“So Helen? What’s all this moaning about being stuck home alone?” I hear you cry “Surely as you love writing then this is a blissful few days of space and time to write away to your hearts content?”
Well yes. I suppose I should be looking on the bright side. And most of the time I can. But it is amazing how isolating being stuck home alone with an injury is. When you have the flu/migraine/stomach bug (delete as applicable) your brain all but shuts down. You’re capable of sleep and …

Whenever I visit my parents in Southport I always envisage a relaxing few days of seeing friends and doing family activities, with plenty of time to spare for penning a few blogs in advance and catching up with Google Reader.
You’d think by now I’d know better. Within my first twenty-four hours I had been shopping (for clothes), shopping again (this time for food), out for dinner with one friend and out to the pub with another. I crawled in at 2am after discovering I can now stomach snakebite and black …

I didn’t just head off to London this weekend, my blogging took a mini-break to share my* Hazelnut Meringue recipe with the readers of Jo’s Kitchen in a guest blog. Jo’s blog is one of my favourites and I’ve had brilliant success with her recipes. Pop over there to read the blog, and check out Jo’s posts too.

As for London, it was fabulous as always. The weather was absolutely perfect. Brilliant blue skies with not a cloud or plane in sight! Of course I was there for the friends more …

Whilst I’ve been off I’ve been making the most of having time to prepare fresh food. It’s all too easy to moan that there is no point when you’re cooking for one (some days I am an expert at moaning!). However it’s a rubbish excuse, and I’m well aware there’s nothing to stop me freezing leftovers – two (or more) meals for the price of one!
As luck, or fate, or whatever you believe in, would happen I stumbled upon Jo’s Kitchen last weekend and discovered a treasure trove of recipes …

Thanks to being ill there has been a distinct lack of proper Cake Friday activity over the past few weeks. But now I am back at work and it is Friday! This is what I have been enjoying today…

and for those of you who missed the glory of Good Cake Friday last week here is one of my mother’s wonderful butterfly cakes…

Faced with the dilemma of being housebound and missing out on a Cake Friday drastic measures and creativity were needed… so here it is… Jaffa Cake Friday thanks to two M&S Jaffas that had previously managed to hide and avoid consumption!

This week it was Iain’s turn to bake cakes for Cake Friday in the library, and he did us proud. Cake Friday raised £50 for Sesame Workshop and Butterwick Children’s Hospice.

I have, on occasion, been accused of being slightly competitive. I just think I have a natural tendency to want to achieve. Whatever the motivation I may have taken ‘Cake Friday’ a little too seriously. For those of you familiar with Friends I may have been akin to Monica. Considering I am living in a new city where my greatest hope of nurturing friendships is in work, I perhaps shouldn’t have been flaunting my crazy credentials so openly.
However as I am new to Library Land, this was my first chance …