SIPIDI! ~ January Round Up

I've tried lots of new recipes this month. A few of them have included one of my favourite things. Chickpeas.

These are the ingredients for Spanish Chickpea and Potato Bake.

It looked so good when it came out of the oven that we dived right in and I forgot to take a photo. The filling smells wonderful as it cooks. The Mechanic actually commented on it when he walked in the door that evening. This almost never happens. It's topped with sliced potatoes, which crisp up in the oven and spread with sun dried tomato pesto. Delicious.

Hummus is regular fare around here and often on the lunch menu. There are some unusual variations in Anna Jones' book, A Modern Way to Eat, using different pulses. The Happy Pear has a trio of hummus recipes too. The beetroot variety is a fantastic colour. I've not tried that one yet, but the roasted carrot version is lovely.

A quick mention for avocados,  which Deb talked about earlier in the week. Another favourite lunch staple of mine and something I've been having on toast for the last twenty years. Lots of great variations on the theme, if you're stuck for inspiration.

Links to everything on my Meat Free Pinterest board. If you've joined in with SIPIDI! this month leave a comment so that I can find your post and I'll pin you to the board. Have a great weekend.

SIPIDI! ~ January

I've been having a rethink of the way we eat as a family and myself in particular. I was a vegetarian before I had my children and really it's just laziness that has kept me eating meat. The effort of cooking two separate meals became too much, with a challenging toddler and a small baby to look after as well as a part time job.

We've had "Meat Free Monday" for several years now and we quite often have a second meal during the week that is vegetarian and fish on at least one day. The Mechanic cooks home made chips on a Saturday. I have egg and mushrooms with mine, while everyone else has a meatier option.

That's four days covered and it doesn't seem quite so daunting any more. There will be some days when I'll eat vegetarian and the rest of the family will have their usual fare and other days when we will all have the same. To that end I'm looking for meals that I think my hardened carnivores will love. The Sweet Potato Quesadillas above were a big hit.

As was the Ultimate Chilli from The Happy Pear. I've also made this soup, found on their YouTube channel, to use up my vac-packed chestnuts. I only added 2/3rds of the stock suggested as I like my lunch soups nice and thick. On the strength of these two recipes I've ordered the cook book and I'm looking forward to trying a few more new things this month. I'll keep you posted.

All these recipes are on my Meat Free Meals board and you can find more information about SIPIDI! here.

SIPIDI! ~ November Pins

This month it's all about getting ready to document December. I've got my Project Life cards in the pages, leaving some empty pockets. They won't necessarily stay where I have put them, once I start adding photos and stories. I think having them out of the box will make it much easier to see which ones I want to use each day.

I bought a plain kraft album and my pages are 6" x 8" with a variety of different sized pockets. The cards above show the main colours: Lost Lagoon, Mint Macaron, Real Red and Very Vanilla. I suspect kraft will make an appearance in there too.

I've picked out some matching card stock and a selection of stamps that will come in handy to make extra cards. I don't tend to buy a lot of embellishments, preferring to make my own, but I couldn't resist these reindeer paperclips. The stars are punched from Gold Glimmer Paper.

I started a December Daily/JYC board, with a few ideas for page layouts, inspiration for hand made cards/embellishments and some free printables in my colour scheme. I'll be adding to that throughout the month.

Image from And So I Don't Forget.....

I particularly like the vellum banners in the pocket above, which have been made with a cut file. I don't have any sort of electronic machine, but they've inspired me to make some stamped vellum banners that I can add over photos with dark/blank areas. I also like the inclusion of an event that was in the news, and on my mind, with my niece arriving in Sydney the day before the siege.

It was great to see some of you joining in last month. Thanks to Amanda and Karen for sharing your October project inspiration with us. If I've missed anyone please let me know and I'll add you to the SIPIDI! board.

PS More information about SIPIDI! can be found in this post.

SIPIDI! ~ Round Up

We've had a very busy week around here, with both children at home. It's been a pleasure to spend time together, between the assignments they've had to complete. The kitchen table has seen a lot of action in the past few days.  It mostly looked like this.....

.....and not a sewing machine in sight. That's OK. I may not have made a great deal of progress on either of my sewing projects, but I do have something to share that made it off my Pinterest boards this month and onto our menu.

Sweet Potato and Chickpea Stew from Deliciously Ella. A lovely hearty dish, which I have served with wholemeal rice on one occasion and quinoa on the other. Just right, now that the nights are drawing in. A welcome addition to my Meat Free Monday repertoire. I did a few things differently. You knew I was going say that, didn't you?

