At The Hop

Paige turned 3 recently and even though Mia wont be 5 for a couple of months we'll be moving house then so I decided she could celebrate early and we had a combined birthday sock hop. 

To be honest Paige wanted a fairy party {which I told her would be so lovely} meanwhile I talked up twirly skirts and glitter balls then wooed her with promises of strawberry milk and fries, not to mention my wild demonstrations of the jive all around the kitchen until finally she was converted to a rock and roll theme. I only feel a tinsy bit guilty since she has never mentioned fairies in her life until we started talking about her party. {Of course she hasn't mentioned sock hops either, but that's neither here nor there.} 

Before the party I spent an hour washing, dusting, sweeping and generally de-wintering the outdoor area before realising it was way too cold and windy to have it outside. What a waste of time! So even though there was a bunch of little {screaming} girls on their way we had to have it inside. Which meant a quick re-arange of the decorations. I think it turned out well.

These records were $5 for a box of eight at the op shop. That's very glittery cardboard in the centre though it doesn't show in the photos. Obviously the juke box pinata was meant to be hanging from my outside hook but it turned out to be a great table decoration instead. Lolly bags from the dollar store and florescent pink tulle, which cost about $1 a meter. 

The girls looking so cute in their cheapo outfits. Mia's tutu skirt is from the dollar store and was falling apart by the end of the party, Paige's was on sale at Spotlight for $14 and the tops are $3 from Kmart. {I love the new Kmart!}

Fifi the poodle was the rock and roll clincher for Paige, marshmallows are her favourite. Which I kept telling myself around 11pm when I was still putting them on Fifi individually! She looks so smug about it too. Your supposed to put the marshmallows all around her body but my icing was too dry and they wouldn't stick thank goodness because I don't know if I could've been bothered. {Don't mention her stubby legs, she's really self conscious.}

The kids got a pink tray {plastic plate} of diner style food. These burger cupcakes were very tasty and so easy to make, way faster and simpler than Fifi the {flippin} poodle. Instructions below. And making an appearance at every party we do, wobbles jelly cups. This time chocolate with a musk stick, canned whipped cream and a jaffa on top to look like a sundae. Other food served, wedges, curly fries, hotdogs, fairy bread, fruit and flavoured milk. You could also do spiders {floats} if you had older kids, ice cream sundaes, pizza, milk shakes or banana splits. I forgot to put out my Oreos. 

We played lots of fab 50s tunes and the girls had a really good time.

And I had the last laugh Fifi!

Hamburger Cupcakes

So easy. Packet cake mix, packet brownie mix and packet icing. Bake mixes, slice cupcakes, cut brownies into circles {I used my 1/4 cup measure} use finger to slightly wet the top of the cupcakes and sprinkle sesame seeds on top. Tint the icing red {tomato sauce} yellow {mustard} and green {lettuce} place in snap-lock bags and snip the ends off to pipe on top of the brownies. Use a powder rather than a liquid to get a true red colour and snip your piping bag small, mine was slightly too big. 

Amazing idea from Bakerella. 

Easter

May as well say this is an 'annual Easter catch up' since I technically did the same thing last year {about 10 posts ago} 

My beautiful little nieces are moving away interstate and my kids wanted to do a movie night and sleepover with them so we {I} set the playroom up with all the mattresses and a little treat station. We stayed up late, watched the movie HOP and I fed them a huge amount of sugar, you know typical auntie stuff.  

I have a small kids table in the corner of the playroom that I covered with fabric and hung a strand of lights over. If you look up when your in my house you can see quite a few clear 3M hooks, I use them for everything {but rarely take them down}. The kids thought it looked a bit special. 

Fyn and I made these little cookie pops, but other than that it was just popcorn and store bought treats in pretty bowls. We did try to make ice-cream pops {small balls of ice-cream frozen hard and then dipped in chocolate} Total disaster. Ice-cream melting all over the place, so I found a few things in my pantry and threw them in the food processor {milk arrowroot biscuits, pre made frosting, cocoa} rolled them up and dipped them in chocolate and sprinkles. I was in a bit of a rush so they could have looked better but very delicious and a big hit. 

