This week, the East End WI got involved in a bit of craftivism. We joined the #imapiece campaign which is an art installation dedicated to raising awareness of the injustice of world hunger in advance of the G8 campaign. Also, there were ukuleles. Unrelated. We all met up in the Fabrications Imaginarium on Broadway Market for a bit of tea and crafting, and got stuck right in. The Imaginarium is a beautiful area below the Fabrications shop; it has the most fabulous natural light which streams in to create a bright and airy craft space - ideal for when you're stitching little letters onto fabric jigsaw pieces. Also perfect for the many workshops held there.

The whole of London was awash this weekend with rain droplets, English flags and bunting. There were fêtes, festivals, parties and jubilee celebrations across the capital; it was really something magical!

We didn't venture out to Battersea in the pouring rain, or to the other celebrations at Buckingham Palace. Instead, we lazily stayed indoors and I sewed while watching the celebrations on TV. It was oh so pleasant, and we sent the Queen our best wishes with our well-practised royal waves as she braved the great British Weather.

I did, however, celebrate with the EEWI's JubiTEA party at Fabrications on Broadway Market.  I got up and braved the Great Outdoors at Very Early O'Clock despite getting home at only 4.30am the night before thanks to a spectacular show by Guns n' Roses. "Once in a lifetime" I chanted reassuringly while we queued for a taxi in the wee hours of the morning. In the rain. With thousands of other concert-goers.

Ah, I digress.

JubiTEA. The lovely Barley Massey of Fabrications fame had arranged for a day of making with ongoing make-and-take classes where attendees made fascinators using Barley's instructions and their choice of supplies provided free-of-charge.

















Supplies were a-plenty in this shop full of lovely bits and bobs all organised neatly into shapes, sizes and colours.






















Personally, I've always mistakenly called them agitators thinking that was a perfectly logical name and it wasn't until very recently learnt that the headpieces in question are in fact fascinating and not agitating.

It depends on who you ask, I think.






















And so, as the fascinators/agitators/hairthingies were on the go, the EEWI were there to serve tea and cakes.

These are my butterfly cakes on Elizabeth's oh-so-retro plastic cupcake stand. It wobbled a bit, but the colours seemed very fitting indeed.






















The baking theme was 'vintage', so I also made the swirly maple syrup butter biscuits on the lower half of the cake stand. They were delicious, but completely overshadowed by the impressive no-fat-tea-cake (made by soaking overnight in tea, no less) and the delicious chocolate brownies on top. Yum!






















Everything was very festive with the red-white-and-blue...

















... which extended to the flowers, the table cloth, the paper doilies and the sprinkles on the cakes!






















Aren't these lovely? Nothing is more British than blue, white, and red icing in matching paper cases, all topped with strawberries. Not to mention, we were also serving tea in teapots with tea cosies.






















This is Colleen's exceptional chocolate courgette cake. Oh yes, you read correctly: it was made using courgettes. It looked amazing, so I bought a piece to take home for tea. You couldn't taste the courgette at all: it was distinctly chocolately, rich and vaguely had a banana bread texture to it. I was terribly impressed, I'm going to try track down a recipe so I can use up my courgettes from this week's veg box!