Winter hats

Now that the winter has well and truly arrived in Ireland anyway, thoughts turn to cozy hats and winter wollies! I recently opened an Etsy shop http://www.etsy.com/shop/SarahMaiDesigns and thought that my days would be spent in Victorian industrial servitude, bent over a work station, ruining my eyesight coping with all my orders. My Phillip Treacy dreams are ebbing away I can tell you! There is so much out there, so many talented people beavering away on their own projects and producing really excellent crafts and designs that mine are getting a bit lost. So, I decided to start this blog. It won't just be about my designs, but about cookery, art, things to do, whats going on....I suppose a lifestyle blog is how you could categorize it. Random witterings of a slightly deranged Irish woman is another description...
So today it's just a general introduction to blogging for me and the best cookery book wrapping idea ever! Tomorrow I will be posting the BEST braised red cabbage recipe that can be frozen and reheats perfectly - something great to get in the freezer and out of the way for Christmas. This blog will be initially a countdown to Christmas, posting wrapping ideas, recipes and general Christmassy things in the run up to the 25th December. After that, only time will tell.

Today I saw this wrapping idea on http://pinterest.com/pin/147352219027657522/

I think it's fantastic - wrapping a cookery book in a fancy tea towel to give to a friend who is into cookery - how clever is that? I love when someone makes an effort with a present. You can get fabulous tea towels in TK Maxx now - a cut above the standard tea towel  in lovely stiff cotton with unusual designs and half the price of somewhere like Brown Thomas. I have some really pretty ones that I use to wrap my brown bread in when it comes steaming out of the oven! They never see a scrap of washing up.