Wednesday, 4 November 2009

Adventures in marriage-hood

Hi Tea fans.

Well if there are any of you actually still out there, or if any of you indeed care. here I am a bonafido married lady*. Marriage09(TM) went very well indeed, despite bad rain in the morning, which threatened us to be relegated to the rather unromantic setting of the Partners Room. Luckily, the wedding lady at the hotel is experienced in the art of lying, and told the registrar it hadn't rained all morning when she arrived. It had by then stopped and thanks to a handful of guests getting handful of worms off the path last minute so I didn't squish them with my princess shoes, it all went ahead outside in the gazebo.

Mr Teashopdiaries, was by all accounts, pretty emotional and nervous, before he heard my dulcet tones scousing up the aisle - hiya, ooh hello there, hi, hi (well we didnt have any music as God had struck the wedding ladies cd player down in return for her lying to the registrar). Completed by a roaring rendition of the guests humming 'Here comes the bride' the short walk of ten feet up the path to the gazebo took less than 15 secs. Just how I like it, now stop looking at me, haven't you people got anything better to do?

Whats seemed like 2 and a half minutes later, encorporating two readings where the voices cracked half way through and threatened a cry fest, we were married. Nice. To the point. Thats us.

Half an hour of photos up a mountain in the wind and we were on with the drinking. Meal went very well, speeches were excellent, though don't test me on the content, I can't remember any of it, except me forgetting to thanks the inlaws and give presents out.

Onto the sky candles which were the only let down of the day. Two members of staff, a nearly burnt down tree and 4 sky candles later, it was all called off. We still have a box full. Cheap to the nearest bidder if anyone wants them.

Next up was the band, provided by my dad and his mates. I knew that I would love it, but I was amazed at how much everyone loved them, seeing as its pretty old school music. Half of them got up and did 'keep dancing' tess and bruce impressions across the floor, and the rest joined in the Pack up your Troubles/Tipperary sing-off which was the surprise hit of the evening. All in all, the Trebletones went down a storm, and what lovely gents they were too.

Then came the wheels of steel, well the ipods of aluminium... and an embarrassing amount of gin later, I had danced the night away. Typically the pics from later on in the evening are not what you would call flattering, but hey I had a great time. God knows where my husband was, but I had fun.

Top the night off with an acapella version of ice ice baby by the Toastmaster and the wedding was complete. That was the hundred-and-thousand on the cherry on the icing on the cake that was our big day.

We couldn't have wanted more.





*loose sense of word

Monday, 5 October 2009

Single White Female

Soon to be brown married one. Eek, double eek, and thrice eek.
Brown as in gonna have to tan-up otherwise people might think I have gone for an all in one bodystocking look wedding dress - "where does she start and the dress end?" will be the words on everyones lips.

So... this is it Tea fans.
In order of things worrying me at the moment, here are my top 5.
1. First dance - Mr teashopdiaries to-be is putting his head in the sand on this one, so no doubt it will be a truffle shuffle along the slippy floor till the three minutes are up.
2. Walking down t'aisle. A) I hope its not raining, so I can walk up the path and not the aisle. B) what if I i) cry b) slip or 3) go bright red. All of which are highly likely and not conducive to elegance.
3. Disco. It will be fine. Really happy with the DJ we have but we are hiring the gear off another dude and I just pray it all goes according to plan. Otherwise Tea fans (real ones not webbed ones) will have to chas'n'dave it up.
4. Hair. Nightmare.
5. Trying to not get pissed the night before.
6. Wearing heels
7. Wearing dress
8. Wearing white dress and drinking wine
9... oh sorry I was only doing top 5 wasn't I?

So, next time I speak I will have learnt the Haka in New Zealand having driven the length of it in record time... and will be back in Blighty looking forward to a first Christmas with my new husband.

Husband.

Hehehehe.

Sunday, 21 June 2009

MIF09 ruins your life

Hi Tea Fans. If there are any of you left, you might be glad to know that I am actually still alive and kicking despite my complete lack of blogginess.

We are heading swiftly to the start of the festival which will be on 2 July - featuring Kraftwerk at the Velodrome with a few blissful surprises in store, Its gonna be like totally MEGA! Thank God, my lovely marketing director sorted out a ticket for Mr Tea Shop Diaries to-be. Otherwise I would have never lived down not being bothered about going when the tickets went for sale and them selling out whilst we thought about it. Oops. Anyway all is well that ends well as they say in Germany.

Other exciting things that are going to happen this week are: The Festival Pavilion is going up on Albert Square, Quay House is being trussed up like a Halloween haunted house for Adam Curtis and Punchdrunks It Felt Like a Kiss, and Rufus Wainwright and Jeremy Deller are milling about our office. A pretty exciting time to be in Manchester at the mo.

And I'm going to see my first opera as well. Eeek.
In the meantime here is the dressing for it at the Palace theatre, done by my own fair mouse hand.









See you on the other side. I'll try and blog my way through it, but to be honest, 12 programmes in 5 days does not a happy equation make, so there might be even less time this week!

Sunday, 10 May 2009

Red nose cakes II


Red nose cakes II, originally uploaded by The Tea Shop Diaries.

And I gave them red nose face/noses this time....

Red nose cakes


Red nose cakes, originally uploaded by The Tea Shop Diaries.

Not sure if you have seen these, but these were the cakes I made for Emmas 'lets have it a month early' Red Nose Day. We ate them all, and then I made some more the month after at the correct time.

I'm back - from outer space (not really)

Well Tea fans, how sorry I am to have abandoned you for SO long. Apart from me having no camera to take pics of any of my amazing bake-ages, I haven't baked much at all, on account of me being so busy doing work for these people as well as doing all my normal work at night and at weekends.

Wedding plans are going well (thanks for asking) and the lovely Ruth at the fine cheese company in Bath, is helping us get the cheese cake we really want out of handmade artisan veggie cheeses they supply for weddings. Had the first fitting for my wedding dress with my mum, and its nearly there. Can't give away too much (anythingin fact) as Mr Tea Shop Diaries subscribes to this blog like a good supportive other half should.

And onto the cakes.

In order to ingratiate myself to my new colleagues (albethem short term contract ones)and also to bring some Monday cheer to the office, I promised them cakes. And cakes they shall get too. These beauties are not only lemon cakes, but they are lemon cakes, with crystallised ginger in them and a little blob of lemon curd in the middle. Topped with lemon buttercream with a mini jelly lemon and some lemon rind curls on the top, you can't get much lemony-er than them!!!

And, they all fit perfectly into my lovely new cake tin.

While I was at it, I threw together a quick tiffin, as its my speciality (apparently) but I buggered it up a bit and had to dry out the mix a bit with ground almonds as I ran out of digestives. Oh well we will see how nice it is in the morning when its chilled.

Till next time TeaFans, I bid you a goodnight, and hope I see you quicker than I did last time.

Monday, 30 March 2009

Apparently...

my cakes are the reason that Darren has put on half a stone since I started going into their office. Well, even though I am glad that he likes my cakes so much I will not take responsibility for this.

No pics for a while now folks as my camera is still being 'fixed' at COMET. DON'T ASK!!!