A book a week

I have a late entry to my resolutions for this year. Today I happened upon this blog by Tara Anderson   about her experience of reading a book a week for a year and that is what I am now planning to do for 2015. Although it's already the 8th of January I have read two and half books since Christmas, so I reason that I can count them towards my total.

Realistically I may not be able to read 1 book every single week, but I'm confident I can read 52 books during the year, especially as I have a couple of long plane journeys and a few train journeys to take at various points during the next year.

I'd like to use it as an opportunity to read different books to those I would normally read so I plan to ask my friends on Facebook and my followers on Twitter for suggestions. By happy coincidence one of my neighbours had suggested that we start a local book club this year, so that may well provide a few unusual choices too. And, like all other book lovers, I already have a pile of books at home in my "as yet unread" pile, which will set me up nicely for the first few weeks.

I'm happy to say that my family know how much I love reading and no birthday or Christmas passes by without me receiving at least 3 new books.  This year was no exception and so the first two books I read were from among my Christmas presents.  My first choice was Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie.  I have always loved Science Fiction and for many years as a teenager would read nothing else, so I was delighted to be introduced to a new Sci Fi author.  I have to say that this one did not disappoint.  I was immediately transported to the world of the Radchaai and literally could not put this book down.  I particularly loved the way the book deals with the gender of characters, and enjoyed reading about the burgeoning relationship between Breq and Seivarden. Having finished it I immediately started on the sequel (Ancillary Sword).  As often happens, I did not find the second book quite as good, but it was still completely unputdownable, and I'm delighted to learn that there will be a third book in the series published in due course.

The book I'm reading this week is The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin.

I am genuinely excited about this new resolution, and hopeful that it will expand my horizons. I also suspect it will help me to kickstart this blog again as well, as I will no doubt want to share my thoughts on each new book.

Resolutions

Last year I pretty much had one New Year's Resolution - to learn to crochet, and to my surprise I did. I'm a long way off being good at it, but I have managed to complete several mini projects, and am a long way towards finishing a scarf for myself and a blanket for the 5yo.

This year I plan to continue on the same theme. I want to finish the scarf and the blanket but I have been spurred on by a most welcome Christmas present of an Attic24 Yarn Pack. The pack in question is the one which will make a Raindrops Cushion, and I am very excited about it.

Now all I need to do is find the time to sit down and start the project.

Happy New Year to you all.

Cheesy Leeks on Toast

I've been back on Weightwatchers for 2 weeks now and really feel like I am on a roll.  I lost just over a pound the first week, and am getting used to the restricted portion sizes.  I am staying sugar-free, but didn't manage to lose weight using that method alone.  I think that may be because I have spent so many years on one diet or another that I just cannot judge portions properly if left to my own devices.

Given that I really do need to lose a few pounds then something had to change.  In fact, let's be honest here, I need to lose about 3 stones (for any Americans reading this, that is 42 pounds, and for any Australians reading this, that is about 19 kg).

For now, I'm still staying off the refined sugar, but am also following Weightwatchers.  I just hope that this time I can stick to it for longer than 8 months - which I think is about my previous limit before the weight started creeping up again.

Anyway, today I'm at home so I got the chance to make my own lunch and spend a bit of time doing so.  I've been really enjoying Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's Veg Book and I leafed through that for some inspiration.  There is a rather wonderful looking recipe for a Leek and cheese toastie, but there was a bit too much double cream and cheddar in it for a Weightwatcher's-friendly lunch, so I adapted it to lower the propoints value.

Ingredients (serves 2)

2 leeks, finely chopped
40g cheddar, grated
2 tablespoons philadelphia light (or other low-fat cream cheese)
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1 tsp olive oil
4 slices of bread

Method

Fry the leeks in the olive oil over a low heat until soft (it will take at least 15 minutes)
Stir in the thyme, philadelphia and grated cheese (reserving 2 teaspoons of cheese for sprinkling)
Lightly toast the bread, then spread with the leek mixture
Sprinkle the reserved cheese over the top
Grill until golden and bubbling (it took 5 minutes under my grill)

Weightwatchers

 8 propoints per serving (using recipe builder on Weightwatchers website)

--> Of course, you could reduce this to 4 propoints per serving by only having 1 piece of toast per person and having a salad on the side

If you're not trying to cut calories, then I'm sure Hugh's original recipe would be even better - his Veg book is available to buy on Amazon.

Sun, running and avocado on toast

The 6 and 4 year old woke up at stupid o'clock this morning. They were over-excited because today was the day a reward chart was completed so they were due a toy. Nothing would induce them to go back to sleep and wait until the sun came up, so they eventually got their toys and then played happily in the lounge.