Steaming the sweet potato seemed a bit of a faff to me. Instead, I roasted it while I had something else in the oven. I only put in one aubergine, because that's what I happened to have on hand, and frozen (whole leaf) spinach in place of fresh. The amount of spice seemed a lot. I cut that down slightly and I didn't have any fresh coriander to garnish the dish.

The recipe is supposed to feed four. It filled a very large pan and there is no way I could have eaten a quarter of it. I would say at least six generous portions.

I've spotted one SIPIDI! post around blogland this month. Karen was inspired by some cards on her Pinterest boards and made a lovely selection, using one of my favourite stamp sets: Gorgeous Grunge.

Now over to you. If you joined in this month let me know in the comments and I'll add you to the SIPIDI! board.

SIPIDI! ~ Update

I realised this morning, that today is not the last Friday of the month at all. That would be next week. I said I'd be back with a progress report though, so here I am.

When I made my first Ginger skirt, I added a contrast waistband facing in a printed cotton. Mainly because I thought a double thickness of denim would feel bulky around my waist, but also.....polkadots. I didn't pay attention to the instructions (which are very comprehensive) because I thought I knew what I was doing.

Once I'd pressed the facing to the inside, I proceeded to catch it down by hand, in the same way I did with my Lonsdale dress. What I should have done is stitched in the ditch with the machine. I turned a 5 minute job into a very much longer one. Ah well, I love the nice neat finish on the inside.

I'm planning to make the pocket version with a soft non-stretch denim. I think the skirt has a 70s vibe to it and I'm hoping the fabric I've ordered will be just the shade of blue I associate with that era. I'll be adding a patterned facing again, but this time I'll follow the instructions and sew it down with the machine. I think having contrast stitching on the outside will be a nice feature on a denim skirt.

As for the cafetiere cosy, I have the fabric cut and ready to sew. I need to source some fusible fleece (although I may just use interfacing instead) then I can get started. I already have the Insul-Bright and didn't realise any other specialist supplies were required. Not paying attention to instructions? I'm sensing a theme.

That's my SIPIDI! How's yours going? Point me in the right direction, if you've blogged already, and I'll add you to the Pinterest board. Next week, when it really is the last Friday of the month, there will be another post with a Linky list and, if things go to plan, a finished project to share.

What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday #333

The kitchen table is cleared, ready for dinner when we get back at 7pm. Nothing to see there, I'm afraid.

In lieu of a desk shot, here's one of the cards we made in class this morning. The rest were Christmas cards. I'm saving those to share once Hallowe'en has passed and I'm feeling a little more festive.

It's so dark here today, as you can probably tell from the photo. I should have taken some pictures yesterday when the sun was shining. How do you get sharply focussed shots on dull days? Any tips gratefully received.

I'll be back on Friday with my SIPIDI project progress. If all goes to plan, there will be a Linky List to share what you've been inspired by on Pinterest (or elsewhere) this month. Care to join me?

For today, I'm linking up with Julia and the deskers of the world.

What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday #332

The answer to that is nothing crafty, at the moment. My kitchen table task, for this afternoon, is filling a shoe box to wrap and send to my boy.

On the sewing front, I've started to gather supplies for this month's SIPIDI project. I need to find a contrast fabric to go with this one. I'm sure I have something suitable in my stash.

How cute is the selvedge on this Japanese print?

That's it from me. It's my girl's long day at college (I don't collect her until 6.30pm) which means I need to have dinner ready to go when I get back home. Better make a start then.

Linking up with Julia and the Deskers, this glorious Autumn afternoon.

SIPIDI-Do-Dah!

I've been meaning to resurrect my SIPIDI! meme for the longest time. When the last week of the month approaches I think about it and then, without warning, we arrive in the next month while I wasn't looking! What to do about that?

I thought about it a bit more and decided to make SIPIDI! a two part affair. I'll post on the second Friday of the month with one or two (or more) things from my Pinterest boards that have inspired me. Then on the last Friday of the month, I'll post what (if anything) I've actually done about it.

Today's offerings are a Cafetiere Cosy from Very Berry Handmade, which I have in mind for a coffee loving friend, and a Ginger skirt hack from Colette. You might remember I made myself a denim Ginger earlier this year and I love the A line style. I've been planning to make another and pockets can only make it even better.

If you're new around here and have no idea what I'm talking about, then check out my original SIPIDI! post here. Both my pins for this month happen to be sewing related, but yours don't need to be. It might be a new recipe you've been meaning to try, a card design or scrap book page that's inspired you, or anything else at all. If you took the trouble to pin it, it must be worth a second look. Right?

Who's ready to See It, Pin It, Do It? Let me know in the comments and I'll be sure to follow your efforts. There'll be a new Pinterest board and I'll do my best to figure out adding a Linky List for the second blog post of the month. I'm looking forward to seeing what's inspired you this October.

