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1. Platja de la Barceloneta, 2. Arc de Triomf, 3. Hot chocolate

Particular favourites were Gelaaati, with their incredible gelati and ice creams, and the Museu de la Xocolata with their divine cups of real hot chocolate. Non-food related favourites would have to be Parc Güell and Sagrada Família – both designed by Gaudí and both rather incredible. The museum underneath the Sagrada Família was fascinating, and well worth the trouble.

Anyway, I’d highly recommend a weekend in Barcelona – I managed to get return flights (Ryanair/Easyjet) for £50, and travel in the city itself is cheap – €8.25 for a 10 journey metro/bus/tram ticket, which is more than sufficient if you are prepared to walk; we must have walked 5-10 miles every day (although with all the churros we ate, this was no bad thing!)

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Cross-posted at SmurfPop Travels

2011′s not been quite as up and down as 2010; there’s still been a few shitty moments that I shan’t be sad to say goodbye to, but we did have a beautiful new addition to the family, so I shouldn’t complain too much.

I really didn’t manage to fulfill any of my resolutions for 2011, which was a bit of a downer. I have set myself just a few for 2012, but I think (I hope!) they are a bit more attainable (and less vague than “Be happier”)

• Get in shape – I miss the gym so much!
• Reach 30 books read on my book list – currently 25.
• Visit 2 foreign countries – bonus if I haven’t been there before, extra bonus if I live there.

I know they sound daft, but I find it quite important to have something to aim for Have you got any resolutions for 2012?

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… Lots of knitting (just a small selection)…

… A bit of playing with my camera and some Christmas lights…

I’ve been asked to make 100 mini cupcakes for a party next month, so I thought I had better make a practice batch… I normally make giant cupcakes, more akin to muffins, but I think the smaller versions are actually a bit better – much less sickly. These cupcakes were supposed to have pillarbox red icing, but no matter how much colouring I put in, I couldn’t get it redder than this – is it possible?! And don’t even get me started on the green icing I tried – it was supposed to be a nice festive moss green, but ended up a neon lime green (plus it tasted foul). Very disappointing.

I also baked an apple cake (recipe here), which was absolutely delicious. I don’t have the sweetest tooth, but this was lush. My sister gave us a bag of apples she had been given, that must have weighed 5 or 6lbs – I think there are lots of apple crumbles and cakes coming up…

And I’ve also been doing some knitting…

Not the best picture, but hey. I managed to knit this in a day and I’m really pleased with it (despite the whole thing nearly unravelling; there was a knot in the yarn which was actually tying two ends together… Until it came undone. Not happy.) Anyway, I hope the recipient likes it

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Pink and sparkly, for a baby shower (let’s hope it doesn’t turn out to be a boy…)

In other stuff, I’ve made some scary realisations…

My yarn stash was previously housed in this – a roughly 16-20l box (that and a couple of plastic bags). After a bit of reorganising, it’s grown.

That’s a 55 litre box, as well as the old one. And it only just fits. I was scared by this point. I also updated my Ravelry stash page. I managed to mark 4 skeins as used. I added twenty two “new” skeins (to be fair, I had already had most of them for years, they had just evaded my last stash-checking). But still. That takes my stash up to eighty skeins of yarn. And that’s just the whole skeins, not the half-skeins or odd left over bits.

WHAT AM I GOING TO DO WITH IT ALL?

Seriously. I even went to the library and picked up a couple of books in the desperate hope that I’d find some inspiration and get knitting. Instead I just got all intimidated and indecisive.

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Anyway, this is all I have to show for the last couple of months, craft-wise.

Mittens On A String

This was a nice little pattern to knit – quick and easy, plus I think they look very sweet

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Finally, a finished project

I FINALLY finished the baby blanket I started in APRIL. I didn’t get it finished before the recipient was born (I knit one of the border sections whilst waiting for him to make his grand appearance) but I DID get it finished before he starts school, so I guess you win some, you lose some.

Horrid editing -_-

I’m glad it’s finally finished – overall I’m pretty pleased with it, and I think my nephew is too :3 I wish I’d tried a row of garter stitch between colour changes (as suggested) to make the line a bit crisper, but you live and learn, hey. And I must add a huge thank you to Mary Jane for her invaluable advice and pattern notes, so graciously offered in the face of me being so cheeky for asking.

