My pink winter dressing gown was bought just before going into hospital to give birth to son no.2 some twenty three years ago.  It still looks almost brand new, what is a girl to do, when her dressing gown, that she has grown rather bored with refuses to curl up and die.  A girl takes to the stores in search of cheap fabric in the very end of the sales and luckily for her she found some lovely fabrics at £4.00 a metre instead of £16.00  and Simplicity pattern 5314 – a two hour extravaganza of sewing time.

Once started, many, many hours later, quite a lot longer than two hours…. I had this.

A new summer dressing gown, with pockets and internal ties, belt loops, a belt and a tape loop to hang it with.  The sleeves have been made to the right length and its a lovely fit. 

I made a quick pair of pyjama bottoms in a three quarter length as I’d only bought two metres, which makes them ideal for the summer, well most of the year really.  I  made a casing and elasticated the top rather than follow the pattern.  I also made a quick change as to how I attached the band on the front of the dressing gown, whipping it through my over locker rather than the more complicated way the pattern wanted you to use – probably because it didn’t require the use of said over locker.

And then you get a quick shot of me creasing up. 

As I’m being attacked by a fierce pussy cat.

Back to the dressing gown, I keep trying to train my photographer, there are some great shots of my face, dressing gowns a bit blurry though, but you get the idea.

 

I recently took a days workshop at the Nikon training school in central London to learn how to take my DSLR off automatic mode.  I didn’t do too bad and my final photograph where we had to put composition, white balance, shutter speed, depth of field and ISO all into one and only one snapshot taken in the street won a mini competition and was voted best photo of the day!

Since then I have had my camera firmly switched over to manual mode and have been trying to remember everything we were taught, not as easy as it sounds.  So as the weather was absolutely glorious today hubby and I decided to have a nice relaxing walk around Hyde Park, with camera.  Some are just snaps, although in manual mode, some the composition is thought about, some I really am trying to capture a moment with a fast shutter speed and some I am trying to capture the light.   Don’t judge me too harshly, its harder than it looks.

Entering Hyde Park, such a beautiful day.

There was no wind, it felt quite warm.

The roller skaters were having a great time.

Wonderful energy.

Wildfowl on the Serpentine.

Children enjoying riding lessons.

Skateboarding, they go really fast!

A pack of Poodles, cheerfully adorned in their winter coats.

More riding lessons on pretty ponies.

Seagulls perched in a line on the ridge of the roof of the boat house. But why?

So they can have a nice little sunbathe, that’s why.

Spring flowers starting to blossom.

I have no idea what either of these flowers is called.

The Serpentine from the bridge that spans the lake in the middle of Hyde Park.

And the view the other way, we will travel further on another day.

We continue our walk around the Serpentine and catch a glimpse of Diana, Princess of Wales,  Memorial Fountain.

And two balloons tied to a post, perhaps in memory, flutter in the wind.

A beautiful sculpture of Isis, the Egyptian goddess of nature, to capture your imagination.

The Serpentine Lido, open in the summer or to members of the Serpentine Swimming Club everyday between 6 a.m. and 9.30 a.m.  Brrrrr, rather them than I.  They also swim on Christmas Day which often makes for comical photographs in the media.

Pedal boats ready for the onslaught of children.

And a very lucky bird being hand fed.

Starting to lose light, it feels very peaceful and serene.

A willow lit up by the rays of the fading sun.

A lovely clump of snowdrops.  But I’m starting to lose concentration.  The ISO is too low for the light, the depth of field too shallow and the shutter speed too long, but hey, at least I got the exposure right !

Something I didn’t know.

So peaceful, so pretty.

And a final glimpse before we head home.

In London I get my shopping delivered which rather leaves me at the mercy of my personal food shopper, but I have yet to be disappointed by whoever they have been, they have been taught very well.  In my economy bag of peppers were these very good sized yellow peppers and it got me to thinking of what I could make with them. 

Being on a home made soup jaunt at the moment I thought they would turn into a very delicious yellow pepper soup.

So with a light spray of oil to help blacken their skins I popped them into a medium hot oven, twenty minutes later I added a handful of miniature plum tomatoes that had been lurking in the kitchen, a sliced up onion and a handful of garlic cloves, skin left on.  Another quick spray and popped them back in the oven for another fifteen minutes.

Or until I had this.

I then left them to cool a little, there is no reward in food heaven for scorched fingers and then popped off the skins of the peppers, tomatoes and garlic.  By that time I’d boiled two pints of water with a stock cube and then slide these ingredients into the same pan.  I then whizzed with my trusty stick blender and tasted. 

