I have a new top...

I have a new top...I have a new stripey top...I have another new blue stripey top...

Good morning all! How are we all doing on this sunny, cloudy, sunny, cloudy, yes definitely cloudy Friday morning? I've had a bit of a blip this morning but I am endeavouring to overcome it by blogging to all of you.

So back to the top. Many of you will know that there is a mug embargo (I'm not sure that's the right word but I like the sound of it) out on me. I am prohibited from allowing any more mugs into the house and I fear that the same may be about to happen to me with stripes...

You see my lovely new top has been added to an already flourishing collection...

Please look at the following exhibits...

I mean seriously, how many stripes can one person have?

Whenever Mr Lardshow takes me out into the land of the living my eyes are just automatically drawn to stripes, it's as if I'm a bumblebee looking for other bumblebees so that I can compare stripey, fat tummies with them! 

In truth I think my love of stripes is down to just one thing; I like to pretend that I'm French! If I could just find myself the perfect beret then I'd be sorted, after all, I already have the stripey top and a string of garlic...

So there you have it, a little insight into the stripey madness of my world. 

Next blog...spotty dressing gowns...

Wedding Wishes

Hello All,

Every weekend seems to have been so busy recently. I love the fact that I'm getting out of the house so much more but boy it's tiring! It's been worth it though. We've had some beautiful weekends in the company of beautiful people. It's strange, while some parts of my life have effectively 'died' some parts are coming alive again.

So this weekend was spent at the wedding of our beautiful friends Simon & Rowena. They had a lovely, small, intimate wedding that was just perfect. Mr Lardshow and I spent the day taking notes and thinking about what we want for our wedding.

I think we enjoyed the wedding so much because we paced really well. I let Mr Lardshow sort everything in the morning so I wasn't already exhausted by the time I got in the car. After the ceremony we took some time out and went for a relaxing picnic by the river. By the time the evening do started we felt relaxed and revived. Perfect!

A few years ago I made the decision to try to make presents for people if I could rather than buying something people don't want. So for Simon & Rowena's wedding I decided to make them some Mr & Mrs biscuits and a lovely, tiny wedding date cushion. Hope they liked them.

My lovely mummy helped me to get the cushion finished & Mr Lardshow was an outstanding biscuit tester! What can I say, its just a gift he has! Have a look at the pics of them and let me know what you think... Hoping everyone has a beautiful day! xBx

Camping Cupcakes

Morning all!
My lovely Rachel's here! She's being very helpful and is making me pace. There's an extra need for pacing today because tomorrow we're going CAMPING!
I have not been camping for years, all our holidays as a child were camping ones. I was always happiest in a tent, in a field with a sheep near by (just the one sheep mind).
So the wheelchair is booked, frozen sponges are chilling in the freezer and the hot water bottles are ready. I really hope I manage this weekend. Cross those fingers...
So anyway Rach and I have done some quick baking. We've made these lemon & raspberry cupcakes. I got the cases from Sainsburys, they're little pudding pots for picnics. I think they almost look like tents, don't you?
So after my rest if Rach let's me go back into the kitchen I'm going to drizzle some lemon icing over the top of them...delicious!
Have a beautiful weekend everyone, the sun is promising to be out...don't forget that suncream!

xBx

Birthday Passion Wagon Bakes

 Hello all,
Life has got the better of me this past week, pacing is extremely hard to do when you're trying to pretend everything is normal. I had great plans to post on Saturday but unfortunately a bit of an incident occurred with my head and a cupboard door. The cupboard door fared much better than my poor, poor head! 

I don't want to be an 'occasional' Blogger, I really need to get back into this, so here goes!

Months ago we found this darling camper van and we've been saving it for the birthday of our dear friend Adam. He loves vw's and as we couldn't find a beetle this was the next best thing.

Mr Lardshow is currently delivering the little cakes to him. Hopefully he likes them. I'm slightly fearful the vw will have sunk into the cake!

Here are the little camper van cakes...enjoy! xBx

Thank You Biscuits

Just a quick post to show you all the biscuits I made today with the brilliant letter cutters that we got from Portmeirion.

 I think they may be one of my favourite baking gadgets I've ever bought. Such a simple, effective idea. You use the 'open' end of the cutter to cut the basic shape then push the letter imprint into the dough. 

