Baby Cheese

So when I posted this on a vegan forum the reponce was quite intense. 

From people loving it, to people shocked and a little horrified. So if the thought of anything made from natural mummy milk, worries you - click next...

Ingredients:

6oc milk (I used frozen)

3 teaspoons coconut oil

2 teaspoons tapioca starch

1/4 teaspoon sea salt

This makes a very creamy spreadable cream cheese. 

Blend it all together.

Then in a small pan, heat on low, until it starts to thicken. 

Keep staring with a plastic or woodern spoon. Once thicken and bubbling cook for about 2-3mins. Then transfer to a glass container. 

Pop in the fridge until firm. It stays like a cream cheese. 

It makes a very creamy cheese, not fully set. Here is where I got the idea from; https://avocadosandales.com/2015/07/10/the-cheese/ I forgot one of the ingredients which I think would make it set harder. So next time I will try it differently. I've tried a tiny bit and it tastes like very creamy coconut cheese! I will let you know what the baby thinks! 

I think I will lower the amount of salt in it, as the next day it was very salty! Baby loved it though! 

How to make an easy pillow cover!

While doing up Daisy, I have been on the hunt for some vintage / retro fabric for her. I was going to use a new fabric and matched all her colours to it but it's been discontinued. But even though it's much more work, hunting for retro matching fabric, it's worth it as it looks fab!

A little prep work for the video, ironing the fabric. While playing some old records!

Using new pillows and cushions, and beautiful retro fabrics, Daisy is starting to really come together!

Here's my first 'how to' video for making an easy pillow case. So sorry my camera fell over! Also it's quite long but shot in real time and shows how quickly you can make a great pillow case!

I was lucky that it the fabric does work well with the tablecloth! (which could also do with being ironed....)

This is the first time, I've filmed a 'how to' video like this so I hope its ok and easy to follow. My silly camera fell down! I haven't edited it, even though its quite long, it does show how quickly you can do it.

Any questions just let me know. 

Another Slow Cooked Curry!

An easy, cheap, use up your veg sort of meal!

Ingredients:

1x can of coconut milk

1x tablespoon of korma curry paste (I think it needed two)

2x hand fulls of brown mushrooms

1x medium size butternut squash

Half a sweed

About 2 handfuls of carrots (I had some frozen ones to use up.)

1x red chilli

1x red onion

2-3 spring onion

2x sweet potatoes 

Chop up the butternut squash, cook till soft. 

Fry the red onion and pepper. 

Add the chilli!

Add carrots, sweed and sweet potato too the slow cooker set to high. (Throw in any rot veg, it's a great way to use up stuff!) 

Add the fried onion, pepper and chilli once starting to brown and soften. Add the mushrooms (uncooked) aswell.

Add korma curry paste the now soft butternut squash and the can of coconut milk to a blender.

You can mash them or add them to blender. I used my smoothie maker! (Saves me getting the big blender out.) 

Add the  and blend till thick and creamy.

Add to the slow cooker and pop the spring onions on top. Cook on high until the curry starts to bubble or about an hour. Then on low for 3-4hrs (I just checked that the hardest rot veg was soft, the sweed and serverd. I think you could throw this all in the morning and come back to it for dinner. The longer it's cooked the deeper the favour. Some of the veg, like the sweet potato had started to disintegrate after 3-4hrs but it was still yummy!

I served it with cus cus and rice. On the left is the child size and right, parent size (of which we both had seconds!)

Our 5yr old loved the rice and cus cus and had a little of the curry. Our youngest, at 2yrs loved it and stole some of her brothers and asked for more! Our 4yr old ran off crying.....he is in the fun 'i won't try anything unless it looks like chips' phase!

*note to self, hover after cuscus!

Painting a Vintage/Retro Caravan

Daisy, our 1969 Bluebird Euorpe Three Caravan. Looked a little worse for where when we picked her up. While I got on with the really important jobs, getting her safe and water tight. Things which where just to make her look pretty where pushed to one side.

Painting her chassis is very important though, to keep the metal in good working order and stop rust eating her. Lucky her a-frame and chassis where in pretty good condition and only min scrubbing back with a wire brush would be needed.

One of the things which made a huge impact was painting her wheels! Wow. A million times better.

I went with cream, looking back at old photos she would have been white or cream. White can look a little hash, so I went with cream.

One more coat to go and then all the parts you can't see will be painted black.

Already one tin of paint has made a huge impact to how she looks! 

We are currently trying to pick colours and paint types for the outside! I will update this blog when we have made up our minds!

My crazy idea for Daisy's door is something like the above. She is a 1960's van after all! 

My plan was to use a new fabric for al the pillows and curtains in Daisy but it's been discontinued. :( I was gutted as its one of my favourite patterns and I have based all her paint work around that fabric.

