craftyguider – Page 10

Meal Planning Monday 30.9.13

Mr Craftyguider escaped to the supermarket with the Craftyguidelets on Sunday. He’s normally allowed out midweek with a list for the top-up shop and to stock up on his gluten free supplies. However, Sunday’s trip was unscripted and he came back with two boxes of premix cupcake kits.

I don’t like buying these kits for three main reasons: a) they probably contain all sorts of unnatural bits and pieces, b) I want my girls to be able to add butter, flour and eggs and produce tasty cakeage, and c) they contain gluten so Mr CG can’t help us eat them which means my diet goes for a burton for another week. However, Mr CG and the Craftyguidelets did have fun making them, and they do know that cake normally comes from ingredients and not a packet.

To go with the beautifully decorated cakes, we will be eating:

Monday Beef stroganoff with rice

Tuesday Ham, egg and chips

Wednesday Cottage pie

Thursday Creamy pesto chicken with pasta

Friday Oven baked salmon

Saturday Freezer dive

Sunday Roast

Linking with Mrs M’s Meal Planning Monday. I’m off to drool at other people’s menus. Join me?

10 reasons why I don’t follow everyone back on Twitter

I don’t work with other people. The majority of my social interaction in a day is talking to children, or talking about children. Apart from my husband and a few mums on the school run, I don’t get any grown up conversation at all.

Then a little bird came into my life. I discovered twitter some time ago and I’ve made some great connections on there. Some people I’ve met in real life, others I’d love to meet. Twitter connections encouraged me to start Craftyguider, to try crochet, I’ve had support when I was down, ideas to put into my Guide meetings and hopefully I’ve managed to inspire and help others occasionally as well. I’ve still got a long way to go to be as popular as some, but I hope my ramblings in 140 characters are mainly worthwhile.

Recently I’ve been followed by people doing the Purpledog Challenge. The object is to follow 10 new people a day and they follow you back to increase your business network. Some timelines interested me so I followed back, but others just got ignored, which is what inspired this blog post. One person seemed to send out her 10 tweets a day just saying “@—– I followed you with the #PDChallenge. Please follow me back.’ However she didn’t seem to tweet much else.

Sometimes I don’t have the time to sit down and go through my new follows for a few days, but I do try and keep up regularly. And sometimes I even take the time to be proactive and browse through some of the suggestions Twitter puts forward, and sometimes, they are even relevant to me!

Why do I choose to follow back certain accounts on twitter and not others? This is the top 10 I came up with.

1. Auto DMs – “Thanks for following me. Check out my FB page and like me. Visit my website.” This is spammy. If you want to thank someone for following you, make the effort and manually type something. I’ve had people tweet to me and say they liked something from my website. It may be something they looked at for 2 seconds on my homepage, but it felt like they had made an effort. An auto DM has me reaching for the unfollow button.

2. Every tweet is a Facebook link. I know that people link their Facebook accounts to twitter. The odd one is fine, however, if I wanted to follow you on Facebook, I would get a Facebook account and like you (is that the correct term?). Not all Facebook links work because I’m not on Facebook, so there’s not much point in me following you.

3. Just retweets. Do you not have anything to say for yourself?

4. Over hashtagging. They are meant to make it easier to search for something, not to take up most of the 140 characters.

5. People who just sell things. Yes, it’s nice to see what you make, but if it’s not something I want to buy, you aren’t providing me with any other reason to follow you.

6. No interaction. It’s like someone who just talks at you all the time and never bothers to listen.

7. Thanks for following. It’s OK, but some people just tweet thank you’s and forget to tweet anything else.

8. Retweeting every tweet you are mentioned in. I’m pleased that you have received a lot of Follow Friday mentions, but do you really need tell us about every single one?

9. Follow Friday’ing everyone in your follower list or everyone who has interacted with you in the last week. Just pick a few who you really enjoy interacting with and explain why I should follow them, rather than a long list of names.

10. Just following people who follow you back. I’m sure my tweets don’t interest everyone that I follow so I don’t expect to be followed back. As long as what you are tweeting interests me, I’ll stick with you.

I’m not into twitter for the number of followers. I’d love it if everyone bought things from my website, but it’s not why I’m on twitter. I belong to a SOCIAL network where people interact, share and support each other. I love having friends in my phone.

If you would like to follow (or unfollow!) me on twitter, follow the link and we could be having some deep and meaningfuls soon.

What annoys you most on twitter, or what keeps you addicted to those 140 character messages every day?

Satchels and Rainbows (and Guides) #WIPslinky

Another month, another opportunity to confess my WIP busting progress at the #WIPslinky party.

