52 New Things - Week Fifteen

This week, in the run up to Christmas, there was one thing on my list that I simply had to do; make a Christmas Wreath! 

Every year Stuart and I find ourselves wandering down the South Bank looking at all the Christmas stalls. I always spot the one that sells some beautiful Christmas wreaths, but I can never justify buying them. They seem quite expensive and when I see them I think, 'they're made out of oranges - how difficult could it be to make my own', but obviously I never have - until now! So you understand what I talking about, here is one of the beautiful wreaths I wanted to try and replicate.

Doesn't look too tough does it? The first thing I did was to go buy some oranges and cinnamon sticks. Then I dehydrated the oranges by chopping them into slices and popping them onto a rack in the oven and left them on a low heat for a few hours.

For the next step, I borrowed some holly from an neighbours overgrown hedge, and then to pull the wreath together I brought some garden wire from Homebase. I was ready to start construction!

Now, in hindsight I probably should have googled or visited Pinterest to see how to make the wreath, instead I decided to go with instinct. I started by shaping some of the wire into a big circle. Nice and easy.

Then it was just a case of donning some gloves, bending the holly and tying it on with more wire. Next I added some of the oranges and cinnamon sticks and to be honest it didn't look too good. By now I had been stabbed a few times by the holly and twisting wire was starting to bore me. So I brought out the big guns. Superglue.

What would you know, superglue didn't even work, after trying to add a few more orange slices and some baubles I gave in. This crafting stuff is hard work! So I present to you my monstrosity of a Christmas wreath.

It does look like a child made it, but I'm a little bit proud of it; it smells really nice at least, and from a distance it has some charm. As Cher in Clueless would say, 'it's a total Monet'. Whether it will be something I'll keep year in and out remains to be seen but for this year it will do. Merry Christmas! 

52 New Things - Week Fourteen

I've got a new obsession. And there's only one person to blame. This person. George.

Let me start at the beginning. I've had Netflix for a long time, and under the recommended titles one TV series keeps popping up, RuPaul's Drag Race. Yet I've never considered watching it. George recently got Netflix and insisted I watch Drag Race. So trusting in her amazing taste I accepted her guidance and now I can't stop. It's amazing. It's like America's Next Top Model, but with Drag Queens. It's easy to watch, addictive, and very entertaining. I'm currently on series 4 whilst George is lagging behind about to start series 3. During series 2 we both agreed that the best Queen was Pandora Boxx. I thought she was funny, glamorous and interesting. Now series 2 was on TV about 5 years ago, so I was pleasantly surprised to see that Pandora was going to do a couple of appearances in the UK, and what's more, she would be in London in December. I quickly decided that I had to get tickets as a Christmas present for George. What's more, 'Attending a Drag Show' was added to my list of '52 New Things'. 

I had never been to the club that Pandora would be appearing at, but as it was advertised as a club I figured we'd have to dress up (it's been a long time since I've been to a club, and thought it would be a whole 'no trainers' thing). So in heels and our most sparkly dresses George and I headed to West Five. On the tickets it said 'doors open at 8pm, show starts at 9pm', so, as any sensible person would, we arrived for 8.30pm. And we were the first people there. Seriously the place was deserted.

Not to be put off we grabbed a couple of drinks, found the best seats in the house, and waited for the show. The place was so empty that I decided I should be the first person to walk the stage that night.

9pm came and went, and we were still the only people present. More drinks were had. 9.30pm and a few people arrived. 10pm and whilst George and I were definitely starting to get a bit merry the place wasn't exactly jumping.

We had no idea what time the show would start so we did the only thing we could. We brought out the shots.

Now we were ready for a dance, and luckily they were playing some good tunes. Some time in the last half hour quite a few people had also begun to arrive. Joining the now pretty busy dance floor we broke out our well rehearsed dance routine and finally the compare, Rose Garden, announced Pandora would take the stage soon.

By now, we had been in the pub/club for over 3 hours and we were ready to be entertained. We headed to the front of the stage to welcome Pandora Boxx.

I've never been to a drag show before (hence it being one of my new things to try) so I only had 'Drag Race' and 'Priscilla, Queen of the Dessert' to go on, and unfortunately, overall I was a little disappointed. Pandora pretty much stood on the same spot the whole time, staying close to her notes. She did sing her own songs, but just as I was getting into one of the songs (Everyone Loves Dick) it was over! I think she was on stage for about 15 minutes and after waiting so long I was expecting more. She did look fabulous though.

