The birds had a little field trip to the window this weekend:

Highlights were watching the seagulls swoop around outside and having a nice preen in the sun. They take turns preening the other one, helping to reach the tricky bits. It never looks that nice to me, but I guess they like it. Frankie (the lighter one) has pulled out all the long flight feathers from his left wing -- I've watched him do this, so I know it's not Ira picking on him.

He can't really fly anymore, so he has to make his way around the cage by clinging to the bars and hopping along. Sometimes I hear a crash on the floor of their cage, and Frankie has fallen to the bottom, having forgotten he only has one good wing. I'm not sure what this is all about. Ira is fine, so I don't think it's an irritant in the cage. Frankie used to get the occasional feather that would go wonky, which he'd then pull out, but he's really gone overboard this time. They have plenty of nesting material. It doesn't seem to be related to a molt. He's just a nut bird.

A picture taken in very poor light. This little corner is a corner of patterns at the moment. My lovely tray and the paper I buy at Oliver Bonas (Islington branch) and hoard. Actually, I've been cutting some of it up to package the bird prints as I send them out -- they're so beautiful, even in little swatches. I still have an entire sheet of the roll on the right and one of another by the same designer. Not sure what I'll ultimately do with them, but I'd love to have them on display someday. They actually form a repeating pattern, so you can stock up and wallpaper an entire room with the print! A bit much, but I'd love to see it.

The little dishes and soup bowls are from Ikea. I'd resisted buying them the last few times I went, as they don't match anything else we own, and there's no room in the kitchen to store them. I finally caved yesterday, because how lovely would it be to have a cup of hot soup with some bread beside it? Or a big mug of hot chocolate with biscuits for dunking? So lovely. We just need to move house so I have somewhere to put them.

Lastly, two interesting things I've seen in the past few days:

• A man on the DLR who was clutching a big teddy bear and reading a Stephen King book. I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explanation, but I like to think the teddy bear was to keep him from getting too scared. He also looked a little like Tom Cruise from halfway down the carriage, but that's neither here nor there.

• We went to 'our' cafe in Woolwich on Sunday (delicious food, very cheap) and there was a big film production going on right outside the windows. This film, in fact. There wasn't any actual taping going on while we were there, but we did see some prop cars ready to go. Of course, we didn't know it was a great big, proper, famous-movie-stars type film (I was hoping it was Dr. Who. The episode where Christopher Eccleston makes a magical reappearance.). If I had known that, I might have insisted we stay longer. Beacause -- dudes! The Operative is in it! Eeee. !

I'm in negotiations with the latest edition of the bird prints. I say they're not living up to my expectations; they say they just need more time to dry before the third layer. I'm giving them that time, but it had better be worth it, or it's the last time I ever listen to inanimate objects!

On a less crazy note, my new prints:

I really, really like this stamp, if I'm allowed to say so. I can't remember what my original inspiration was, but every time I print these, I get the Beatles' song 'Good Morning' stuck in my head. Understandably. When I was cutting this, I was really getting worried, because the little lines in the '3D' letters were looking quite ragged. It printed up wonderfully, though -- it's so nearly indentical to my original drawing that I can hardly believe it.

I'd love to make notecards with this stamp -- how wonderful would it be to leave little 'good morning!' notes for people? I shall investigate my blank card options next time I'm out, but for now, I've got the six prints above on offer. There are three yellow/green prints and three teal/dark teal prints, each for the usual £3/$5 (includes shipping). Send an e-mail my way if you'd like one.

Just a quick question/plea. Does anybody buy the Mary Engelbreit magazine? Or know where they can buy it? I've suddenly been struck with a desire to have this issue (the latest one), but I've never seen it for sale here. So if you A) live in the States and would like to send me a copy (I can pay/send treats in return -- magazine swap?) or B) know where I can buy this in London, I'd be greatly appreciative.

Update: We just went to our local Borders, and lo and behold, they had a lone copy. It was in with the women's magazines, which is why I've never seen it before -- I tend to stick to the home and food section. Am a big dunce for not trying harder before I made my plea. Still, many thanks to Hillary for her kind willingness!

