Baking to me is escapism, mundane magic. You don’t have to change your life, leave the country or even pack a bag to be transported to someplace wonderful. You just need a few disparate ingredients, mix them together, add heat and time, et voila – perfection! Or at least a little bit of heaven on a plate.

I welcome you to Baking Day which I shall endeavour to write once a week.

Today Let me show you my mini Picnic Banoffee Muffins. Simple to make, tasty as anything and even better you can pack up 6 in an egg box to transport to picnic/school/car or anywhere else you happen to be heading – try the living room sofa!

This recipe will make either 12 mini muffins or 6 normal sized muffins.

75g/21/2 oz plain (all purpose) flour

75g/2 1/2 oz wholemeal flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

60g/2 oz caster sugar

1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg

1 tablespoon grated dark chocolate plus extra to decorate later

1 ripe banana

1 tablespoon confiture du caramel (caramel sauce)

50ml/1/4 cup milk (I used skimmed)

1 egg

3 tablespoons sunflower oil

Icing sugar and cream cheese enough to make paste to top the muffins

Prepare your muffin tin by lining with paper cases or those reusable silicone cases. I used the latter and think they are wonderful.

Preheat the oven to 200C/400F/Gas 6

Sift the flours and baking soda into a bowl adding in any bran that is leftover in the sieve. Stir in the sugar, nutmeg and grated chocolate.

In a jug mash the banana and add the milk, stir to make a puree. Add the caramel sauce and then crack in the egg and beat into the mixture. Add the oil and then pour all this into your dry ingredients.

Just stir to bring it all together, never overbeat muffin mixture or the muffins will come out tough.

Spoon into the muffin cases making sure you only fill each about 2/3 full. I used one teaspoon per mini case.

Bake for 15 minutes until risen and golden. They should spring back when you prod the tops with a fingertip.

Let them cool on a wire rack before you ice them. I simply used about half a tablespoon of plain cream cheese and stirred in sifted icing sugar until I had the stiffish consistency that I wanted. Scatter with grated chocolate to finish off.

Enjoy!

Karon x

Usually Minou would be sitting on the pile of papers beside the plant looking out of the window and keeping up to speed with the comings and goings. She is a lady who likes to know what’s happening. You could well imagine her gossiping to Berti whilst lazing by the fire of an evening – “Well you’ll never guess, that old ginger guy from up the lane was marching past bold as brass this morning, think he’s up to no good. He’d better not turn up here carrying a dead mouse for me, yuck I don’t even like the cat, eeuurgh he’s ginger!”.

Minou is not sitting by the window because I got up to take this photograph and my moving very often means a trip to the kitchen, and that’s something no girl can ever miss out on…..

I’m back at my desk again these days. I realised that there is nothing I can do in the present Mum Situation. While I wish it were all over, I cannot hasten the end. Funny how it can take you a while just to grasp this. You get so wound up in all your anguish and grief that you almost think that by wishing it were all over then that would be so. Wishful thinking at its best I guess.

This was another to-ing and fro-ing weekend, another chance to get better acquainted with the M8 motorway and harbour such thoughts as a wish that you could gain car miles like those air miles you get on planes, I could be heading for a nice holiday by now with all my cross country mileage. I imagine myself motoring in Tuscany and perhaps heading down that gorgeous Italian coastline on the winding scenic roads. Headscarf and shades firmly in place and the look of a young Grace Kelly about me. Come on it’s a dream remember…..

Anyway I’m back at my desk again. Working and blogging. Maybe not on full power yet, but I’ll get there. I can’t put my life on hold for someone else to let theirs go. Life as we know it in all its ups and downs goes on.

Thanks again for all your support and good wishes. You really have no idea how much it has all meant to me. I’ll keep you posted re Mum, but I want to try to get back to ‘normal’ (whatever that is) whenever I can. This has all taken such a toll on all of us. It’s funny how grief effects us all in different ways.