I have had successes in the past. The dresses for the Craftyguidelets continue to be worn, I still love my tablet case, and I think the draughts have ceased in my friend’s hallway.

Last month I set myself the target of finishing my satchel which at the time looked like this…

Well, ta dah!

Yes. Not very impressive is it? I’ve ironed on all the interfacing, made the strap and made one tab. I did start another one but it was so fiddly being upholstery fabric, and it started fraying everywhere so I had to cut out a new one. It was also taking up so much time, it’s gone back into the project bag and back into the drawer for a bit. I haven’t given up on it forever, but I need to concentrate a bit more time on the business and getting ready for Christmas craft fairs.

My other targets from last month were to finish my frame purses…

…tick! and to carry on making a new uniform for the Rainbow mascot, Olivia. Fortunately, Girlguiding UK has started to stock large Olivia’s again so I am saved from this task. I still need to design and make a Rainbow banner for Remembrance Sunday, as well as make some new badges for our Rainbow groups like this.

At Guides, we are going to be making macrame bracelets so of course I needed to learn how to make them myself. After a bit of practice, I’ve finished a sewing machine charm one. I just need to source some different charms for the Guides that are a bit more age and interest appropriate.

And as for October’s #WIPlinky party target? I suppose I should start making my Christmas cards, as well as getting my Christmas craft fair stock ready.

Which WIPs are you attempting this month?

Linking with Tales from Mount Pleasant’s #WIPslinky party

Meal Planning Monday 23.9.13

Last week’s menu had it’s successes and failures. Last minute changes to my afternoon schedules meant that the ratatouille had to be made in the slow cooker and turned out a bit soggy. However the chicken cordon bleu went down very well with the family and I’ve been asked to add it to the list of regular meals.

I love making vegetable goulash. The smell of smoked paprika is divine, and look at all these lovely colours together.

I’ve also been busy on the baking front. Rather than make a loaf of bread, I chose to make some rolls from Paul Hollywood’s How to Bake book. I’m so pleased how they came out, although I’m yet to try one and they went straight into the freezer.

I’ve also been baking with the kids. Eldest Craftyguidelet saw a truffle recipe in her Moshi Monsters magazine which contained biscuits. As Mr Craftyguider is gluten intolerant, I chose a truffle recipe from the Eat Yourself Thin book instead, and we coated them with the hundreds and thousands that were in the magazine, with some gluten free sugar strands for Mr CG. I don’t think chocolate and honey mixed with coffee is ever going to make me thin though, so I might leave the family to munch through these.

We also made the Millionaires Shortbread recipe from my favourite gluten free baking book, Cake Angels. The Craftyguidelets rechristened it Minionaires shortbread due to their obsession with all things Despicable Me.

This week is a bit on the busy side so the menu will be fairly simple.

Monday: Ham, egg and chips

Tuesday: Bolognaise

Wednesday: Fish pie

Thursday: Something in the slow cooker

Friday: Vegetable pasta

Saturday: Pizza

Sunday: Roast something!

Linking with Mrs M’s Meal Planning Monday. Have a look to see what everyone else is cooking up this week.

Frame Purses

In my quest to clear some space in my office, I have set myself a challenge to work my way through my WIPs (work in progress). I’ve mentioned Anthea Willis’ #WIPslinky party in a previous post which is an additional incentive to get things done (come and join me!).

One of the WIPs for this month was to turn this pile of fabric…

…into these frame purses.

Ta-dah!

I have had the frames for months and the fabric (in most cases) for even longer. You know the ones. You bought them because you loved them but the right project never comes along. I bit the bullet, cut the fabric, and they are made.

What WIPs do you have lurking in the back of the cupboard?

Linking to Handmade Harbour’s Handmade Monday. Pop over and see what fabulous things everyone else has created.

Where is my…?

I find planning a week’s meals really helpful. It makes things so much easier when I’m taking the girls swimming after school and I only have 20 minutes to put a meal together when we get home. Also, it stops last minute dashes to the shops for emergency supplies (and are you like me and always come out of the shop with much more than was on your list in the first place?).

I’ve blogged before about my meal planning organisers from Organised Mum. The pad hangs on a nail in the kitchen, and whenever I run out of something mid-week, it’s always there to quickly jot down on the shopping list part.

Now I’m sure I bought a few to stash away when they had a sale, or to save on postage. However, can I find them? Not anywhere. But what I have discovered has made me think that I need a sort out. Here is just a selection.