Well, I was spoiled by the lovely Amanda. In exchange for a bird print, she offered to send me one of her frenchtoastcake prints, and look what else:

Okay, not the book. I'll get to the book later. But! She did indeed send me one of her prints, which is wonderful and cute and amazing. Also: handknit leaf earings -- knit with both wool and wire! Clever girl; I've had absolutely no luck knitting with wire. And! A little bundle of silk roving for felting. Luffly. Stroke the nice silk. And a nice note to round it all out. Thanks, Amanda!

The book is this one. One of my resolutions (a general resolution that doesn't really have anything to do with the New Year) is to buy more hand crafted items from the creative internet people. My plan was to use the money that was building up in my PayPal account -- they more I sold, the more I could buy.

But then I accidentally bought the above book, Nuku Nuku, which is a Japanese pattern book. There's an ebay seller in the UK who stocks quite a few Japanese titles, so I finally put some of my PayPal money to use. Those clever Japanese, with their beautiful, beautiful things. So now I have to sell more so I can get back to the original plan.

I'm now out of the second edition of bird prints, but I think I'll be making more soon. I also carved a stamp a couple weeks ago that I really like, but I've been ever so remiss in posting pictures of it. Soon.

Ah ha! Another horse finished. She's been nearly done for a week, but those last little details took a while to come together. Introducing Meryl Beatrice:

Meryl is a very clever type of horse, who dreams of being a detective, and for that reason, she keeps a detailed list of observations in a notebook she carries in her corduroy messenger bag. When she's not tracking suspicious characters (those squirrels are the worst!), she likes to watch '70s crime dramas, shunning today's CSI spin-offs, as they're 'too polished.'

And, of course, she loves Dr. Who. If she can't be a detective, being the Doctor's companion would suffice.

I love Meryl's scarf. I bought a human-sized scarf on clearance and felted it in the machine, and I think it worked perfectly here. Despite the fact that Meryl might be my new favourite, she's available in my shop.

Ah, poor whale. Still, nobody takes care of the whales who don't happen to come into London when they get sick. So maybe this one was lucky. Maybe. More famous, anyway.

Here's an uninspired shot of a thing I made:

Like everybody, I love the look of Lisa's log cabin pillows, and I was looking for a way to 'showcase' my Liberty fabrics. I use them here and there, but they sit in the fabric cupboard for the most part, and I wanted to be able to admire them.

The cushion is entirely Liberty prints, except for the back, which is made from some of the silk I bought back during the Knitting and Stitching Show. These are the red/pink hued prints; I'm planning on making another with the cooler colours. Pretty, pretty.

In case you're keeping track of these things, here's what I had for lunch:

The nuggets are Quorn's chicken-style dippers, which taste (to me) just like the chicken fingers fast-food places serve. Well, less greasy, of course. I still don't entirely trust Quorn (which doesn't stop me buying and eating it in truckloads); I think someday we'll find out that Quorn is people.

As a kid, I would have had a hard time believing I'd someday eat soy products (because 90% of children know that vegetarians are gross. I don't get it, either.) and would crave a good can of green beans. But I guess these things happen. Why, just last night I was imagining how to make crushed-peanut covered tofu squares (to be eaten with noodles and some sort of kung-pao-ish sauce). Gross.

As you might know, a bottle-nose whale made its way up the Thames and into London (more of a city whale than a sea whale?). It just passed our bit of the river, this time on a barge, which is attempting to bring it back to its home. Good luck, little whale!

As you may or may not already know, Rob now has a few bionic teeth. They can run faster, jump higher, etc -- but not for three months. Since he can only eat soft foods until that point, I feel obligated to double my cake production. My contribution:

These are just plain yellow cup cakes (from scratch, naturally) with my basic frosting, topped with sprinkles (or as I say, spirkles -- or as they say around here: Hundreds and Thousands). I don't like eating the sprinkles, but they sure are pretty, aren't they? I just realized Rob could bite into one and ruin our his valuable new teeth, so maybe I should go back and pick them all off. Or make a new batch!

These aren't terrifically rounded, muffin-like, on the top, but they're pretty good. I don't usually criticize the way things are done in the UK (I mean, apart from the things we all criticize -- transport, cranky sales staff, the Welsh*), but British cupcakes are sad little things. The ones I've seen are completely flat on top, below the paper cup, and have been topped with a very runny (and then hard) icing.

