This 1961 Morris Minor shall be ours for a month or so. Rup was hoping to use it for work, but as we suspected it will be too fragile. It needs a bit of work. Pretty while it lasts...

...and it's June 2014 and the Morris is still with us. Rup lovingly maintains it and has restored an engine to replace the one it has. Then when that wears out he'll replace it with the other one that will have been restored...and so on...

Helped out at Bristol Harbour Festival today. Son drove one boat with me in it and husband drove the other. We helped with the cardboard boat race and collected the boats when the race had finished.

Tom driving full steam ahead to avoid us getting wet when the Pyronaut fire tender began its water display!

Gardening 2012

Have planted marigold and leek plants, chard, lettuce, cucumber, butternut squash and spring onion seeds. Hope everything grows! Rupert's quince tree is in blossom, tiny as it is. Plum tree had a lot of blossom too, so pruning must have been OK. Here is the quince:

Baking in my new oven!

The first batches of chocolate chip cookies, cherry and sultana cookies, and chocolate cakes and raisin cakes made in my new cooker have all been eaten. However, I did get an early morning opportunity to take a picture of the white seeded loaves that I made yesterday, before they both got eaten. Very pleased with my cooker.

Amaryllis 2!

 Here is a picture of my amaryllis when all four flowers came out

 I have managed to keep my amaryllis alive and it's flowering again! Smaller flowers this time and only two, but it's still looking pretty good.

Making my room look more cheerful

Amaryllis

I have finally got an amaryllis to flower and so far have not killed it! Admittedly I haven't had it very long :)

Sewing and Cooking today!

 Sewing

Making a prototype lined shoulder bag from cheap fabric, so that when I buy the the fabric I really like, I won't mess it up. Here's what I've mocked up, which I might just keep to use in the summer. I want to make the final bag in thicker, grey fabric with dark red designs.

Cooking

Spent the rest of the afternoon making Chicken, Onion, Leek, Red Pepper and Sweet Potato Pie

Filling before Pastry

Finished Pie

Ingredients (feeds 7):

3 chicken breasts

1 onion, diced

1 leek, chopped

1 red pepper, chopped

1 small sweet potato, diced

2 teaspoons paprika

1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

sunflower oil for frying

1 pint chicken stock

salt and pepper

shortcrust pastry (8oz flour, 4 oz margarine, pinch salt, water to mix to dough)

corn flour for thickening and gravy browning if desired

Chop chicken breasts and fry diced chicken with onion for 10 mins.

Add chopped leek, pepper and sweet potato and sweat for 5 mins.

Add chicken stock with seasoning and simmer for 15 mins.

Make pie top from shortcrust pastry

Mix 2 teaspoons cornflour with a little water and gravy browning and stir into chicken and veg pie filling, simmer for 5 mins.

Place pie filling in dish and cover with shortcrust pastry

Brush pie top with milk and cook at 180 degrees for 25 mins

Everyone liked it, so it seems to have been a success!

New Year gardening and homemade Christmas food

Pruned willow tree with my eldest son, results on main picture...think we've done an OK job.
I have always wanted a garden with fruit trees, so we've made a start. Husband has planted his new quince tree

Plum tree, new last spring, was pruned last June as per instructions I researched on GardenAction.co.uk, so I hope I've done it correctly! I had five plums last year, but it looks a bit too small and sad to display at the moment , so will wait until it looks more promising before I add a picture.

Still have a Christmas pudding left, made by my youngest son, my youngest daughter and me

and some apple chutney my husband made

and some Christmas Cake made by my eldest son. We've eaten all the homemade mince pies and white chocolate cherry and ginger fudge my eldest daughter made...food doesn't last long in this house!
Going to practice some yoga today to try to feel a bit healthier.
Here's where I went to classes (too poor at the mo): http://fourseasonsyoga.co.uk/