I have a massive pile of party ware. There is a potted history of all the themes we’ve had at parties over the 6 years of eldest Craftyguidelet’s life so far. Each year we buy more than we need as plates come in tens, cups in 25s and spoons in 100s. Youngest will start having parties next year. Will it matter that the cups and plates don’t match?

I have a very old frozen dessert maker. I think the bowl was thrown out years ago, and it was useless anyway. Is it worth keeping?

I have lots of saved biscuit and sweet tins. I also have at least 5 bought cake tins. I can dream of having that amount of cake, but I think the reality is that one or two tins could be enough.

I’ve got some fat trapper liners for the grill. They need to be used on a grill which you use with the door open. I haven’t had one of those for at least 5 years, if not more.

I have a couple of cans of oven cleaner, but my oven is self cleaning.

I’ve got a perfectly respectable amount of mugs and tea cups. Do I really need all the corporate/Easter egg/novelty ones?

This is just the tip of the iceberg. I could go on but I’ve probably lost most of my readers already. Thanks for sticking by me if you’ve got this far! I am an expert in squeezing things into cupboards. As long as I can get stuff in, I’ve been blinkered to the problem. My kitchen is organised but I think it needs a good sort out and an action plan.

1. Do I need/use it? The donated wine glasses that I used for candles that didn’t sell could go to the charity shop.

2. Could it be stored somewhere else? Time to store all the rice together so it gets used up rather than just reaching for the microwavable sachets all the time.

3. I need to make a list of what I do have so I know that I’ve got 3 deep 8″ cake pans and don’t need to buy any more. Or is it 5…?

4. Before buying a new packet of something, do I really need it yet? On average we use 7 dishwasher tablets a week. Am I going to get through 20 this week or can I wait?

5. Are all the things I use regularly to hand? Equally, are all the things the Craftyguidelets use at their height?

6. Do more cleaning!

7. Use up all the bits and pieces I have. I also need to educate husband that he needs to stick to the shopping list I give him and not to buy the new cleaning products he spots on his way round that do the same job as all the ones we have already.

8. Think twice before adding the latest Lakeland gadget to my stash. Sushi seemed a great idea a few years ago. Number of times I’ve used the kit? Zero.

9. Use the gadgets I’ve got. The family love the homemade burgers I make in the burger press (Lakeland purchase!) but I hardly ever make them.

10. If I buy something for a reason, use it. Time and time again I have a great idea to make butternut squash soup. The squash gets stored in the cupboard for months before I get round to it. My eldest was even weaned on a butternut squash I’d bought before she was born! Therefore it was at least 6-7 months old when it was pureed.

Now will someone tell me where my meal planners are pretty quickly or I’m going to miss the cut off for my shopping order tonight!

Meal Planning Monday 16.9.13

Finally I’ve managed to have the time to sit down, plan a week’s menu, AND blog about it!

Whenever I plan a menu, I normally spread out on the sofa with a pile of recipe books, my laptop with my Ocado order on it, and my diary. The diary is very important as it points out what the family is doing each evening. Mr Craftyguider’s board meetings mean he’ll be back late so I can plan in a meal containing gluten, onions, spices but no meat for me and the Craftyguidelets. Swimming means that I have 20 minutes to get a meal on the table. When my mother-in-law comes round to babysit while I help with Rainbows, I need to have something that I can prepare and leave for Mr Craftyguider to sort when he gets in from work.

This week, we will be eating:

Monday – tuna pasta bake with sweetcorn

Tuesday – gammon, egg and chips

Wednesday – tuna steak and ratatouille

Thursday – spaghetti bolognaise (meat and quorn versions)

Friday – chicken cordon bleu (and a quorn version)

Saturday – vegetable goulash

Sunday – sausages

Linking with Mrs M’s meal planning Monday. Pop over and get some inspiration for your meal plan this week.

Who gets your cards?

As someone who makes cards to sell, I should use this post to try and persuade you to buy everyone you have ever known a card for each wedding, birthday, anniversary, thank you, RSVP, new school, exam good luck, exam congratulations etc. etc. etc. It would generate a good income for my Guide unit and I could happily craft away all day and all night.

However, I am having a dilemma. As I make cards, people expect handmade cards from me. I can just imagine family members thinking “This is a shop bought card. Why don’t I deserve one of her handmade cards? Couldn’t she be bothered to make me one?” However, I know so many people through school, university, work, family, friends, their kids, their grandchildren… I was there when they got married. Each date gets religiously entered on my fruit phone and set up to remind me every year of the date. Can I really keep coming up with original cards for every occasion (and also remember which ones I sent them last year)?