When the biscuits are baked you're left with these fabulous letter shapes that are just begging to be filled with icing. I love the fact that the letters are all different.

I use little squeezy bottles that we got from hobbycraft to do the very precise icing. I start off with the lightest shade and then darken the icing each time i start a new set of letters.

The finished biscuits. I did three different shades of blue this time. I think they look really effective.

So these biscuits are for the ladies at Pain Management. It's the last day of the course tomorrow and I just wanted to say thank you to them for all the amazing things they've taught me. Most importantly they've made me realise that life can go on, you can have a wonderful life with pain. Your life won't be easy but you are entitled to a beautiful life and you can get there with a bit of pacing...They are the best medicine I've ever been prescribed. xBx

Blueberry and Lime Drizzle Cake

Delicious Drizzle

Hello all,
Still feeling a bit rough here but I'm insisting on carrying on. We've just done cake club and here is the cake I made for it. It's my second attempt at a drizzle cake, my first attempt was a brick, used as a doorstop for a while! This was a much greater success though. The recipe made a huge cake that I have to say is absolutely delicious, thankfully there's loads left so Mr Lardshow will be taking some to work tomorrow. apparently some of his colleagues want to join cake club. Who am I to say no? I used some of the duck eggs we got the other day and they really have made the cake light and fluffy but not too rich.

So the cake is made up of 250g caster sugar, 4 eggs, 250g plain flour, 1/2 tsp baking powder, zest of 2 limes, 200g blueberries and 225g butter all those beautiful, magical ingredients that when whizzed up together in the kitchenaid turn into gorgeous goodiness (Yes, I know it's not a word).

As the eggs came from a farm I made sure i gave them a good wash before cracking them open.

I thought they'd crack open really easily but the shells seemed really tough.The yolks were huge and such a glorious sunshine yellow.

So you cream the butter and sugar together and then gradually add these perfect eggs, if the mixture looks like it's about to curdle just add a spoonful of flour and it will come back again. You then need to add the rest of the flour and baking powder ooh and the lime zest. I managed to fill the kitchen with lime zest and covered my pyjamas in it, ooh lemony, sorry limey fresh! Make sure you keep back a spoonful of flour to gently toss the blueberries in. This helps to stop the mixture turning grey and keeps the blueberries whole and not mushy in the mixture.

Line your cake tin on the bottom and the sides and plop the mixture in and then pop the cake in th'oven as Mr Lardshow would say. It's a long cook, I struggle with not opening the door all the time to check it's cooked...

While you're waiting for it to bake, get on with the lime drizzle, for this you will need the juice of 2 limes and 100g of icing sugar. Now you should you use a thin skewer to make holes in the top of the cake, however I don't have one so I used a knitting needle...it was clean I promise!

OOH! OOH! TAKE THE CAKE OUT OF THE OVEN!!!!!! 

Sorry, I forgot that part, the cake will take about 50 minutes, you'll know it's done when a fork that you've poked in it comes out clean.

So leave the cake for 5 minutes and then spoon the drizzle into the holes that you've made and leave the cake to cool completely in the tin.

Now make the icing, more limes and icing sugar! 5 tsp of lime juice and 125g of icing sugar. Take the cake out of the tin and plate it up. Drizzle the icing generously over the cake and down the sides if you can. Sprinkle some lime zest over the top. Put the coffee pot on, slice, eat, enjoy. 

Done!

P.S This makes a cake that will last for a good few days under a big glass cloche, a tin went to work with Mr Lardshow for Simon, Marlon and the rest of his work colleagues who are literally wasting away in their office. There's also plenty left for Pain Management Group tomorrow. NOM!

Love Cat Love

I am not a mad sad cat lady I am just a lady with cats...
That's what I keep telling myself anyway...

I'm not feeling too great today, back off to the doctors later. Boo Hiss.

I've been trying to find some inspiration about what to post today, nothing exciting is coming to mind I'm afraid. Let me think...We got some fresh eggs, duck eggs! We got a new mattress (Heaven on a bed frame!) I appear to have started a cake club with my pain management friends and it's still raining here. That's it.

