Day 6

My photo for the 6th :o)

Alice and I made cookies together yesterday, she enjoyed watching everything being added to the mixer and it going round and round but I think, more than that, she enjoyed gettting to eat the mixture off the beater once I'd finished.

 I thought it might be best to strap her in to her highchair before letting her have the beater otherwise I would have been covered in cookie dough too ;o)

 First taste she had to make sure she liked it

 Yes, it's good!

 The finished cookies weren't too bad either :o)

And after showing these photos I thought you might like the recipe too.

Chocolate Chip Cookies (Mary Berry recipe)

100g (4 oz) butter, softened
75g (3 oz) caster sugar
50g (2 oz) light muscovado sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 large egg, beaten
150g (5 oz) self-raising flour
100g (4 oz) plain chocolate chips (or milk chocolate if you prefer)

Lightly grease baking trays (or line with parchment paper).
Pre-heat oven to 190C/375F/Gas Mark 5.
Measure the butter and sugars into a medium bowl and beat thoroughly with a hand held electric mixer or wooden spoon until evenly blended.
Add the vanilla extract to the beaten egg and then add these gradually to the butter and sugar mixture in the bowl, beating well between each addition.
Next, mix in the flour and lastly stir in the chocolate chips.
Spoon large teaspoons of the mixture on to the prepared baking trays, leaving room for the cookies to spread.
Bake in the top of the oven for about 8 - 10 minutes, until the cookies are golden. (Mine took closer to 12 minutes so time will vary depending on your oven)  Watch them carefully as they can turn dark brown very quickly (which one batch did while I took Alice out of her chair - they still taste good though).
Allow the cookies to cool on the tray for a few minutes, then lift off with a palette knife and place on a wire cooling rack.
Leave to cool completely then store in an airtight tin. (They are delicious warm too ;o)  ).

Enjoy!

xx

Day 5

Day 5's photo is a tough one because, in a way I'd like to use two. I'm ok with that and I'll tell you why.

 The photo above was taken when I met my sister, Kay at Costa's  (we were actually drinking it in the store but for some reason the Barista had made it in a take away cup. Not serious, it tasted just as good!) Kay and I had agreed to meet up last Sundayas she had the day off and I don't have Alice on a Thursday. She asked where I wanted to meet and  I had to go for Costa's because it gave me a chance to have their Black Forest Hot Chocolate one more time. Hugh introduced it to me just before Christmas and it is delicious! It just feels like the right thing to have at this time of year and I'll be sad when it's gone! So that was photo #1.

 Photo #2 is the one I should be using because we had double glazing fitted.  Just over four years we downsized after Jon had been out of work for a while. This house was the first one we viewed and I knew it was the one for us that first day. I love it's location and I love the fact that we get sun in the back garden virtually all day (when it's sunny ;o) ). That first day as I stepped out the back door, I could imagine myself sitting on the back steps with a cup of tea/coffee. I'm so glad we got it - it may be quite a lot smaller than our last house but it feels right, it's cosy and it's home.

 However, when we moved in, the house had been extended and in the new part of the house all the windows were double glazed. In the original part the windows hadn't been changed and were still single windows in wooden frames. It was something we knew we would have to change at some time and it's taken us four years to get there but they are finally done and I'm looking forward to seeing whether it makes much difference or not. In winter, opening the curtains in the lounge first thing in the morning you were subjected to a blast of cold air from the bay window. I wonder if that will still be the case!

The bay window and this kitchen window were top priority in my books. Why this kitchen window? The frame had rotted quite badly and when we had really heavy rain it would sometimes come through onto the window sill - no more :)   It's feels quite silly to be this happy about windows but I am! 

xx

PS  The downside to all this? The new kitchen window made me realise that the other kitchen window was in dire need of a clean so this afternoon I have cleaned it, and cleaned through all the cupboards underneath it, and now feel the need to go through all the other kitchen cupboards lol!!

Day 4

 Yesterday was Emily's first day back at school in the new year. And yes, the sky really was that colour! The photo was taken as Emily was leaving for school, just before 8am.

And I can't resist posting this photo that Claire posted (as her photo for the day) on Facebook yesterday morning. This was Alice with amazing bed head hair when she woke up :o)
Too cute!!  Thanks Claire :o)

And finally, thank you to everyone who visited Norma's blog yesterday, she got a lovely surprise when she saw all the comments!

xx

My sister's new blog :)

Norma and Emily (Oxford, England  July 2011)

If you read my blog fairly regularly, you'll know that I have a sister, called Norma, who lives in South Africa and comes to visit us as often as we can get her to ;o)  Well, today she left a comment on my previous post letting me know that she's started blogging again.  She's started before and then dropped out. So, I'm posting about her new blog here and asking you to pop over to visit it and leave her a comment. If she knows people are popping in, hopefully, she'll be more inclined to carry on. I'm sure once she gets into the swing of it, her blog will be fantastic and, as a bonus, she enjoys crafting (which will be a plus for some of you).  For the family reading my blog, pop over and say hi to Norma too, I'm sure she'd love to hear from you :o).

Her blog can be found here

xx