Dark and White Glitter Chocolate Truffles

I got this recipe from the wonderful ladies over at A Beautiful Mess blog, adapted it a bit, and now I'm ready for christmas, albeit in a bit of a chocolate coma.

 

 

(I had to make sure they were ok!)

 

All packaged and ready to go!

InstaXmas

 

My chalkboard advent calender, I was trying to be good but then someone bought me a chocolate one..oh well!

 

My homemade wreath, made from ivy, bits of chirstmas tree, a wire coat hanger and a couple of pieces of lavender...so simple.

 

Awesome wrapping paper from paper chase.

 

Christmas sparkles!

 

Winter sky.

 

Cheese, tea and more cheese...I had some VERY strange dreams last night after our little (ahem) cheese binge!

Chair-Lift

Like a face lift..but for a chair.

 

When we moved into our home 2 years ago, we decided EVERYTHING should be red. I'm not really sure why, but it seemed like a good idea at the time.

 

I'm slowly but surely de-redding everything, and this brings me to my latest little diy project - a 'dip-dyed' chair. I've seen some beautiful images of chairs with dipped legs on the bible that is pinterest so I thought I'd give it a go.



 

 

I just measured the same distance up each leg, popped on some masking tape and got the paints out!

 

 

Blackbird

While clearing out our office and trying to make it resemble a room again I uncovered some old oil paints and paint brushes. These were from when I was doing GCSEs...so about 9 years ago and guess what? They still work! I had expected paints to have shrivelled up and dried and the bristles to have disintergrated into a fine dust, but no!

 

I am under no illusion that I have ever been a good painter/artist, but I have been feeling really crafty and creative this last few days and thought I might try my hand at creating something. I have been after a framed picture of a blackbird to hang on my wall for a while now and have yet to find one I like - so that was my inspiration - I'm not sure if it's wall worthy though!

 

Blackboard Post

I had to share this one, it made me smile...Roald Dahl - what a hero!



Homemade Hand-picked Jam

You can't get much more home made than this jam - I made it with the strawberries and blackcurrants that we picked, and kind of made it up as I went along - here's how: 

You will need:

300g Blackcurrants

780g Strawberries

2lb Sugar

3tbs Lemon Juice

Knob of butter

Put the blackcurrants in a little water in a pan and bring to the boil. boil until they have reduce into a pulp.

Put the strawberries in a pan with the lemon juice and heat for about 20 mins until they have gone soft, stir regularly.

Take both pans off the heat when they are ready and put both contents into one pan and add the sugar. Stir until all the sugar is totally dissolved.

Place back on the heat and bring to the boil for about 20 minutes (check at 15). Make sure the jam has set properly (you can see how to do this here) and pop into some jars.

You can get creative with some nice labels, and you can decorate the top with some nice fabric.

Make sure you write the date on, the jam can last for about a year if jars are properly steralized.

There's not much better than jam on toast me thinks!