I would most likely have gone for a more vintage blue and creams, if not for that fabric. 

So I've had to go back to the drawing board, even though am not all that keen on the blue of Daisy's walls, it has grown on me. It's bright but not cold feeling and with all her many windows (not many vans have this amount of windows) she feels light, open and spacious. Without feeling exposed, she's still cosy. 

So I've gone with trying to find vintage fabrics, with yellows, orange and blues. (The blue matches her walls, kettle and hob. Also the beautiful 1960's table cloth from my Nana.) 

It's quite easy to find vintage/retro fabrics, it's much harder to find ones which match your brief. As many are off cuts or anything vintage on a roll is a crazy price. (It's not that it's not worth it, I just don't have the budget.) Due to my background in design, I do think one of my strengths is pattern matching/colour matching. I love putting different fabrics together which you wouldn't think would work but by adding in another, pull it all together. 

People looking round Daisy (when we had pink polkadot fabric as a temporarily curtain was even worse!) couldn't see my whole vision and she looked a little bit of a hodgepodge!

I've got a lot of colours going on in Daisy. 

My main rule when doing anything with colour, is a rule of about 3. Be that a bedroom, or an outfit. 3 colours and then picking cream, white or black, and sliver or gold. So our bedroom is Grey, black, sliver and white. 

Dots room is Pink (light and dark) cream and sliver. 

The boys is blue (light and dark) white and sliver. 

Our living room/kitchen is Grey, black white and sliver. 

That way if you pick a lamp or pillows, you will know it will work without having to colour match. One colour is too much, 2 is ok but to get it perfect 3!

But with Daisy.....I've gone a little crazy!

Cream

Orange

Yellow

Light blue

Dark blue

It's quite close to my rule of 3, orange, blue and yellow. Then cream and sliver fittings. So it's not to hard but when am looking at fabrics, the 1970's one almost always add in brown...or green...it's quite hard to find just orange or orange and cream. I missed out bidding on orange and cream beautiful curtains which once cut up would have worked for all of her windows. Ebay is an exciting and frustrating place! Outbid at 4 secs to go! Thanks internet.....

If you have time on your side, the right fabric will come along. I wanted to be a little more finished by Retro Fest but I managed to get two curtains up (not hemed but up!) 

It can be a lot harder working with vintage fabrics, most are much more fragile. Where I have joined the fabric to widen the curtains has already pulled apart, so I will have to redo this or back the fabric to make it stronger.

Before you rip out old curtains, hand wash or soak them. You will be surprised how wonderful they can be after a wash and press! 

I will update this blog as soon as I get painting! 

In the meantime, I've found this amazing ap from Dulux. Its been so hard to think about what colours would look best on Daisy! 

 Its lots of fun......but.....so far its not helped me make up mind.........it has given me a great way of seeing what different colours could look like. I still have no idea which one though! 

I quite like the idea of all one colour!

I just can't make up my mind!! 

We have made up our minds, and due to a huge problem with fabrics.....There have been some big changes. Click here to read all about going back to the drawing board!

Wanna read all about doing up Daisy? Click here

Italian Tomatoes and Olives

Before changing our diet to take out meat, dairy and eggs. One of my go to cheap, easy and tasty meals was Italian beef. Slow cooked beef with tomatoes and olives. It was yummy, you could have it with potatos, salad or dumplings. (Or all three.) At Retro Festival, we brought some huge, delicious, olives. I could have just eaten my way through the bag but then I thought it was worth having a go at this dish from a vegan point of view. Having just come back from 5 nights away in Daisy (our 1969 Bluebird Caravan) I had some veg to use up, so for this dish I've just used what I had to hand. Am sure you could mix it up a bit, and I will experiment a little with this recipe too. One thing I don't know I can recreate is the olives have been stuffed and mixed in herbs and socked garlic. The company just said they came from London and couldn't give me a card. (Also there was about 3-4 garlic cloves mixed in with the olives. They are not needed for this but you can add if you want.)

I've slow cooked it as it really brings out the flavours. 

Ingredients:

About a cup of your fav olives, black and green both work, I like a mix but this one just had the ones brought from the show.

1x tin of tomatoes (once you have added the tomatoes, refill the now empty tin with water, add that as well. Do the same with red wine.)

About 2x glasses of red wine-half a bottle.

2x celery sticks

1x small - to - medium size sweed

About a cup of butternut squash 

1x red onion

2x red peppers

3-4 large tomatos 

Herbs: fresh rosemary, mint and black pepper 

Chop up the sweed and butternut to small cube about the size of a 50p, square. Pop in your slow cooker. Add the celery, chopped up. 

Fry the onions (very small) and chopped up peppers. 