So because I have no exciting news I thought I'd post about the cats that fill my days with love, nibbles, snoring and nagging for food.

If you visit our little white house, within moments you will be greeted by Finn and if you are wearing black he will soon become your best friend, curled up on your lap, ready at a seconds notice to roll over and dazzle you with his whiter than white tummy. He's just this minute graced me with an extra special tummy rub...bliss.

 If you stay for longer and end up going to sleep he will climb up onto you, he's not fussed about where, normally the most uncomfortable spot for you and commence snoring. His snoring seems to have got louder and heavier since the introduction of the meat shelf into the house. Anyone else seeing a correlation there?

 Then there's Huckleberry, our little Bear. Finn gives his love freely and seems to know when you need that little bit of extra love. he's outstanding at knowing when my bad kidney needs a good pummelling. Berry however is more like the stroppy teenager of the family. She runs around like a mad thing, barging into rooms, miaowing loudly and then dashing off again...we think it's hormones!

She is the most beautiful cat I have ever met. I know I'm biased but honestly she is. She looks like she has a mask over her eyes and wears an off the shoulder black evening gown. All she needs is a tiara and she'd be all set for a night out on the tiles.

Because Berry is such a different cat to Finn when she does choose to give you love it just fills your heart with joy. You think, "She's chosen me! She wants to love me!" Over the years I've realised that it isn't that she doesn't want to be affectionate it's just that she wants to be affectionate on her terms and if that means some Berry cwtching on the bathroom floor in the middle of the night when you've woken up for a quick wee then so be it!

Finn waiting for the taps to be turned on for his morning drink. Note the grumpy 'I haven't woken up properly' look

I know that as you read this you will have been thinking 'sad cat Lady' and that's fine. I am a cat lady but I'm not a sad one. I think I definitely would be without them. I spend the majority of my days, in my house, alone apart from the telly and random phone calls from cold callers. My cats genuinely keep me going and I love them all the more for that.

Mash Lollipops

Hello all,

It's been a slow day here, I seemed to sleep through the morning. I say seemed, I did. It's taken me hours to get moving today, I seem to live my life in reverse, I wake up more as the day goes by. Much to Mr Lardshow's annoyance, especially at 11pm!

Anyway, the washing got done and it is out! I know people, out, and it still hasn't rained! Yet...

Tomorrow I'm hoping to find the energy to go back to yoga, I really enjoyed it last week and I really want to get some strength back in my weary, knackeredy body. Then, hopefully, Jill and Sandra from my pain management group are going to come over for some coffee and cake in the afternoon. Can you tell that talk form the dietitian had absolutely no impact on us whatsoever.

We're going to have this;

just out of the oven...

All iced up...I really want a slice...

Almond Tart. Don't tell Mr Lardshow though. He hates almonds. Shame isn't it. We are going to feel duty bound to eat it all up! I really hope they come, we were all talking last week about making links with others in the group and I'd love to find some people to spend time with during the long days.

Dinner tonight is mash, veg and a turkey steak for him...I didn't know you could have turkey steak but apparently so...I haven't really got the energy to make a fancy dinner, I managed to do the mash but that's about as exciting as it's going to get I'm afraid. Would you like to see the mash? here it is...

You just have to have a mash lollipop, it has to be done. How else would one know if it was perfect? Sadly one lollipop turns into seven and then there's hardly any left! 

I'm going to sign off now, there's gravy to be made and mash to be tested. One last pic for you all, this is our lovely, blissful little kitchen. 

The best present my parents ever gave me. 

Thank you xBx 

I cooked a chicken (but forgot to take any photos)

Good evening my lovely readers,
Well I am cream crackered! It's been a busy couple of days and (don't tell the pain management ladies) I haven't been pacing at all. I've managed quite a few things that I'm really proud of. I drove on my own for the first time in months yesterday, I went to yoga, I did a shop, I went to pain management and today I cooked a whole chicken!

Mr Lardshow's parents have come down for the weekend for the first time so I am in a house full of Lardshows and meat eaters, the cats are in heaven! So after much debate about what to cook for them we decided on a roast chicken. Up to this point I have got away with just cooking pieces of meat but today I bit the bullet (not the chicken) and had a go. After trawling through my cookery books I found a nice simple recipe from the voluptuous Nigella. Mr Lardshow was dispatched to a good butchers and bought a high quality free range chicken. Hopefully the chicken had a happy, clucky life.

