Slow holidays with Inntravel

Holidays are meant to be relaxing. We don't know about you, but we're big advocates of taking a little extra time and making the effort to turn something ordinary into something special and personal.

That goes for what we eat, how we shop and approach our days. It also goes for how we spend our holidays. When work and family life is crazy, nothing is better than escaping the real world for some R&R.

One idea we like are 'Slow Holidays', by our friends Inntravel, which aim to let you 'see more, discover more, remember more'. Ahhh, sounds bliss!

Slow holidays are not about following the tour group, but carving your own way, immersing yourself in another way of life, exploring and taking your own time - no matter whether you're after a hike in the Himalayan foothills or a gentle cycle round little villages in Europe. With detailed guidance from Inntravel’s notes, you’re free to go entirely at your own pace, and to unearth some enticing little finds along the way.

What is your idea of a slow holiday? We'd love to hear!

Apple butter recipe

This apple butter recipe is perfect partner to the dee-licious rugelach we shared in our firework night feature in issue 2.

Rugelach is a bite-size pastry filled with spices and chewy dried fruits - perfect for a nippy firework night. Any kind of jam can be used for the filling, but for a wholehearted autumnal flavour, nothing beats apple butter.

Our recipe of choice comes for one of our fave baking blogs, apt 2b baking. Baker Yossy ropes in friends to help her make a big batch every year. Check out the apt 2b baking blog to see how she does it.

Have any of our readers tried our rugelach recipe? Let us know how it went and don't forget to Tweet us a pic!

WIN an iPad with Gathered by Mollie Makes (closed)

Our sister mag Mollie Makes is launching a weekly digital craft mag, Gathered, and giving you the chance to win an iPad!

Gathered by Mollie Makes is a brand new digital craft magazine exclusive to the iPad, coming soon. Each week, the Mollie Makes team will bring you an interactive mag full of inspiring crafts, interviews with designer-makers and new projects to inspire you to get crafting!

To mark this exciting occasion, they're offering you the chance to WIN a brand new iPad, and a whole year's subscription to Gathered along with it. To find out more and enter into the draw, visit the competition homepage.

Gathered will be hitting Apple Newsstand  store later in October, so follow on Facebook and Twitter to keep up to date with all the latest news!

DIY painted terracotta pots

Give your houseplants a makeover with this colour block terrracotta pot DIY from Lovely Indeed.

We have a lot of time for a touch of gold in the house, especially when pared with simple matte white to tone it down. Make like blogger Chelsea and hang your new plant pots from the ceiling with twine to show them off properly. Lovely, indeed!

Chocolate Week 2012

Chocolate Week starts on Monday 8th October, and we are licking our lips already.

We're all massive chocoholics in the Simple Things office, so we were very excited when rumours of Chocolate Week reached our ears. A whole seven days dedicated to our favourite sweet treat? The right side of swimsuit season? Events all over the UK? Sign us up!

If you can make it down to London, the grand finale Chocolate Unwrapped, with top British chocolatiers, demonstrations, and lots and lots tasting opportunities is a no-brainer. If not, check out the Chocolate Week website for more info on what's going on near you.

Book Launch : My Berlin Kitchen

We've been feeling the Berlin love ever since reading all about Sandra Juto's experiences of her city in The Simple Things issue 1.

Luckily, tying in neatly with our feature is the release of The Wednesday Chef Luisa Weiss' My Berlin Kitchen: A Love Story (With Recipes).

As you'll have gathered from the title, this is not just a cookbook, but a memoir of Luisa's journey so far, punctuated with the recipes that defined these different phases in her life.

In her own words, from when Luisa first decided to put pen to paper:

'I'm moving back to Berlin and I'm writing a book, about Berlin, about my life, about cooking and home and family and love, about being divided and finding a way back to being whole again, about a city and its recipes, and a girl who's learning how to find her way.'

Wordless Wednesdays ... in the garden

From Carrots and Kids.

Shop love : Rockett St George

We've been crushing on Rockett St George for quite some time now.

They're top of our list for very, very cool tea towels, and just generally excel in hunting down homeware designs with a sense of humour. Superb case in point, this tableware range including a glass milk carton and glass ziplock bag.

Also going straight into the basket are this homemade biscuit stamp (if we're baking, we want some credit) and fab typewriter tea towel. Told you they made cool tea towels!

Check out the Rockett St George online store to pick out your favourites.

Blackberry buckle cake recipe

This blackberry cake recipe makes the most of blackberries, which are at their juicy, inky purple best right about now.

Blogger Sarah from Lemon Fire Brigade baked this cake after a day out berry-picking with her family. Her snaps made us want to drop what we were doing immediately, pull on some wellies and track down the nearest blackberry bush.

Sarah has mixed together her blackberries with blackcurrants, which are also in season at the moment, and created a recipe with a high proportion of berries. This makes for a very beautiful cake (she calls it tie-dye style, which sums it up pretty perfectly), and provides a tart counter to the sweet vanilla sponge.

Do you have any favourite berry recipes? Share below!

The Simple Things launch party video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIKZVN5B3TU *Sigh* We loved our launch party. So many fab people, so much amazing cheese.

In the midst of all our excitement for issue 2, this gorgeous little video of the launch party provided us with a moment of calm. Spot anyone you recognise?

P.S. You can also see some pics from the party here ...

