Brielle's Notions

Arwen Coronation Gown: Part 4....Finished!!!

Suilaid! Im gelir ceni ad lín.

This post is best read while listening to this music

Here I am with the 4th  installment of my Arwen dress making of.

You can read all my other posts about this dress here

I have recieved many comments and emails asking how my Arwen Dress was coming along......and if I haven't finished it yet, why was it taking me so long?

Well, the very simple reason is....

I only work on this dress when I am not doing customer orders.

So, maybe on Saturday evenings or Sunday afternoons. Maybe.

The beading was also taking me a rather long time to complete and then I ran out of beads! Thankfully, the store where I purchased them was able to custom order more for me. So I could complete the neckline...it would have been rather tragic to have only half of my neckline beaded! 

Well, with all that to say....... I have a little something to show you.

Yes, yes...I do. A small sneak peak....

This is a costume I have wanted for many years and it is hard to belive I finally finished it!

 

The poor un-finished dress has been sitting in a box for a long time, but no more!

Once I slipped those elven slippers on...It felt like I was trying on a wedding dress....so much fun! It totally makes me feel like an elf. :)...or a princess.

I still do not have a crown yet, but we shall see what comes of that.

I am just so happy this gown is done.

Maybe I have elvish blood or something...I could wear these all of my days.

 

 More pictures coming soon!!!

Have a magical day...

 P.S.

I have had many comments and e-mails from ladies asking "could you please post tons of pictures of this dress when you finish?"...and yes, I shall try.

Currently the weather is far to bad to step out of doors in such a gown, but I shall model it for you all when the weather gets better. In the mean time my kind dress form Jean Grey shall do the job for me, she is my body double. ;)

 

Elven Bread Recipe

Suilaid, Im gelir ceni ad lín!

I really like Lord of the Rings. alot. I grew up reading the books and then watching the movies.

It is something I shall never grow out of. I still want to live in Rivendell...

If you are a fan you might recall the Lembas bread!

Well here is my own version of it.

This Lembas Bread was made for my cousins hobbit birthday party.

I found the recipe online about 3 years ago. (can't remember where..sorry!) 

I modified it and added a few touches of my own. So the recipe below is the result.

Lembas Bread Recipe

1 cup of Butter (or vegan butter)

1 1/2 cups White Flour

1/2 cup Oat Flour (or rice flour)

1/2 cup Honey

1/4 tsp Vanilla

3 teaspoons brown sugar

1 teaspoon finely ground almonds

dash of ground cloves

dash of nutmeg (more or less to taste)

dash of Cinnamon

____________________________________________

I pre-heated the oven to 350.

Mix together the flours and ground almonds in a bowl. Set a side.

Cream the butter with the Honey and Vanilla in a mixer or another bowl.

Now add the flour mixture (slowly!) into the sticky honey mixture.

You want the dough to look like a scone mix. (or muffins) So it isn't too sticky, but not too hard.

Add more flour if you need to.

Take the dough and place onto a floured surface. Smush out into a round shape, that isn't too tall. Like just shy of an inch. ok, once you have that nice round shape cut the dough into slices.

You are left with slices of Lembas that needs to be placed onto a cookie sheet.

Bake for about 15 min. So they are that perfect golden brown color.

Once removed from the oven spread a bit of melted honey on the top. yummy!

 The taste and texture is like that of a british shortbread.

I think Tolkien would approve.

*I doubled mine for the party, but the above recipe will make one batch.

If you want to get creative you can wrap them in large elvish leaves. I also served it with homemade blueberry/peach jam.

Thanks for reading!

If you give the recipe a try let me know. :)

Namárië

A hobbit birthday cake!....

Greetings!

I was recently invited to attend a sweet sixteen birthday party for my cousin.

With a Middle Earth Shire theme complete with hobbit style food.It was a very lovely party full of festivites and good family time.

....I made the cake. What do you think?

Well my grandma baked it and made the 3 perfect frosting roses...and my mom made the frosting. So I just got to do the fun part! (aka decorating and painting...)

We wanted to make my hobbity cousin something fun that was a hobbit theme.

Of course we could have done Bilbo's birthday cake, but...it didn't seem unique enough for our occasion. So I thought, oh! a Lord of the Rings book of course.