The happy chuck was popped in the oven with lemon, potatoes, shallots and a whole bulb of garlic sliced in half with some olive oil, thyme, salt and pepper. Lots of mathematical doings were done to calculate how long it needed to be in the oven but in the end I opted for going and having a bath and leaving the responsibility of the chicken to Mr Lardshow. As Baldrick sort of used to say 'I had a cunning plan'!

So, by the time I got out of the bath the chicken was done and all we needed to do was put the Yorkshire puddings in, warm through the mash and steam the veggies. Dinner was done! As is now the norm, I spend all of dinnertime staring at people's plates quizzing them on whether the meat is cooked and hoping it tastes ok. Tonight though I had the added bonus of Mr Lardshow senior constantly offering me random bits of chicken to taste for myself...I declined!

Anyway dinner was a success, our bellies are full and we've collapsed onto the sofa to watch the end of the tennis.

It's nearly bedtime now, I'm really tired and I REALLY want to have the energy to go and see the Olympic Flame in Lichfield. I want to be a part of it in my 'Official Team GB' hoodie in spite of the pain. Cross those fingers! Night Night all xBx

Olympic Dreams

Now I'm not sure if any of you out there are aware but there's something really special happening in this the year, 2012...yes that's right I will be competing in the Olympics! Have you picked yourselves up from the floor? Good, then I shall I continue. A few years ago if you were to have typed in my home town into Wikipedia and scrolled down to the bottom, under 'notable inhabitants' you would have read my name, Olympic hopeful in the 1.2 metre breaststroke. Oh yeah baby I had dreams!

But sometimes dreams change and you have to adapt. Sadly I missed out on the trials for said breaststroke competition and on a very dark day my dearest mother sat me down and said my Olympic dreams were over. I tried not to take this to heart but it was hard, all those years of training, all those swimsuits, all that talcum powder!

Yesterday I decided to believe that maybe my Olympic dreams could be realised again. After a bit of a sad, teary morning I decided to be brave and try and find a local yoga class. Since starting my Pain Management group I really want to get stronger and get out of the house a bit more if I can. The days can be very long in my little white house all on my own with just the two mad cats for company! Anyway, I found a class! I had a lovely chat with the teacher called Jean and she was so lovely, she laughed when I said it might take me longer to get up from the  'Downward Dog' than everyone else.

The lovely Mr Lardshow stopped off on the way home and picked me up a yoga mat (That means I've definitely got to go to the class now!)

And so with much trepdation we contacted the official Olympic commitee and told them I was back in the game. I have to admit, there was pure joy in their voices when they heard the news. afterall, I am a medal prospect and yes i am talking BRONZE here! The post arrived here mid morning and there was something extrememly special all packaged up for me. I am taking this as confirmation that I have got into the official GB Yoga team. 

GO TEAM GB!!!!!!

Little Candles

Last night I cleared away the bits and bobs that we'd piled high and filled the table room with candles.

I love the way the light has made rays coming out of the holders, like little rays of sun in our rain filled summer.

I'm tired today. I went to pain management this morning from 9:30 til 1:00 but I didn't get home til 2:00. It was really good today but the sessions are so long and it's excruciating sitting on a chair for that long. We had 2 speakers today who had done the course before and had come along to tell us how the course had changed their lives. It's very hard, only 2 weeks in, to imagine how it'll be able to make that much of a difference but I am remaining positive.
The best thing I'm getting out of the course so far is leaving the house and getting to spend time with other people. People like me, who understand why I sit in funny positions with a hot water bottle constantly attached to me! We did exercise today (I know, deep breaths!) and apparently we'll be doing that every week! Every time the course leader said the word 'exercise' I just kept on thinking 'CAKE'. I had a lovely giggle with one of the other girls on the course and it was lovely to feel equal with others.
So no cooking tonight, friends are coming over for curry. Nom! I can feel a nap calling me to bed, I've done too much, i clearly didn't pay any attention to the lecture we had on 'pacing'. I hope you enjoy the candles. xBx