moon river

>drawing on a boat at night<

Ra !

Ra Paulette has created these carved cave houses in the desert in New Mexico. He works with hand tools such as shovels, pick axes and scrapers. It looks like pure mediation to me, what bliss he's created. A temple, a sacred space.

hand chopping but not chopping hands

one of my favourite pastimes...when the sun is shining :)

hand tinting

this wood cut was inspired by building round structures with Tony Wrench, roundhouse pioneer, he is awesome ... This is his guest house which features in Lloyd Kahns (another dude) upcoming book by Shelter publications.

chocolate & tahini

 

This weekend the river flooded the marina and me and my neighbours were marooned for a day. As I watched the river rise and zoom past my kitchen window I mixed up a banana cake. It was one of the cosiest feelings ever, the fire was roaring, the wind was howling, rain lashing and for a moment the sun shone as I whisked the eggs into the sugar mix, mashing up the bananas and adding some flour and cinnamon. The smell of a cake baking is pure comfort.

 Living on a boat makes you feel the weather that little bit more. Your boat becomes a part of you, a bit like a car or bike does...you know what i mean..you give it a name, it has a personality!?! I certainly know when it's raining, when it's cold and how cold before I even get out of bed. Yeah I'm not the best at getting out of bed when there's a frost on the window and my breath turns to mini fog...but there's nothing like having a fire to warm you...and when you can bake a cake and share it everything feels alright.

The cake above is my chocolate and tahini mix...make your usual chocolate sponge and add this delicious frosting... Tahini + Sugar = Halva flavoured Heaven! I decorated with sesame seeds, cocoa powder, and chocolate curls. 

A Tahini Icing

225g cream cheese

160g icing sugar

a good spoonful or two of tahini

pinch of salt
(could add a tsp of cocoa powder for colour, add little more cream cheese if you do)

x peace & cakes x