I used her favorite colors and covered the book shaped cake in "pages" of rolled vanilla fondant and painted it with food coloring. The cake is lemon with cream cheese filling.

The "one ring" was actually my grandma's idea. She had it left over from when she used to decorate wedding cakes years ago.It added that perfect finishing touch.

Thanks for reading and looking at the "girly hobbit/LOTR birthday cake". 

Happy Sweet 16 Meggie!

Inspired by Chocolat

Greetings,

(this post is best read while listening to this song or this soundtrack)

I recently watched the movie "Chocolat" and it made me want to be a gypsy and travel around making chocolate.

However, being that isn't very practical at the moment I decided to create some "Maya" inspired hot chocolate instead. (I'll work on that traveling around like a gypsy later)

 
The costumes were very well done also. I loved the fact that Vianne and her daughter wore red wool capes...very fantasy like.

Renee Ehrlich Kalfus was the costume designer for the film and was nominated for best costume design award in 2001.

She did a lovely job! The whole look for the costumes was historical, but old world/modern fantasy at the same time. I think my favorite looks were the outfits she styled for the gypsies(Pirates!)....and of course Vianne's gowns were quite cute.

 
 So here is the recipe I came up with...feel free to change it up! I just added a bit of this, and a bit of that until I had the taste I wanted.

 

~ Maya Hot Chocolate ~

• 1 cup of coconut milk (so delicious brand) * you can use real milk also
• dash of cinnamon
• dash of fresh ground nutmeg
• dash of chili powder
• drop of vanilla
• 2  heaping tablespoons of  sweet baking chocolate (best quality you can find) ... or more depending on what you like.

Heat milk on medium/low heat and whisk in powder ingredients. Add the drop of vanilla and whisk until heated. Pour in a pretty cup and enjoy! Best if served with a chocolate truffle or slice of chocolate cake....

 

 I poured mine into a vintage tea cup for a late night treat.

 
 

I want to start making real chocolate from scratch...such as truffles, candies etc... so we shall see how that goes.

Thanks for reading!

Oh, if you decide to watch "Chocolat"... there is a good review on it here.

Night Shade Smoothie Mix....

Greetings,

Today I thought I would share a smoothie recipe and a bit of what I add to my daily smoothies.

 

I was over at Sayward's blog reading her post on how to make your own "green powder" for smoothies. What a great idea! (not to mention so much cheaper than getting it at whole foods) So I set to work on drying up a laundry basket full of fresh organic kale.

Here is what it looks like dried...

 Next step was to grind it up in a fine powder. (I actually used a food processor for all of it, but I wanted to try with my mortar and pestel for a small batch...because it is way more fun)

 
 Once I had all that crunchy dried kale turned into a fine green powder it was time to store it.

I decided to put it in my "Deadly Night Shade Jar" from Disneyland. Sally, (from Nightmare before Christmas) is on one side...and the words "Deadly Night Shade" are on the other side. The lid seals tightly and is perfect for storing powders of all kinds.

 Here is a front shot of the jar. Also, you can see the fine ground kale powder and the fresh kale side by side there. I found that 2 full tablespoons of kale powder was equal to one bunch of kale. Pretty awesome how concentrated it becomes.

 
 Why use Kale in smoothies?

Kale provide excellent sources of several essential nutrients. Potassium, Vitamins C and K as well as lots of dietary fiber. Kale is also a huge source of calcium. You can use fresh kale in your smoothies (tastes awesome!) or you can use the powdered kind (can't taste it at all).

Blue Berry "nightshade" Smoothie.

• about a cup of fresh blueberries (frozen is fine too)
• 1 frozen banana
• 1 cup of orange juice (more if needed)
• 1/2 cup of organic unsweetened so delicious coconut milk
• about 1/2 cup of fresh marion berries (or frozen black berries are fine too)
• a cup of frozen strawberries.
• 2 tablespoons of kale powder...aka, deadly night shade mix. ;)

 

Throw everything in the blender and mix for about 2 min until totally smooth.

Pour into your favorite tall glass and enjoy! The glass I am using is from Rainforest Cafe...It was free when you bought a poison python drink.

 
What kind of smoothies do you like?

I will also be doing a post on my Bright Green Smoothies.

Thanks for Reading!