Well done! I agree with the previous commenters re. the spacing of laughing and emphasis.

I'm after a pattern for the Eiffel Tower done in blackwork. Anybody remember seeing one in a book or anywhere? 

This contains a chocolate cake made from this recipe, which I highly recommend - although whenever I've made it I've put buttercream and raspberry jam in between the layers, rather than the ganache (I recommend doing this for a bit of freshness, in order to make it less sickly sweet). I did put the ganache on top.

The cake is then wrapped in a chocolate "wall" higher than the cake, and the resulting "basket" I filled with mixed berries from the garden.

To make the chocolate wall, measure the circumference of the cake and then the height you want it to be. Add a little to the circumference to make sure the ends overlap a little (maybe half an inch?). Draw a rectangle that size on some greaseproof paper, making the lines go well beyond where they cross so you can see them even when the rectangle is covered with chocolate. Trim the paper to about an inch from the line. Turn the paper over. Melt chocolate (I used about 100 grams but it turned out a bit too thin, so I recommend making more than that) and spread it over the rectangle which you can (hopefully) see through the paper, going over the lines a bit. It's best if you have a stone surface to do it on as it will help with the cooling. (Don't do it on a hot day!) Now keep an eye on it while it cools, and when it's set just enough - i.e. it is malleable, not dripping, but not solid - trim off the edges of the chocolate along the lines of the rectangle you drew, and then trim off the paper along the edges of the rectangle. Now, working quickly, pick the whole thing up and wrap it around the cake (with the paper on the outside!), making sure the ends overlap (peel the paper away from the end so the chocolate sticks to itself). They should still stick together if the chocolate is soft. If they don't you could gently brush some of the ganache or something like that in between. At this point it's best to leave it alone to set, don't poke at it too much! It may look like it will be a disaster, but it will probably turn out ok. Leave it in a cool place for an hour or so, then peel off the paper.

If you get any holes in the chocolate, don't try to fix them with hot melted chocolate! It will only melt a bigger hole (I say this from experience). You'll need chocolate or ganache that is still liquid but not hot. Anyway, any holes will only add that nice homemade touch!

That's awesome. Great job on figuring out how to make the dots!

I agree it doesn't need framing.

I made this door sign that says WELCOME (in Finnish) in a hurry when I needed a housewarming gift for a friend who has a wire-haired fox terrier.



We had some old, very weathered bits of wood from some bush supports I took down from our garden, so I sawed off a bit (maybe 6 inches long) which had some moss on it. Sanded it a bit, put on a thin watery coat of white acrylic craft paint, then painted the letters and the doggy picture and sanded again a bit to retain the weathered look. I actually tried to transfer the letters from a printout using the technique described here, but I guess my letters were too thin and small so it didn't really work at all. So I just copied them freehand.

The piece of wood had a couple of rusty screws in it from some hardware so I took them out and screwed them to the top to tie the twine to.

It didn't quite come out like I'd envisioned but it was the best I could manage in the time available and with the materials I had on hand! It took maybe a couple of hours total, including drying time on a very humid day.

Before: sad and broken (from being left out in the rain and enduring our cold winters), with wobbly wheels



After: much happier and much more useful!

 

[Thank you]

I thought the same thing! Having them disappear from the main list would make it easier to keep track of which ones I bookmarked already.

I agree, I wish they DID disappear from the main list because I classified a few of them the other day but now I want to do more I can't tell which ones I did already! Especially as the order of the main list changes according to which threads have new posts. At least, when you click on the green plus sign, it should tell you which folders (if any) the bookmark is already in.

But anyway, this is only a problem at the start, when the bookmarks aren't classified. Once you start classifying them when you make the bookmark, the problem disappears.

Thank you for adding this functionality! It was something I'd wished for for a long time.

Really well done! It's so beautiful.

I love the railings and weathervane! Brilliant piping skills.

Adorable. And quite intricate! Good job!