Amanda's Low Calorie Brownie Muffins

Using a box of devils food cake mix, replace all the wet ingredients with pumpkin puree.  Here is the recipe http://www.hungry-girl.com/show/surprises-shockers-and-swaps-yum-yum-brownie-muffins-recipe.
By Amanda

Sophie's Blanket

     While I was waiting for my wool to come to knit my blanket, I made one for Sophie my cat.

By Betty

Betty's Blanket (The Ladies Circle)

     At last my blanket is finished what a roller coaster that was.  To start off my wool was four days late in coming, then I had visitors for ten days so no knitting got done.  Then the following week my visitors came back for another three days so again no knitting done.  But to top it all when I started sewing it together I kept finding mistakes.  So out it comes "Sorted".  Would you believe it the more I was sewing the more mistakes I was making, I nearly gave up as it was doing my head in.  I think I was making mistakes because I was rushing it as everyone was finished but me, plus I was tired.  But I got there in the end.  So here is my finished blanket, I hope you all like it.  Can't wait for the next project. xxx
By Betty

Aileen's Blanket (The Ladies Circle)

     Here is my blanket, what a mess huh!  I didn't enjoy this project and I don't like it.  I think it's off to the charity shop very soon : )

By Aileen

Christine's Blanket "The Nightmare Blanket" (The Ladies Circle)

Some of my squares.

 A trial run.

My big pile of squares.

Lots to do.

Don't look too closely.

The nightmare blanket.

     Well, it's finished, the blanket that is, almost my life as it took up all my energy, it was stressful and boring all at the same time.  

     I started off with a different pattern and that was sooooo long and tedious, so I gave that up and decided to go with small squares instead.  Some I crocheted which made it a wee bit quicker as crochet is very quick, then it was coming along nicely, but then I knew I needed a million squares and that's when it got to be boring.  But I was excited when I was on my last square.  Yippee!

     Then it came time to sew it all together, ugh, double ugh!  I couldn't quite get into the groove of sewing it together, then I took a look at it and thought if I turn it this way it may be easier and that's exactly what I did and it was very easy.  But that was only going one way, now I had to sew down the way to join it altogether, then I had an idea, maybe I should crochet it, so I did and it gave it another look.

     In the end I was very pleased with it but I won't be in any hurry to make another patchwork blanket I can tell you that.

By Christine

Rose-Ann's Blanket (The Ladies Circle)

     I knitted this baby blanket with love for my new grandchild who will be born at the end of April.  From Grandma xx.

By Rose-Anne

Kathleen's Blanket (The Ladies Circle)

     Here is my patch-work blanket, I am reasonably pleased with the final outcome. But if I'm honest I found it a chore and very difficult to keep up the interest in making it.
By Kathleen

Miniature Blueberry Crumb Muffins

These were the first batch of muffins I ever attempted.  After craving blueberry muffins, I decided to make my own from scratch.  I started with large organic blueberries bursting with flavor, and folded them into the batter to keep from mashing them.  Of course, no muffin would be complete without a crumb topping!  They turned out great, and a little heavy, so they were quite filling as an afternoon snack.  With only 15 minutes of prep time and 20 minutes in the oven, these make a simple sweet treat for any occasion, and the aroma makes the house smell wonderful!

Ingredients:

Batter:
1 1/3 cup of flour
1/3 cup of white sugar
1/3 cup of brown sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons of baking powder
1/2 a teaspoon + a pinch of salt
1/2 cup of milk
1/3 cup of vegetable oil
2 eggs
1 cup of blueberries
1 teaspoon vanilla

Crumb Topping:
1/3 cup all purpose flour
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup softened butter
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Directions:
1.  Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

2.  Mix dry batter ingredients (flour, white sugar, brown sugar, baking powder, and salt).

3.  Add the milk, vegetable oil, eggs, and vanilla to the batter.

4.  Gently fold the blueberries into the batter.

5.  In a separate bowl, mix the crumb topping ingredients (flour, brown sugar, softened butter, and ground cinnamon).  The mixture should make small clumps after a while.