As Pandora left, Rose Garden returned, got everyone dancing and generally pumped things up. Now I'm probably biased as Rose Garden was both more what I was expecting from a Drag Show, and also because I was the first one she pulled onto the stage to dance, but I enjoyed her comparing more than Pandora's show. She was loud, confident and demanded attention.

I think if I've learnt one thing from the show, it's that is there are many different drag performers with many different styles. And also don't worry about wearing heels to a club. You'll never compete with the Queens and sore feet will just cut away your dancing time. Because, after returning to the dance floor and hearing a dance version of Adele's 'Hello' we were spent. I guess that will happen if you arrive at 8.30pm but everyone else turns up at 10.30pm! I did have a fantastic, if somewhat bizarre, evening, it's been a long time since I've been dancing, and I had great company. I would like to go to another drag show to compare and see more performers - and when I do go I'll remember to get there a bit later. Merry Christmas George.

52 New Things - Week Thirteen

Stuart decided that he wanted to choose something off the 52 List for week thirteen. I had no idea what he would go for and was pretty surprised when he told me we'd be going to a roller disco! I can never convince Stuart to go ice-skating so I didn't think he'd want to join me for this task, but I was glad he picked it. This is because when I added this task to the list I had visions I would be so good at roller-skating, that I'd have to join a roller derby team. Now was my chance to find out! During December and January a pop-up roller disco called Bump has been set up on the South Bank near the Royal Festival Hall. Stuart brought our tickets for a Saturday afternoon, and after a wander through the nearby Christmas market we headed in.

I was really excited when I saw other people in the hall who had roller skates that lit up when they moved, so I pulled off my trainers and waited in anticipation for my light up skates! Imagine my disappointment when I was given these plain ones.

  

It didn't put me off for long though, as I was ready to discover my secret skating talent. Boots laced, nothing was going to stop me. With a joyful glee I stood up and suddenly realised, even as a kid, I couldn't skate. Still, I shuffled into the hall and hoped I wouldn't fall.

       

It took me a couple of laps and the occasional wobble but eventually I could get round without clinging to the side. As it got pretty busy I found it easier to skate through the middle as there were less people to interfere with my moves. One thing worth pointing out though was, although Bump is advertised as a roller disco, not many people were dancing. I think the evening sessions might be a bit more disco-ey, but my task was to go to a roller disco, so even if I was the only was I was going to dance!  

I could see everyone was impressed, but unfortunately my dance moves were to become Stuart's downfall. Geared on by my grace and elegance Stuart rightly decided you cannot leave a lady dancing on her own. As he joined me, even though he had definitely been the better skater all afternoon, dancing was a step too far as he fell in the most spectacular way. It was the funniest thing I had seen in a long time. There were arms and legs flailing all over the place as he tried to keep his balance, I think he managed to add in a pirouette, but eventually gravity took over and he crashed to the ground.

Once I had finished laughing (I'm sorry, it really was funny, it was like I was seeing him fall in slow motion) we continued to skate about, but I could see Stuart had lost his mojo. The fall had hurt his bum, and the boots were starting to rub, so we decided to quite whilst we (well me at least) were still ahead.

Overall I really enjoyed this task. I don't think I'm good enough to join a roller derby but I do want to go roller skating again. I didn't fall over, and I didn't have to cling to the side, so I take the whole task as a win. I don't know if I'll be able to convince Stuart to join me again though!

52 New Things - Week Twelve

For week twelve I picked the slightly ambiguously named task 'Visit an unique museum'. What I meant when I added this to the list was it had to be a random, specialist museum, not the Natural History, or Science museum as I've visited them plenty of times before. I wanted to go somewhere that there's only one of them and where the contents were a little odd, somewhere like the Fan Museum, or the Museum of Brands. In the end I picked a location pretty close to where I live, The Musical Museum, which is by Kew Bridge.

I've cycled past this building the few times I've bothered to get my bike out to commute to work, and couldn't work out what it was all about; was it the history of musical theatre? Or a particular musical genre, or perhaps a instrument range? Without knowing what we were going to be greeted with we headed in early one Sunday to be met by Roy, who was running a tour of the museum.

