martinimade

Not sure exactly how it happened but I managed to scratch some projects of off my long-term project list during the past few weeks. A few are still in progress and/or really not ready for their close-up. Two, however, are.

Like this cute, little pillow:

I picked the kit up during my quickie pilgrimage to Liberty London this summer. I could have spent the better part of the day in there, frankly, and it's best that I didn't because I would like to be able to send the kids to college. Still, a pillow kit was a) affordable and b) packable. And so it went.

The biggest challenge was finding a pillow form to fit said cover. The closest craft store is an hour from here so I dove into the internets. The first pillow form -- the size the kit told me to get -- was waaaaaay too big and is the white blob beneath the finished pillow. It's not worth the hassle of returning it so it looks like there's at least one more pillow in my future.

From this point forward, I would like to be addressed as the Pillow Tsarina, thank you very much.

The other big project was to attempt to make puff pastry from scratch. 

Yeah. I know. You can buy it. Here, however, I can only get the Pillsbury kind, which tastes like chemicals.* Plus, it's not that hard to make your own, just slightly tedious and a little scary. It's a low-stakes project, too. If I'd screwed it up, I'd be out less than $10 in ingredients. 

I didn't screw it up:

These are the off-cuts, which I baked with cinnamon and sugar.

What I really made was an almond galette a la Mary Berry:

It was good -- but could have been better if I'd rolled the pastry thinner. Next time.

So what have you been working on?

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* in my opinion.**

** please do sue me.