Girls Night In! Invitation

Lorelle is organising a Girl's Night In!



I've brought my ticket!! Can't wait - it will be a wonderful night :)

Kaszazz workshop

I had a busy day yesterday! I cooked more biscuits (3x batches) - I just use the same base recipe then add extras (jam, mini M&Ms, icing, etc). I gave Mum half again :) If you would like the recipe, just leave a comment and I will post it.


Cassie and I finally got to do the Kaszazz workshop last night. We made this cute little pop-up cupcake / ball and a card to send it in :)

Back into routine

I feel like I have finally gotten back into "routine" again :) I managed to get motivated and cooked 3x batches of biscuits (jam drops, coffee creams and passion fruit kisses) last Thursday - gave half to mum & Mike. Then today I made Craig's fave - Mars Bar slice. I have plans to cook more biscuits tomorrow.

Friday night I went to a Midnight Crop at Scrapbook Addiction - it was nice to meet so many new people :) I used to go to a monthly midnight crop at another shop (which is now closed) - and really missed it.

Saturday I popped into Spotlight to pick up a few bits & pieces and brought this yummy fabric :) The flat fats were marked down to $1 each and the blue/white material was $2/metre - bargain :) Not sure what I am going to make with it yet, but I have a few patterns / ideas.


Sunday Craig & I got up at 5am to go fishing - it was perfect weather! I think everyone else had the same idea, cause I have never seen the jetty so busy :) Unfortunately we didn't catch anything and after chatting to others it seems they had the same bad luck too :( I did manage to have a sleep though - yep, I dozed off, fishing rod in hand and snoring! PMSL

Here is the first capsicum off my plant!!

More cards

I made this card to say thank you to Susannah from The Soap Dish for the sample pot of home-made body scrub and the most delicious smelling soap that she sent me a few months ago.


I also made this card for Katie's birthday.


I wanted to share this wedding Save The Date card that Chris & Cassie sent us. What a clever idea to use the idea of a boarding pass! We love Cairns and can't wait to head back there next year for the wedding :)

Hybrid scrapping

This month's swap at Scrap the Boys is games. I remembered I had a cute digi kit (from Peppermint Creative) with some bingo cards - so I decided to use them. I am really loving these swaps - the embellishments everyone has been creating is amazing!


After making these, I looked through my other digi kits and printed some more embellishments to use. I love the HELLO name tags :)

OMG! .... A layout!!!!

I have been scrapping a bit lately - this is the first LO I have finished though :) This one is for this month's challenge at Scrap The Boys.

Not happy Jan!

Ugh! What is it with my dogs this weekend?!?! Friday night we came home to find Jedi had gotten a toad (again) - so we followed "normal procedure" and got her feeling better. Silly dog - one of these days she'll learn to leave them alone :( Jedi is a "hunter" and will chase anything that moves - even if it is bigger than her! This is why Craig does 'toad patrol' every night to make sure there are none in the yard.

Then Sunday morning I went outside to find that Indy had completely demolished my plant trying to get a green frog (the frog had escaped)!! This is so out of character for Indy - he's pretty placid and has never been much of a hunter.


Apart from the dog dramas it was just another quiet weekend pottering around doing some DIY projects.

Free printables

Everyone loves a freebie and I thought I would share some of my favourite blogs / links / websites!

A variety of links to free downloads - both scrapping & non-scrapping
How About Orange
My life in lowercase

Vintage clip art
Free Pretty Things For You

Kaiser
Up and Away
Lush

Digi kits
Shabby Princess

Moist coconut cake with coconut ice frosting

I made this cake on the weekend and it was so moist and delicious!! :) It got the tick of approval from the ladies at simply Crafty, so I promised I would share the recipe.


125g butter, softened
1/2 teaspoon coconut essence
1 cup caster sugar
2 eggs
1/2 cup desiccated coconut
1 1/2 cups SR flour
250g light sour cream
1/3 cup milk

Frosting-
2 cups icing sugar
1 1/3 cups desiccated coconut
2 egg whites, beaten lightly
1 tablespoon water
pink food colouring

1. Preheat oven to 180C (160C fan-forced). Grease deep 22cm round cake pan, line base with baking paper.
2. Beat butter, essence and sugar in a small bowl with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs, one at a time.
3. Transfer mixture to a large bowl. Stir in half the coconut and half the sifted flour, half the sour cream, and half the milk, then add remaining coonut, flour. sour screm and milk. Stir until smooth.
4. Spread the mixture into the pan, bake for about 50 minutres or until cooked when tested. Stand cake in pan for 10 minutes before turning onto wire rack top-side up to cook.
5. Coconut ice frosting - Combine sifted icing sugar in a bowl with coconut, egg whites and water, mix well. Tint with a little pink colouring.
6. Top cold cake with frosting.

Some cooking :)

I finally got motivated to do some cooking :) I made chilli jam last week and tried two new recipes on the weekend - coconut cake and tirimasu. Both recipes were delicious! I will post the coconut cake recipe tomorrow.

On Sunday I spent the day scrapping and catching up with everyone at Simply Crafty. I did make & take card - thanks Pauline (Kaszazz) :) After months of only scrapping cards, I started working on 3 LO! Woo hoo! I was still in the scrapping mood today and worked on the LO a bit more - welcome back mojo!! LOL

I realised I haven't shared this card yet. I made it for the Xmas in July challenge, but felt it didn't really meet the requirements so didn't post it.

STB Denim swap

My denim swap from Scrap the Boys arrived last week - aren't they fabulous?!?! I can't wait to use them :)


This month's swap is "games" - if you are interested in joining in, pop over to the STB blog for more info.

Another busy weekend

Saturday arvo Craig set up the new surround sound system I brought him as a wedding anniversary present - I just watched :) I have no idea when it comes to electronics, but give me flat-pack furniture and I'm your woman! LOL He managed to set it up and we watched a couple of movies. Saturday night I went out for yummy Thai food with Cathie and Kylie. We spent hours just sitting around and chatting - I love nights like that :)

Sunday Craig & I spent the morning wandering around the markets. We brought some strawberry plants and chillies. It was nice to be out in the yard planting / gardening again :) I'm going to use the chillies to make Chilli Jam - I've been a bit slack with my baking lately - so hopefully this will motivate me to start cooking again :) I spent the rest of the afternoon making my Scrap The Boys Time (calendars / clocks) swap. I just heat embossed the calendar atamp (Kaszazz) onto kraft cardstock. I managed to make all 12 cards without any incidences, then as I'm cleaning up I knocked over the bottle of embossing powder onto the carpet - I managed to rescue half of it :(


I also had to make a sympathy card - I struggle with these, so I just CASEd one that I have seen on lots of Stampin' Up! blogs.

Scrapbook Apprentice - Round Three