6.  Fill greased or lined muffin pans with batter 3/4 full.

7.  Top each muffin batter with crumb topping.

8.  Bake for 15-25 minutes.

9.  Most important step of all: ENJOY!

Best of luck in your baking adventures.
-Jonathan A. Neary

Chloes Knitting Kit

Chloe And Harrys Christmas Cake

Jonathans Christmas Cookies

     As Sam's Christmas cookies are carefully counted out for presents, Jonathan decided to make his own batch of Peanut Butter Blossoms.  He did an excellent job!

Sams Christmas Cookies

 Sugar Cookie

 Peanut Butter Blossoms

 Sugar Cookie

 Sugar Cookie

 Gingerbread Cookie

 Sugar Cookie

 Swedish Spritz Cookies

     Sam has been very busy the past two days baking her famous Christmas cookies. 

Nutella Brownie Cupcakes

     My sister showed me a similar photo of these wee cupcakes and I thought they were fake, until she told me they were real cake in a cup and you put the cake filling into the cups and put them in the oven, wow, fantastic I thought, I have to have them. Sure enough my sister (Betty) mailed me a set of 4 and I made some brownies with extra chocolate chips, popped them in the oven for about 15minutes.  When they cooled I covered them with Nutella yum, yum and sprinkles and I put them on their saucer and gave the children I take care of one each. They loved them.
Thank you Betty.

By Christine Neary

Heathers Scarf (The Ladies Circle)

      I went shopping with my mom (NOT a knitter) at Nancy O's, our local yarn shop. My mom admired this very lacy spirally scarf in a Wedgewood blue-type color. Not her normal kind of scarf OR color. But I took the hint and after I dropped her home, I scurried back to the yarn shop to buy the yarn and the pattern. The yarn was this lovely kid mohair/silk blend, and wouldn't you know the shop was already sold out and had to order it. It wasn't to come in until the 17th (ack!) but they swore this scarf was "one skein, one hour," so I tried not to panic. The yarn came in and I picked it up Saturday (the 18th?). My mom (who the scarf is FOR) was at my house all day and I had to wait for her to leave before bringing out the knitting and getting started. I was getting antsier and antsier. FINALLY it was time. I looked at the yarn in consternation. It was a lacy tube. How would I even cast on? I looked at the pattern in horror. It made absolutely no sense. Make two stitches 5 cm apart and that's the whole row? Depressed and angry, I logged on to Rowan.com, watched a tutorial, started knitting and sure enough...had made the whole scarf in one hour! Amazing! And I think it's lovely!! And the best part was...when I registered (for free) at Rowan, they asked if I was part of a knitting group or circle....I could answer "yes"!!

By Heather

Michelles Scarf (The Ladies Circle)

     I am not a knitter I have been trying for years with the help of my Mum but I just can't do it.  So I thought I would make a scarf on the knitting loom and here is the result. I was so pleased with it that I would like to make another one.

By Michelle

Kathleens Scarf (The Ladies Circle)

     This is my scarf, feel quite proud for my first attempt.

By Kathleen Murchie

Aileens Scarf (The Ladies Circle)

     This was a very fast scarf to knit.  I like the way it sits neatly around my neck or Conroys neck.  I'm looking forward to hearing what our teacher has in store for our next project.  Have a lovely Christmas everyone.

By Aileen Doyle

My Ugly Scarf (The Ladies Circle)

     This scarf caused me a lot of grief, here is how it went.

     My friend asked me to make her a scarf, she also picked the colour Rust (which is what I thought it was).  I decided to do a cable stitch to make it look pretty, so I started the scarf, did a few inches then started to make mistakes, I wasn't quite sure of the cable stitch yet, anyway needless to say I ripped it out about 5 times and was getting very frustrated.  So after I had quite a few inches done I showed it to my friend Alcina (yes, I am making sure everyone see's her name, so no one will knit for her hahaha) and would you believe she had the nerve to tell me it wasn't the colour she wanted, that it wasn't rust and she did not want that kind of scarf, I was set to blow, I argued with her that when she asked me to make her a scarf, this is what she chose and she flat out denied it.  Then she continues to show me scarves that she likes and asked me can I knit her this one or that one, well, I just flat out said NO and told her she is not getting it, scarf anyone?