However I couldn't get back to sleep and was vaguely wondering what productive things I could do when I realised it was my running day and that instead of going for a run after they were asleep this evening I could go this morning.

I've been training for a 5K now for several weeks, using the 5K Runner app, and so far it's going well, but I am still getting used to working out when to fit the training into my day/week.

I'm not sure this morning has convinced me to set an alarm to run in the early morning, but it really was a glorious day to run today.

The sky looked like this:



There was hardly any traffic on the road, and everyone who I passed smiled or said Good Morning.

And to top it all off, when I got home I remembered that there was half an avocado in the fridge, so I could make my favourite sugar-free breakfast for myself:

It couldn't be simpler. Toast some wholemeal bread (preferably with seeds and/or grains in it). Spread liberally with salted butter. Mash an avocado on top (if the avocado won't mash easily with a fork it's not ready to eat).

I truly think it is perfection on a plate.




And here's another picture of the beautiful sky, just because.




Happy Thursday!

Mini Crochet Bunting

I've always been a sucker for a magazine, and since taking up knitting last year and crochet this year I have bought more than my fair share of crafty/yarny publications. I usually buy editions that come with free yarn and/or needles and then spend ages looking at the patterns to see if I think I can manage any of them.

I had an early success last year with this knitted cardigan for Rabbit. This was made using a magazine pattern and some wool I already had. The then 5yo was delighted with it.

Then in January this year I used some of the leftover yarn from a magazine to practice granny squares and turned them into a blanket for Rapunzel. The 4yo loved it and tucks Rapunzel into bed with it most nights.

In April I made some more granny triangles, in two different patterns:

My eventual aim is to make some rainbow-flag inspired bunting for summer but I haven't yet got exactly the right shade of purple. One is too dark and the other is too light. So frustrating.

While the rainbow bunting is on hold I found myself browsing the magazines in my local shop again, and ended up buying issue 62 of Let's Get Crafting magazine, which had some rather lovely bright yarn in it. None of the suggested projects grabbed me though, so I decided to experiment with some different styles of granny bunting triangles.

Of the 4 different styles shown, my favourite is the bottom left (with blue on the outside) and I'm proud to say it is all my own design. I can't really believe that I only learnt to crochet in January this year and already I can design patterns. Only in simple treble crochet stitch, but still, to me it seems amazing.  I was enjoying myself so much that within a week I had used up all 4 bright colours and had 16 mini triangles:

I steam blocked them, then used one of the remaining colours from my pack to join them together with a simple double crochet chain. This is the finished product hanging up in my brother's conservatory:

It didn't stay there long though - I brought it home and now it is safely packed away in the Easter box in the loft, ready to be decorative again next year for our annual Easter Egg hunt.

Crochet for Rapunzel

My crochet skills are improving on an almost daily basis. In fact, I am even mid-way through crocheting myself a scarf. However, I keep being delayed in finishing this project by small people asking for various yarn items for themselves or their toys. This one being a case in point. I had bought some yarn in a variety of rainbow hues to make some rainbow bunting for the summer, and was looking at them when the 4yo said "could you use the red, pink and purple to make a scarf for Rapunzel?". It seemed a pretty reasonable request to me, so I made a few teeny squares in those colours:


When I showed them to her for her approval she said: "where's the lellow?". On pointing out that she had not initially asked for yellow she said: "yes I did". There was no arguing with her, so that evening I made some slightly different yellow squares to add into the mix:


These did meet with approval, but apparently the red edging was not good enough, so the finished item had to have an extra yellow edging too. I think it's turned out pretty well myself:


Of course, said scarf is now adorning a radiator and not the intended doll, but the colour scheme was much admired by the 4yo, and I was quite pleased by how neat it looks. Not bad given that I only started learning to crochet this January.

Chocolate and Pecan Brownies

These brownies are the best I've ever made, and I stumbled upon the recipe by chance, as I wanted to use up the pecans I had left after making Nigella's Christmas Cake.  (and yes I know it's February now, but it seems as good a time as any to blog about brownies).

I made these on Christmas Day, using my shiny new KitchenAid, which is without doubt one of the best Christmas presents I have ever received.

I made enough for us all on the day, and to take with us to the rest of the family on Boxing Day.  Every single person in the family liked them (ages 4 to 64) which was very gratifying, but did mean that I didn't get to eat quite as many of them as I would have liked.

The recipe I used was a Sophie Grigson one, and can be found here.  Since one of my new year's resolutions was to give up refined sugar, I'm not planning on eating any more of these myself in the near future, but I may make some for everyone else to eat, seeing as they were so popular.