Rings and Things Dishes

I love the beautiful little dishes I keep seeing cropping up on craft blogs and pinterest. The ones to pop your rings, earrings or other little bits and pieces in when you are not wearing them, so they don't get lost.

When I got married I wore my rings all the time, then about a month after our wedding I got an itchy red patch on my finger underneath them. (very attractive!) I started taking them off at night - problem solved. I used to just put them on top of my jewellery box, but now and again I got a nasty scare in the morning when they had somehow been knocked and I couldn't find them for a minute or two. I needed a little dish for my rings. 
At this point I should say it has only taken me 22 years to realise I need aforementioned dish - bless, sometimes it takes a while for me to catch up!

Rizzi at ThermoMorph sent me a tub "for freeeee!" (Bedtime Stories anyone? No - never mind, actually quite a sweet funny film though)

ThermoMorph is a mouldable plastic that comes as a big tub of little white pellets (Apparently the proper name for them is Polymorph Granules) The nail varnish in the photo is to give a sense of scale, so you can see how big this tub is. I could have used a more traditional coin or ruler but the nail varnish was handy!

You pop a couple of spoonfuls in a bowl of almost boiling water and watch the pellets go clear and stick together. Then you can make stuff with it. 

This is what it looks like when it's not quite ready to use, see the remains of the pellets not quite all clear yet. 
The good news - As it cools again it hardens so you don't need to bake it or cure it. If you go wrong you simple heat it up again and have another go - nothing is wasted. 
The bad news - As it cools again it hardens so you have to be pretty quick with it.
Once set it's a bit like those white plastic chopping boards in feel and texture. In the course of my experiments I discovered I could heat it up with my hot air gun (that I use with embossing powder normally) I found this much easier than hot water but it's not essential.

Anyway, let's get on to the making bit. I needed a little dish, I had a big tub of stuff to play with.
I heated about 2 tablespoons of the ThermoMorph pellets for each dish I made and used a shallow metal dish as a mould. This dish is actually part of my spoon rest that lives next to the cooker, it was just the right size for this.
First I tried rolling it with a rolling pin and cutting it out using cookie cutters. It kept setting before I was ready and I had to keep reheating it, however I was able to cut a flower shape.

Once it was set I just went round it with a craft knife to tidy it up.

Then I warmed it up again just enough to be able to shape it into my spoon rest bowl mould. No photo of that sorry, you'll have to imagine!

To make the round dishes I found that just taking a lump of the clear warm ThermoMorph and pressing it into shape in the dish with my fingers worked best for me.

It only takes a few minutes to cool and harden completely.

Then they were ready for painting. I used blue and copper acrylic paint and gold spray paint. They all needed a couple of coats. These paints covered really well and seem tough as old boots.

I did try a matte pink acrylic paint on one though that was a disaster, I could just scratch it off with my nails :-(

The gold needed a little extra bling I thought, so I Mod Podged all over and sprinkled it with glitter (in a plastic tub of course, but despite that, every member of the household had glitter on their face at some point in the next few days - how does that even happen?)

It had two coats for extra bling and then a coat of Mod Podge so it doesn't moult glitter everywhere it goes!

The gold is just so gorgeous and sparkly!

The copper one is more sophisticated I think, with a rough almost hammered metal effect.

The flower one had blue paint inside and the copper on the outside.

This is the one I'm now using on my dressing table.

If you fancy having a play with ThermoMorph you can get it from Amazon. It costs £19.95 ($19.97) for a 500g tub. 

Amazon.co.uk Amazon.com

It seems quite expensive for a tub but I've made loads of stuff with it and barely made a dent.

See that flat bit in there, that's an off cut of something else I tried, you can just bung the little bits back in and melt them again next time. You'll see this product cropping up again, I've made quite a few things with it.

Originally I was going to try to make a little dish from clay, I've collected some inspiration on my "Make it - everything else" board. The ThermoMorph version is not so easy to imprint on but I have no worries about it cracking or chipping and as I can be pretty clumsy sometimes that seems like a bonus.

I may still try a clay bowl one day, maybe something a little bit bigger but now I can rest easy knowing my rings are safe at night!

You might also be interested in:

Cardboard Tube Pillow Pouch

Patchwork Gift Box

Personalised Wedding Picture

Simple Speech Bubble Cards

I'll be linking up this project at all these lovely link parties, pop over for a look at loads of projects from other blogs

Silent Sunday 27th July 2014

My Mum's Chocolate Cake Recipe

When I was growing up my brother's favourite cake was Chocolate Cake, so pretty much every year, on his birthday my mum would make Chocolate Cake using this recipe. It's really delicious and moist, not a bit dry like chocolate cake can be.
She never decorated it like I have here, that was for our daughter's birthday last year, but the icing is the one she always used to. (This decorating was inspired by this beauty that I found online and pinned. Actually this is a bit embarrassing because if you check out the inspiration you can see how woefully short I have fallen from it. I had a few technical difficulties cutting the Minstrels in half. Still if you don't peek at that one mine looks ok - it's all relative!)

