Exciting Times at FTC

The progress of the nursery took a giant leap forward this weekend and I have to share the photos with you all, before I burst.

Matt came up and despite something of a crisis of confidence in his abilities, did an incredible job of filling in the rough pencil sketch I had done with something meaningful. George himself was beautifully shaded, along with the pier while Keith and I slapped the base coat for the sea on with carefree abandon.

The fish were an altogether different proposition and despite the genius idea of outlining them in marker rather than paint (it’s called knowing your limits) it was still tricky to plan the spread of colours and designs. Most importantly it was tricky to keep Keith and his pencil away from the wall long enough to prevent him turning every fish into a shark!!

The most exciting part of the fishy scene is actually something you can’t pick up from this photo (but fear not, once completed there will be more on the way) but a lot of the fish have actually been given a top coat of glitter!! This little masterstroke of genius is the absolute icing on the cake, as the light catches them beautifully as you walk around the room. And plans for glitter have grown (thanks to my picking up a multipack of different colours) so that in due course, the top of the lake will also be lightly glittered so that it looks as if the light is bouncing off the surface of the water.

Baby Steps

As promised, I made a start on the areas of the nursery wall that required least talent, blocking the colour for the riverbank and the letters and painting in a few of the less demanding outlines.

I fully recognise I am never going to be lauded as the new Da Vinci, so despite desperately wanting to get on and finish the whole wall, I am imposing a ban on myself even looking at the wall until Matt comes up to rescue the situation.

Hopefully his diary will allow for a visit before my resolve breaks.



There was another small step towards household nirvana this weekend, which was a nice antidote to the otherwise terminal decline of the kitchen. Keith finally got the kitchen larder to open all the way out.


His method: he pulled on it, hard. God bless brute force and ignorance, although it does make the fact that we’ve been living with a half opening larder for nearly 3 years a bit of a joke.

And in other exciting news: as I sit here and type, the tiler is in the lounge priming the floor ready for our new tiles. And I have to admit, I’m a little bit excited…. And now also needing to vacate the house to avoid noxious fumes.


Before I go though, I was sent a recipe for the most dangerous chocolate cake in the world yesterday (thanks Polly!!) and of course Keith gamboled into the kitchen to make one as soon as he saw the words "ready","five" and "minutes". I wouldn't say it was the greatest triumph of the modern culinary age - potentially due to the fact that a slightly too long cooking time had resulted in a cake with the ability to suck the moisture from every last crevice of your body. It was a laugh though, and for those of you in need, I include the recipe below:


5 MINUTE CHOCOLATE MUG CAKE!!

4 tablespoons flour
4 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons cocoa
1 egg
3 tablespoons milk
3 tablespoons oil
3 tablespoons chocolate chips or (optional)
A small splash of vanilla extract and your favourite tipple
1 large coffee mug (NB It needs to be VERY large, as we found out!!!)

Add dry ingredients to your largest mug and mix well.
Add the egg and mix thoroughly.
Pour in the milk and oil and mix well
Add the chocolate chips (if using), vanilla extract and a drop or two of your favourite tipple, then mix again.
Put your mug in the microwave and cook for 3 minutes at 1000 watts (high).
The cake will rise over the top of the mug, but don't be alarmed!
Allow to cool a little, and tip out onto a plate if desired.
EAT!

On Your Marks ....

These are trying times at FTC. The clock is counting down to the start of the mayhem and we have now run out of space to store 'things' which means the garden is being used as a temporary storage depot complete with upturned slipper bath which I'm frankly glad isn't in the house or I would be very temped to try it out for size, no doubt resulting in much "turtle on back" hilarity until Keith took pity on me and heaved me back out.

Anyway, first up is the new floor in the lounge. After 3 years, with a small sob of acceptance, the carpet was given up as a lost cause in the face of Harry's endless shedding. Instead I went online and found these delicious tiles which for some reason really reminded me of melted caramel and which I thought would look really lush with all the wood we have in the lounge already.

In order to lay these little beauties, we enlisted the help of a professional, as I had clearly run out of both time and talent on that front, and his instruction was to lift the lounge carpet well in advance to make sure the concrete slab underneath was level. Very sensible approach I think, one I should probably take in the future if I had any sense.

The one slight problem standing between us and a lifted carpet was of course the copious quantity of heavy furniture, none of which I am allowed to lift, so of course, we had to rope in some help. Bill and James who thought they were coming to ours for a weekend of relaxing at the local cider festival instead found themselves working off hangovers shifting bookcases and chests.

Luckily for us, the slab does seem to be in pretty good working order so the tiler is all set to start on Tuesday. In the meantime, I'm finding the new echo and student-esque lounge a bit disconcerting, especially as I don't have any slippers and concrete isn't so toasty on the tootsies. I have promised myself a sheepskin rug to go down in front of the fireplace once the floor is in place though, and be warned, come winter I will fight for occupancy rights with all my hormone fuelled might!!

The other piece of prep work that happened this week was the marking out of the feature wall in the nursery. The photos of the nursery being put together are being held captive on Keith's laptop at the moment, so you will have to wait to see the overall results, but this is a quick look at what will soon decorate the end wall.

I borrowed a projector from work and by making a tower of various pieces of furniture finally managed to get the image high enough on the wall to start drawing an outline in pencil.

Curious George was not my choice I might add; it seems that I led a sheltered and somewhat deprived childhood free of the adventures of the cute little monkey and his yellow hatted friend, but luckily my sister in law was well versed in the ways of the George and suggested him as the basis of the design.

Please excuse me dopey look in the photo. Having realised that the projector wouldn't enlarge the image to the size of the wall, I was busy trying to work out how I would extend various bits of it to fill the available space. The end result (of which I am extremely proud) basically involves a damn sight more fish.

Now I just need to get some tester pots and start blocking in the basic colours before the real artist comes along to make it look good!!