Baking Again

Happy Birthday HK!!

Mary-Jane has been on top form today. She had a good night last night and there hasn't been much of a murmer from her so far tonight. She has played and played and played today. She also made a nest again after lunch and insisted that Daddy lay down with her.

Here is the wee girl herself! She is getting bigger all the time. She is being very cheeky and sitting on her table - and looking very cute to boot.



All this playing can make for a tired girl needing a rest on the sofa



But Hey! You're taking photos and I want in on that - Mary-Jane charging across the sofa

I finally managed to get round to doing some baking. I started at lunch time. The house got very very noisy this afternoon - far too noisy for me to easily cope with. The less said the better.

I am a bit miffed that the foil cases didn't hold their shape well. I baked them in a shallow bun tin and the cases were touching each other. I didn't want to put them in a muffin tray, the papers always seem to come out looking greasy if they are too small for the hole. I will keep a look out for bun tins that are shallow and more widely spaced apart. I think that may be the only solution. The cake is vanilla. I will be interested in how they taste. The icing is fondant with a rice flower. I haven't used fondant before - made from scratch rather than pre-made shop bought. I am confident to use it again with lots of colour. Instead of using water in the fondant, I used a tip from the fondant sugar box - to use fruit squash/juice instead of water to give it colour and flavour - a good tip!



These are Lady Grey Cupcakes with pink swirls. They will have tiny sugar butterflies put on them tomorrow. They look nothing like the picture in the magazine. For one I didn't have the spray for the lustre on top. Secondly I think I slightly overfilled the cases. The recipe called for self raising flour and baking powder, so I don't know if this make be a contributing factor as well.

When I went back to them this evening they looked better that what I thought they would. It is one to keep trying - practice makes perfect.

I'm still knitting the blessed swap cloth. I got as far as casting off the last stitch and it suddenly looked terribly out of proportion, so I frogged the top border and resigned myself to do at least another pattern repeat. I don't think I have enough yarn to do a second pattern repeat.

When the cloth is finished I want to get cracking and finish Revontuli in time for my new Mystery Shawl KAL to start on 7th July.

Baking Again

I was baking yesterday. It took the best part of the day and some of the evening to complete. In between times was taken with being with Mary-Jane, and of course HK and spent in the usual doings of the day. May-Jane is still teething, although she seems to be over the worst. It is a little tricky to happily see inside her mouth and take a running total of peggies!

I made a batch of Red Velvet Cupcakes. This time I used sugarpaste dye and the colour unsurprisingly came out soooo much better. I did want to put a different icint topping on, but by the time I got there, it was too late to be messing.

I cut some snow flakes out of a ready to roll fondant icing, then used a paint brush to dust sparkly dust. I liked the effect, better icing next time lol! Well, there are non- left now so they must have been okay!

I also made some NSPCC specials - Vanilla with chocolate chips, with a pale green butter icing and a green spot to resemble the 'stop' of the Full Stop of their current campaign. Unfortunatly all this was lost on the NSPCC Coffee Morning as remarkably, none of these sold, even at the cheap and cheerful price of 30pence each. All is duly noted. I like them and the taste nice. Good enough for me.