Add the butternut and then tomatos (always adding the slowest thing to cook on the bottom and quickest on top.)

Add black pepper and herbs. 

Add the olives, tin of tomatos. Then refil the tin with water, add to the slow cooker then refil with red wine and add. Cook on high for an hour or until it starts to bubble on top. Then turn to low. I forgot about it and it was left on all night! I would say 3-5hrs is all that's needed on low. 

I served it with pan fried dumplings and new potatoes.

I will write up my recipe for pan fried dumplings soon! 

Retro Festival

We where so proud to be apart of the Retro Caravan display, for the Retro Festival in Newbury.

Daisy was not the prettiest looking van on display but I was still so proud of how much we have done so far. So many people where amazed that all our vans are not just for shows but used and loved. All Daisy's 'props' are used when we go away. We drove straight from three days camping in Derby, so it was a little stressful getting show ready! (I will be uploading a blog all about our amazing adventures from toasting Jaffa Cakes on the campfire, to scary walks up long forgotten steps!)

We where part of a display of 39 retro caravans, starting in the 1930's all the way to the 80's. I think another 9 where dotted through the fields. 

It was so lovely to meet lots members and meet up with members we have already become friends with. I love chatting to people about Daisy, I know am a bit of a show off sometimes but am so proud of what we have got done and want people to see - that if I can do it, anyone can! 

Our three children 5 and under, had come from a really relaxed camping trip. With about 17 other childern, all playing and running free around the huge field. So it was a little stressful going from that, too, don't touch that, no sorry you can't go in Daisy right now, and stop running up to people and hugging them! 

We are lucky that the other club members are so lovely, they would go from van to van being entertained with bike rides on vintage bikes, cakes and games! 

I need to update the information on Daisy, people always stop to look at her so it stays on her all the time, not just at shows. It's amazing to think she's 47yrs old and has three kids jumping up and down in her (Bear likes to stump up and down, which am trying to stop as Daisy shakes!) I cook in her on her 1960's oven, we use her just as she would have been used when she was first brought! 

That's one of the many things I love about the club, our vans are used and loved. Not just sat in a museum or rotting away forgotten about in a field. Makes me really sad to thing of all the unloved forgotten ones still out there not being used. 

It was really interesting to see how many people didn't believe the vans where used! (Daisy looked used bless her! She's not as pristine as the other vans right now!) I loved telling people about the bath in the Winchester or that we had driven straight from a camping trip! 

I just managed to get one coat of hammerwright paint on her a frame before the show, the difference was huge!

Looking back over the old photos of Daisy I have, her chassis and wheels would have been white/cream. I think white can look a little hash, so went for cream. Doing her wheels has made a huge difference to how she looks on the outside! 

Keeping little ones busy at shows is quite hardwork. Pops is already great at talking to people about Daisy and he was even showing someone how all the beds work and where he sleeps! I was quite shocked at how much everlything was at the show. I really thought that things like the fair was part of the ticket price so was a little shocked to see it was £2 a ride, x3 children it quite quickly could have got far to expensive for us! My husband spent £16 just on icecream!!! (Am still in shock but what do you do when they have just handed your excited child an icecream, say no!?) We helped to save a little by making dinner and breakfast in Daisy. (Just out of show hours.) I made us a pack lunch in the morning but we where walking so far in the day that we had eaten that quite quickly. So just brought chips to share. (They where lovely chips, £2.50-£3 for a small portion but as a snack not main meal they did the job.) 

I was really disappointed with what they had for childern, (there was lots for them to see and do) but we are used to festivals where extra costs are low and the childern activities are free/part of the cost of your ticket. (See my blog about Into The Wild, I highly recommend it for families.)

This amazing slide was £2 for 5mins, lucky one of the mini people was napping at the time so cost £4. (I know I may be sounding a little penny pitching here but to me we feel a little henpecked into having to spent a lot of extra money for a ticketed event.)

Unfortunately this ride had no signs saying socks where needed (I should have thought about it, but I couldn't even hold them back before I could pay, as they where so excited.) Our poor boys came off with carpet burns all over the ankles, which haven't yet healed. They where both very upset and hurt with them. Hours of tears and hugs. So make sure you take socks in your bag, even on hot days for such rides.....

By far some of the best things where the free things. Bear is abscessed with trains (he takes my childhood train to bed with him.) So seeing these mini road steam engines was like a dream come true. Thank you so much to all the lovely owners who let my children sit on them and pulled the whistle for them! They made a little boy very happy in deed!! 

Dot and I, loved this little walking band and did stalk them waiting for them to stop and play again. They where fab! Dot had got a little upset (sleepy and didn't want to sit in the buggy) and she stopped crying as soon as they started playing. It was great fun watching the steam engines wondering by too.