I have two rules about baked goods: they must be comforting (reminding one of the good days of childhood, etc), and they must be indulgent. Something about flat little cupcakes inspires pity in me, and how can I be comforted by that? It's not that British cupcakes don't taste as good or that the cupcateers (as they're known) aren't as skilled; it's just a preference thing.

But I'm totally right about this.

Anyway, a picture of Ira having a sit in the sun. Everybody laughed at me when I said it would be sunny today. They laughed!

*I'm kidding about the Welsh. It's Rob who doesn't like 'em.

Well! It's like everybody went off to delurk elsewhere for Delurking Week! I suppose it's my fault for not mentioning it was Delurking Week last week. For those of you who have commented lately, I shall grant you one nice thing. Next time something nice happens to you, you can go ahead and figure I was responsible for it. No, thank you.

I made another horse. This one is called Clara May, because Clara is a nice sounding name, and Brian May must be one of the nicest rock stars ever. And doesn't she look nice?

I wasn't sure I'd like a soft-coloured one as much as the very bold Patience, but she's really grown on me. I have decided that she must go live in America, though. I've got another (and possibly another) which are nearly finished, but I'll have to wait until I'm home during the daytime to take a picture.

It's a silly thing to struggle with, but I've had a really hard time finding a doll-style plush that I could make and also like. The horses are fun to make, and I think they're original enough that I'm satisfied that I'm doing my own thing. Of course, I'm also an adult making plush horses. I think my junior-high enemies probably saw this coming. But then, I bet they didn't bet I'd get to see this earlier this evening, from my de-lux apartment flat on the River Thames:

Ha! Joke's on them.

*Get it?? It's like a London/Jeffersons cross-over joke!

Not perfect, but there they are. They didn't turn out as dome-shaped as I would have liked for two reasons (that I can think of): the egg whites lost a lot of air when I folded in the dry ingredients and the macaron halves were too big. Regarding the first -- I was so careful. Sooo careful. Gen-tle. But I'm pretty sure I could actually hear the air escaping. Not sure what to do about this except to beat the eggs even more and hope I don't over do it. The second is easy enough to remedy.

The first tray went on the bottom rack, where I usually bake everything, and they wound up way too dry and crunchy. The second tray sat for much longer, so the little macarons formed a skin, and then I put them on the top tray. They're actually quite nice, but not exactly right. Next time, they'll be better. And there will be a next time.

This is not a macaron. No, it doesn't even HAVE eggs in it. But it's tasty:

Rob wanted something to go with his (storebought) custard, so apple dumplings it was. Verrrry tasty.

Here's something from the craft department:

This is Mary Patience, a little lady horse. I'm not in the habit of naming the critters I make (which have been few and far between lately), much less trying to interpret their personalities. But, then, Jane does it, and she's just about as sophisticated as I could hope to be (in this scenario, sophisticated = baking cakes, earning multiple degrees. . . and possibly having chickens). So Mary Patience it is.

She's not so outgoing as her appearance would suggest.

You can see here that she's actually quite prim. She's made of wool felt and Liberty fabrics, which I've been gradually using (and would you believe: they're even better to sew with than to look at!), and her hair is made from cleverly repurposed eyelash yarn. Her necklace is made of little felt beads.

Patience (as I'm sure she's called) was a bit of an experiment for me. I was feeling so inspired by the lovely Margaret that I wanted to try another doll-style plush, and the idea for this horse shape came to me pretty quickly. I'm planning on doing a couple more, once I've stocked up on fibre fill, and possibly offering some for sale. What do you think?

Speaking of things I'd like to sell, I polished up the shop a bit. Put in the newer items and put the old Things I've Made design back in action.

When I bought my miniature pot of miniature flowers on Monday, hardly any had bloomed. And then, just the other day, BANG:

Click the photo to enlarge. Nice, eh? I worked from home today and took a minute out to photograph a subject in actual daylight.

I've been doing crafty stuff lately, but none of it's finished, so I don't have any pictures to show for it. I've had to squeeze in fabric cutting and bits of sewing into the time between getting home from work and going to bed (allowing for dinner cooking and eating and a dose of television). It's not that I don't like work, I just wish I had more free time. Not an entirely new dilemma, I admit, but frustrating all the same.

