Spicy 3-Sausage Pasta

Although it's never going to win any beauty contests, this dish is one of my favourites (especially now that autumn is drawing in). It's hyper speedy to make and really tasty.

As well as some pasta (I just used dried 3-colour spirals as I had some in the cupboard), you will need 3 types of sausage (cocktail sausages, mini salami and hotdogs), bell pepper (any colour), hot sauce (at the moment I'm using Cholula, but Encona/Tabasco etc will do the same job), tomato puree and creme fraiche.

Chop the sausages and pepper into pieces approx 1.5". In a small/medium pan, heat some olive oil and gently fry the pepper for a couple of minutes. Throw in the sausage, a few dashes of balsamic vinegar and some sugar and continue to fry for a couple of minutes. Now start to boil the water for the pasta and throw pasta in once boiling. Add a good splodge of tomato puree (enougth to amply coat the sausages and pasta) and hot sauce (as much or little as you like!!), and cook a bit more. When pasta is just about ready to drain stir some creme fraiche into the sauce mixture. Drain pasta and add to sauce. Serve with some grated parmesan and black pepper.

Thanks for looking.

Lisa xoxo

For my Mum

Tomorrow's Mum's birthday, so I made her this card.

The background paper is Dovecraft Hint of Pink (from my new stash). Flower dies are Bosskut Wild Flower and Wildflower Cutout. Font dies are Curly Girlie. The border is one of the Cuttlebug Frills Border embossing folders (also from new stash - I love love love using new stuff). Edges are inked with Dark Peony Cats Eye Chalk Ink (I think this colour is just fab!).

Here's a little close up of the border embossing - I bought these and thought I might never use them, but actually I really like this one.

I'm quite liking my white background for a bit of a change, although I really need to make myself a banner for my title. A long time since I've done anything like that, so may have to trawl for a tutorial.

Toodles

Lisa xoxo

A Bunch of Stuff

After a few weeks of not really making anything, managed to get a few things done this week.

I had a call from a colleague on Thursday who needed a pair of earrings to wear on Saturday night. As I was busy Thursday and working Saturday morning, I made them on Friday and she popped round to pick them up Saturday afternoon. I had never thought of putting these colours together (well would have put some of them together, but not the lilac), but they turned out really nice.

As it was a last-minute order, I had to scramble about and use stuff I had which fitted the colour remit of orange, red, yellow, black and lilac. She also wanted chunky. I've had these orangy/yellowy discs for a while and always liked them. The others were just picked from my jumble of beads. I threaded the discs on eyepins, the top section on eyebins and the bottom danglers on headpins and just hooked the lot together.

Thursday was Stu's birthday, so I made him a cake. I asked him what sort of cake he wanted and he decided on chocolate. I don't like chocolate cake, except for Black Forest Gateau, so made one of those - not the prettiest thing ever, but it tasted really nice. I didn't have any kirsch though and couldn't see any in the Asda next to work, so just added some vodka to the cherry juice!

I also made this card for him. I always struggle a bit with man cards (I think most people do), but did manage to find a nice Metallica font, which kept the rock god happy, especially since Death Magnetic was released on his birthday. I've used DCWV Rock Star papers, inked with dark peony Cat's Eye chalk inks. The font is Pastor of Muppets, with the last letters being Pastor of Muppets Flipped.

Treated myself to one of those little portable studios from Maplin everyone has been raving about and I love it (even though I've only used it once, to photograph the earrings). Still need to faff around with it a bit though, as I was getting quite a bit of reflection of the glass on the background, although I think it looks quite nice. Anyways, I'm great at faffing, so shouldn't be too much of a hardship.

Thanks for looking. Toodles xoxo

In the Middle...

...of changing my blog layout, so sorry it's a bit of a shambles atm - still getting to grips with this drag and drop way, plus internet has been mega slow tonight.