Where do I stop? How many anniversaries do I send cards for? Do I keep sending cards to a friend I haven’t spoken to in years, who never sends me cards and whose kids I’ve never met? “Mummy, who is Louise on this card?”

I’ve made a decision over the last few months to stop sending cards to most friends’ kids once they’ve had a couple of birthdays. My friends don’t send them to my kids so I’m sure they won’t notice. Equally, I think I’ll cut back on the anniversary cards. We just got cards from our parents, one relative and a friend this year. We’ve been married 8 years now so it’s not a big anniversary.

I’m sorry dear friends and family. I do still think of you on your birthdays. Hopefully you’ll all get a handmade Christmas card this year (or at least one of those school fundraising cards drawn by the Craftyguidelets and printed), but perhaps I won’t be sending a card for your second cousin twice removed’s decree nisi.

Having said all of that, please do support crafters who hand make cards. They can usually create personalised cards to a specified theme in a few days for around the same cost as the celestial hog lot, and to a higher standard. And you know that there will not be another card like it on their mantelpiece for their special day.

And obviously I would like to put in a special word for my Craftyguider online shop. 100% of the profit goes to my local Guide unit to contribute to running costs, and the postage cost is a flat fee so no matter what you order, you only pay £1.50.

How many cards do you send out each year?

Craftyguidelet Dresses #WIPslinky

Last month I joined the Tales from Mount Pleasant #WIPslinky party. The idea is to confess to your work in progress projects and then actually get round to making them. The link opens near the end of the month, and you have a month to finally get round to finishing those projects that you have been getting round to ‘one day’.

I shared just part of my WIP collection and chose to finish my daughters’ summer dresses. After a packed summer, they are finally finished.

It is probably the last warm day of the year but they have worn them. I also made them in the next size up so they get to wear them next year.

My 4 year old loves pink, so I chose these gorgeous fabrics from Sew La La with rose shaped buttons.

My 6 year old really suits this red colour. It looks like Kath at Sew La La has just got some more of this Gypsy Rose Red fabric so I might stop by for some more.

Being more aware of my WIPs has led me to finish more this month.

I’ve wanted to make a case for my tablet for some time, and I used some of these gorgeous fabrics to make a patchwork padded case.

I’d promised my friend that I’d make her a draught excluder. I managed to finish it in time for a visit and even managed to blog about it.

I have also cut out fabric for a collection of frame purses that have been sitting in my cupboard for months. They will either be given as presents or put on sale in my shop.

And for next month’s entry? I’ll be revisiting my quest to make all the bags in Lisa Lam’s Bag for all Reasons book and aiming to complete the ‘too cool for school satchel’.

I’m using a gorgeous Cath Kidston upholstery fabric and all the bits are cut out and stashed in a bag ready.

Along the way I really should finish making the new uniform for our Rainbow Guide mascot, Olivia, a banner for the Rainbows to use at Remembrance Sunday parade, and also transforming that pile of fabric pieces above into frame purses.

Come on everyone. Join the WIP busting crusade and post your WIPs on the linky tool and let’s cut fabric, use papers, grab that pattern or kit you’ve saved for a rainy day and do what we all love to do – CRAFT!

Ay up me draught excluder

I have a very good friend from Nottingham. We met when we worked together in London, and a mutual friend introduced her to her (southerner) husband. They had a son together and settled in Hertfordshire. One Christmas I saw a remote controlled duck that you use in the bath. As we frequently ribbed each other about the differences in my Highgate accent versus her East Midlands one, I thought a bath duck (barth duck vs bath dook) would be a little joke, as well as being a great present for a little boy. He loved it, the joke was appreciated and it began a long saga of duck related presents.

Mother and son moved back up north and the little boy became a fluent East Midlands speaker. Ay up me duck and all that. We have carried on exchanging presents for years now, and each birthday and Christmas we increase the duck related merchandise. Duck tape anyone? Yes, I have done that!

She moved house last year and her new front door is very draughty. I said I’d make her a draught excluder, but events overtook me and she had a draughty winter.

She is coming to stay with me at the weekend, so I made up my mind to get it made. I can’t believe I didn’t do it sooner. It was so quick to make. In fact the thing that took the longest amount of time was chasing rogue polystyrene balls around the carpet.

I bought the fabric at the Knitting and Stitching show at Ally Pally specifically because it had ducks (dooks) on it. I still have more so she may get something else made from it at Christmas.

As well as the polystyrene balls, I added some lavender. The front door is where the footie trainers are kept, so a bit of lavender may help matters.

I still have some polystyrene balls left so I may make some more for my Christmas craft fairs.

Linking up with the Handmade Harbour Handmade Monday blog.