I made small, chocolate meringues Wednesday night (and then we et them before I had a chance to get a good photo), which were lovely and light and hollow enough to trick one's self into believing they had no calories at all. What I really want to attempt are Nigella's chocolate macarons, but I'm obviously subconsciously afraid of them and have procrastinated by whipping up other egg-based concoctions.

Things Which I Have Made in the Last Week Which Have Been Delightful and Made Me Look Good in the Eyes of Friends and Loved Ones:

• Eclairs. I want to make inside-out eclairs next, with some sort of chocolate pot as the filling. Because how rich would that be? Yum yum yum.

• Chocolate Meringues. Did not boil in the oven, but were tasty and perfect.

• Potato Soup. Was just about perfect -- will need to find new life goal soon.

• Sesame Tofu. You could have never convinced child-me that I would one day love tofu and think about it all day long. But here we are.

I really want french toast for dinner. Then I'll use up all the eggs and not have to face my crippling macaron fear this weekend. And also -- french toast!

I hadn't made a big proclamation or anything, but I wasn't planning on going to the Liberty's January sale. I'm well stocked with fabric at the moment, so much so that even I thought I should just abstain from shopping for a while. But then I remembered that I had a Liberty gift certificate from my mom! Hooray! I kicked my will power to the side. Always trying to get in the way, it is.

I bought several metres of fabric with my gift money (is there anything better than seeing Liberty's new fabrics for the season? What? You don't know, because you've never been to Liberty? Oh. Well, it's neat.). I bought this tray for my own self, but I can't tell you what I paid for it; just know that everything at Liberty is overpriced. The design is by Josef Frank, for Svenskt Tenn. Do you know how much his textiles are? Ninety-nine pounds per metre. £99! Per metre! Clearly, the bar in the things-I-want-but-absolutely-cannot-afford arena has been raised.

You can't actually see the tray very well in my picture, due to the mini pot of flowers in the foreground. Is cute, no? Five pounds. Possibly the cheapest thing in the store, or rather, in the doorway of the store. You have to keep spending until you're out on the street! Such was my impulse to buy my new favourite tray that I had to actually leave Liberty, walk halfway to Oxford Circus to find the cash machine (Liberty doesn't accept Solo cards, because they're for children and foreigners), and then all the way back up to the third floor. Dedication.

I don't usually go shopping after work, because I'm driven to get home and on the couch as quickly as possible, but Rob's at the spa with the boys staying with his folks for the night in order to make a doctor's appointment in the morning. So I had to go shopping to avoid a Bridget Jones all-by-myself scenario. If you'd like to come over and watch Moulin Rouge/Almost Famous/Spinal Tap, consider yourself invited. If you'd like to burgle me, no thanks.

I was all revved up to make a million (a rough estimate) little lavender pouches today, and I wound up with only four. I think I would be unstoppable if I had little cutting elves who cut my pieces out of the fabric and got them ready for me. As it is, I have to do that cutting myself, and I find it tedious. So tedious. Almost as bad as having to fold the remaining fabric and put it away.

Click the picture to enlarge. I made these two and two that look exactly the same, for myself. I had thought I'd offer these two for sale, but then I ran up against the inevitable pricing problem. I spent a long time making each one, and therefore want to price accordingly, but doing so is useless if nobody then wants to buy them. So I'm not going to bother trying to sell them.

But if you'd like to arrange a trade for either or both, e-mail me at anna.torborg[AT]gmail.com (as always). The pouches close with a ribbon tie, and the actual lavender is sewn into a separate little oragandie (voile? Sheer meshy fabrics go by too many different names.) bags, so you can switch it out when you want. The pouches are 4.75" high by about 3.5" wide.

A better shot of the lighter one.

I've added the on-site links to the sidebar. The image map in the title image doesn't work in IE, which I've known for a while now and hadn't done anything about. It's obviously not the cleverest bit of code to use, but then -- if you're still using IE, you've got problems beyond missing out on the rest of my site.

That wasn't very sympathetic of me. But, seriously.

Firefox.

Look what I made! Just like I said!

My apologies for the bad lighting -- winter in the UK, blah, blah, blah. It's a proven fact that if you stare at that picture for long enough, you can actually see the chocolate dripping down.

