Going Healthy for Saturday Pudding

Now you won't believe this I'm sure, but for once I was being healthy. Normally I go for chocolate, cream, high calorie puddings. You know the sort... just look back, high calories is what puddings were made for!

But not this week.

This time I used FAT-FREE cottage cheese, REDUCED FAT cream cheese, HALF FAT cream, real fresh strawberries and a whole bag of frozen summer fruits. That's got to be my five a day right? Oh, and eggs too. Eggs are good aren't they?

Presenting Summer Fruit Cheesecake.

(I am not thinking about the butter or the biscuits in the base, or even the double cream served with the cheesecake. No way, I was far too busy being smug that I had bought anything labelled as 'fat free'. Watch the pounds fall off!)

Desperately seeking someone!

I have nearly finished sewing up the knitted squares blanket and would love a crochet border round it. Problem being I can't crochet. Is there anyone out there who would be kind and generous, willing and able to crochet a simple border round this blanket for me? Please? A really big please?

Sadly the only compensation will be knowledge that your edging will be loved by someone who you (or me) are never likely to meet.

Please, all you Happy Hookers out there, do not feel obliged to volunteer, if no one does then I shall attempt to learn the art of the hook myself! Gulp!

On hold...

It pains me to do this, but the latest sock has been put on hold. The photo does not do it justice. It is very pretty - an unusual stitch (well to me at least) that I've never come across before - I now have lots of ribbing to do. It is a fun knit and one I can heartily recommend (come on Sussex Yorkie, you know you want to!) so come on everyone, go here and get the pattern ordered!

Anyway, like I said, this sock is on hold for the week - at least. I am determined to get the blankets sorted. The whole blanket thing has hit a bit of a dead end really. I sent 2 to St Dunstan's, and had an e-mail to say they had arrived - shall we say the recipient (the lady in the fundraising dept who was responsible for dishing them out) does not obviously appreciate the hand made things in life. Sad really. She also said that while they were happy to have more blankets, they thought that maybe a different charity would like some. I took it to mean thanks but no thanks.

So I have been scouring the country. Literally. You wouldn't believe the e-mails I've sent out! It seems that care homes for the elderly have lots already, the ladies like to make them themselves, they have to be classed as fire resistant, oh the excuses I've had. From the people that bothered to reply that is.

And then I had one of those light bulb moments, that I can't quite believe I was so stupid to ignore in the first place. My sister-in-law works in one such care home in North Wales. They do not have lots of blankets. Their residents are not capable of knitting / sewing to make pretty blankets. And as to fire resistant - furniture yes, but blankets? The few knitted blankets they do have are very much favourites in the home. They love colours, they love softness, they love the warmth, they love the fact that people are bothered about them. Strangers like us.

So I will be very busy this week making up lots of blankets - felted jumper ones and knitted squares ones. So bear with me, posting will be slow this week. I have a lot of sewing to do!

Saturday Pudding.

Just had to show you this from my fab new cook book. If you have got the book, go out now and buy the ingredients for this. It is wonderful. Quite simply wonderful. As from now I think it's one of my most favourite puddings. Ever in the history of puddings.

Raspberry cheesecake brownie.

Cakes!

There has been very little knitting taking place over the last few days. I've been busy doing cakes. This one is for a friend of ours - apparently he wants a model railway for his birthday. Not sure this will last quite as long as a Hornby one though!

It has taken hours to make this one, but I've enjoyed it, I just hope they don't cut it when I'm around. I might cry!

Today is Mr Stressy's birthday. Instead of a proper cake, I got out my new best cook book and decided he could have cupcakes instead! Strawberry cheesecake cupcakes no less. A very unusual recipe and to be honest I didn't think they'd work. But they did. They worked very well in deed.

On closer examination of this book, I have realised that it is not for the dieting or weak hearted people amongst us. Every recipe seems loaded with sugar, butter and frequently chocolate (1.4kg of the stuff in one recipe I liked the look of!) I have now tried 2 things from the book and on both occasions found them a little too sweet for me - and I love sweet things normally. But still, these are only little cakes and maybe you aren't supposed to eat 6 at once.

It's my problem then really. Too greedy. (But as these have strawberries on, they must be healthy right?)

Whisper this one please!

On Sunday night a lady phoned me to ask for a cake with a Mexican Theme. Amazing the difference a few hours can make isn't it? We are all now being bombarded with Mexico for all the very wrong reasons. It is, in my very humble opinion, scare-mongering. You can all e-mail me in a few weeks saying that I was wrong, but really, am I the only one who feels like this? Well, me and Terry Wogan anyway!

But I digress. This is what I've come up with for Mexico - the lady came up with the colour scheme, the rest is all me.

What do you think? I resisted the temptation to do little pigs, face masks and anti-viral capsules! (I don't want to belittle the serious nature of swine fever by the way, it is obviously very serious if you catch it, but how many people in the world have heart disease? Cancer? Malaria? The list goes on...)


And just in case you wondered, I have in deed cast on Ensnared. All the knit stitches are knit into the back - it is likely to take a very long time! But it's already so pretty, at only 5 rounds long!