Macarons Take Two

Been a while since I have blogged!

My latest baking adventure has been a return to making macarons. I went a bit crazy buying almond meal a few months back and now that they will expire in a few months I thought I'd better get cracking on using it up.

So this time round its Chocolate biscuit and raspberry filling for the macarons.

I modified the vanilla recipe by adding cocoa powder, but did not realise untill later that there was a specific modification to the other quantities. Whoops!

Anyhow, here are the batches:
Batch 1 and 2 = Fail, cos overcooked/burnt/cracked
Batch 3 = Perfect after I worked out how to avoid the cracking
Batch 4 = Cracked but still good

The crappy 1st and 2nd and 4th batches - uneven sizes and cracked, burnt

Ah sweet success - I have finally worked out how to pipe properly! Check out the smooth tops!

Next time round - Raspberry Biscuit and Vanilla filling. I have also said to my friend I'll make Green Tea Macarons for them for their birthday.

Bracelet

Stuck at home with a groggy head.

In order to feel like I have achieved something this weekend, I pulled out my stash of jewellery making bits.

Here's what I produced.

Trickiest bit is tying the ends tight enough so that it doesn't break!

Lessons learned: using elastic for bracelets.

Too Young to Care!

Was my nieces birthday a few weeks back and I was told to come dressed as a pink butterfly.

Well I did do that but I cheated and bought butterfly wings. The part that I did decide to create was a birthday card, something I thought my niece would appreciate....

Making the card was quite a lot of fun, deciding upon the colours was tough!
Here's what it looked like.

Upon giving it to my niece, she glanced at it for 10 seconds and was then consumed by the butterfly wings, gettting me to put them on for her and then heading off to galavant around the house and show off.

Sigh next time I must remember...don't make cards for young kids!

Stool gone Vintage

After procrastination to finish this stool revamp, it has finally been completed!

The most complicated part of this project was the thought behind the construction and the sourcing of the padding used for the chair. Other than that it was actually quite easy to do, although I think some of us would cringe at the amount of hand sewing I did. My initial staple gun idea didnt work so I had to revert to the sturdier sewing.

And now that I have a sander (thanks to a lovely xmas present) I am set to reduce the pain I went through to sand the chair!

Stool Before Image (Note: the stool had been sanded and varnished already as I forgot to take a before photo!)

 Stool After: Fabric chosen to match current vintage obsession of mine

Jacket Revival?

I was cleaning out my wardrobe recently, it's amazing how much you can accumulate over a few years. The thought that you once loved those items so much, but now they are just the same old to you. It's a bit of a waste really, how much consumerism/materialism creates and just discards. There must be some way to minimise the impact on the environment, if only.....

Anyway enough of my ramblings...

As part of the cleanout I almost gave this jacket away, but then I thought hmm..what if I did a few things to revive it...well here you go..see what you think..I must admit the photo doesn't do it justice as it looks better worn in real life.

                                    Before

 

                                    After

Recipe Stand

Why hello!

It's been a while and I have been dabbling at a few things but not really getting far.

Finally managed to complete 95% of this item which I really like cos it fits in with my country/vintage theme. The last thing to do is paint and varnish one more layer at the back of the stand.

I won't be using it anytime soon though as I would love to have more space to utilise it. Nonetheless at least it will be ready when I need it!

Bangle-d

I was a little bored and looking for something to do and remembered watching a tv show that decorated a wooden bangle. I thought might as well give that a shot.

I used alot of scrapbooking technique to get the result. Must admit I am finding more and more of my scrapbooking skills handy in decorating alot of things.

Here is the result, the colours are probably more kiddy than I expected. However, if I ever wanted an 'adult' version' I'd just have to find the right colours!

 Before

After

On a side note, I find that more and more now I am trying things just to see if I can do them. This experimentation is quite a lot of fun!