PS Please don't feel you can't comment, if you don't want to take part. You might not be a Pinner, I realise that not everyone is. I'd still love to hear your thoughts.

SIPIDI and a Friday Find

The blogging schedule, such as it was, didn’t quite go to plan this month, so I’m squeezing two posts into one today.

I mentioned last week that I was having another attempt at teaching myself to crochet. I found a local class, but unfortunately it’s the same time that I teach my own classes so it was back to Youtube for me. I pinned this video for a simple flower. Armed with an odd ball of yarn and a magazine kit freebie hook, off I went.

I’m pretty chuffed with the result. I’m struggling to hold any sort of tension. Told you I was cackhanded! I had to go and do something part way through and lost my way a bit. Not exactly sure how I managed it, but the top two petals are upside down. You can clearly see the chain around the edge of the bottom three petals, but it’s underneath on the other two. I realised I’d made a mistake, but didn’t know how to right it. Having got that far, I wasn’t going to start again!

Do you crochet? Have you got any tips for me or links to helpful videos and blogs. I’m a keen follower of Attic 24 and aspire to make some wonderful creations like Lucy’s Jolly Chunky Bag or a rainbow striped blanket. One…step….at….a….time!

If you’ve made something from your Pinterest boards this month, or inspired by something you found while browsing the internet and filed away for another day, then please let me know and I’ll be round to check it out. All info on SIPIDI can be found here. Looking forward to seeing what you’ve been up to in October.

And finally, that Friday Find. We’re big fans of Studio Ghibli around here and this has to be the cutest Halloween costume I’ve ever seen.

How brilliant is that? Check out the Sew Chibi blog for lots more.

Happy Halloween!

Spicy Roasted Chickpeas

I posted a picture of my roasted chickpeas on Instagram the other day and Rinda asked if I would share the recipe. It was one of those make it up as you go along experiments. The oven was already on to cook the dinner and I had time on my hands. I’ve been trying to think up some healthier snacks and this fitted the bill.

I used tinned chickpeas, which I rinsed well and then placed on a tea towel. I folded the other half of the cloth over the top and rolled them under my hands to dry. That removed any loose skins and I could easily pick them out.

I put them in a roasting tin, lined with foil, sprayed with olive oil and dusted liberally with smoked paprika and powdered garlic. Followed by a couple of grinds of black pepper and a little sea salt, before placing in the oven at 200 C.

After about 15 minutes I took them out and gave the tin a good shake to turn the chickpeas. Repeated after another 15 minutes and then removed from the oven after another 15 minutes, by which time they were nice and crisp and delicious. 24 hours on, the few I saved (in an air tight container) had gone soft so they want eating up. They’re very moreish and somehow I don’t think that is going to be an issue!

PS If you were expecting SIPIDI! today, I’ve decided to give it a little break over the Summer. It’ll return in September.

See it, Pin it, Do it! ~ June Edition

Another month has almost gotten away from me and I haven’t made anything at all from my Pinterest boards during June. Never fear, when I came to write the May edition of SIPIDI! I completely forgot what I was going to talk about. I got all excited about my vintage sheets and told you about them instead. Now, back to the cake.

When it comes to Birthday cake, my girl is very fussy. It must have no sugar based icing, of the buttercream or roll out fondant variety, and definitely no jam anywhere near it. Chocolate is always her first choice for the cakey part. I hesitate to call it sponge because she favours more of a brownie texture.

Over the years, I’ve tried many different recipes in a quest for her perfect chocolate cake. The one we settled upon, about 3 years ago, came from a very old Be-Ro cook book and involved evaporated milk. It was a good cake. Light and moist and very easy to knock up in the food processor. I didn’t use the suggested icing, but topped and filled it with a simple chocolate ganache and it was a winner.

This year I tried something new and apparently it was, “The best Birthday cake ever!”

I particularly enjoyed the slice I had, the day after her Birthday, with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Rich and moist *and* easy to make. What’s not to like?

Over to you, lovely readers. What have you been pinning this month? Did something inspire you enough that you had a go yourself? Please share. We’d love to see.

All the SIPIDI! info can be found here and the Pinterest board is here.

See it, Pin it, Do it! ~ May Edition

Only six days left in May, which means it’s time to share the pins that have inspired us all to action this month. Not a finished project from me, but one I’ve just started.

I met Mary at the South West Stitchers group I belong to and was inspired by the beautiful star quilt on her blog. I started looking out for vintage sheets to make something myself. It would seem they are few and far between around here, so I took the easy option and ordered some Fat Quarters from Mary’s Etsy shop instead.