Wrist Worms by Sandra Juto

Sandra Juto's Wrist Worms are just the best way to fend off the early autumn nip in the air.

Hand-crocheted and available in a range of gorge autumnal shades, these keep you cosy and let you type on your computer, swipe on your iphone or eat your cupcake (fluff-free) in a way that is rather tricky with regular mitts.

Head over to Sandra Juto's online shop to get your hands on a pair.

Issue 2 - out soon!

Tah-dah! The Simple Things Issue 2 goes on sale in the UK on 4th October! What do you think of our cover?

As it's our October issue, we're embracing all things autumnal. We'll be chatting crusty loaves with a fabulous baker brother, seeing the sights of Amsterdam, whizzing through fallen leaves on bicycles and rounding the day off with a bonfire party. All, of course, with crafts and recipes worthy of fireworks.

Issue 1 is still available, but not for much longer. If you've not got your hands on one yet, get down to the shops sharpish to start your collection!

For a rundown of where you can get your hands on the mag, check out our 'Find us' page, or download our digital version here.

Postage stamp craft

Our friends at Oxfam got in touch last week in search of some crafty ideas to go with the bags of vintage stamps they're selling in the Oxfam online shop. We love a challenge, so here you go - a round-up of our tip-top postage stamp craft ideas...

First up is A Law Student's Journey, who's put her own twist on a well-established trend to create this postage stamp bunting.  Very simple, quirky and somehow much more winter-appropriate than fabric bunting. We love.

Requiring a little more patience and dexterity are Just Something I Made's miniature stamp houses. Blogger Cathe has tucked a roll of stamps inside hers and made it into a stamp dispenser, and we think this would be a super-cute way to store stickers. Pop over to Just Something I Made for a free printable template.

Finally, we couldn't do a postage stamp craft round-up without a little découpage (they're already sticky on the back, for goodness sake!). Crafty blogs are awash with postage stamp découpage ideas, but our favourite is this dresser from The Next Stitch. A gorge display of stamps, dove grey paintwork and a little gold leaf. Perfectly imperfect and shabby-chic at its best.

For the best range of vintage stamps around, pop over to the Oxfam online shop (and check out their new Oxfam Shops Facebook page while you're at it!).

Wordless Wednesdays ... morning coffee

By Marion Berrin at L'Inventaire de L'Esthétique.

Win! Josie Jeffery's Seedswap (closed)

Competition time! We've got 5 copies of Josie Jeffery's Seedswap to give away.

In her Seedswap guide, Josie introduces the exciting new global seed swapping movement, looks at why plant heritage is so important and gives us plenty of advice on how to go about getting involve!

We've got 5 shiny new copies to give away! Click over to our competition homepage to enter.

P.S. If you're already embracing the seed swapping spirit, this year's

Great Seed Swap

will be taking place on Saturday 20 October at Wakehurst. Pop over to the

Kew Gardens website

for more info!

How to make your own butter

At The Simple Things, we think that sometimes it's worth putting a little extra effort in to make something everyday a little more special.

With that in mind, take a peek at this recipe for homemade butter at Longest Acres. The instructions require no specialist equipment and are so simple, they made us wonder why we'd never tied this before.

We're planning on having a go at this when we next have a free hour. We're daydreaming of toasted English muffins spread with butter made with our own fair hands, eaten tucked up in bed on a lazy weekend morning. Totally idyllic.

Issue 1 : reader photos!

The Simple Things went to press last week - can you believe it?!

We're still buzzing from the launch, and could not be more pleased about all your amazing comments! Loads of you have been sharing pics of yourselves getting into the Simple Things spirit - taking time out to do some crafting, baking (our raspberry brownies especially proved to be a massive hit!) or get back to nature. Here are a few of our favourites.

Keep 'em coming on our Facebook and Twitter pages, we love to see what you're up to!

Thanks to (deep breath) ...Caroline Madaher, Miss Leoniest, My Red Wellies, Betherina, Jody Richardson, House Mouse, Madeline Norris, Poppy Sakulku, Bella and Will, Kate Helen Carter, Forest Flower 23 and Jayne Lynch for your photos.

How to make origami cranes

How lovely are these little origami cranes?

This weekend, we'll be taking some time out to folding up a mini flock from mismatched papers, and stringing them up with some bright thread. So simple and so pretty.

Pop over to the Penelope and Pip website for a free paper crane printable.

Illustrated Bites

When Heather Diane's herb illustrations popped up on our Pinterest feed earlier this week, we instantly fell in love. Californian artist Heather combines her love of food with her talent for drawing to create quirky illustrated guides to all of her favourite foodstuffs.

Our favourites are her latest edible flower design and super-pretty herb guide . Check out heather's website for more illustrated loveliness.

Mollie Makes Christmas book - reader offer!

Have you heard? The Simple Things' big sister Mollie Makes has put together their very own Mollie Makes Christmas book!

Mollie Makes Christmas is filled with cute craft projects for the festive period, designed exclusively by regular Mollie Makes contributors especially for you. Whatever your craft of choice, there are ideas to decorate your home or give as gifts, all with the loveliness you'd expect from your fave craft mag!

Mollie Makes Christmas is out on 4th October in the UK, but pre-order now and enter code Mollieloves at the checkout to get your copy for just £7.00 (it's usually £9.99)!

Click here to pre-order your copy now.