Fountains Abbey

We are lucky enough to be have the beautiful Fountains Abbey ruin just a few miles up the road from us and this mild October weather is perfect for a Sunday walk and post hot chocolate and scone in the cafe. 

Picnic Loaf

Until this rather wet a dreary day we have been enjoying a rather mild autumn so a couple of weeks ago Mike and I went out for an autumnal picnic on our bikes. Perhaps this was our last picnic for a while but I'm also a fan of a cozy mid season picnic. To take with us I made a picnic loaf.

This is a great alternative to sandwiches. It's really easy, though does require a little foreword planning as it is best prepared the night before.

1.Basically get a round cob of bread. I chose a whole meal. 
2.Cut the lid off, and scoop out the bread for the middle (blend into breadcrumbs and freeze for another recipe).
3. Brush the inside of the loaf with olive oil, then start layering up your filling. 
I chose chorizo, rocket, tomatoes, feta and olives. Keep packing it I until you can't get anymore in. 
4. Pop the lid back on and wrap in lots of cling film.
5. Place in the fridge with a heavy book on top and leave over night.

Don't forget to take a bread knife and chopping board with you on your picnic to cut    your into slices. 

Seriously this is one of the best picnic inventions, EVER!

Homemade Baby Balm

 

 

Recently Millie developed a rash on her face and I wanted to make something nice and natural, so I roped in my friend Robyn to come and help me make a baby balm.  

 

We did a bit of research and www.wellnessmama.com gave us some good ideas. I was keen to use chamomile for it's soothing properties and Robyn wanted to use olive oil. We also didn't want a barrier cream (which has zinc oxide in) and a lot of recipes were for this.

 

Eventually we settled on this recipe which was a bit of a mixture of ones we'd found. We got our ingredients from a local health food shop and from Amazon.

 

Beeswax is antibacterial, anti-inflammatory and locks in moisture.

Coconut oil is pretty amazing and I could probably do a blog post just on this but essentially it is packed with good fatty-acids and proteins which can help repair skin, moisturise (although I've found on its own it can actually be quite drying) and protect the skin.

Cocoa Butter is a deep hydrator

Shea Butter again is a good moisturizer and can help heal skin

Olive oil acts as a anti-inflammatory, contains anti-oxidants and those great fatty-acids which fight naughty free radicals

Lavender oil inhibits bacteria and therefore can help protect against infection and its scent is calming

Chamomile oil is antiseptic, antibiotic, disinfectant, bactericidal and anti-allergenic

Vitamin E oil promotes healing

 

This is a tiny overview of the ingredients we used, I could go on and on and on, but I won't, you can do as much research into them as you like.

 

The process was easy:

1) Weigh your ingredients out. We used digital scales that you can reset and put everything in one bowl. The less bowls and spoons you can use the better as its all oily and a bit hard to wash.

2) Melt the ingredients over a pan of water (make sure the water isn't touching the bowl).

3) Once its all melted, leave to cool for a few minutes then blitz with a hand blender (preferably an old or spare one and keep it just for this kind of thing) this will stop it curdling. Put on an apron and put the bowl in the sink as you want to limit the cleaning! It'll look like this:

5) Allow to cool then decant into your jars/containers. Robyn had a great idea for this - spoon it all into a freezer bag, cut off the corner and pipe it into your containers as though it were icing.

 

I've used this on Millie's rash which looks a bit like eczema and its clearing up. I'm using it as a nappy cream and all the ingredients are safe for using with cloth nappies. It also makes a nice hand cream for you.

 

 

Nb. We doubled the amounts so there was enough for the two of us!

 

Em x

 

Pastel Hair

About six months ago I became a touch obsessed with pastel colors, and inspired by pinterest particularly pastel hair! I dreamed of having pink or lilac hair for ages. Unfortunately my current hair was bright red dyed hair and the first consultation with a hair dresser pretty much said it was a no go! so I dreamed some more. 

Randomly, after another few months of deliberating, I asked in another hair dressers. They took samples of my hair and experimented with stripping out the red, and it worked without leaving my hair in a total wreak. 

 So finally on the 11th July my pink hair dream came true! And I love it! 

I touch my color up in between trips to the hairdressers with la riche directions semi permanent hair dyes, these are really good for temporary dyes. They have millions of crazy colors and generally wash out in a few washes. They really only work on blond hair and if you have dark hair and are thinking of going blonde I seriously recommend going to a professional, this is not one to be attempted at home!

So far Ive only attempted pastel pinks, lilac and lavender colors but I'm seriously tempted with a pastel blue or turquoise for a few weeks. I love the versatility of getting to try out a new hair color every few weeks without damaging my hair. 

Hatty x