This year we {I} had to make 2 little easter hats for the girls kindy parade. They were my first 'girl' hats, so I got a bit carried away with the flowers and the glue gun.

The girls were very happy with the hats and thought they were absolutely beautiful. Until they saw the other kids and realised they were the only ones with meadows on their heads. After that they were a bit um ... apprehensive. 

This is the table set for Easter dinner. The flowers are in ramekins and are from a neighbouring tree, can't be sure but they may be weeds. Each person got a little chocolate chicken, $3 for a whole bag and surprisingly yum. 

Now I'm just showing off my view.

Stage Three

I have officially reached all requirements for stage three on my Christmas scale.

Stage 1. Believe in Santa, everything is magic, its all about the presents!
Stage 2. Pretend to believe in Santa, everything is relaxing, it's all about the presents!
Stage 3. Become Santa, everything magic requires your hard work, its all about the food!

This year I am making the Christmas dinner for the extended family. Me. Turkey, gravy, potatoes the whole deal. I am wishing for a perfect juicy turkey {I know it can be done!} golden crunchy potatoes and perfectly done roast vegetables. No need to panic.

Buffet all dressed for deserts. {Although that's a bit of joke as it's woefully inadequate to hold all the deserts my family will have.}

Now thats a party table! Looks like way more fun ... maybe I'll sit with the kids this year.

Almost Spooky Stuff

I don't know the historical significance of Halloween {and I probably never will} but I do know I love the cheap imported products! It's not festive, it's not pretty, it's not even significant {to me} but Halloween is without a doubt the best fun around.

My kids decorated this with some stuff from the two dollar store and it looked very spooky in the dark. 

The ghosts can only been seen at night ... rightly so. Fyn just stuck them inside the lampshade with blutak, simple and effective. 

And even though I knew they were fake and I knew they were there, they still freaked me out whenever I walked past, a whole bag of black spiders for $2. They're scattered all over the house now so I assume they will randomly scare everyone. 

A sweet friend organised for a large group of Twilight lovers {yes I'm one those girls} to see the new movie together. She thought a DVD marathon was a good idea to refresh our memories {and recommit to our teams.}

What to drink? B+ of course!

I did the usual drinks buffet with some red candles, apples and chocolates for a twilight touch. I also stole an idea from my sister who had a pink chocolate fountain at her daughters pool party. I can't believe I never thought of that, genius! I thought a red chocolate fountain {you know, for blood} would be a bit gross and yummy. So I was just finishing up my red chocolate which was about 4 blocks of good quality white chocolate an entire bottle of red food colouring and a touch of black to get that deep red colour, when I heard a blood curdling scream {dramatic effect added}. My baby had hit his chin and bitten his tongue. So while I was mopping up the real blood, the chocolate blood burned. Such a shame!

Luckily I store chocolate like it's the end of the world, sadly not red food colouring so I had to settle for milk chocolate. Not spooky at all, but definitely yummy. And for the record I am team Jacob {most of the time.}

And this is the edible graveyard I made for the kids.

Ingredients: brownies, chocolate custard, shortbread, chocolate finger biscuits, oreos, brocolini and white chocolate. I also bought some chocolate candy rocks. 

How quickly it all fell apart because at this early stage I realised I did not have enough packet chocolate icing to cover my sponge and I couldn't be bothered to make any. Why didn't I just buy chocolate sponge? I've said it before, not a genius. So carry on it's not like the kids are going to care anyway. 

Cut around the coffins then hollow them out. Fill with chocolate custard and all sorts of freaky stuff like spiders, worms, G.I Joe legs etc. I used a couple of lolly grubs. {Tombstones and dirt made the same way as the science party rocks} Dip the shortbread into black coloured chocolate and use black icing gel to write on your tombstones. Cover everything in Oreo dirt and flash forward to this.

Try to ignore the exposed sponge!

This $2 toy laughed wickedly and had flashing eyes. Very cool.

This is a yummy way to dig your own grave! I find it much easier to make food pretty rather than ugly but I'm still happy with how it turned out. And in case you were wondering, no they did not eat the brocolini grass.