I pinned Jeni Baker’s amazing Giant Star Quilt, made with vintage sheets, a while ago. There is a clear tutorial and suggestions for alternate numbers of different colours and patterned fabrics to make up the star. Mine will be made up of pink and yellow fabrics, in the various designs I have.

I had a lucky break when I found the blue and lilac sheet, for the bargain price of £2, in a local charity shop. That will be my backing. I just needed something for the background. I realised I would have enough of the sheet left over, once I’d cut the backing, to make the background too. Which means I can get started at last.

I’m going to scale the pattern back a bit, to end up with a quilt measuring 60” square. I think that’s quite big enough for my first attempt at machine quilting!

Over to you now. Have you made anything inspired by your Pinterest boards? We’d love to see. All the info on SIPIDI! can be found here.

The Pinterest board is filling up nicely. Just leave me a comment if you take part and I’ll add your project too.

See it, Pin it, Do it! ~ April Edition

Hello and welcome to another edition of SIPIDI! It’s time to see whether we’ve put any of those great ideas we pinned to good use. This month I’ve been on the hunt for a great pancake recipe. I quite often cook them for a weekend breakfast and have always used a Nigella recipe to make the thick American style. It’s a throw it all in the blender type of mix, just what you want on a lazy Sunday morning.

I have envied the puffiness of pancakes I’ve seen pictured online, but mine never seem to reach those heights! A friend of mine uses a Jamie Oliver recipe, to make the most wonderful looking thick pancakes, but (and it’s a big but for me) it involves separating three eggs and whisking the whites. I wanted a simpler way to get that fluffiness and I think I’ve found the secret ingredient….buttermilk.

I tried this recipe a couple of weeks ago and the pancakes were light and fluffy and delicious with a good slug of maple syrup. Success! And no egg separating needed.

So….it’s over to you. If you are a Pinterest user, what kind of things do you like to pin the most?

My SEWING board tops the charts with 44 pins and, to my shame, I have only used two of them. Although, in my defence, a lot of them were ideas I pinned for Five Things I’m Loving This Friday. I have three different RECIPE boards: Savoury, Sweet and Budget. I’ve cooked around half of the Savoury, three of the Sweet and all of the Budget recipes, well there are only two on that last one!

Which pins do you go on to use the most of?

If you’d like to join in this month, all the information can be found here. Just leave me a comment, to point me in the direction of your post, and I’ll add it to the board.

PS You can make your own buttermilk, by adding a tablespoon of white vinegar, or lemon juice, to ordinary milk. It works best with whole milk or semi skimmed.

See it, Pin it, Do it! ~ March Edition

Here we are again, with a week to go until the end of the month. Have you made anything you’ve Pinned this month? Want to join me? I’d love to have you along.

I’ve been making Grandmother’s Flower Garden blocks this month, from some instructions I pinned a very long time ago, all the way back in November 2012. The block was intended for a project which didn’t get off the ground and ended up among the other UFOs in my cupboard, until now. I can’t show you that one just yet though.

I completed two other blocks, while I was away on a crafty weekend, and have a few more basted hexies ready to whip stitch together when the mood takes me. They are perfect to sew in front of the TV and not as anti social as a whirring sewing machine! Very transportable too and everything I need fits into the clutch I made.

All the instructions/videos can be found in the November post I’ve linked to. The only difference is that I cut hexagons from my fabric rather than using squares. I have the die so it made sense to do that.

Big thanks to everyone who joined in last month. We had a great selection of projects between us, from artisan bread, cakes and salads to cards, jewellery, scrapbook pages and art journalling. You can find them all on the SIPIDI Pinterest board. What will March bring? I can’t wait to find out.

If you fancy joining in this month, you can find all the information right here.

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday? # 247

No, your eyes are not deceiving you, that really is sunshine falling across my desk.

That hint of brighter light was enough to prompt me into having a bit of a sort out. As far as my work space goes, it just made it all that much untidier. It’s got to get worse before it gets better though, hasn’t it? I shoved all the paper crafting stuff up to one end to make room for some sewing bits and pieces.

I have so many projects that I want to have a go at and more than enough fabric in my stash, yet whenever I decide to begin something, there always seems to be a vital ingredient missing! My mission this week is to pair fabric with patterns/ideas and see what else is needed to complete these projects.

The next step will be to buy zips, interfacing, matching thread etc. so that I have everything on hand when the mood takes me and I have a bit of a time to sew. I did manage to finish one thing last week, which has been hanging around half made for ages. Mainly through fear of messing it up with the glue and getting it everywhere.

