Well, this is it folks!
Book of Numbersand you just might like this one too (again, keep the sound on if you like 30s style jazz):
It's the Christmas aftermath... I'm feeling very flat, after all the excitement. 
Tape transfer of magazine page
I've been messing around with my camera (not a very good one) and taken some closeups of the Christmas trees.
The small one - white tinsel - (just 3ft high) is sitting on my art table.
We're suckers for Christmas lights - there are 3 sets on the large tree (2 sets of 20 bulbs, plus one of 40 bulbs) and the small tree has 2 miniature battery-operated sets (10 bulbs each).
I also managed a bundle of twigs with lights twined round them, standing in tall vase on the floor by the bookcase, and a set of Santa lights over the mirror, a set of star-shaped bulbs across the wall and another set of lights draped over the curtain rail.
Go to the NORAD site to download their Google Earth link, and you'll be able to track Santa's actual flight plan!
This is another alcoholic recipe - for a drink very reminiscent of Baileys Irish Cream Liqueur.
HOME-MADE CONDENSED MILK RECIPE
Some years ago, I hosted a recipe swap for two of the yahoo groups and begged this recipe off my friend, Helga. I have to say when I first tasted these, I thought I'd died and gone to Heaven!
HELGA'S CHOCOLATE TRUFFLES
This is a family recipe, but it’s me who worked out how to get a quarter to half a bottle of sherry into it!
Ingredients:
LARGE cut glass or Pyrex bowl - minimum 4 pints (2½ litres) capacity
2 x packets Jelly or jelly crystals (Jello in the
1 x bottle sweet full cream sherry
1 x pack boudoir biscuits or sponge fingers
2 x tins fruit (fruit cocktail, strawberries, sliced peaches etc)
1 x tin or packet Birds Custard Powder
1 x tablespoon sugar (granulated or caster)
1 x pint (568 ml) milk (semi-skimmed or full cream)
1 x LARGE tub double cream (half pint or even more)
NOTE: If using a precious cut glass bowl, make sure you never put hot ingredients straight into it – or it will crack. Rinse in hot water first, then keep the bowl resting on top of a towel to help absorb temperature changes, and let any hot ingredients (jelly, custard) cool down a little first.Method:
Layer the boudoir biscuits or sponge fingers across the bottom of the bowl. If using Swiss Roll, cut into slices (½ - ¾ inch) and lay on their sides across the bottom of the bowl, and just coming up the sides a little (you can see them through the glass – pretty!)
Take your bottle of sherry, and add by sprinkling over the sponge (if it helps, keep your thumb over the neck of the bottle, so it dribbles out). Alternatively, pour the sherry into a milk jug or similar, and drizzle over the sponge layer. (The idea is to get as much sherry into the sponge as it will absorb, and you want the sherry to completely absorb into the sponge, so pouring half a bottle in at one go is not a good idea, as the sponge might disintegrate. Drizzling it in works best.)
Keep adding the sherry until you have used about one third to one half of the bottle.Meantime, you have opened your tins of fruit and drained the liquid off (RESERVE this liquid – you will use it later). Add the fruit from one tin on top of the sherry/sponge layer (I usually use about a whole tin of strawberries) and leave whilst you make up the first packet of jelly. The strawberries will absorb some of the sherry flavour.
The jelly in the
If you are impatient to get on with the next step, and it isn’t cooling quickly enough (NEVER put hot liquids in the fridge – especially in a cut glass bowl or it will crack) then stand the container in a pan with cold water (and even ice cubes) to bring the temperature down without diluting the liquid further.
Now leave the jelly alone, and put in the fridge until set.
Next step: The second layer of jelly.
First sprinkle the remainder of the fruit over the first layer of sponge etc. Make up the other packet of jelly (again, using only a QUARTER PINT of boiling water) and add the liquid from the tin of fruit (and cold water if necessary) only to the HALF pint level. Allow to cool down a little before pouring into your bowl. Cool for a while longer then put in the fridge to set (overnight if you can).
Adding the custard:
Make up the custard: use 2 heaped tablespoons custard powder, and mix in a bowl with one tablespoon sugar (granulated or caster). Add a little milk from one pint and mix well. Heat the rest of the milk in a saucepan.
When the milk is fairly hot (but not boiling), pour from the saucepan into the bowl with the custard/sugar mix, and stir in. Return the whole lot to the saucepan, put back on the heat and keep stirring until it comes to the boil (it will thicken considerably). Let it boil for up to half a minute, stirring all the time, then remove from the heat to cool.
How to cool custard without a skin forming
Whether you like to pour the custard into a jug first, or prefer to let it cool in the pan, put a piece of Clingfilm straight onto the surface of the hot custard and press gently down on top of the custard, working from the middle to the sides. This gets rid of any air bubbles, and prevents a skin from forming. Do this immediately you take the custard off the heat. As soon as it has cooled down enough (say 15 minutes) remove the clingfilm and pour the custard over the trifle. Apply more clingfilm over the top then put in the fridge to set.
And finally, folks:
Take the double cream (at least half a pint – more if you want) and put in half a teaspoon of sugar. This helps it when you are beating it. You don’t want to sweeten (you have enough tastes in there) but you do want it to hold peaks.
Whip with an electric beater, and when it has doubled in volume and holds its peaks, spread carefully over the trifle using a palette knife or fork to make pretty swirls and patterns. Add a little at a time, starting at the centre and working out towards the edges (so you don’t add too much weight at any one spot, and won’t break the surface of the set custard). Add a little grated chocolate, or cherries cut in half, to decorate.
DISCLAIMER
I finished that photoshop course (2 hours each Friday for 4 weeks) so feel a little more confident about messing with layers. Here is one of my first attempts - an old cabinet card with sunlight effect at top left; the image was sharpened, lightened and posterised, then I added text.
