Marilyn Painting

For Christmas this year I decided to do a painting for my favorite blogger friend. Little did I know just how long an oil painting would take...the first week or so seemed disastrous. The next few weeks, things improved...slightly...and finally, the last couple of weeks the painting actually looked the way I'd imagined.

Maybe if I had more time and energy for painting this process would progress a little more. Currently I have two paintings sitting half-finished on my easel. Maybe by the end of 2009 I'll be able to finish them. Funny how life gets in the way of art!

Happy Holidays!!!

~flutterbyblue

Turk dance from Scrubs

Ever watch Scrubs? This scene is classic:

who says white birds can't dance?

Spun sugar and rice pudding

During my food blog travels, I happened upon this delectable-sounding recipe:

Rice Pudding and Spun Sugar

She includes a link to another one of my favorite food bloggers, Tartelette !

Now I have a craving for rice pudding...yum!

~flutterbyblue

Image lifted from hungrygirlporvida.blogspot.com.

Teatime!

Had I known of Portea at the Berkeley Hotel in Knightsbridge, London, I SO would have stopped by for tea.


Nibble on edible versions of designer collections, (updated every six months), and sip tea from fine bone china designed by Paul Smith in collaboration with Thomas Goode of Mayfair.

"The tailor-made tea is served so that, whenever a guest takes a cake or savoury nibble, it is quickly replaced on the cake stand. Over and over, one can relive the excitement of a Louis Vuitton dress selling out and being re-issued, simply by stuffing one's face."

This is likely the only place where you can come close to some of these highfalutin fashion-world trends.

Yum!

~flutterbyblue

Image lifted from www.iht.com.

Chocolate Factory

Remember the episode of I Love Lucy when Lucy and Ethel worked at a chocolate factory?



Read about one girl's experience at See's Candy Factory in San Francisco! Too bad See's doesn't offer regular tours...(it's invitation only.)

~flutterbyblue

Advent Calendar

In search of a really garish and tacky Advent Calendar to hold up as an example of what NOT to do, I instead came across this simple, and very cute wood Advent Calendar instead:

Having grown up with the occasional paper Advent Calendar filled with small, unimpressive chocolates or plastic toys, the idea of filling one's own calendar is a novel idea. Fill one of these with Teuscher chocolates and I'd be hooked!


~flutterbyblue

Images lifted from amazon.com and www.teuscher.com

Christmas Gift Ideas for the Foodie

Love this Teatime Hamper from Fortnum and Mason:
It comes with a little fruit cake, some marmalade to go on your buttered toast, loose leaf tea, and some sweets to go with your cuppa. Plus it all comes packaged in a quaint wicker hamper. How British!

I am awaiting the day when one of these places opens in Boston. There's nothing quite like the food halls of London.

Another fabulous gift (for the foodie) is this fascinating Salts of the World sampler:
Try anything from Italian Trapani Sea Salt to Seoul Bamboo Salt to Black Lava Salt. The list goes on. I've always wondered whether pink salt really tastes any different from blue salt...

Although I admit this weirds me out, handmade "sushi" chocolates from Suedy's Koo-Ki Sushi make for a cute stocking stuffer:
These pieces come with hand-molded dark or white chocolate plates, artfully edged with edible copper or gold luster. The sushi may look real, but it's all dessert - crisp rice cookies, apricot flavored "gummi-eggs", bits of caramel, chocolate, and meringue.

Prefer something a bit healthier? How about a basket of baby veggies:
Send your favorite foodie friend a selection of artichokes, beets, broccoli, radishes, cauliflower, eggplant, carrots...all in miniature!

~flutterbyblue

Images lifted from ww.fortnumandmason-usa.com, www.earthy.com, www.kookisushi.com, and www.melissas.com