It needed more salt and a little black pepper but it also needed more acidity to make the flavours sing.  I thought the tomatoes would have added enough acid, but it needed another two tablespoons of white wine vinegar to enable the subtle flavours to shine through.

Its a very light soup and I’ve since found that serving it in a mug accompanied by a sandwich makes it a sunny moment on a cold winters day.

And essentially per serving it is zero Weight Watchers pro points.

I’ve been playing with the multiple exposure button on my camera and it is fun.

There have been umpteen photographs taken this afternoon and to be honest not many successes.  The art I am trying to capture is alluding me, but I know that I will eventually develop my skill, just as soon as I learn how to do it !  All these are presented to you without the aid of Photoshop or any other computer wizardry, they are simply one photograph exposed twice. 

Monty the penguin was a very good model along with a knitting magazine (some of you will recognise).  Eventually I got this.

Then Toile sat still for long enough for me to practise.

And then it was time for me to go outside and everything I had just learnt flew out of the window as the exposure was wildly different.

Eventually I got this.

Which I liked.  The essence of hubby.  Hubby with a rosemary bush overlaid.  But then my model shivered and moaned of feeling cold so we went indoors.

This is so much fun.

Its been on my to do list to have a proper explore of Selfridges for a while now. We finally managed to do this last Saturday.  As always this is just a snap shot of what is there, a tiny, tiny, snapshot.  We missed the fashion floors out completely, although I must have a wander around those on another day.  So here we have a few wonderful hours exploring the not so hidden charms of Selfridges.

Can you imagine how you would feel if your boyfriend rolled up on Valentines day carrying this,

or these?  I think I would quite literally faint.

I thought these mini hyacinths were so beautiful.

Whole legs of ham, ready to carve.

I could imagine a troop of these traversing the mantelpiece.

I’ve always liked articulated limbs, artists models, horses.  I thought they would be brilliant at modelling hand knitted gloves, its good to know where they are sold.

There were hand quilted quilts.

And beautiful hand painted mugs.

A table I absolutely adored.

And who couldn’t fall in love with this chicken.

There were beautifully painted olive bowls.

And half sized butter dishes.  Which I thought were perfect but hubby moaned they were too small.

A wonderful Zebra poked up to say Hello,

And then I noticed the rest of the herd, along with friends. 

I think they would be really fun in a childs bedroom.

Wonderful vases, which took so much work.

I think they would look wonderful on a kitchen windowsill.

These were my favourite pieces. China hand painted door knobs.

I just need to survey my cupboards to see where I could place a couple.

They just were so pretty.

I really want to use a couple.

We stopped for tea, the cheapest place in London, at Selfridges, its crazy isn’t it. £2.15 for a pot of tea each, including extra hot water,  at the Brass Rail restaurant just by the food hall.

And then we made it to the top floor and Hubby found a new friend.  Wouldn’t that be fun in the corner of the living room.

And I’m glad we didn’t have our boys when they were young with us, it would have been impossible trying to stop them crawling all over this.  But at nearly thirty thousand pounds, I would have tried very hard.

I wanted something vibrant and tasty, yet comforting and familiar to ward off the chilly wintery weather today.  Thoughts of carrot and coriander soup drifted through my memory when I remembered I had some very nice root ginger perched in the fridge. 

Firstly, I chopped four carrots and roasted them off with a spray of oil for twenty minutes or so, until they were just softened and then added a tin of drained chickpeas to add protein and texture, one small onion sliced and some discs of freshly peeled ginger, sprayed again with oil and returned to the oven for ten minutes or so. 

Meanwhile I prepped the salad cress, which basically means taking the scissors to the plastic box on the windowsill and made a stock out of a cube (chicken, but it could have been vegetable) and two pints of water.

And then whizzed the contents of the oven with the stock using my stick blender until smooth,  tasting for salt, it needed more than the stock cube provided and then ladled hot nutritious, comforting soup into my big bowl. I garnished with the cress which added a fresh mustard flavour and the promise that winter will end and there will be spring growth,  freshly ground black pepper and the lightest of swirls of sesame oil to finish off the oriental slant.

And for those interested in such things,

Serves 4 with between 2.5 to 3  Weight Watchers pro points per serving (depending on amounts of oils used.)

 

All the cats I’ve ever known and lets face it I’ve known a few have hated with a passion any hint that a hand might be straying towards a bit of tummy tickling., on some cats one could easily lose a finger such is their eagerness to tell you to stop doing that, at once.  All the dogs I’ve ever known would have walked over hot coals for a bit of a tummy tickle.

Toile, well she lands on my chest, flips herself over, parts her legs and waits for the tickling to begin. 

Toile, she’s All Dog.