Why 'Wine' Gums?

On my way home from Cambridge this morning I bought a tube of Maynards Wine Gums at Waterloo. As I was munching my way through them I wondered why they're called 'Wine' Gums when they don't actually taste of wine.

When I got home I looked it up (aren't I a sap?!) and according to Wikipedia "the name comes from the lingering, subtle fruit flavours that make it similar to the experience of savouring a fine wine" and that's why they have the names of various alcoholic drinks such as 'Port', 'Claret' and 'Hock' stamped on them. So now I know!

Cupcakes

It's my niece Robyn's fourth birthday today so I've made these cute cupcakes to take with me when I go and see her this afternoon. Vanilla cakes topped with pink buttercream decorated with sugar flowers and a dusting of spangly edible glitter. Yum!

Sneaky Peek

These 'Banana & Pomegranate' beads are part of the batch that I will have for sale on my website this evening. For some reason they're extra shiny - getting that one on the left to balance on top of the Torus bead was tricky. They behaved in the end, though!

There will be lots of Torus beads for sale tonight - you all seem to be loving those.

A non-beady Laura creation

When I'm travelling to and from Cambridge I find that my normal handbag just isn't big enough. Sure, it may look nice with its shiny silverness but it's no good for holding my book, iPod, purse, phone and other travelling and handbag-related paraphernalia. When I was browsing around my favourite haberdashery (love that word) shop the other day I saw some fab red and white polka dot fabric and I thought I'd make myself a bag from it.

It's quite roomy and fastens with a swanky magnetic closure. The big red button does nothing except look nice. I love buttons - I ended up buying a huge transparent lavender-coloured one. I have no idea what I'll use it for but I just knew I had to have it in my life!

I've got a bit of a thing for red and white polka dots at the moment (understatement) and I've always been partial to black and white stripes so I decided to line my bag with some. I really enjoyed making this bag. I think I might have to make another .....

'Mostly Magenta'

One for all the pinkaholics out there!

So, we're in September and are therefore sliding down the slippery slope towards Christmas. I saw a Christmas tree for sale on one of the TV shopping channels the other night and I reckon we'll be seeing huge tins of Quality Street, crackers and festive gift wrap and greetings cards in the shops before the month is at an end.

Oh joy.

More Torus beads. Don't you just love the yellow and pink together? Reminds me of sweets - those yellow bananas and pink shrimps. They don't taste the same as they used to. It's just no fun since they took all the E-numbers and artificial naughty stuff out of them!