (and I can tell you that it was not easy to take a photo with one hand while keeping the tongs clamped shut with the other).

And here is the lovely winner: Menopausal Musing who said, 'I would love to own the Sergeant Pepper teatowel and the Tunnocks one - red is such a cheery colour!' Perhaps you could email me with your details, and I will pass them on to the lovely Al at All Tea Towels.

Oh, the bliss of a shiny sink!

Commiserations to those who did not win this time, but why not put your favourite tea towels on your Christmas list? Just think what fun you could have making things shiny, shiny - I think this one would coordinate rather beautifully with my sink, and this one would look rather fetching on the Aga. I have also used tea towels as rather fun recyclable wrapping for presents;  it seems so much less wasteful than paper, and I have spotted a few in the sale which would be just perfect for some people I know . . . 

Flying; or, the best gingerbread ever, with a few hints on cookery

I have been Flying along on the housework front, you may be glad to hear (or not as the case may be), and am now feeling quite overcome with heat and exhaustion and am in dire need of Cake.

Looming domesticity

Today I did step up a gear - the Bedtime Routine is cracked (clean up the house just before bed - 20 mins - piece of cake), then the Gratitude Diary (thank goodness I can lie down now), and the sinks are shiny, shiny, so this morning I went a little further and put on lace-up shoes.

I think the Fly Lady's shoes would be cleaner (and probably shiny)

The Fly Lady is quite firm about this, and insists that you get up in the morning, get fully dressed, including Lacing Up Your Shoes, but I in my innocence and ignorance started Flying wearing ballet pumps. (They do have bows, permanently tied, and somehow I thought that I could get away with this.)

Have very High Hopes

But no, we Stay-at-Home Mummies (does running a business from home validate or invalidate this epithet?) have a nasty tendency to end up on the sofa if we can kick our shoes off easily, not to mention leaving said shoes lying around cluttering up the place . . . and yes, she's right, yesterday afternoon I suddenly found myself on the sofa, shoes on the floor, on the way to nodding off - and I wasn't even in the right Zone.

I had washed the mattress cover and patchwork quilts from our bed when I should really have been decluttering the sitting room where there are cupboards which have not seen the cold light of day in aeons (especially the yarn cupboard, which has to be approached under cover of darkness because it all has a nasty habit of tumbling out and revealing its excess when I dare to open the door).

Held together firmly

So it was lace-up shoes today, and my lovely Dottie Angel apron wrap to hold it all in - I have found that there is nothing like a nice pinny to make me feel domestically competent, but I am afraid that I peaked too early, in spite of Having High Hopes (no 1 on the list of Dottie Angel Dos) on the housework front.

Calming Dottie Angel traycloth and cookery book accessorized by food stains 

There is nothing like scrubbing down the B&B to bring on severe cravings for Tea and Cake, and so I rustled up some of the most delicious gingerbread you could imagine (for the children, of course), baked in the Aga, but it works just as well in other ovens.

Cake tin

This recipe goes back a long way - I won't tell you how many years but here are its beginnings in my school cookery book, or Domestic Science as it was termed - nothing creative about domesticity there, Being a Housewife was an Important Job (scientific rather than airy-fairy), and a full-time one at that (I am beginning to think that Being a Fly Lady is a full-time job as well, and am already looking forward to my next holiday).

Inspiring drawing of gingerbread

Please don't be put off by the fact that I only got a B+ for this - I have refined the original concept over many decades, and would draw your attention to the A I received for my macaroni cheese, which went into the Open Day Display (I think my drawing of the toast garnish is quite inspired, almost as inspired as my drawing of the gingerbread squares).

A very wonderful drawing of toast triangles

And what about my breakfast tray? There was no mucking about there, we girls were taught to warm the pot and put half a glace cherry on our grapefruits before laying up a tray to impress invalids and husbands as we tripped upstairs to give them breakfast in bed. And didn't it all come in handy for running a B&B?

Model breakfast tray for model housewife

So here is your recipe for lovely sticky gingerbread made in the Aga (or whatever cooker takes your fancy). Being so ancient, the quantities are imperial - I have given metric conversions but not tested them.

Delicious gingerbread

Ingredients:
8 oz (225g) self-raising wholemeal flour
1 level teaspoon (tsp) bicarbonate of soda
2 tsp ground ginger
2 tsp mixed spice
4 oz (110g) unsalted butter
2 oz (50g) dark muscovado sugar
4 oz (110g) black treacle
4 oz (110g) golden syrup
2 eggs
1/4 pint (150ml) milk

Shallow rectangular baking tin, preferably non-stick, approximate size 8in x 11in (20cm x 28cm) - can be a little bigger as this will just make shallower pieces of gingerbread - greased and base lined with baking parchment or greaseproof paper.


Method:
Sift dry ingredients (flour, bicarbonate of soda, ginger and spice) into a large bowl and mix together, making a well in the centre.
Melt butter, sugar, treacle and syrup together gently in a saucepan - do not allow to boil or you will have toffee instead of gingerbread.
Pour the melted mixture into the centre of the dry ingredients and mix together gradually until smooth.
Beat the eggs into the milk and add to the mixture gradually, beating well as you go.
Pour the mixture into the tin (it is quite a wet mixture) and make sure the top is level.

In the Aga (two oven):  put the grid shelf on the floor of the top oven, and the plain shelf on the second set of runners, and sit the tin on the grid shelf. Turn once half way through.
Conventional ovens: 325F/gas 3-4/160-170C (fan ovens tend to need a lower temperature).

Cooking time: 35-40 mins. The gingerbread is ready when it is beginning to shrink from the sides of the tin, and the top springs back when pressed (in the centre) lightly with your finger .

Leave to cool in the tin for 5 minutes, then turn onto a wire rack. Cut into big pieces or small as your fancy (or greed) takes you when completely cool if you can wait that long.

Time for tea

My cookery book says serve hot for tea - yum!

Look how Pomona has become rotund with grief

[I must stop baking so much cake as the Ploughboy is heading back to university next week, and the General marches off to be a fresher this weekend. I shall become positively rotund with grief if I carry on like this; I thought sending off number two would be a piece of cake in itself, but as the fatal day approaches I feel my heartstrings a-quiver and the tears waiting in the wings . . .  Princess Bunchy and the Aged Ps will be all alone but for the dogs and the hens and the pigs and the spiders, oh so many spiders, the feather duster has been much in play.

Shoes that mean business and a faithful friend in adversity

She tightens her apron strings and marches firmly on into the future with High Hopes and tight-laced shoes.]