I cry and rage and fall apart somewhat publicly. Tears flow and I have no stoppage of them. Colin seems like a rock, a sturdy wall of compassion and strength. But even a wall, an island or a rock is not all it may seem. There are cracks and fissures where sadness and doubt can creep in and cause havoc beneath the calm and strong exterior. Fissures that can  threaten to bring down the entire structure by undermining the core. Where I rage and sob and wail and behave with mannerisms not too far removed from the average five year old, his trauma and grief eat at him through his health and pull him down a breath at a time. Every bug and infection seem to cling to him as if his own immune system is tired of being strong for someone else.

Too much, too much.

Work goes on. Book manuscript  is in and calls must be made.

Onwards today, onwards.

Karon x

Wonder where Minou is, she had better not have run off with that Ginger guy afterall…

It is wrong, a crime against humanity to wish someone dead. I’m guilty of this crime and  am beating myself up endlessly about it. I don’t want to do this of course, it just happens. We are brought up to respect life, to cling on to it to give it all we’ve got. But dear God when it is gone in all but the breathing and most piteous of communications, why do we have it?

I don’t think I ever really understood the term ‘death is a mercy’ until now.  Right now for my Mum I would host a party for it. I can see now where wakes can be celebrations, not just of a life well lived, but of a release from pain and suffering at the end.

“We are keeping her comfortable” is the daily news. To be honest I’m tired, I’m knackered mentally and physically from the backwards and forwards, the listening for the phone, the heartbreaking rush of “She’ll only last the weekend”, then the “she is rallying a little”, again “things are going down”. We all know there is no hope, but the wait seems endless.

I feel like the lowest most hateful creature, a veritable Golem if you will. On one hand the dutiful daughter rushing to and fro across the country, hand holding, smiling and whispering words I have long lost track of, yet on the other I am longing for the end. I have never been good with stress, I am not liking me at all right now.

Karon x

Today is Friday and I know it should be my Friday Favs. In fact I had a lovely post lined up about a fabulous shop, however it can wait until next week.

I don’t want to be a whinger and host a pity party but I wanted to post here to say thank you to the many of you who have commented and emailed me this week about Mum. You don’t know how much this means to me to have such wonderful support.

This week seems to have been endless, it hasn’t felt real at all. Days have passed in a mess of calls/visits/work and tears. How many tears can one body hold?

Choosing music and writing words for the impending funeral. Trying to be organised as I know the dreadful ‘falling down the liftshaft’ feeling when death does take its toll.

Stupidity (my own) seems to be dogging me this week. If I can forget something I will, if I can drop it, I most certainly shall. The kitchen floor has met with numerous breakages this week, butter fingers seems to be my middle name just now. Add to that I’m exhibiting a remarkable lack of patience, even for me. The poor animals quake at the sight of me, I almost can’t bear to have anyone around.

The hospital have decided to return Mum to her care home today. She is barely conscious now, but there is nothing more that can be done for her there. Better that she pass in her own bed in the care home where she has faces and voices around her that she knows. I am glad for this. They say it won’t be long now, I guess we are just waiting for God.

Karon x

On Sunday morning, on my way home from Musselburgh, I decided to go fishing, in fact I decided to go salmon fishing in the Yemen. Strange choice for a Sunday morning in Scotland, but why the hell not.  She went to the Yemen? No, for those who haven’t heard this is the name of Ewan McGregor’s latest movie – Salmon Fishing In The Yemen.

You might also be wondering about my sanity (I often do), what the heck was she doing going to the cinema alone on Sunday morning after leaving her Mum at the hospital. Well there are two answers to that one – the cinema on a Sunday morning is quiet. I had a private screening all to myself. Just me and a big cappuccino and the movie. The dark cinema is also sound proofed so you can let out those sobs that have been building and trapped since you first walked into the hospital 24 hours before. You can quietly sit and sob in the darkness and only Ewan McGregor will know.

Actually it is a wonderful film. It’s a feel good film, and that was the other reason for going. I just wanted to escape real life and Be elsewhere. I couldn’t have picked a better movie for it than this. I loved it. Here is a little run down;

A Sheik (impossibly handsome of course) from the Yemen has a passion for salmon fishing. He has an estate in Scotland and fishes there all the time. Yest he has a dream, he dreams of creating salmon rivers and the whole peaceful fishing experience and much more besides in his home country. Now this seems like an impossible task but hey, when money is no object, few things fall into the category of impossibility.

