Owl bag

My sister wants to see my new (actually not so new) bag, so apologies to the rest of you, but bear with me :)

It's made of navy corduroy and lined with this lovely bright blue quilting cotton:

It has a very dodgily sewn inside pocket and phone pocket - I wish I'd taken a bit more time over those bits but I was a bit over it by the time I got to them. Maybe I'll unpick them sometime and fix them up. Ha ha ha or not.

Here's the whole bag:

And my little applique owl on the front:

Busy busy

I've been super busy with some really fun knitting / crocheting over the last month or so. Thought I'd quickly put up some pics before I forget because I've given / posted most of them away already. The pants above are made from my super gorgeously soft organic merino. They were such fun to make and I think I'll be doing a similar pair next winter for a special new member of our family :)

I did these cute under the sea pants for another custom order. They're made from super thick Cascade Ecological Wool - should be great for winter and nights :) I made felt for the fish and stitched them on. Always fun to do something new!

This little kimono was for a special new baby at church. I haven't made this style of top before and it was super easy. I had plenty of knitting time up at the hospital - the bright spot in an otherwise pretty stressful day!

Here's a quick pic of some tiny newborn longies for a recently born baby - they seemed to take forever to make even though they're so small. I think I'm not used to 8ply anymore!

Last but not least, here's the first garment I've knitted for T3 (ie the new baby)... I had boy yarn and girl yarn dyed so I could cast on straight after our scan. I suppose you can guess what the result of the scan was! This nappy cover turned out HUGE! I don't think she'll be wearing it for awhile! Loved the pattern though (Vanilla soaker) - totally my fault that my gauge was off! Better too big than too small though I always say!

Cooking etc

I've been getting very fed up with the whole gluten free 'thing' lately.... sooooo much extra work and expense involved for frankly not very inspiring outcomes. Last night though I came across a great blog which has links to heaps of fab looking recipes and I actually started feeling slightly keen on cooking again... hooray!

This morning before heading out to our college wives picnic I made these orange creme cupcakes. I made a few changes as I'm not that keen on xanthan gum and I didn't have any egg replacer and some of the ingredients are American brands. So, no xanthan gum, used about 2/3 cup of orange juice in the cake part and then had to add about 1/2 cup of rice flour because the mixture was so runny. I also used 2 eggs instead of the egg replacer, and used mainly Orgran GF plain flour instead of the sorghum flour. Used Nuttelex in the icing too, instead of whatever she specified.

They were really yummy! A bit dense but fantastic flavour :) I think it helps that we're in the middle of navel orange season at the moment - delicious! Next time I think I'd make the Orgran flour SR instead of plain and see if that added enough extra lift.