Miniature Flowers

Making miniature food is great fun but from time-to-time we feel the need to take a break from polymer clay.

Generally, when that happens, we either turn to miniature tableware or miniature flowers...just to keep that miniature vibe going. So we'd like to share one of our favourite miniature flower arrangements with you!

We can't take all the credit for it. This was made using elements from several miniature flower kits (by Pascale G - coucou!).

Don't let the fact that they come from kits mislead you...there is still an enormous amount of work needed to get the detail in these flowers!

Sometimes the petals needs to be painted (often with several coats of different colours and shades of paint) and there are often tiny elements that need to be included - details that you would almost miss with the naked eye. For example the "hairs" on the irises above.

And while we're talking flowers, here's a photo from this weekend of a real "Cosmos" flower in front of the house...

Chocolate Chip and Pink Praline Cookies

It was a calm Sunday afternoon in the village. The summer sun was beating down when suddenly, inexplicably, I had an urge for some chocolate chip cookies. Disaster! The cookie jar was empty...and the local supermarkets are shut on a Sunday :(

After rifling through the pantry, we realised that not only did we have the basics to make the cookie dough, but we also had some extra bits 'n' pieces to try to make some super luxurious cookies!

We didn't have any chocolate chips, but we did have a bar of dark chocolate with tiny raspberry "pépites" (nuggets...?) so we crumbled that up and added it to the mixture.

We also had a packet of pink praline (you can read more about that here) which was in need of use. I originally bought them because they looked pretty but the time had finally come to do something with them!

So we mixed up that little lot and baked them (more heat in the kitchen - just what we needed!) and enjoyed some delicious, super moist cookies with sweet crunchy bits of raspberry choc chips and praline!

Heaven knows how we managed to keep enough back to take the photo!

Hearts and Flowers - Handpainted Miniature Tableware

So, is is hot enough for everyone? We're approaching 30°C today, and apparently it'll be even hotter tomorrow. Yay! Anyway, you're not here to read about the weather!

Just a quick post to show some of our new hand painted tableware - our popular heartshaped dishes with a rose motif and a pretty border.

They make lovely little decorative pieces, but are also perfect for presenting miniature candies and cookies!

There are six colours available - dark pink, baby pink, lilac, black, aniseed green and blue...

They will be appearing on Etsy in a few minutes...

Click here to see the individual listings

Photo Challenge - Double Tagged!!

So we were tagged with the photo challenge today - our first time! And our second - we were tagged twice!

Many of you will already know the deal - choose the 4th photo in the 4th folder on your hard drive. We had to take it one stage further as we have lots of hard drives - so naturally we chose the 4th... :-D

And this is what we found...

This photo dates from 13th May, 2007. We had driven down to Aix en Provence in the south of France to spend some time with my family. We spent that particular day with my parents on a tour of some gorgeous Provençal villages.

This photo of a narrow, deserted street was taken in the afternoon when nearly everyone had their heads down for the post-lunch siesta. The name of the village is Lourmarin.

I mentioned we were tagged twice, so we're taking the liberty of doubling up and choosing the 8th photo in the 8th folder on the 8th hard drive, which gives us....

...shortbread!!

Not just any old shortbread, but Miniman's homemade shortbread (yes ladies, he sometimes bakes too!). Lovely and golden and sprinkled with sugar - they were delicious! This is from 25th August 2006.

So thank you to Vicky Guile for the first tag and Oiseau deNim for the second!

Summer Garden Inspiration

It was a beautiful warm weekend in our neck of the woods so we decided to spend a rare moment enjoying the garden.

Most of the flowers we planted in the spring have shot up and are displaying gorgeous colourful blooms and, attracted by the vivid colours, the garden seems to have become a playground for all sorts of creatures, not least flittering, fluttering butterflies!

Needless to say, before too long, the "miniature reflex" had kicked in and we were working on some pieces inspired by our little patch of land...here are the results!

The plate is handpainted with a flower and butterfly motif and we even made some flower and butterfly cookies to go with it.

And this is a selection of handmade miniature flowers in a tiny planter in the shape of a teacup (we're still looking for a real full-sized planter like this for the garden - tell us if you know where we can find one!).

Both pieces are now available on eBay:

Click to see the plate with the cookies

Click to see the miniature flowers in the teacup planter