We where very disappointed that many of the main big acts/events where pulled last minute. Understanding that things do change outside of organisers control but it did feel many things had changed. One of these was the record-breaking jump. I was really quite looking forward to all the record-breaking events lined up and to be apart of the camping one.

The kids did love the motorbike show which I think was a last minute change but they where good. We found a great place to sit close and watch. With a pinic and blanket. My husband and I even got to sit for a moment!

For this sort of event, where it's very busy and you are wondering around a lot. I highly recommend a baby carrier. Dot is at the age where she mostly wants to walk but her Hypermobility means she does get very tired, so popping her up in the carrier really helps. Also two very excited boys wanting to run off was a little stressful, so having one happy in a carrier did really help. We also had the buggy which we put back in the car by day two as Dot really isn't a fan of it and it was hard to get round the busy marquees.

Having been to the Beaulieu Autojumble a few months ago with the RCC (Retro Caravan Club.) I must say I was disappointed with the amount of traders at Retro Fest. I had got round them all very quickly, though I was so excited to find this retro heater which will be perfect for Daisy. I can't wait to get it safely tested/tryed out. We had got very cold on our Into The Wild trip, so I have been looking for a little heater since! 

If you hunted and bargained, there where a few good deals to be made. But I did noticed that over all the club members had brought a lot less than they had at Beaulieu. I only brought the heater and a record! 

I was so proud about how fab Daisy looked on the inside. Now I've started to find material to make curtains and pillows, she feels like she is at last coming together! (Look out for my blog review on our new record player!)

I know she didn't draw the crowds quite like some of the other amazing finished vans but am still so proud of her!

One of the days I showed her with her 6x6 (very unusual to have such a big bed)    

bed and the other with her set up as a dinning table. I thought it was good to show her, how we use her. When we are away the main bed mostly stays up and we just put away the boys beds. 

I love how Daisy is full of our family things, the table cloth is my Nana's 1960's one, which I have loved and used for many years. The pininc table was passed down through the family from the 1960's. The bunting, I made for Pop's christening and fits round Daisy perfectly! The 1960's coffee set was a gift from my Great Uncle, which am hoping to find a dinning set to match. (Yes we use china in Daisy, it's not just for show.) This last trip away, I used my Nana's 1960's plates, which I nicked out of my kitchen cupboard as we eat on them anyway! 

I really haven't brought many items (apart from lights, wood, paint etc) for Daisy at all, most is family hand-me-downs, which I love! 

  

The evenings where great, we managed to get the mini people down and join the rest of the club around the campfire. We are all so different, I think our oldest member is 93! (Don't quote me, he could be older!) From singles, couples and families. We all get on so well, with our common love of these retro caravans!

Here's a photo of some of us, nicked from the club page. We signed up lots of new members, who wouldn't want to join for £15 for a year, railles and events! Let alone the amazing magazine (in which Daisy is featuring this month!)

This could have been taken in the 1970/80's! No it was yesterday! So much more fun, than lots of square white modern boxes! (Taken from the club page.) 

It was a great event, I massively underestimated how much extra money it would cost us though. That did put quite a big dampener on the weekend. I think if we had been childless, we could have sat and had a beer and a dance in the evening. I may have felt differently. Though the children and I, did love having a dance in the tents! 

It did at points feel like it had lost a bit of the love and the 'making money' had taken over a little. So my advice when attending is to take extra cash for rides and maybe a picnic.

The things which the kids loved where meeting and trying out things. (Free!) The love the owners had for what they had on display was great and that really came across. Not everyone was friendly and ok with little people sitting on things, but I can understand that and wasn't upset by it. We just made sure the kids always asked and didn't touch till they had the owners permission. 

Some owners shut their doors early and wouldn't let people look inside as they where cooking dinner. I was cooking spaghetti bolognese and chatting away to people. (Was out of main show hours.) Daisy is used and loved, she has given us so much freedom. We didn't buy her to look perfect at shows. We are however so happy to be apart of them and hope we do Daisy and the club proud!

If you want to know more about the festival, here's the link:

http://www.retrofestival.co.uk

And here is a link to the RCC:

http://www.retrocaravanclub.co.uk

If anyone has any matching poppy dinner sets sitting around unloved, please email me! 

Overall we really enjoyed the show and would like to go back next year. A few things we where upset over. Like the lack of Guinness World Record breaking adjudicators, to sign off on our Record Breaking attempt. Am sure we would have smashed the 104 record number of caravans slept in over night record! Would have been great to have called Daisy a record braking caravan!

With a little pre-planing on having a picnic and being prepared for the extra stress of being show ready, we really did have a great weekend! 

Very much looking forward to our next RCC event!