These were very easy to make, even though I haven't done anything quite like this before. I had my fears that it was going to be a boil-in-the-oven recipe, but everything went really well. I began the icing process very carefully, and when I had loads left over at the end, I just went back and slapped it on. People want eclairs with a lot of chocolate, not ones that look nice!

Both Rob and I give these two chocolate-y thumbs up. They're only little, but there are so many! If only we ever had visitors. . .

Phew. How does anybody get anything done during the week? I'm having a hard enough time getting stuff done so far this weekend! We looked at a couple of flats today, and that took up the entire morning and a couple hours of the afternoon. We're not even looking for a place to buy yet -- just a flat to rent so our current place can be empty to sell it. THEN we can buy. Since property hunting isn't fun, here's a nice hibiscus which was blooming in Rob's parents garden in Portugal last October:

Pretty. So, what things did I want to accomplish this weekend? Let me consult my list. I wanted to buy stamps and send the give-away prints, but since the first part failed to happen this morning, I'll have to wait until Monday. They're coming, guys, but they need special postage to fly, fly across the sea.

I also wanted to make more prints (check!) and sew up some lavender pouches (tomorrow?) and make tote bags (next weekend?) and bake macarons from Nigella's recipe. I've since scrapped the macaron idea, because I bought The River Cottage Family Cookbook (it's a great book for cooking with kids, and also for me, cooking without kids), and there's a recipe for chocolate eclairs.

Really, chocolate eclairs. Yum.

So, I did make new bird prints last night. This is what they look like:

They have a light aqua background with red-orange birds and leaves and a dark blue outline. I really like this colour combo, and I've got a few extras if anybody is interested. There are eight of varying quality, though none of them are actually very bad. If a price of £3/$5 sounds good to you, drop me a line at anna.torborg[AT]gmail.com, and I'll send you a PayPal request. I'm also open to trades, and it doesn't have to be for just the print. (If anybody getting one of the freebies wants a matching set, get in quick, and I'll send them together on Monday.)

The other list hinted at in the title 'Lists' is my Amazon wishlist. It wasn't actually for wishing for things (because I'm a bit gifted out after the holidays), but just for general interest purposes, in case anybody cared what I'm thinking about buying (or wishing I had). I can't seem to get a link for it, though, so no list. I can summarize it by saying: lots of domesticity and Honky Chateau by Elton John. What a great album.

And now! Chocolate eclairs!

Well, my aging mobile phone (previously Rob's aging mobile phone, until he got a new one over a year ago) finally kicked the bucket. Even though I hardly ever use my phone -- I pay as I go, about ten pounds every couple months -- I figured an actual working phone was probably worth having.

So! Guess what I have! A camera phone! Not because I support the unholy alliance between cameras and phones, but because it's really hard to find a phone without a camera. I told the sales guy I didn't want to spend more than £50 on a phone, and then I took the first one he offered me, because let's face it -- if it rings/vibrates when people call me and has a dial tone when I call other people, it's a perfectly serviceable phone.

That's the little memo board at the side of my desk at work. Cutesy animals and a bottle of paint -- that about sums up my job. Oh, yes, and there's some stuff I do on the computer.

[EDIT: All the prints have been claimed (as well as a couple secret backups) -- if you've already e-mailed me, I've got one for you, and I'll reply soon!]

I love the idea of multi-layer prints, whether they're screen prints, stencils, or stamped designs. I'd been meaning to try one for a while now, and I finally got around to it yesterday:

It doesn't look perfect, obviously, but it's actually exactly as I wanted it. I've spent a reasonable amount of time creating this effect (uneven print, slightly off register, etc) by hand in Photoshop, but nothing compares to the texture of the real thing (it's a set of three carved stamps, by the way).

But why should you care? (Ooh, mustn't start asking that question.) I made several prints of this yesterday, but I haven't fooled myself that I can sell them, so -- give away! I'm going to cut out six from my sheet of prints and send them to the first six people who e-mail me (anna.torborg[AT]gmail.com). Er, so I hope there are six people who want one.

Click the image to enlarge. The total image size is only 2"x2", so if you want one and I send it and then you decide you don't like it after all, you can totally just tuck it behind something and never have to worry about it again! It's like a miniature piece of art. Art I made, but still. I did illustrate a book once.

p.s. -- The print to the right in the photo above is the most badly registered of them all and isn't one I'll be sending out.