The sewing part was easy and came together very quickly. I think I shared that before, but couldn’t find the post, which shows how long ago it must have been. I distinctly remember having a discussion with Lisa-Jane about kiss clasps. Well, finally the fabric and the clasp came together and I’m pretty happy with the result.

Now onto a bit of shameless self promotion. That’s if you’ve got this far, I seem to have waffled on more than is usual for a Wednesday! If you’re visiting from WOYWW, then I already know you love to see what other people have been making and like to join in with a meme. Perhaps you would consider mine?

It involves taking some of those ideas, you’ve carefully filed away on Pinterest and bringing them to life. Whether that be a crafty project, organisation strategy or simply something good to eat. All the details can be found here.

Even if you don’t fancy joining in, it’s worth checking out this month’s post to see what everyone else has had a go at. As my friend Rosey said, it’s nice to see things made by real people, rather than Martha Stewart!

See it, Pin it, Do it!

Only a week to go until the end of the month and Half Term is almost over. Already?! Welcome to the very first edition of See it, Pin, Do it!

One day last week I was making the dinner, which only involved cooking some rice and heating up the batch cooked chilli I’d defrosted. I had some leftover cream in the fridge and time on my hands. A dangerous combination it seems. I wanted something quick that I could make with what I had in the cupboard.

I had a vague memory of once seeing a TV chef make a chocolate pudding mixture and then pour boiling water over it, before putting in the oven. I turned to Google and came up with this recipe. It took about 10 minutes to throw together and the only thing I did differently was to put it in one large dish and bake for a bit longer.

It was delicious with cream poured over and would be even nicer with some vanilla ice cream. It’s best eaten straight from the oven, slightly cooled. I think it might have been a bit stodgy once it had gone cold. I didn’t have the chance to find out!

My Mum went gluten free a little while ago and has felt all the better for it, so I pinned another version to try next time. There will definitely be a next time.

Over to you now. Have you made something, from an idea you’ve pinned, this month? Just comment here to let me know and if you’ve blogged it (and the post includes an image) I’ll pin you to the SIPIDI board.* It could be something you pinned ages ago or just yesterday and you can join in any time.

I’ve seen one post already, thank you Gemma, and I’m hoping there will be more to come, over the next couple of weeks.  Looking forward to seeing what you’ve created this month.

*That sounds like some form of cruel and unusual punishment.

A New Monthly Meme

A monthly meme you say? That’s something new around here. It is and I really hope that some of you will join me. So what do you need for a meme? An idea is a good place to start. Perhaps a snappy acronym to go with it?

I give you SIPIDI! ~ See It, Pin it, Do it!

How often do you see something, while visiting your favourite blogs or just browsing Pinterest, think it’s a great idea and pin it? If you’re anything like me, then that’s probably quite often. How often do you actually go back and use that idea as inspiration for a project of your own, or cook that delicious recipe? Not quite so often? Well, lets do it then.

Towards the end of each month, I’ll link to at least one thing that I’ve pinned to my boards on Pinterest and show you what I’ve made. It could be a card, a sewing project, a recipe, or anything else that takes my fancy. Are you with me?

Here is where I’m really hoping that somebody out there is saying, “Yes!”

This month I’ve been trying out quite a few new recipes. Being a great lover of chickpeas, this was a favourite with me. Jardaloo Ma Murghi or Curry with Apricots.

As you can see, mine doesn’t look quite like the picture, although I did follow the recipe fairly closely. I think the original looks almost like sweet and sour. My apricots were in juice and I have a feeling that Jack’s may have been in syrup, to get that shiny quality to the sauce.

I’ve made it twice now and I did change a few things. I used dried chickpeas the first time, as specified, but you have to be organised a day ahead for that. I’ve always got the tinned variety in the cupboard and it worked equally well, when I substituted those, along with some peaches, when I couldn’t get apricots.

I prefer cumin seeds to the ground stuff, I think they have a nicer aroma when you fry them. I now use Very Lazy Chillis from the jar, because I developed a particularly nasty burning sensation, all over the palms of my hands, after chopping a fresh chilli a few months ago. The recipe says 5 apricots, which was much more than a third of my tin. There were 14 halves so I used 10 of them. When I switched to peaches I used 5 halves. Otherwise I stuck to the recipe.

As suggested, the leftovers were indeed delicious the next day in a wholemeal pitta.

Have you been inspired enough, by something on your boards this month, to have a go? If you have then point me in the right direction in your comment. If you’re interested in joining in, then let me know that too and I’ll have a go at setting up a proper linky at the end of February.

PS If you like the look of the recipe and I can heartily recommend it, then don’t forget to pin from the source, rather than the picture on my blog.