The last little while has been totally manic on the work and personal
front, but I have survived so far!

I recently let this frock out of the studio:
http://www.diceyhome.free-online.co.uk/KatePages/Sewing_Projects/Weddingallery/f
inalfrock14.JPG
Six layers of cobweb fine silk chiffon,, cut on the bias!

There's a wedding dress going out real soon - got a couple or three
hours work to do on that one!

I'm all done with the design stages of Miss havisham's wedding dress,
and will cut and sew that one ready for fitting on Monday...  Silk
georgette coat over a cotton lawen gown, distressed and aged to look
like it's been worn every day foir 20 years!  :D

I even managed to make a tarty party frock for me for Saturday!

Saturday was our Silver Wedding, and we had a party in a field...  Well,
in the paddock behind our house!  It belongs to a neighbour, and we
hired his band and he let us have full use of his swimming pool, garden
pub, barn (for the food!) and his daughter (aged 10) hired out her
bouncy castle to us (her way of earning pocket money).

Several folk camped in the paddock, and I cooked wall to wall party
food!  The menu was almost all WW friendly until we got to the
puddings...  Well, you need SOME indulgences at a big do!

Quiche was low fat pastry, some were onion free for the onion haters,
and some were gluten free for the coeliacs...

The sausage meat tarts were all gluten free and low fat!  I made the
sausage meat by grinding up very lean pork mince with herbs, an egg and
buckwhaet flakes, and used Doves Farm gluten free flour for the low fat
pastry.  After the near disaster of trying to roll the pastry for the
quiches, we dolloped this into the mini muffin tins and squidged it down
with the dibber!  :D

There was a whale...  Well, a 12 lb salmon, really!  It was a bit to
long for the fish kettle, so got beheaded and had its tail cut off, and
was then poached in a court buillion.  Very moist and yummy it was too!

I did WW recipe goat cheese and butternut squash strudels: I made them
smaller than the recipe says: party food size!

I boiled a large chunk of ham and sliced that...

Two chickens were roasted and turned into low fat coronation chicken and
creamy chicken with a youghurt, lemon, and coriander dressing.  The
bones and remaining meat were made into leek and potato soup for those
arriving on Friday evening...

There was Greek Salad, a green salad, and a 3 bean salad with Balsamic
vinegar and olive oil dressing...

There was about 2 miles of French Baguette!

I'm sure there were other things, but I can't remember...  There was plenty!

The puddings were to die for, though I say so myself!  Again, all home
made...

Chocolate tart with cinamon crust
Yorkshire style cheesecake with good Scots shortbread as the pastry!
Chocolate rum gateau: this is a rich dark chocolate cake that is then
soaked over night in a rum syrup and hidden under a layer of whipped
cream: there's no substitute for double cream here!  But we cut slim
slices...  It's too rich to eat big slices!  It was a 14" cake, and the
only thing I have that is big enough for it is the cake stand my wedding
cake came on!

Pineapple and strawberry salad: just pineapple, strawberries, and dark
rum...  Sigh - hic!
Fruit salad: the juice for this was organic French pear juice that was
really a bit too sweet to just drink (naturally sweet, not sweetened.  I
bought it at a French Market a few months back), the remains of a bottle
of dry white wine, and a good dose of Lurgashel Winary mead!

There was cream to pour over things (I refrained!  Though I did have
some gateau...  )

What did I do?  Ran round like a one-armed paper hanger organising beds,
tables, chairs, buffet, table cloths, and setting the tables, organised
my willing slaves (Big Sis and all my friends are very fine cooks, and
made perfect sous chefs!  They sorted the fish, made fruit salad, helped
with bean and potato salad, and all the laying on platters.  And T'lads
did all the heavy lifting, laid my temporary instant footpath - with
lights! - and moved the tables!).  Big Sis and a nursing friend
sanitized the paddock po and made it habitable (including flushing a
poor spider!), and then we all showered and changed in relays!

The band played, and we danced like dervishes until midnight, when we
turned back into pumpkins, white mice, occasional lizards...  :D
Acctually, we came back to the house not long after midnight and opened
prezsents and drank more wine, beer, coffee, tea, etc and flopped into
bed around 3 am after tidying up the kitchen!

On Sunday we binned the remaining party food (not a lot - mostly
crumbs!) and paper plates, washed up the platters and coffee mugs (I
LOVE my dishwasher!), and cleared away the tables and chairs.  Then we
had lunch...  After that I paid a brief visit to the garden centre for
canes for Monday, saw Big Sis onto the train, and had a siesta.

I spent a day and a half in school this week with the sewing machines,
making kites with years 3 & 4, and saw my son off to KanderJam
(http://www.kanderjam.kisc.ch/en/) at 7 am this morning - so we had to
get him packed for 15 days away and get his bag delivered to the trailer
by ten o'clock last night!  I'm slipping: we did it with an hour to
spare!  ;P

While I didn't count points this week (no time!) I did make sensible
choices (ONE not too big plate of food at the party, and ONE pudding
only! And sensible WW friendly food all the rest of the week), and have
used so much energy elsewhere that what what with 3 hours dancing and
all the other batting about I've done (including the walk up to school
on Tuesday, back at lunch time, and up and back again in the evening for
the head's farewell bash: 4 miles total), I don't think I can have put
much on this week.

Dinner tonight is Bambi Burgers (Sainsbury's Be Good To Yourself venison
burgers: 2.5 points each), salad, and fresh baked rolls.  That'll be
AFTER weigh in, and tomorrow I'm back tracking my 18 points a day.  :)

Once the wedding dress and Miss Havisham are out the door, I am taking 3
days off to stay with my mum before James gets back from Switzerland,
and then I may have a bunch of costumes to do for early September!  :D

And I thought it was going to be a quiet summer...