WOYWW 390 An Alternative “Desk,” Mandalas and More Gold

Nothing to show my fellow deskers in the studio dept. this week because nothing has gone on in there except adding to the tip. I’ve been really busy. Today, I decamped into the kitchen and have been cooking most of the day. I love getting stuck in in my lovely kitchen. Here’s what I’ve been up to. Sorry it’s a bit long, but just flip through the photos!

General view:

Preparing the pastry for two quiches and some mince pies:

One quiche pastry ready for blind baking. The foil is to stop the pastry rising. It’s resting on my favourite recipe book, which I had for a 21st birthday present!

Making the first batch of mince pies.

The filling for the quiches, made with onion, yellow pepper, diced sweet potatoes (some roasted in sesame oil, the rest softened in the microwave), garlic, herbs, seasoning, cooked in olive oil. Once cooked, I added some grated cheddar cheese.

Steaming some beetroots ready for the freezer.

A nice big batch of butternut squash soup being cooked – with onions, carrots, yellow pepper, garlic, herbs, broccoli stalks that I’ve been saving and freezing, vegetable stock.

Preparing supper in advance – a lump of lamb’s liver and bacon casserole defrosting, and some potatoes and carrots ready to cook. I steamed sprouts and sliced courgette with sage in the steamer part, over the other vegetables. Four veges cooked on one ring!

The blind pastry cases for the quiches, cooked and ready for filling.

Two batches of mince pies and two quiches ready for the oven. The filling was spooned into the pastry cases, and a “custard” made with eggs and milk, herbs and seasoning poured over, with a final sprinkling of grated cheddar on top.

The butternut squash soup, liquidised. You can see the blender jug on the left.

The fruits of my labours today: butternut squash soup, two sweet potato quiches, two dozen mince pies and some steamed and peeled beetroot. All freezer fodder for now!

The Before photo (chaos!):

and After!

I like the final clearing up, when you end up with a nice clean tidy kitchen again – a sense of satisfaction of a job completed, and lots of nice nosh to enjoy in the coming weeks!

Art Projects – iPad Pro, using PaintStorm and Procreate apps

I’ve been working on another mandala and this time I’ve put some “gold” in the centre rather than a Zengem, since I’m on a gold roll at the moment. I went a bit mad with this one because I started with a canvas on PaintStorm that was much too big, so I shall never be able to print this out at full size! It’s very intricate-looking at a smaller scale. Here’s the outline:

and here’s the colouring I’ve done so far – note the touches of “gold”:

I’ve done a bit more gold for my Bible study group visuals too – this is the final one for last week’s session, not done in time for the last WOYWW:

and here’s the finished visual, showing how I used this image:

For this week’s session, these are the drawings I have done:

I’ve still got quite a bit of work to do to finish preparing the session by Friday!

Shoshi Health Update

I’ve got my 6-monthly oncology appointment tomorrow morning. I’m not worried, as the latest CT scan came back clear of cancer, and I’m sure the appointment will be fine – just a chat about how I’m getting on. I shall tell her about my hernia (Miss Piggy) and the support garment that is coming, and also about the clots on my lungs but she may already know about this, as my surgeon, who ordered the CT scan, has probably shared the results with the MDT (multi-disciplinary team) who have overseen my care since my diagnosis back in January last year.

I lost another pound this week – if I lose one more pound, I will have lost a total of 3 stone (42 lb) in 2 1/2 years – not that I really count last year because I lost a huge amount in hospital and then put it all on again, having to abandon my diet while undergoing surgery and treatment, and ended up only losing 1 lb last year! Ideally I’d like to lose another stone, but it’s coming off very slowly these days and that may be a bit optimistic!

Kitty Health Update

Phoebe has got to go in to the vet sometime in the next week or two to have some teeth extracted – they’ve put this off for some time until her epilepsy was stabilised. They reduced the dose of her epilepsy meds recently and her liver function has improved which is good – they take regular bloods to check on her general health, in order to balance therapeutic levels against adverse side effects. She will have to stay in overnight when she has her operation and it’s going to be very strange without her here! Hope she doesn’t get too stressed… Both kitties are eating quite well these day (little and often – it’s like having kittens in the house again) and both have gained weight and seem very well. They are 16 and 13 respectively. Both are on medication permanently and have to be fed separately because Beatrice is on a special diet. Life is complicated Chez Shosh!

Sorry I didn’t visit many of you last week, and those I did, were rather late! It may be the same again this week as I’ve got a lot on and not a lot of time to do it.

Happy WOYWW everyone.