Wholemeal Honey Cake and Wall Hanging

The simple pleasures a cup of tea and a slice of cake can bring. This is a particularly good cake - by which I mean the recipe, I'm not just patting myself on the back for my baking skills here! I first read about this on the lovely Flossie Teacakes blog. When Florence first posted about it she described it as 'a cake that left a grown man nearly weeping with happiness as he ate it' - praise indeed! You can see her post here and the recipe here. She mentioned it again last week and this prompted me to think that I must make it NOW. I'm happy to report that it was just as delicious as Florence said it would be, and very easy too. I shall be making it again!

In sewing news, I thought I should show you another work in progress - hoping again that by showing it on the blog I shall be shamed into picking it up once more! This is from this book - a really lovely book that I was given last year.

I like this 'look' very much and quite quickly (and somewhat ambitiously) decided to make this as a wall hanging.

The pictures below show far I've got - I've cut out all the leaves and drawn my tree on the front of my fabric, and then stitched them all in place.

So far, so good. The next stage though is to free motion quilt the whole thing, which I'm ever so slightly terrified about, hence the project has stalled. I clearly just need to practise, practise and practise some more, and then bite the bullet and go for it, but, having spent quite a long time on the appliqué, I'm rather worried I might just ruin it! Still, nothing ventured, nothing gained - and it's good to challenge yourself, right?! I'll let you know how I get on!

Crafts, Cake and a Cemetery!

My visit to Ray Stitch was just the start of my adventures on Saturday. Next up: the Selvedge Spring Fair. I'd never been to this before, but had read about it in blogland, so was keen to see it for myself! It was just as lovely as I thought it would be and I had to exercise a lot of self-control not to spend too much money. In the end I was very restrained and just bought some postcards and a fabric covered button from Becky Adams.

I was sorely tempted though by Emma's beautiful jewellery and will be adding either a brooch or a necklace to my birthday wishlist! After a quick look around the fair, I then hot-footed it up the hill to Highgate village to meet up with two old friends from school. The main reason for coming to Highgate was to visit High Tea of Highgate - it's been on my to-do list for over a year now! I'm happy to say it didn't disappoint; the lavender cake was delicious.

We had to earn the cake though - first with a walk round Highgate Cemetery, and then back through Waterlow Park - with great views over the city.

It was a lovely day out!

I'm off on my Easter hols now - a trip report and crochet update to follow next week! Happy Easter!

P.S. Needless to say, the log cabin cushion hasn't been finished - good intentions and all that! Maybe next week?!