  
After deciding to join the (free) tour we were led into the main room to see a whole range of strange looking contraptions. It turns out the Musical Museum is a collection of clockwork and self-playing instruments. Roy explained how the museum came together after a local man started to collect antique clockwork and motorised instruments from across the world. He stored them all at a local church, and when that started to get over run the Musical Museum was born. Starting with a small exquisite music box and ranging into large organs and self-playing pianos Roy demonstrated a few of the most interesting items. 

My favourite one had to be the self-playing violin. After years of lessons as a child I could never get past the screechy beginners stage, so to learn there was a machine that could have played for me and saved me years of practice was a revelation. We were also able to have a go on a mechanical piano which was tougher than it looked to play, but a lot of fun.

Joining the tour was definitely a great decision. Without Roy, his fascinating stories and demonstrations we would have been left in a room looking at strange items, trying to figure out how they worked. The demos brought the items to life and let us imagine a time when these would have been displayed and shown off in the grandest of houses. Most of the items were born in the Victorian era and the newest was from the 1940's. After that date most houses would have had record players which quickly made these instruments obsolete. I think that they are so fascinating. They are a snap shot into a short flash of history and now I have seen and learnt a little about them I am glad some were saved and stored here.

  
Once we had wandered through the downstairs rooms Roy took us upstairs to see their Mighty Wurlitzer organ. This is one of a few of the Wurlizer's in the UK, and we were lucky enough to hear their organist Chris Barber play a few tunes for us.

This style of organ was from the 1920's and would have been used in cinemas during silent film screenings. The organist would have played along with the film enhancing the mood for the audience and adding atmosphere. I was pretty interested to hear that the Museum run monthly film nights where they play an old film with the organ accompanying it. I am definitely going to the January film night to check this experience out. It sounds like a one of a kind event and as a film geek I don't want to miss out. I definitely recommend a trip here, but make sure you join a tour so you can see some of these instruments brought to life!

52 New Things - Week Eleven

As week eleven drew in I could feel myself on the cusp of giving in to this cold that has been going round. Well, that's my excuse for picking a relatively relaxed task this week; baking biscuits. I've wanted to try a particular recipe out for ages. It's a really old one, and I remember my mum making these each Christmas when I was young. A couple of years ago my mum gave me the book with the recipe in and it's taken me this long to try it! The book is The Good Housekeeping's 'Basic Cookery' Book, and this addition was published in 1956 so is almost 65 years old!

It's fun to flick through the book and see what they were making back in the 50's. In the book they show you how to pluck your own chicken, make your own soup with what you have to hand, but the most impressive section is the part dedicated to cakes. I think half the book must focus on cakes, and there's so many options to pick, from rock cakes, Madeleines, Christmas cakes,  and even a 'make your own three tier wedding cake'! 

The recipe I wanted though was the one for Finnish Ginger Biscuits. I remember these being amazing when I was a kid. Not too crunchy like ginger nuts can be, but slightly soft in the middle, and more crispy on the outside. Now I had the chance to see if I could match my childhood memories! I gathered the ingredients and was pleased to see that it all seemed very simple to make.

You melt the butter, golden syrup and sugar in a pan, without boiling. Then at the same time sieve the flour, spices and baking powder together. So far, so good. Once the butter has melted, mix the two until you form a nice dough. Mine did seem a bit sloppy so I had to add a little bit more flour, but once I had done that it looked okay, and smelt lovely.

The book says you should leave the dough for an hour, or better overnight, so I left mine overnight and went back to it first thing he next morning. I have no idea why it says to leave it. It's not like bread, it doesn't need to rise, and mine looked exactly the same as when I had left it. So now it was time to make my biscuits! 

My baking equipment is still pretty basic (because I never do any) so in the absence of a rolling pin and cookie cutter I had to improvise with what I had to hand! The wine glass worked particularly well in making uniform biscuits though. I was a little worried with the first batch as I didn't have any greaseproof paper so I thought I'd be scrapping biscuits off the tray but after 15 minutes in the oven they slipped off the tray and onto a wire rack to cool. They look pretty good don't you think?

And they tasted just like I remembered. Well almost, they could have been a bit softer in the middle, but the gingery-ness was spot on. They smell whilst they were cooking made the house feel so Christmassy that I decided to get the Christmas decorations out and set them up so I could eat the biscuits with my Yule Cat (Jólaköttur) looking on. A perfect way to start the season. I've even invested in a gingerbread man cookie cutter so the people at work will be getting some of these soon!