Last night we feasted on Butternut Squash Chili and fresh cornbread and ate Halloween cupcakes for dessert. All while watching Hocus Pocus and listening to the rain pour down! It was the perfect Halloween evening.
{The Chili recipe is from the lovely Jenny Steffens Hobick. We made it last year and just can’t stop making it! We have made a few changes to suit our tastes, it is a wonderful and easy recipe to make!}
Well another date to add to the t-shirt, I/we survived the first day back to school. It was great to see my kids and my colleagues. I was tired, but a good tired.
The highlight of my day was going to Costco after work with a girlfriend. Sad, I know, but Costco brings me a measure of happiness and although we are trying to stay healthy and be good, a pack of red velvet cupcakes just jumped into my cart, I couldn’t believe it, but who am I to make them jump back out again, when they risked their lives leaping from the shelf in the first place? I just let them stay there and enjoy the ride.
Is there a better way to celebrate the end of the week then with a chocolate coffee frosted chocolate cupcake?
I made these for Mr. Michie’s class this afternoon, as it was his Friday to make the cakes and I was even invited down for one and a cup of hot chocolate to boot.
Have a wonderful weekend!
The breakfast of champions! This deliciously iced, sprinkle topped cupcake and a frozen coffee was my breakfast this morning.
It was not healthy, I know, but it was absolutely scrumptious!
I have made a set of 6 Halloween Cupcake Toppers for you to download and make to create some bewitchingly cute cupcakes!
Enjoy and Happy Halloween!
French vanilla cupcakes with my Nana’s chocolate coffee icing and a chocolate covered coffee bean on the top. A perfect afternoon snack for a fall day!
Going, Going, Gone!
Mr. Michie e-mailed this to me after coming across it. He knew I would love it and he was right! What a beautiful image. It was created by Allen Hemberger and Sarah Wilson as a birthday gift for a friend.
I think it is stunning! To see how they did it, watch the video here. Just looking at this poster makes me hungry!
We went shopping this weekend and I came across these silicone tea cups:
Unfortunately, the store was out of stock, they just had an empty display box, stating more stock would be in soon. I thought that this would be an adorable idea for a children’s tea party, or even a grown-ups tea party for that matter. To have delicious cupcakes baked in these pipped with twirly-whirly swirls of icing in a rainbow of colors and sprinkles.
And you could serve them alongside these yummy lemon raspberry sandwich cookies:
These little ham & cheese thumbprints:
Mini cucumber sandwiches made with my Mom’s mouth-watering cucumber and carrot spread and a selection of delicious vegetables with a homemade buttermilk ranch dip. I am getting hungry just thinking about it!
The day started out rainy this morning, but now has gone sunny and deliciously cool, the perfect tea party day, for bunting strung in trees, white tableclothes billowing in the breeze, good music floating through the garden and a group of friends to enjoy the afternoon with as day slips into night.
When these get back in stock, they might just jump into my hands, because I think this is a truly cute idea!
(Click on the cookie and thumbprints pictures to be taken directly to the recipe, tea party girl by Belle & Boo)
Well, Saturday took a different turn than expected. We headed out of our London burb and into the city center. Which meant a trip to Carnaby Street!
One of my favorite streets in all of London and a quick back entrace into Liberty’s where I got to see a good portion of the Target range that is being offered Stateside, oh, how tempting it all was!
On our way there we took a short cut/ detour down a side street and went past this building: “Oh, Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your golden (in this case auburn) hair!” When you went up closer and peeked through the window the hair continued inside in this shell of a room, now completely filled with a cobweb of tangled locks. It was pretty interesting to see.
We also went past these cute painted drums, their faces made me smile! And then we headed onto Carnaby Street. I could hear the choir sing in my heart as we headed into Kingly Court, I thought this dress was Spring time pretty, standing in a shop window as advertisement for the vintage store upstairs. But, we kept right on moving so we could get one of the best cupcakes going, from Candy Cakes.
I got blueberry with a blueberry yoghurt topping it was heaven as always! I had a little rainbow colored marshmallow twist on top of my cake, which of course I shared!
My sweet red head was in the mood for cake and got the most wonderful piece of carrot & walnut cake, I could have just eaten a bowl full of the icing on that cake and have been happy for the rest of the day.
So, an unexpected errand brought me the cupcakes I truly desired and I couldn’t have been in more of a state of cupcake bliss than I already was. Hope you had a happy weekend?
(Click here to go to the Candy Cakes site)
I have these crazy Martha Stewart ideas at times, I see something and I think, “Oh, wouldn’t that be the cutest idea, all made, decorated, beautifully wrapped and lined up in neat rows to hand out…”, the idea I am thinking of, are Thanksgiving goody bags, or boxes in this case.
Whether we had Thanksgiving at our house or someone else’s, everyone always left with a bag of goodies, especially (my mom being an original New Yorker before she moved below the Mason Dixon) if cookies had been sent down from New York, you can’t beat a good bakery! Divine cookies with sprinkles or nuts or a little cherry stuck in them; shaped like leaves and hearts and circles, they were a box of pure happiness!
I was looking for something this morning and went to the Bake it Pretty website and saw their turkey cupcake picks and that started off my whole wave of crazy thinking. I thought wouldn’t it be cute, if you made little pumpkin bread cupcakes, iced with mountains of cream cheese frosting (in these retro Sound of Music looking liners), stuck in a little turkey pick, whipped up some acorn shaped sugar cookies while you were at it and had everything all beautifully packaged in a box with some bakers twine or raffia tied through the handle, with something cute stamped on the box.
These are my Martha Stewart moments, the ideas that I would be insane enough to do, but will not. I just love the idea of it!
(Images from the Bake it Pretty website)
P.S. I heard my 1st Christmas song of the season on the radio this morning, I did a Charlie Brown Peanut’s dance of happiness!