     Anyway, I continued to knit and knit and knit and dropped stitches,and forgot what row I was on and ripped out and did it again and continued to knit hating every minute of this scarf, and to top it all, it kept curling inwards,i wish i had curled inwards.

      Here is the finished product, just don't let me see it again.

By Christine Neary

Collar Scarf (The Ladies Circle)

     My last project for The Ladies Circle happened to be a 14 foot long scarf, so I decided to go in the opposite direction and make a collar scarf.  I crochet a ridge stitch using some left over chunky yarn; however, because the ridge stitch takes up a lot of yarn, I ran out half way through my project and was forced to buy another ball.  Sam picked out the large wooden buttons for me from her store and with the help of Youtube made my first item that contained working buttons...YAY!

By Suzy Neary

Bettys Scarf (The Ladies Circle)

     Here is my scarf that only took a couple of days to do.  It's about 60 inches long without the fringe.  It's lovely soft wool and very warm.

By Betty McCreadie

Rose Ann And Michael's Handmade Gifts

 I made this coloured blanket for my gorgeous Grand-daughter Phoebe.

By Rose Ann

Michael made this castle for our Grandson Lewis for xmas.

Bettys Kitty

Bettys Tea Cakes

Bettys Handmade Jewelry

I have never made jewellery before but I thought I would give it a go and here is the result. 

By Betty McCreadie

Aileens Blanket (The Ladies Circle)

I enjoyed knitting this blanket. The pattern is very easy. I did have to rush at the end because my sisters all came to visit and I knew I would never have time to knit while they were here.

By Aileen Doyle

Bettys Tablecloth (The Ladies Circle)

This is my tablecloth that I made.  I started off knitting it but the pattern I used made the tablecloth go all wonky...it was very wide on one side!  So I ripped it out and started again with another pattern - that went the same way!  So in the end, I decided to crochet it.  It looks fab on the table and I'm very pleased with the results!

By Betty McCreadie

Kathleens Blanket (The Ladies Circle)

     Here is my finished blanket, also a picture of the wool that I used.  Fell in love with this wool when I saw it. But little did I know the amount of hassle it was going to cause. The original pattern suggested I cast on 80 stitches, but I found that extremely difficult to manage. Then having already tried and ripped it out 5 times, I decided that the only solution was to shorten it. I then took it back to 60 stitches and as you can see there is now an end result.

By Kathleen Murchie

Beach Buddy (The Ladies Circle)

     I was very excited when my Auntie Chris told me about her knitting circle idea, nothing like a needle crafter with a mission!  I decided to crochet a circle scarf using some yarn I already had sitting in my basket.  The last foot of crocheting seemed to take forever but here is the end result.  I took a picture of it on the beach where it will spend most of it's life protecting my face and ears from the biting winter wind.

By Suzy Neary

Shawl We Dance Tra La La (The Ladies Circle)

      I decided to get in touch with my sisters and friends and ask them if they would be interested in a knitting circle where we would all knit something and start on a particular date and end on a particular date.  It was my way of trying to get us all to keep in touch more often, as we were kind of dwindling, well, they all agreed and I set a date for the last week in October and to be finished their project on the last day of November.

     So far a few of us have been keeping in touch throughout the whole project and I sent emails to make sure they were all busy knitting and it turned out to be a lot of fun and a lot of Skypeing.

     Here is my finished project,The Shawl for those chilly knights.  I am very pleased with it and it was very easy, just plain/purl and casting on at every end, I used circular needles as the shawl was getting too big for regular needles.  I dare say I will be wearing it when I am doing my next knitting project.

     Hopefully everyone else will be finishing their knitting very soon and getting it on this blog for all to see.

 By Christine Neary