Sunday tea.

After yesterday's stress and trauma We had a friend round for Sunday Tea.
She has been responsible for my lovely afternoon tea books that I was lucky enough to have for my Christmas and birthday presents.

Afternoon tea is so fab, I love the whole ritual and am glad that I am able to do this from time to time.
So last night and this morning was spent, cooking and baking and preparing.

We have a delightful mismatch of china that we have accumulated over the years. So here are the pictures of our tea.

For Sandwiches I made, Ham, Smoked Salmon with soft cheese and of course cucumber. Along with an egg and watercress roll. 

I have decided to put in my wish book a pair of serving tongs as well as some sugar tongs. (I have a little handbag book that reminds me of things I want/need. It has useful measurement's in as well such as the collar size of my father in law and the size of the dining room fireplace.)

Now I have to work on my scones because these were a little to moist and a bit flat, they tasted nice enough and I served them with clotted cream and strawberry jam. 

For the pastry's I made some little tarts, they were made with a sweet pasrty, some sweetend cream and fresh fruit. they tasted lovely, However they could have been a little more pretty. 

They tasted scrummy. 

Now the 2 cakes under the tartlets on the stand are a rich dark and white chocolate brownie and a honey and poppy seed mini loaf cake. 

Brownies are yum and the loaf cakes go very nicely with the tea. I made 4, but 1 sliced was more than enough for the tea table.

Finally I made cup cakes. 

Now I need to improve upon my icing as it does look like it was done by a 5 year old.  However the contents were yum. 

It was not just the food that made it such a nice afternoon, it was the company and the whole ritual of afternoon tea, the good linen, the nice china, taking time and conversing. A very nice way to spend the afternoon and a perfect antidote to a horrid day the day before. 

Hope you all have a happy week. x 

Frozen Roast Potatoes

This morning did not start well, as soon as I woke up my head was pounding so plans for picnic's, walks and cycle rides went out the window (I know I said I was not going to moan but today was horrible).......

So LSP and I put on a happy face and did the shopping. 

This afternoon we had both of our daughter's and older daughter's boyfriend round for dinner. 

As you know I love cooking and baking but today there was no way I was going to stand and cook a roast. 

So, For the first time ever, I used Frozen roast potatoes. 

I drew the line at using pre-made yorkies (Aunt Bessie has never crossed this door) 

They all said it tasted fine, I was surprised as they did not taste to bad at all, not as good as home made but not to bad, I served them all alongside some frozen veg and some lovely pork steak's which I used a M&S sticky marinade over...yum. 

To finish we treated ourselves to Banoffee Pie and raspberry torte (from Tesco) yum....This was some compensation for staying in on a most glorious of day's!

I was pleased with the table  though...

I have 20 minutes left to eat as I need to fast from 8pm tonight until my hospital appointment at 9am in the morning. I then have to be there for 2.5 hours so I have saved my Country Living magazine which I will read from cover to cover, that and my I-pod and I will be fine.

I hope you all had a great weekend and enjoyed the sunshine.......

How to break into a bike lock!

My main mission today was to undertake a 25km training cycle. I mentioned this in a blog earlier on this week.

I did not. I have managed to free the bikes from the shed. This was some achievement. We bought a combination lock so we would not loose the key, this was all good until the combination did not work! It was the right combination (yes really) but still it would not open. We tried to borrow and buy some bolt cutters to no avail! So armed with my garden tools I attempted to get through the twisted metal rope. luckily it was not a chain chain rather a plastic covered twists of metal.

I started with my long handled lopper's and slowly managed to get through the outer shield and slowly start to get through the wires. Once this was no longer working I switched to my trusty secateurs and slowly piece by piece. I managed to get through the wires. By the time I had got through I had wasted an hour and my hands were sore and I was so fed up of looking at my bike I had lost my desire to go cycling!

If you are a wannabe bike robber. I would suggest bolt cutters and wire cutters not garden tools!

So what did I do instead?

Shopping and Cooking!

The shopping was, food shopping! Well mine was!

This was LSP's trolley!

The flowers were for me!
After Tesco Our eldest daughter wanted to go to TK maxx!

I was so good. I did not buy anything, yes I was tempted, but still managed come out empty handed and keep to my not shopping for lent! Even though there were some tempting display's.

This afternoon I cooked a full roast, I used to do one every week but now the children are older and busy most weekends they are a rare treat.

It tasted great! proper roast. chicken, stuffing, roasties, yorkies, carrots and a green veg medley! Followed by a bought black forest gateaux!

Despite not cycling it has been a wonderful, weekend, lots of sun, lots of outdoor time. bliss made it worth working for the week! Hope you all have a happy week!

12 hours on a typical Sunday.......

I thought it might be nice to photograph mine and LSP's day.

So here we are this is 12 hours on a typical Sunday (no icky bits)

Lie in today so we do not need to get up till 8am.

I will spare you the shower and getting dressed!!!

The Labrador decides to help wash the floor!! hmm I wonder what time it is?

Yes its doggy breakfast time!!


Now its time to take YD (Youngest Daughter) to work.

After dropping her off it is now time for our breakfast!!

I know its wrong.......but so nice on a Sunday morning it fills that time between dropping off YD and the opening of .....

No big shop today, just a few essentials for the day ahead.......

Bones for the dogs, magazines for my nan, nuts for the birds, chicken for dinner, wine for cooking (only £2 a bottle) and we had ran out of bread and fruit!!

Petrol station on a Sunday morning......... necessary if you want to complete the day!

ok now off for an hour of torture........At the gym....

It was a difficult hour, lots of sweating so much so a 2nd shower was in order. Now for a change of pace. 

The flowers in the shopping trolley were for my parents,

The earth is because the moles have set up home in the churchyard, need to get some grass seed.

well time to go now

Off to see my Nan and to tell her about the Ritz, pass on the magazines and have a cup of tea,

Lunch time... (lunch on the run)

ok now we have refuelled off to do some geocaching!

Geocaches are boxes hidden all over the world and you get the co-ordinates to try and find them. Go to www.geocaching.com to find out more! we had picked up a travelbug in Austria and it needed moving on.

Can you see it???

There it is.......

bye bye treavelbug I will blog about you again soon.
Ok so home now time to collect the doggies and go for a walk.

yes the pictures are posed... otherwise the pictures of walkies looks like this...

ah well of home as we bought them a treat in tesco remember!

Time to clean out Tiffany the gerbil.....

Yes she is as evil as she looks (the dinning room was covered in LSP's blood the other night)

 This is her cosy bed she made from shredded paper and huge pieces of cardboard!!

All clean and ready to go!

ok time to fix the dinner....

need to turn this

into this......

to this,

to this

to this,

we also managed washing, changing sheets, tidying, sorting, cleaning, talking none of which are great to photograph! I hope you enjoyed looking at our day !!!