art inspiration

well it has to be said i am getting nowhere fast with my work for my exhibition entry!

so i thought i would gather a little more inspiration to spur me on! 

for some reason i keep being attracted to all things birdy!

 vanessa cooper

 lisa wolfsgruber

 elaine pamphilon

keiko minimi

lovely lemon curd

image from pinterest

 the greengrocers had piles of lemons and limes  for £1 last week, so i couldn't resist making a big batch of lemon curd. I had been wanting to try making a desert from Annabel Lagbeins book 'the free range cook' - which is a current favourite in our house, she mixes home made lemon curd with whipped cream and sandwiches it into a choux pastry ting with sliced strawberries. i did make it but it was all eaten before i had chance to take a photo! so instead here is annabels recipe for lemon curd, you can buy the book here - it is fab!

lemon curd

375g caster sugar

220g diced butter

finely grated zest of 1 lemon

juice of about 6 lemons

6 eggs

you are supposed to make this in a bain marie but i am a lay wotsit and made it in a pan on a very low heat!

place the butter, sugar, lemon juice and zest in a pan or bain marie and heat gently till the butter has melted. whisk the eggs and stir them in , cook gently storing all the time till the mixture thickens enough to coat the back of a wooden spoon - it is ready when you can draw a line along the back of the spoon and it doesn't fill back in with liquid. - it takes about 5mins.

remove from the heat, and pour it through a sieve into sterilised jars (i think this is worth doing as it gets rid of any scramble bits and also of the eggy bits known in our house as egg bogies!!)

slather onto buttered toast, or fold in to cream, it makes a fab dessert spooned into pastry tart shells , or dolloped onto a shortbread biscuit with a scoop of creme fraiche and a tumble of raspberries.

new collection 2

 i thought i would share a little more from the new collection photoshoot with you
the pretty chair above is covered in our new florence fabric, a really pretty floral inspired by an old eiderdown i found a number of years ago. the chic is available from sharland and lewis.

we have done the design in 2 sizes, the little one above is perfect for small windows, little girls rooms and of course eiderdowns , and the larger scale one below - shown here in duck egg looks great as summery billowing curtains, i think we might try it as a pretty faded wallpaper too!

 we photographed various bits and pieces on our trip to provence earlier in the year  and the cushions and lavender pillows will be available on the website and in selected interior retailers from the end of june.

making memories

i happened upon a lovely idea on pinterest last week and thought what a lovely way of recording your childs life. the original came from spearmint baby.com

anyway i am not known for my technical abilities but i managed to create the one below in 2 mins using pages on my mac - though i am sure if you are au fait with photoshop it would be incredibly easy! i have looked back through our pics of our little people and think that i will try and do one for each year for both.

new collection

i have been really busy trying to pull together my new collection ready for launch. though i don't feel it is very new now, as i started it over 18months ago! it was all shelved while we looked after my parents in law, and then i struggled to get back on top of it after they had gone. Anyway we are back up and running and seem to be on fire! so i thought i would share some of the photography with you!

above faded roses in faded red
below faded roses cushion stack

we were super lucky to be able to do the outside shots at the fabulous lifestyle emporium sharland and lewis (where incidentally everything you see in the photo is for sale!)

if yo happen to be in nailsworth , gloucestershire go and say hello to libs - you will soon be able to have a scrummy lunch there too when they open the fabulous courtyard cafe, i defy anyone to leave the shop empty handed.