The UK government (cue Kirsten Scott Thomas as amazingly bitchy press secretary) gets involved due to their lusting after a ‘good’ story to come out of the Middle East. The lovely Ewan McGregor (playing a rather dowdy fish expert) is enlisted to help and Emily Blunt (you might remember her from The Devil Wears Prada) is the Sheik’s assistant who can make anything happen.

The scenery in Scotland is amazing. The whole story of faith and hope and love is wonderful. The comedy that winds its way throughout is rather like a salmon stream itself. There are twists and turns and ups and downs.

The whole idea is impossible, but then so are a lot of dreams. This is a great film about fish and faith and funny too.

I’m glad I took a detour on the way home on Sunday. My little salmon fishing trip to the Yemen was a treat.

Karon x

No matter who you are; rich, old, poor, happy, sad, young, famous, broke or otherwise, at some point you will very probably be faced with this; signing the consent form that says do not resuscitate for your parent/s.

Your brain will of course be telling you that this is The Right Thing, it is in fact The Only Thing to do. After all, if this were a beloved pet no way on God’s earth would you allow this sort of drawn out suffering, you would say one word, Enough.

Alas as humans we live with a code, the code of human rights. That right says that you cannot end the suffering of a loved human as you would that of a loved animal. Instead you must be patient, you must watch them die in front of you, just a wee bit more at a time.

But I digress, (as ever), back to the consent form. As you are signing this and the brain is leaping about telling you that it is The Right Thing, your heart is screaming like a demented banshee. Your heart has taken on the embodiment of a five year old child throwing a temper tantrum as the only way to be seen, to be heard. Your heart is yelling ‘No, don’t do it’, ‘she’s my Mum, of course she’ll get better’, ‘I love her, please God isn’t that enough to give her back life, real life’. Of course it is not, even love cannot do that.

You are the grownup here, you are no longer the pampered and protected child. You must do the protecting as best you can. You must put your mark on that paper, you must, in essence, sign someone else’s life away.

So I don’t care who you are, or where you are. Let me tell you right now, this will be the hardest thing you have ever done.

The heinous reality of Mum lying curled up in a hospital bed (by the way the same ward and hospital that my Dad died in a few years ago – and let me tell you what a jolt that was when my tired brain registered the surroundings, the view, the ward number – the earth shattering reality of it all, I wanted to run away) with tubes and indignity, and turns to ease old bones and paper thin fragile skin. I hold her tiny hand in mine and blather about Idgy, the animals, the weather, anything. She winces with pain at the holding, it is too much. She can barely talk, a mere whisper now and then. Old faded so, so, tired eyes watch you half shut – what are you seeing Mum, please see me.

They say she is Comfortable. Let’s not even go there.

I hold her in my arms, I want to crush life into her, give her mine.

I love you, I love you, I love you.

“Love you back”

Those three words mean the world to me. They were all she said.

I don’t know how long she has left. I am honest here so I shall say – I pray that the time is short and she lets go of this life and steps out with my father again.

My mobile is attached like an extra appendage waiting for the call.

Come soon.

Karon x

I will soon be moving, no, not in the physical sense (not yet anyway) but in the online internetty sense. I will be changing domain name/web address/that thingy at the top of your screen bit.

I have reasons for the move, as ever with me they are a little mixed up and wobbly, but I feel as reasons they are pretty valid.

Here they are;

So Easy Life as a domain name was meant to sort of brand the ‘so easy’ book series. At the time of conception it seemed like a pretty good idea (doesn’t everything at that moment!), after all those were my only book avenues.

However a year has passed and I’m doing other things and broadening my horizons so the name is just part of things and not the whole.

The other reason is a lot more me-ish and difficult to express. Every morning when I log on I see the so easy life banner, all my emails carry the name, it is all around me. It is as if I am tying myself up in ribbons printed with those words. They are nice words, inspiring words. But let’s face it they are not true words for every day for most of us. Seeing those words so much when things aren’t easy can actually make things harder. The fact that I put them up there and practically branded myself with them can make it all the more difficult to bear sometimes. One can almost feel as if one is failing oneself by not living up to the words.

