Martha's Marvellous Munchies

It's unusual that Graham makes requests for his birthday.  But for this one he asked if I could make a birthday cake with a picture of Lewis Hamilton's Mercedes on it.  (He's not especially a Lewis Hamilton fan, it's just that the Mercedes happens to have a big number 44 on it.  Guess how old he was this birthday!)  Now, drawing racing cars is not my particular forte, but you know, since he's my husband and all, I figured I'd have a go. There are plenty of pictures out there, of course: a quick Google Images search turned up this one , and I sat down to try and transcribe it onto paper.  My pencil drawing came out well enough that I felt able to carry on - at least, it looked roughly like a Formula 1 car and the perspective wasn't completely screwed up. The cake was a simple sponge cake.  I marzipanned and iced it, and set to work.  With the drawing in hand, cutting out the shapes in fondant was relatively simple, as I could trace the lines ont...

Last week my Bible study group discussed Genesis chapter 22 - the story of Abraham being asked to sacrifice his son Isaac.  At first reading this can seem a brutal story, of a jealous and possessive God determined to wring every possible concession from his follower, before relenting at the very last second and grudgingly supplying a sheep instead. But as we talked it through, I came to see that there are other ways of understanding it too.  Like most Biblical stories, we are given very little insight into the thoughts and emotions of the characters.  We have to recreate them as we read.  Sometimes it's as if we were reconstructing a building from the clues in its excavated foundation.  And like in that archeological task, we often bring our own ideas about what the construction should look like, as well as following the pattern of other buildings of that time.  It's possible to recreate two very different buildings from the original foundation stones. ...

Very occasionally, we plan to have a barbeque.  Much more often, we look out the window about 3pm and decide the weather's right for one.  So sometimes the food available includes traditional barbeque staples such as sausages and burgers, and sometimes it includes... well, parsnips. Partly this is due to my dislike of eating too much meat, even when grilled outside.  But once those coals are glowing it's a shame just to cook half a dozen sausages.  Chunks of potato work well, courgettes are some of my favourites, tandoori vegetables were deemed too exotic, mushrooms are pretty good.  Really, anything you would put in a roasting tin, you can put on a barbeque.  But until now, I had never barbequed a parsnip. These were fairly small ones, so they just got peeled, topped and tailed, and parboiled.  Shake them up with a little oil and seasoning, and they're good to go.  I'm not sure about putting them in a bun with ketchup, but as a side with t...

Long ago, at school, I had to write a haiku for each month of the year.  From memory (and why do I even remember it?), the one for this month was: Changeable April Rainy and sunny by turns Weather for rainbows This April has taken that to extremes, by being sunny, rainy, hailing, sleeting, T-shirt warm, frost-on-the-grass cold, and most things in between.  We have been working hard while it's sunny and going out when it rains - or occasionally the other way around.  Cafes with Kids has been keeping me busy and taking us to a few new places, but we've also fitted in some work around the house and garden, enthusiastically helped by the boys (especially the bits which involved lots of MUD). Toby  - rather liked the idea of April Fool's Day.  He tried out a few comments like "There's a spider on your foot!" and "Your hair is turning green!" Look at my tree! - has been doing some really good drawings (in my completely unbiased op...

Imagine finding out you owe the government £7 million.  Seven million pounds!  It seems an impossible amount. Even when it was reduced to £2.5 million, it was still far too much for the Cavendish family to pay.  They were forced to give their house to the government in lieu of the taxes.  This house wasn't just an average suburban semi, however.  The head of the Cavendish family was the Duke of Devonshire, and the house was Hardwick Hall. The story of the break-up of many great estates in the 20th century is a fascinating one, of which I only know snippets.  Two world wars had an irreparable effect on the wealth of many landed families, of course, but the change in taxation seems to been at least as big a burden.  The amounts charged are so enormous (the Cavendish estate was taxed at 80%!) that I assumed the tax had been brought in on purpose to destroy the gentry's power.  Interestingly, that doesn't appear to have been the case.  The...

It was too nice to stay in today.  The sun was shining, the air was warm, and Graham had taken Theo out for the day, so I was on my own.  I managed a few hours of working on the website, then slammed the laptop lid and headed out to find some sunshine. I recently read a book entitled The Wild Rover , about walking Britain's footpaths.  In the first chapter, the author, Mike Parker, draws a 3-mile radius circle around his Welsh home, noticing how many footpaths within that area he has never walked.  When we got out the map for our own area, we noticed the relative paucity of paths; hemmed in by major roads, a railway and a river, many rights-of-way simply dead-end a short distance away. However, a few minutes' drive down the road, the village of Repton is surrounded by a spider's web of pink dotted lines.  I parked outside the tall-spired church and set out, OS Landranger map in hand. Considering how strongly Ordnance Survey maps and rights of way are...

By the time you get to March you start feeling like it really should be warm already.  Apart from a few tantalisingly spring-like days, it has stayed stubbornly chilly.  Between sniffly noses, headaches, and fevers; job-hunting and website construction; rain and cold and missing mittens, we haven't always been in the best of moods this month.  But we managed our usual few outings to beautiful places like Carsington Water and Beacon Hill, spent a few days with each set of grandparents, and of course, enjoyed a bit of Easter chocolate.  So we're still smiling! Toby Front view - was Peter Rabbit for World Book Day - in a home-made costume! Back view! - did a lovely Mother's Day assembly with his class at school. - rode his bike through all the puddles at Carsington Water, proudly asking Graham, "How do you think my bike looks now, Dad?" as it (and he) got muddier and muddier. By the lake at Carsington Water - spent several days curled up ...