Showing posts with label Kids. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kids. Show all posts

Tuesday, 4 September 2012

My Birthday Girl!

As many of you have seen already, August is a very big birthday month for me (well for the whole family. I'm sure B is cringing at the thought of that month also). I didn't exactly time it very well with both Miss 11 and Miss 6 being born a day apart, and then in April I have the same issues with Mr M and Master 8 having the same problem but I guess once you reach a certain milestone you're not exactly wanting all the fan fare....yes Mr M I'm talking about you! (He gets a little grumpy in his old age).

With both the girls being so close in birthdays and with five years between them I have been fortunate to be able to get away with just parties for the oldest as being the youngest you don't really know any different! (I can see B rolling her eyes as there is eight years between us!)

Turning six and being at school now has changed all that for my youngest lady and of course the other two had their first "official" birthday party once they had started school. This particular post doesn't exactly have any recipes attached to it. It is more just little ideas that I came across to help decorate my little lady's "ballerina/fairy" themed party and how it looked with all the decorations in place. I found some wonderful online stores that helped make it all look magical on the day.


The tissue paper pom poms I made myself as I am now an expert at making them as I've made quite a few over the last 12 months, for a baby shower and a high tea also. They are very easy and I found a site on Youtube.



Because my Miss 6 wanted Ballerinas and Fairies I added a few butterflies and also handmade these super cute little ballet tutu's on a stick.



The were actually very easy......just some pink card that I came across in a scrap booking place and I drew the outline of a leotard and cut some pink tule and stuck it on with a hot melt glue gun and added a little bow. I then stuck them onto a stick as I was thinking of sticking them into something at the time but ended up putting them on the blinds behind the table.





I made each little fairy/ballerina a flower garland to wear on their head which made them feel special......all I did was purchase some soft garden wire and shaped it into a circle and bought some little bits and pieces like paper flowers, feathers, stars, material flowers and ribbon and stuck them all around the wire with my hot glue gun.

I also made some little crowns that I had spotted on one of many late nights surfing the net and these were dead easy. All you need is some toilet rolls (empty ones of course) some scissors and some paint. I just cut the rolls in half and cut triangles all around them to make the crown shape and of course the paint was white and pink!




A great online shop I found for some lovely little things was "Little Big Company"......I bought this gorgeous drink dispenser along with these cute little milk bottles! I filled the dispenser with pink lemonade but you can just about put anything you like in it.



The beautiful coloured straws were of course bought from the "Donna Hay" store (I know I have a slight obsession with anything DH) but you can just about get any coloured straws from most online party shops.  Another great shop for some little things was a place called "The Party Parlour".
I had both paper cups along with the little glass milk bottles (I'm not sure if the novelty for the little bottles was more for me or the kids.....what on earth was I thinking with 12 six year olds and glass bottles!!)




I was able to find some lanterns just at my local post office in the throw out box so I was very excited to see pink ones there. I just bought some cheap ribbons at my local material shop and hung them from some wire and attached these gorgeous little butterflies that I found just at Crazy Clarks......a $2 shop here in Oz for all my overseas friends who take the time and follow M & B.

I have done a couple of recipes that were done on the day in previous blogs, like cupcakes and those yummy jam butterflies. We also had some little ham and cheese sandwiches that were cut out with a circle cutter and I attached a cherry tomato to some to make them look like a flower.





All in all it was a great morning and I really had the best time putting it all together but I have told Miss 6 her next party will be when she turns 18. Of course she just rolls her eyes at me and secretly deep down I know I won't be able to help myself.......until the next party!

I think B might have the next party....wink wink!

M x

Tuesday, 22 March 2011

Gingerbread People

Cooking with the kids can be fun at times or very messy!!! My 3 cherubs LOVE getting their hands into everything. Licking the spoon would rate very highly on their radar but having just one spoon between 3 can sometimes cause riots in our place. Being a rainy afternoon, there was a little bit of cabin fever going around so we decided making gingerbread people would be a nice simple boredom busting activity. Plus the kids can eat the dough and everyone is happy!

This gingerbread recipe is a household favourite in our family from way back. I remember our mum making it and B even had us all making it for her wedding as a special gift for each guest.

The recipe is from The Big Book of Beautiful Biscuits from The Australian Women's Weekly (AWW). Nearly everyone I know has this book tucked away somewhere at the back of their mother or grandmother's cupboard, along with the Children's Birthday Cake Book. I had to purchase my copy off eBay as my mother won't part with hers (when mine arrived in the mail it even smelt of mothballs!!). I also suspect B nabbed mum's spare copy - thanks B!



You will need  (page 22 in AWW's The Big Book of Beautiful Biscuits)
125g butter
1/2 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1 egg yolk
2 1/2 cups plain flour
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
3 teaspoons ground ginger
2 1/2 tablespoons golden syrup  (I have found that you really need more butter and golden syrup just so the mix comes together, so I added extra 2 tbsp of golden syrup and made my butter 160g)

Royal Icing
1 1/2 cups icing sugar
1 egg white
4 drops of lemon juice
food colouring



Step 1
 Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy, add egg yolk, beat well. Gradually add sifted dry ingredients and syrup, mix well, knead lightly. Divide dough into portions. Roll each portion between two sheets of greaseproof paper to 3mm thickness.


Step 2
Gently remove greaseproof paper from top. Cut out gingerbread figures with cutter. Remove any excess mixture around the cut-out figures.

Step 3 Lift the figures onto a lined baking tray. Bake in moderate oven 10 minutes. Cool on trays. Spoon royal icing into small plastic bag, snip off one corner to make a piping bag.

Royal Icing
Sift icing sugar. Beat egg white lightly in a small bowl, using a wooden spoon. Add icing sugar, one tablespoon at a time, beating well after each addition. When icing reaches piping consistency, beat in lemon juice and desired food colouring. Makes about 20.


Enjoy!

M xx