My Mum's Chocolate Cake Recipe

Makes 1 x 8" cake (with 2 layers)

You can get a simple version of the recipe (cake & icing) to print here

7oz Self Raising Flour (200g or 1¾ cup)

2 tbsp Cocoa Powder
7oz Caster Sugar (200g or 1 cup)

4 oz Margarine or Butter (115g or ½ cup)
1 teasp Vanilla Essence

2 Eggs

5 tbsps Evaporated Milk

5 tbsps Water

You also need: A mixing bowl, a jug, a wooden spoon, 2x 8” round cake tins

oven: 160 c/320 f/gas 3

First you need to get your oven on to heat up, wash your hands and then grease and flour/line your tins.

I am super lucky as I have inherited these awesome cake tins from my mum. You don't have to line them with baking paper as they have that clever little swively bit that stops the cake from getting stuck in the tin. I cannot describe how much I love these tins and how much pleasure I get from using them. My mum always greased and floured them so that's what I do. If you are not so lucky then I'd recommend lining the bottom of the tin with baking paper so it doesn't all stick.
Next pop the flour, cocoa powder and sugar in a bowl. 

Chop the marg/butter into chunks and add to the flour mix.

Now this is where the method is so different from the regular sponge recipe. You rub the fat into the flour mix, like you would if you were making pastry.

If you've not done this before, you just sort of lift the fat up and rub it with your finger tips, letting it drop back into the flour. You just keep going till it looks like this.

When you think it's done, give the bowl a good shake and all the lumps will rise to the top.

How does that work then? I think it's magic, my son says it's science! Just rub the lumps in too.

Next mix the eggs with the evaporated milk and water in a jug, just combine them with a fork,

then pour in to your flour/fat mix.

Give it a mix with the fork till it's combined.

Then pour it into your prepared tins.
Bake for  30 - 40 minutes until it looks like this.

To tell it's done you just open the oven door and carefully reach in an press lightly in the middle of the cake. If it leaves a dent like this...

...carefully close the oven door and give the cake another 5 minutes, then test again.
Cool on a wire rack then get ready to decorate. My mum always used this fudge icing recipe.

Fudge Icing

 Makes enough to cover the inside and top of your 8" round cake
Printable version here

2½ oz Margarine or Butter (70g or 1/3 cup)

4 tbsps Cocoa Powder

8oz Icing Sugar (225g or 1¾ cup)

3 tbsps Milk

1 teasp Vanilla Essence

You will also need: a mixing bowl, a mug, a wooden spoon and a sieve

• Melt the marg and add the cocoa powder
• Heat the milk in a mug in the microwave till hot but not boiling
• Add the milk and vanilla essence to the marg
• Sieve in the icing sugar and beat till thick and smooth

No photos of the Icing making process sorry, don't know what happened there. I'll photograph and add them next time I'm making this one. It's pretty straightforward anyway, I'm sure you'll be fine!

Use half the icing to sandwich the layers together and the other half on the top. Swirl it round a bit, and add what ever else you like. 

Here I used White and Milk Chocolate Buttons, Minstrels, Maltesers and piped a bit of melted white and milk chocolate.

This is the same cake from a few years back, funnily enough decorated with exactly the same sweets!

This is the version my 2 teenage sons made for my Birthday earlier this year. Shoot, now you can all guess how old I am (and see how we like to reuse candles in our house!)

Of course you don't have to add anything extra, it's perfectly nice with just a swooch of icing!

You might also be interest in:

My Nan's Shortbread Biscuits

Easy Peasy Banana Muffins

Easy Cake Decorating Ideas

Cake Making for Absolute Beginners

I'll be linking up at these great link parties

Silent Sunday 20th July 2014

Washi Tape Phone Cover

I had a beautiful, very sparkly phone cover but when it finally broke beyond repair I started looking for a new one. Once your phone has been pretty it's hard to go back to it being boring!
I have an i phone but quite an old model so it's getting harder to get covers for it. I'm also not sure how much longer my phone will last, some of the apps don't work any more and tell me I need to up grade something or other that I don't seem to be able to do.

With this in mind I didn't want to spend a lot of money on a cover that I might not keep for long. 
Enter Washi tape!
Cute, pretty, inexpensive but how would it last, would this work for more than a day or two? I figured it was worth a try.
I just stuck it on, snipping it with scissors to go round the important phone buttons and bits and pieces. I spent all of 5 minutes doing this highly skilled and technical task.
Apparently I was so happy with it I forgot to take a photo! Never mind, lets move on..
1 week later it looked like this:

The tape on the ends is not coping with being pulled in and out of my pocket, so off it came.

3 more weeks passed:

Time for a do-over. It all peeled off without leaving any residue and I spent another 5 minutes sticking some more on. This time I went crazy with a diagonal pattern!

So I conclude this is a great temporary way to fancy up something a bit boring. 5 minutes once a month doesn't seem like too much of a time commitment.

Over at As the Bunny Hops Amy has covered an i pad case and protected the tape with mod podge.

Seems like a good idea if you want to do something a bit more long lasting and Amy has a great step by step tutorial of what she did.
Krista at While he was Napping covered her phone cover and made it last with Nail Varnish. Isn't it pretty?

You might also be interested in:

Paper Cutting first attempt

Share a Coke with Picture

Washi Tape Berry Baskets

Recycled Pen Tub Tutorial

Linking up at all these lovely link parties