Eggs and sneaky sellers

I'm typing in the dark. Let's see how well I know my keys. You can't judge because you can't see!

I dragged my sister around Covent Garden on Saturday to hunt for the eggs they've "hidden" around the area. They're raising money for Action For Children (I believe) and have gotten artists from all over to decorate large(ish) eggs which are sold and bidded away. There are 101 of them, which we all found. A lot of them weren't difficult to find. The Big Egg Hunt did do a very similar thing last year and it was definitely much harder to find them all as they were dotted all over London. That one was a lot of fun. Shame this one is only on for a short period.

The eggs were only around up until last Sunday and then they bundle them all away and take them around different areas of the UK where they stay around for a week in each city before they travel back to London for a final showdown.

I took a few pictures so here's a few for you to see. Pictures are a bit shoddy as it comes from a camera phone.

 

 

I left home half 7 in the morning to get there before the crowds and I'm so glad I did.

During the day, a couple of men rained down on us and scooted us into a shop and tried to sell us a "wonderful" and "magical" cream. I rolled my eyes but my sister was easily drawn in. So I just sat there as this guy tried to sell us this product. Then he moved onto prices and claimed that each product was £100 but today they were going to give one away when you buy one. I rolled my eyes. I was particularly interested in his method of selling.

Seeing big hesitation coming from my sister, he dropped the price of one cream to £50 with other "freebie" products. This clearly wasn't going to work. A massive amount of compliments on our beauty oozed from his lips. Again, I rolled my eyes. He then proceeded to sell us a lovely spa treatment with £20 taken off the price if we booked now. Ha. And guess what? That didn't work either. Apparently I have a beautiful smile and never age. I know where to go when I'm fishing for compliments.

Oddly enough, I was approached a while later near Oxford Circus by another seller. I thought it was a bit rude to ignore him completely so I hung around a few minutes at the most. "Where do you get your haircut from?" he asks me, trying to draw me in. I smirk in my head and tell him I cut my own hair. "So how much do you think a haircut costs in this place?" and he gestures towards the hair salon behind him. I shrug. I didn't care. It wasn't a very good attempt at selling when it costs nothing at all for myself to cut my own hair. And I definitely did not want to colour my hair. Not for £35 a month. Kudos for trying!

Not easy for anyone to sell me anything.

Smiles.

Bucket list - things I want to do before I.....

I was talking to a friend last night about bucket lists. He was curious to know what was on mine. I've kept the list mentally in my head and I have never written it down anywhere. I have a lot of things slipping in and out of that list and in that mind of mine (I do forget what I put on there!). It's very easy to forget things than to remember them!

A few of the things on my list include reading all of Stephen King's novels. I adore Stephen King and if I can, I want to finish everything of his. At the moment I'm reading IT and loving it. Another on my list would be to see the thunderstorms out at sea. I saw an image of that somewhere and thought it was beautiful (yet dangerous!). I also want to walk through a graveyard at night in the middle of the night.

There are so many things on the list but who knows when they will ever be done. Just wishful thinking for now..

Cookies and Dreams

A friend of mine gave me a recipe to make Millie's Cookies as I was talking cookies non-stop. The craving for them didn't fade and as soon as I got home that day, I went ahead and made those cookies. Those cookies were lush. Tasted so good.

The recipe I was given (if you don't believe how lush they were, go ahead and try it....you know you want to......):

Ingredients:
125g butter, softened

100g light brown soft sugar

125g caster sugar

1 egg, lightly beaten

1 tsp vanilla extract

225g self-raising flour

½ tsp salt

200g chocolate chips

• Preheat oven to 180°C (Gas Mark 4)
• Cream butter and sugars then add the egg and vanilla extract
• Sift in the flour and salt, then the chocolate chips
• Roll into walnut size balls, for a more homemade look
• Place on ungreased baking paper. If you want to have the real Millies experience then bake for just 7 minutes, till the cookies are just setting - the cookies will be really doughy and delicious. Otherwise cook for 10 minutes until just golden round the edges
• Take out of the oven and leave to harden for a minute before transferring to a wire cooling rack

As simple and as delicious as that!

I've made it twice since but was a little displeased as I added too much butter the second try (I have no scales so I had estimated it). I've bought a lot of chocolate drops now so I'm prepared when I have a cookie urge.

Cookie cookie cookie.........

I had a dream last night. I was baking brownies and I had to make 70-odd something of them. I've no idea why but I was trying out my first batch. And now it has me thinking of cookies.