Chocolate chip cookies, om nom nom

These made a very rainy Sunday afternoon a wee bit better.

Choc chip cookies

Oven: 180c

100 grams margarine
75 grams soft light brown sugar
2 tablespoons golden syrup
175 grams self raising flour
100 grams choc chips

Cream together margarine and sugar. Add rest of ingredients and mix well. Line baking tray and scoop up small balls of mix and drop onto tray. Place well apart (no need to flatten or shape them). Makes approximately 18. Bake for 8-10 minutes, until lightly golden. Best enjoyed warm and with a cold glass of milk

Mum found this recipe somewhere – I sincerely apologise I can’t link to the source, but I wanted to share it because it’s such a quick, foolproof recipe

An orchid that seemingly thrives on neglect

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Hidden inside was a big dollop of strawberry jam, which worked much better than the lemon curd did in my last batch of cupcakes – the key seems to be adding it after cooking, rather than before.

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First stop: Notre Dame

Our first (of many) tourist stops was the Notre Dame cathedral. We’d been on an overnight coach for 10 hours and all I wanted to do was have a shower and a nap, but alas, we had too much to see and I was branded a wimp. It was beautiful inside, but all the camera flashes and people videoing inside was rather irksome…

Next was the Cimetière du Père-Lachaise, which was just bizarre. There were big groups of people, led by tour guides, touring the cemetery and hunting out the most famous tombs. It was all rather surreal. Especially the gaggle of teenage girls getting stoned behind one of the tombs.

Monuments to Honoré de Balzac, Guillaume Apollinaire and Oscar Wilde, who seemed to be the most popular in the whole cemetery…

Our second day began with a wander along the Seine and over the Pont Des Arts…

… where we saw love padlocks. Lots of love padlocks.

Then there was the Musée d’Orsay, which was really rather lovely. I’m not generally an art lover in the sense of “going round big galleries looking at very old paintings”, but I really enjoyed it (except, perhaps, the part where we got talking to a member of staff, who talked for 45 minutes about everything from the history of Paris to Mick Jagger – my feet were not happy by this stage)

After the Musée, we did what I’m sure 99% of tourists in Paris do…

…Yep.

Unfortunately it was windy, cold and overcast, so I didn’t get any good pictures, but I did go all the way up to the very top, for posterity. I was even tempted to have a glass of champagne from the minute champagne bar up there – y’know, one of those things that you do just so you can say you’ve done it – but €10 for a thimbleful from a plastic glass didn’t really appeal too much. The whole experience took over two and a half hours. I couldn’t quite believe it took so long to be honest!

The third day was our last and so we headed to the Sacré Cœur in Montmartre.

The whole place was really rather lovely – there was a market on in the town square selling all sorts of loveliness. And we also found another love padlock…

Photo taken 28.05.2011 ^_^

After that we hoofed it across to the Grand Palais – unfortunately, it seemed like the tickets were going to be expensive, so we headed to the Petit Palais across the road instead. I found it a bit odd there – the exhibits seemed to be mooshed together, so there would be beautiful antique paintings alongside ultramodern sculptures, next to artwork done by local children. It was a bit much to take in! After THAT, we trotted off to the Panthéon, followed by a good rest in the beautiful (and scorching hot) Jardin des Tuileries.

And then we went home.

It was exhuasting. I wish we had been able to find nice places to eat that weren’t exhorbitantly expensive – we only ate out once and that was just out of sheer desperation. And one thing that REALLY annoyed me was the people who were aggressively selling absolute crap – all over the city were people flogging minature Eiffel Towers and fake handbags. Worse were the people actively conning tourists – asking people to sign “petitions”, but upon signing they demand money, or forcibly placing roses in your hand and then following you until you pay. And don’t even get me started on the hoardes of people doing the 3 card trick on naive tourists in Montmatre.

I’m not sure how I feel about Paris now. It’s expensive. It’s incredibly touristy. It’s exhuasting. I really wanted to love it, I really did.

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They certainly tasted good, and I was quite proud of myself for making lemon curd from scratch (I had no idea it was so easy!) but I definitely need to practice… My piping wasn’t great, and I used an electric grill in lieu of a blowtorch, which was both unsuccessful and ended up burning half the cupcakes. I was also hoping that the dollop of lemon curd in the middle would be like a doughnut, but it really wasn’t :/

In other news, there’ll be a little bloggle about Paris coming in the next few days…

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