Recycled Tote Bags by Alice Draws The Line

These have just arrived in the Alice Draws The Line Etsy Shop! They are 100% Recycled Polyester Tote bags. I've created 10 designs in total... here are a few for you to see! To view them all, do have a look in the shop by clicking this link!

A couple more mug designs

I have recently designed two more mugs, first up is the River Mug;

Inspired by the River Severn which runs through Shrewsbury, as I frequently walk along it's banks (often on the way back from the post office). You can find the River Mug by clicking here

The other design started as a 'Mere Mug' inspired by the mere's in Shropshire - Colemere and Ellesmere in particular. I've now renamed it 'Ducks and Friends', you can find it by clicking here

Both of these designs are available both in Enamel and China. For more picture and a list of species that feature on the mug, please see the links to the shop. 

Sorry it's early...

There are some festive items now in the shop - these include two new china cup designs - Holly & Ivy and a Christmas Badgers design. 

I've also been rash and designed some festive temporary tattoos - perfect for Christmas parties or stocking fillers.

There are currently two new Christmas Card designs too - Christmas Badgers and Chocolate Coins.

All of these can be found in the Etsy shop by clicking here!

Feasting in the Forest part 2 - campfire doughnuts!

Having looked through the photos from the bank holiday of camping in the woods I realised there are so many food pictures it is worth a couple of blog posts at least. 

Here is another easy one that I've done with children at work in the past - but was really fun to do socially. 

We made two versions, the first with Elderberry and ginger jam and the second version were lemon curd doughnuts. 

To begin with, buy or make some white bread, choose your filling and make some pancake batter...

Spread the filling on the bread (we didn't bother with butter) and add another piece of bread to complete the sandwich.

Next, cut the sandwich into squares - we went for bitesize and did 9 squares out of the one sandwich. We also left the crusts on.

Dip these into the pancake batter so that it covers all sides (we lowered them into a jug of pancake batter with some tongs), then add to the pan with some butter or oil

Turn them so they cook on all sides...

... temporary tattoo wearing is optional! (but if you feel it would help you can buy them here!) I also highly recommend using a handmade spatula - made by another member of the team (and hopefully soon to be available to buy - watch this space!).

Finally, when all sides are cooked, take them out of the pan and cover in sugar - we used granulated as forgot to take any caster sugar (or you could use icing sugar) with us. The jam will be HOT! so this sugar covering stage gives it some time to cool a bit but do check the temperature before enjoying as they keep their heat for a while (especially if you are doing this with children).

We had ours out of another beautiful bowl by CalderWares (they are busy making at the moment but do check out the Etsy shop for handmade goodness!)

The bank holiday weekend - feasting in a forest!

Last bank holiday a tiny, select few of us decided to camp in the woods. We fitted it in around other family commitments and so spent just a bit of evening and breakfast time at our camp before going and washing the woodsmoke out of our hair and doing something quite different. 

This year, we had no other plans - just to be in the woods, from Friday until Monday. There were a few more of us at times and we were all able to use and share our different skills to make a thoroughly enjoyable time. 

One of the things we were most excited about was cooking / food - so I thought I'd share a few pictures here... there is going to have to be another blog post as it turns out we cooked too much / took too many photos!

I took some mugs along - which we used throughout! Above is a morning cup of tea - the mugs can be found in the Etsy shop here

Something we sometimes make in my day job (Forest School) is chocolate orange cakes, cooked in the orange skin in the embers of the fire. This weekend we built an oven and so sat them in a pan (just to stop them wobbling over) and popped them in that! Here is a step by step guide - we just used a packet brownie mix and used some of the orange juice from the hollowed out oranges instead of water.

 I'll write another post with a few more of the treats we cooked - for now here is some of the lovely summer sun on the bracken. The temporary tattoos can also be found in the shop by using this link