Spotlight : four etsy favourites...

During my time of taking things slow I may have spent a number of lovely hours browsing Etsy...it's such a treasure trove of beautiful creations. I always love hearing about new shops so I thought it would be fun to share with you my four latest favourites. Plus, it has been a looong time since I've done a blog or shop spotlight :)

Beautiful prints by Hello Paper Moon

I love these rose gold dipped earrings by Amoorella

So many pretty creations by The Object Enthusiast

Gorgeous hammered stack rings by NoaNoa Jewellery

Be sure to check out these shops, they're full of so many lovely things!

Happy Friday :)

Life lately...

Life lately has been much slower than planned. I had grand plans for getting my life and house organised this month as well as opening up shop...and then I got a run of blurgy illnesses. So instead of running around I've been taking things slow, eating lots of healthy treats (and not so healthy chocolate) and have tried to embrace the opportunity to start 2014 off with rest and reflection.

I'm pretty much back to normal now which means full steam ahead with opening up my little online shop! A lovely part of life recently has been all the pretty post I've been ordering from bead shops. I've had so much fun playing around with designs...I just need photograph everything and then I can do a proper announcement!

I'm also thinking about doing a jewellery making series here on the blog to coincide with opening up shop so let me know if there is anything you would like to know about jewellery making!

Chocolate goo balls...

This recipe is one that will be passed from friend to family to friend to friend to family and so on. Trust me.

I first experienced these little mouthfuls of deliciousness when my sister baked up a cake feast for my nieces dedication party. It turns out she had got the idea from her sister-in-law who'd got them from someone else. But the best bit about these goo balls (aside from the melt in your mouth cake centres) is that you're not left waiting, hoping that your friend will remember to send you that recipe you are salivating over so politely asked for...as they don't actually require a specific recipe.

Yep, that's right! Simply bake up your favourite chocolate cake (although confession time, I actually use a boxed cake mix to save a little time and it still tastes amazing). Whilst it cools make up a batch of cream cheese icing. Then blitz the cake in a food processor to produce cake crumbs and place in a bowl. Gradually mix in the icing until the mixture comes together and you can form balls of cake. Roll the cake mixture into balls (the size is up to you), then simply melt 200g of chocolate and coat the balls ( as you can see I'm not so great at this!). Leave to set on a tray with greaseproof paper.

It turns out that they're basically just giant cake pops...amazing.

The mixture of cake with icing results in a super soft chocolatey mouthful. I can't recommend these enough...seriously, go make them now!

20 Breads: Olive breadsticks...

I know...the first week of January isn't through and I've already started on one of my goals, please don't, no really, oh okay, stand in awe if you really want to :)

Haha, although I need to let you in on a secret, I actually made these for New Years Eve so I suppose technically they don't count but I'm going to count them because I've never made them before and I did eat one on the 1st January.

These are Olive breadsticks and I've been wanting to try them for ages. They are a Paul Hollywood recipe which you can find over at the BBC food website. Lovely airy dough surrounds whole olives to create these really tasty breadsticks. I found that these didn't crisp up like typical breadsticks, this could have been because I made them a little fatter but the dough does seem much more like ciabatta than a typical bread stick.

One word about these, they aren't pretty and they are messy to make! It's a wet dough and it's almost impossible to move it in any uniform fashion. I haven't worked too much with wet doughs so I could definitely do with practising handling it...any tips are welcome!

You can find the recipe here, I halved the quantities and made 18 bread sticks. These are certainly going into my recipe book, they were so delicious with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. If you don't like olives you could easily swap them for something else, e.g. sun-dried tomatoes.

One down, nineteen to go!

Hey there 2014!

Happy New Year to you all! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas. Ours has been busy but so great, we got to spend time with both of our families, I'm going to be honest with you...they rock :)

Christmas seemed to creep up on us this year, I think it had something to do with there still being leaves on the trees and having worked outside in a t-shirt in the week before Christmas...cold weather definitely helps to induce Christmassy feelings...that being said, it didn't take us long to embrace it! But if Christmas sped up on us then, my, 2014 has sped up even quicker.

Up until 2 weeks ago I thought I was going to be starting this year in a new job. An opportunity came up at a local charity who work in an area in which I am very interested. My notice was handed in, I was due to finish on Christmas Eve, I even had my leaving do...and then it fell through. Fortunately I was able to stay at my current job, my boss was so amazing in letting me reverse everything. I work in stroke rehabilitation which I also find so interesting so it isn't a chore to remain :)

However, I was looking forward to the New Year as the start of something brand new. Change was in the air, and I love change. I felt invigorated with the thought of doing something different! So, it has been a strange couple of weeks in which I have had to process all that has gone on, but I'm still excited for this new year. January 1st signals a fresh start, it might not have worked out how I expected it to but I know that God has it in hand. I've been thinking a lot about God's calling on our lives and how he wants the best for us. His best for us doesn't depend on circumstance...he doesn't need particular things to happen (or not happen) in order to bless us. My situation really isn't that tough in the grand scheme of things but he is with us even in the roughest of moments.

I'm thankful to be starting this year with that in mind, who knows what 2014 will bring our way but I say bring it on! For a laugh I revisited my 12 things for 2012 list I shared two years ago... it is hilarious how little I have actually achieved from it! But, being someone who is in denial about the fact I'm so bad at crossing off lists, I've decided to set some more fun goals for 2014 :)

1. Open an on-line shop - I am soooo excited about this...I debated when to reveal this plan but here's a little teaser - it's happening. soon. Stay tuned! There's jewellery involved :)

2. The 20 breads project - completely inspired by Elise's bread project. I love making bread but I have totally fallen into a bread rut and also completely out of the routine of making all our bread... so my challenge is to try 20 different bread recipes to keep things fresh! I'm counting enriched dough too... because my sweet tooth asked me to.

3. Learn a tune on the harmonica and play sitting on a pier whilst the sun sets over the lake.... this is one goal carried over from 2 years ago! I can currently play the harmonica badly and slowly, lets see if I can change that this year :)

4. Improve my blog photography - I would love to be able to take better pictures for the blog and I want to try to focus on that this year. I'd say my craft photos have definitely improved but I still have so much to learn...especially when it comes to taking photos of food!

5. Print my photos - another goal from 2 years ago...and I've taken plenty more photos since then which also haven't been printed! But my goal, as it is each year, is to finally print out all my photos from the last 8 years!

I'm going to stop there, I could keep going but it would be nice to look back in a years time and have actually achieved it all (although I don't hold out much hope regarding no.5)! I love having fun projects on the go alongside more serious goals, it's good for the soul to have some fun :)

All that's left for me to say is Happy New Year to you all, I hope that 2014 brings you much joy and laughter!