Raw Baby Steps

I've recently been developing an interest in RAWFOODISM, three years ago, I had my very first raw meal, yes, I know salad is raw, and who hasn't had a taste of salad by the grand age of 52? However, I'm talking RAW, raw food, not just limp ice-burg lettuce, a couple of slices of tomato and some cucumber (although, in this house, we rarely have cucumber because my husband hates the stuff - I love it) No, I'm talking lettuce, tomato, cucumber, beetroot (not strictly raw, but still salady) nut butters, hand made tahini, seeded sprouts, and anything that is well, just not cooked!

The experience I had three years ago, has been holding me to my "one day I'm going to become a raw foodist" pledge, well, I'm nowhere near there yet, but I have had a bit of an escapade with a dehydrator that my husband very kindly bought for me as an Eid gift! (shocking, because he doesn't "do" Eid, or anything to that matter, infact, he doesn't really "do" gifts either, however, he does make cakes for Christmas and Easter - and his birthday lol) however, I tried dehydrating carrot, apple and tomato.........the only really successful thing was the apple, tomato was ok(ish) the carrot was given to, and rejected by  Montymoos - my giant lop eared rabbit, and eventually  got tossed out into the garden and disappeared somewhere, somehow.

Three years ago I was working for a family as a Maternity Nurse (an exhausting job, the only healthy maternity nurse you'll find is a retired one! We work THAT hard!) Anyway, I turned up at a friend's house for a weekend break, and she just so happened to have been tucking into a big raw meal by another friend of hers, having been handed a small plate of - well, just about everything, little piles of neatly grated carrot, (raw) beetroot, tomato, swirled somethings, sprinkled bits, a couple of balls of something and some kind of paste, that was, I was informed later, some kind of seed butter (although I can't remember what now) I ate it, because I DO rather enjoy my food, (rather too much, but there you go - we're all different) It was lovely, and I enjoyed it, but I was exhausted and really just wanted to sleep.

You may or may not believe this, but I had a bit of an epiphany moment 20 minutes later, I was BUZZING, absolutely full of energy (which was a tad annoying, because I was trying to sleep!) but I was high, and bouncing off the walls, that one, small plateful of raw food was enough to provide me with an Elephant load of energy! I was stunned, and stayed up all night talking! (haven't been offered a meal there since, I suspect that might be the reason why :p )

Dehydrator aside (I've only used it the once so far) I bought a box of mixed sprouting seeds last week, it's taken me several days to get around to it - but I have managed to sprout my first seedlings, and I'm very proud of myself.

Having done a bit of research, and asked a few friends on trusty old Facebook, I have been informed that these are ready to be eaten. I feel a bit guilty that these baby plants have, in their innocence, sprouted themselves for my pleasure, and I will be scoffing them post haste. After a moment's thought and sympathy for these poor little plantlets that had burst forth with high hopes of life, only to be scuppered by a monster of a human being wanting to scoff them, I tossed them all over my lunch. 

Now lunch was interesting - I DID say I'm only just embarking on this raw route. Having looked in the fridge all I saw was two minuscule cherry tomatoes, half a red pepper and beetroot. Some Salad eh?! Having not eaten all day, my stomach was beginning to rumble quite dramatically, so I popped  some potatoes and sweet potatoes into the oven and vowed to buy salad stuff tomorrow. 

Baked potatoes later, I roughly chopped up some cheese, lathered said potatoes with butter (it's getting worse!) I stared forlornly at my poor attempt at lunch whilst my son pulled out a half eaten kebab from last night's escapades (PAH!!!!)  he dunked the meat and bread on his butter and cheese laden potatoes, followed by a smidge of lettuce and tomato, I scraped the rest of the salad off the polystyrene container onto my plate, dunked on my tomatoes, pepper and beetroot, a hand full of my newly sprouted alfafa sprouts, tipped some lemon on (was going to be mayonnaise until I remembered I was supposed to be trying to be healthy) 

Three pickled green chillies, two baked potatoes and one green(ish) salad later, I was stuffed and feeling good - I haven't got the same buzz as I had when I went raw that meal several years ago - but then again, who would after a Donner laden salad ? Ah well - Onwards and Upwards eh?! :D 

My Adjustment skills put to the test

I have decided to improve on my Nappy cake business (not that it's actually a business yet) but I've been working on increasing and improving my Knitting, sewing, and crocheting skills. Today I'm going to be adjusting a dress that has been handed to me by a friend, she bought it from a charity shop the other day on our visit to Peterborough, but it's too small, and very tight across the bust - so she's handed it to me in the hope that I can either do a simple adjustment to make it wearable for her..............or turn it into a scarf and undercap.

I think the dress is too pretty to be reduced to a scarf, so I'm going to attempt to put in a couple of gussets with a bit of lace, across the front to see if I can work it - of course, I haven't got the funds or capacity to buy matching material, so I'm having to do my usual and bodge it as much as I can. I've found a piece of light tan t'shirt material, and surprisingly, I have some elastic lace  that I bought a while back that matches the material. So I'm experimenting with this.

I don't have anything gold except for a small piece of gold ribbon, there's enough to work with if necessary, but I'm hoping to cope with what I've already got. Let's see how it goes - I'm inviting you to follow my adventure, I feel quite confident, I have in mind what I want to do - but of course, I AM a bodger, so it's anyone's guess how it's actually going to work out, it could be fantastic - or  I could be reduced to a jibbering wreck by the time I've finished.

Here's the dress in it's pure and unadulterated form! Here goes, wish me luck! :D  

Dress is now cut, I've just pinned the panels in to see what it looks like, it's sad I couldn't get the same colour or even a contrasting colour, but I think once it's finished, it might look ok, bearing in mind, most of it's going to be covered by a scarf anyway :p Ok, I'm going to push on and see if the next stage looks any better :)

The next logical stage was to sew the middle panel together, around the cut out section

Front of the panel - I've sewn twice down the lace, once in the middle, once on the edge where the gold piece is - however, I ended up sewing a third time along the outside edge of the lace because it kept on folding in on itself. 

This is the back side of the panel, just so you can see vaguely (very vaguely, sorry it's such a poor photo) what I've done.

Who'd have guessed a roll of Christmas wrapping paper would come in so handy, however, this enabled me to hold the dress at a tension so that I could then pin in the base of the central panel, different, but effective :)

Of course, I can't possible complete a task without some form of war wound, this was the result of me being a little over enthusiastic with the seam ripper!

Nearly there, the dress is wearable, but the neckline looks dreadful, I'm determined to do something about that! In the end I put in four small darts across the top, one either side of the ribbon. 

Tadaaaa! Finished, it may not be the most perfect match, but I think it looks ok, I'm actually really proud of myself seeing as I'm teaching myself techniques as I go along. The dress (so long as you don't look too closely and aren't too critical) is wearable now - which is more so than it was this morning.