So I decided to change the name. To stop punishing myself with the so easy life moniker and just be me. So very soon this blog will change over to being www.karongrieve.com. There, I’ve said it, it’s just a name, my work name.

This has all been bubbling away for some time, and it all came to a head at the weekend and I made the decision to change. Then a couple of days later I received an email from a friend in America talking about blogging and how someone had said to her that they were sick and tired of all those ‘ain’t life grand’ blogs were people seem to live this fantastical life that actually makes the reader feel bad.

This really resonated with me. A couple of the blogs that I’ve read for years now seem to have skipped off into the seriously joyously happy happy land where the writer is living the life few of us would even dare to dream of. They are jet setting around the world, hosting their own TV shows, have perfect handsome loving husbands, great kids, wonderfully supportive extended families, lots of money and everything is amazing. It is so amazing that just by reading their pages I can feel myself shrivel up inside. I am no longer inspired by their lifestyles, I am now crushed and feel as if I have failed and am useless that I have no hope of ever achieving even a modicum of that happiness.

This to me is where blogging can be dangerous. If you take it all at face value you can’t live up to some of this stuff. I don’t want people to think that of me. I thought the name So Easy Life was actually a slap in the face to myself sometimes, it could just as easily be hurting someone else out there when they read it. So there is the other reason for changing the name. I don’t want to make anyone feel that I am showing off some look-at-me-I-have-such-an-easy-wonderful-life, now go out and feel bad about yourself because you don’t have one. I know I am very blessed in what I do have, for that I am eternally grateful, but like most of the population there are many things I would like to have, to change, and so many I would like to aspire to.

So there you have it, so easy life as a name will be no more as soon as the technology can manage to change it.

I know friends and readers who have been with me for a long time (I started all this back in 2008) will understand where I am coming from on this one. I hope the rest of you (you are there aren’t you?) do to.

Thanks for reading.

Karon x

I made this on Saturday when Sue came round. I am ashamed to report that we scoffed the lot.

Here’s the recipe, very basic, very simple, very, very yummy!

115g/4oz butter (unsalted)

115g/4oz caster sugar

2 eggs beaten

2 tablespoons instant espresso coffee

3 tablespoons boiling water

115g/4oz self raising flour

200g icing sugar

150g cream cheese

2 tablespoons nuttella (or similar)

Beat together the sugar and butter until nice and fluffy and then gradually stir in the eggs. Pour the boiling water into a little cup with the coffee and let it dissolve completely. Add about 2/3rds of this to the cake batter (save the rest for your topping and filling). Sift in the flour and fold this all together.

Spoon mixture into two small cake tins and bake for approximately 15 minutes or until risen and golden and just coming away from sides of tin. Gently prod centre of cake with fingertip. If cake is ready it should spring back and not leave an imprint.

Let cool for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Now for the filling and topping.

Beat together the icing sugar, cream cheese and nuttella. Add more icing sugar as required. You want a consistency that is pasty enough for the centre of the cake, but not too firm for the top. Your call really.

Now slather it on one cake and sandwich the other on top. Cover the top with the rest of the topping and stick a coffee bean on top just to remind yourself that its a coffee cake.

Eat, eat and enjoy………

Karon x

Isn’t this gorgeous? This isn’t one of my photos, in fact it was taken by my besty friend Sue Quinn last week when she visited Devon. These are wild ponies on the moors. Click here to watch Sue’s beautiful little video of the ponies.

Sometimes it is our friends who are the only glue that holds the world together. When things get tough they leap in there and fight the dragons for you as best they can. The dragon chomping at their own tail doesn’t hold them back and they throw themselves carelessly at your dragon, waving their arms and screaming every bad word they know.

Sometimes it is their sheer determination to fight for you that pulls you from the edge.

Sometimes you forget to say Thank You for their unstinting devotion and help.

Sometimes Thank You just isn’t enough.

Thanks Sue.

Karon x

PS  If you are in UK and lilstening to the radio today tune in to BBC Radio Scotland at about 10.45am, I’m on with Fred McAulay chatting about Weedy Ways. Will tell all tomorrow.