I don't felt all the time and I really look forward to Christmas when all my babies come home, well my babies are 22 and 25. Besides felting I love to bake and cook. Now when the kids were little, I would cook dinner every night. I loved the nightly ritual of reviewing the day while enjoying a meal together. Now that we are pratically empty nesters I have given the daily reigns of cooking over to my husband. I have to say he has turned into a really adequate cook, which means I take over for the big events. Cooking and baking at my house starts about a week before Christmas. I make four different types of cookies(down from twelve). I love baking and got the hips to prove it. My baking culminates in the creation of the Buche Noel, the Yule Log. The cake takes two days to prepare. One day to create the mushrooms, chocalate ganache, and pistachio marzipan for the ivy. The next day, I bake two flourless chocalate cakes and a quart of stabilized whipped cream. As soon as the first cake comes out of the oven and cools I spread the cream over the cake roll it up then cover it with the chocalate ganache. The second cake recieves the same treatment, however this cake will be used for the branches on the main log. The cake is finally decorated with the merangue mushrooms and ivy and dusted with cocoa powder to simulate the forest floor.
With fifteen people for dinner there wasn't a bite left!
And, of course,there was some felt for the holidays! I gave all the favorite women in my life felted flowers and felted soaps. Here are some pictures of the felted brooches.
This is a fantasy sunflower brooch created using merino wool, and glass seed beads.
On the left, my sister wears a fuchsia merino wool and silk brooch with glass beads and on the right, my close friend Randy wears a merino wool pansy fantasy.
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