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March, 2013

  1. About my blog

    March 31, 2013 by sarah

    All the photographs on this site are copyright of Sarah Keir unless otherwise stated. You may link to this site or use one image to link to a post but please credit the image to me and back to my blog. You may not reproduce whole posts. You may not use my images for commercial use without my permission.

    All views expressed in this blog are my own. I have no intention of lying or misleading my readers. All words are my own and if I recommend or slate a product/company then it is my personal view. I will always be honest and true to myself and my readers.


  2. Happy Easter!

    March 31, 2013 by sarah

    It is Easter Sunday and the sun is out! Hello Mr Sunshine, we haven’t seen you for a while!

    I put out my Easter decorations today. The decorated eggs are not homemade but I have had them for about 10 years – I bought them in ‘The Olde Friars’ in Keswick when I worked up in Cumbria. I made the little bunnies and chick during the week while listening to MP3s for my medicine certificate – multi-tasking! I think the hanging bunnies have worked well, especially with their little pompom tails, but the 3D bunny on the chocolate egg basket is a bit weird! I’ll try something different next year. I also didn’t get time to make a felt lamb but if any of you guys have the time then there is a fantastic pattern here www.patternbee.com/FREELAMBKIN.html (the pattern is in the top right corner). Happy Easter everyone!

    easter (4 of 8) easter (6 of 8) easter (8 of 8) easter (7 of 8) easter (5 of 8)

     


  3. Easter chocolate egg nests

    March 31, 2013 by sarah

    Oh no, I’ve done it again! Despite this supposing to be a blog about baking, the recipe this week is again a non-baking one! Never mind, we all have busy weeks don’t we? And don’t these little nests look so retro and kitch? I think I must of been about 10 when I last had one but this time I made them grown up with a good proportion of dark chocolate. But don’t feel obliged to get out the expensive 70% plus coco solids chocolate. No, these were made with a cheapish bar of Cadbury’s Bournville with some milk chocolate I had kicking around in the cupboard for added sweetness. So they are frugal and yummy – a smashing combination do you not think?

    easter (3 of 8)

    easter (2 of 8)300g chocolate (any combination of dark and milk)

    25g unsalted butter

    100g shredded wheat breakfast cereal

    little chocolate eggs in colourful sugar shells

    mince pie tin

    Melt the chocolates and butter in a bain-marie or carefully in the microwave. Crumble the shredded wheat into another bowl. Once the chocolate/butter is melted, stir into the shredded wheat. Divide into 12 among the mince pie holes and gently press the middle of the mound to form a depression to hold the eggs. Put the nests somewhere cold until set then flick them out of the mince pie tin with a knife and add the little eggs. Voila!

     

     


  4. More of those brooches

    March 31, 2013 by sarah

    I’ll show you soon how I made the Scottie dog brooch.easter (1 of 8)


  5. How to display brooches…

    March 27, 2013 by sarah

    I had been thinking of doing this for a while but didn’t get round to it until this weekend when I saw the picture frame in a charity shop. It is missing the glass which would make it useless for displaying pictures but I wrapped the backing board in some velvet and glued it on the back only so when I stick the pin of the brooch through it stays and is shown up beautifully against the black velvet. No more rummaging around in a box to find the one brooch I want to wear. Unfortunately the black brooches I have just been working on won’t show up, but I’ll leave that til next time.brooch frame (1 of 1)


  6. About Me

    March 17, 2013 by sarah

    085Hello friends and thank you for stopping by my wee blog! I have started this blog to get away from Facebook, to start some digital scrapbooking and see where this path leads me!

    My name is Sarah Keir and by day (and plenty of nights and weekends too) I am a  small animal veterinarian in the South-East of England. The rest of the time that I call my own I bake plenty of cakes, craft all sorts and am obsessed with vintage chic. My perfect weekend would be sunny (naturally), wearing a 1950’s dress and apron, knock together a teddy or vintage inspired brooch, make some delicious cakes and have friends round to enjoy them. The rest of the time my taste testers are my husband Mr K and my work mates who devour anything I produce. Anything that fails goes to the chickens – my lovely girls that keep me supplied with fresh eggs for my baking attempts.


  7. Lemon curd and some non-bake baking!

    March 17, 2013 by sarah

    Though the weather today is the opposite of spring-like, I felt like making some lemon curd. The silky smooth texture with a fresh zingy flavour and eye-popping yellow colour sort of sums up Spring. I hope the sun comes soon! This was my first attempt, by the way, and I am very pleased with the result.

    _1SK1708 _1SK1714 _1SK1715 _1SK1720

     

     

     

    Makes about 700g or 3 small jars and a little left over.

     

    Grated rind and juice of 4 ripe unwaxed lemons

    4 eggs, beaten

    125g butter cut into small pieces

    350g caster sugar

     

     

     

    Place all the ingredients in a pyrex bowl over gently simmering pan of water (picture 2). Stir until the sugar is dissolved and the butter melted.

    Continue to heat gently for about 20mins until thickend and coats back of a spoon (image 3).

    Strain and pour into sterilised jars. Done!

    Keeps for a few weeks in the fridge.

     

    _1SK1718

    While the curd was thickening, I threw together a batch of rocky road (melt 125g butter and 300g dark chocolate and 3 tbsp of gold syrup, add 200g crushed biscuits, 100g mini marshmallows and any dried fruit or nuts that need using, press into tin, refridgerate).

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Update 15/9/13 – made the lemon curd for the show using this recipe but reduced the sugar to 300g and added half a teaspoon of real lemon extract. This made it super zingy and so super nice.


  8. My early jewellery attempts…

    March 9, 2013 by sarah

    After seeing how expensive vintage style jewellery was from sites like http://vintagemagpie.co.uk/ I decided to give it a go myself…

    Sarah Keir

    Me on wedding day!

    What do you think?


  9. Ready to get started….

    March 9, 2013 by sarah

    Testing out how will work.