The big button A!

So a while ago i was a bit of a tease. I posted a couple of photos on here but wouldn't tell you what i was up to. Naughty me.

Well, i was making something for my wonderful husband. It was a surprise so i had to keep it a secret until i had given it to him. But now i have so i can share it with you!

And here it is:

I spent a long time collecting together lots of badges that i liked as well as using lots of lovely bright buttons. I then arranged them, painstakingly, in the large A shape.

It was then just a case of gluing them all down and getting it to a framers. I am so pleased with how it turned out. It's difficult to tell from the photos but it is massive! And my husband loved it too. Hooray!

Damson vodka!

Definitely my favorite of the fruit flavoured alcohols!

Last year was a sad year for the damson, there was none to be had and i couldn't make any vodka. Darn it. This made me sad, although i did manage to get hold of some sloes (but even that was hard going) so i had something to offer at Christmas time (phew).

I had my fingers double crossed that this year would be different. And i was! With the bullace berries that my dad brought over for me he also brought two massive buckets of damsons. Thanks dad!

So i set about straight away making the vodka. Got to give it as long as possible to mature. Yummy.

Bring on Christmas time!

Bullace berry gin.

The other day my dad brought me round a big bag of bullace berries. They are a bit like damsons or sloes and somewhere between the two in size.

Now i had never heard of then before but have done and bit of research and have been told that they are wonderful if made into flavoured gin. So that's what i have done!

I have used the same basic recipe that i use for making sloe gin and damson vodka. To be honest i do it by eye and don't use exact measurements. That way if, after a couple of months, it isn't sweet enough or is too sweet i can add more sugar/alcohol as is required. It also depends on how much fruit i have. I try to put in as much as possible to flavour the alcohol.

 

I have used up all of my demijohns making other flavoured alcohols this year so i had to revert back to the trusty plastic bottle.

They will now go away until Christmas time. I can't wait to find out what it tastes like!