Hello dear ones. Happy Spring!! What better way to celebrate the arrival of this floral season than sharing my vintage cactus party with you. This was actually my daughter’s tenth birthday party late last year. After much deliberation, and yes I confess, perhaps even a persuasive word from Mama bear, we decided upon a cactus theme. I wanted to keep the colours bright and fresh, using crisp apple green and lolly pink, with white accents.
Good morning Lovelies. Isn’t it wonderful that Autumn has finally poked his chilly head up after a long and tiresome Summer (sorry, I know most of you love hot weather, but not me!) He has taken his time this year and most days are still quite warm, but I am relishing the fact that my flannie jammies and slippers are finally out of the cupboard at last.
Last Spring we welcomed a precious family into our home for afternoon tea. They live in Singapore, although they are an Australian family who are blessed with 13 children. I wanted to spoil them so I set up a really simple tea party using some colourful flowers as my inspiration. Never overlook cheap supermarket flowers. While some of them are quite ordinary, you will often find enough pretty ones to mix and match with greenery from your own garden to make a lovely table centrepiece. The key is to get creative with your presentation and put flowers in something unique, like these gorgeous vintage thermoses or painted mason jars.
With these sunshiney flowers as my inspiration, I built the entire theme around their bright colours. Sunset orange, fresh yellow, watermelon red with a splash of green became my colour palette.
Looking through my collection of vintage aprons I selected those which matched the theme, instantly adding a retro feel to the set up.
Another easy way to add a bit of fun to your tea party is to dress up some glass bottles. I raided my scrapbooking supplies to see if I had anything that would suit the colour scheme and found bright washi tape and cute wooden flower pegs. By adding string, paper flowers and matching straws to each bottle, I brought cohesion to the theme and delight to my guests. By adding white tags to each bottle, guests wrote their name, keeping their own bottle throughout the party. A win if there are a lot of children buzzing around.
What could be easier than giving guests soda water with fresh lemon slices and mint leaves to drink. Tea parties do not need to be complicated. It is all about presentation!
For the adults, I served tea in my gorgeous Johnson Australia cups.
To keep things super simple, I only served one cake for afternoon tea. I made a generous sized carrot and pecan cake with cream cheese frosting, decorated with flaked coconut and fresh flowers.
The rich colours of this tea party ooze the essence of Autumn, but could equally be a celebration of the arrival of Spring. Whichever hemisphere you live in, with Mother’s Day approaching, perhaps you will find inspiration to gather some of your favourite things together to host a little tea party of your own.
For more seasonal party inspo, check out my Spring Brunch or Autumn dessert table
xx
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Hello Lovely ones, how’s things? Life is looking pretty good from where I am sitting. It’s such a crazy ride at times, and today is no exception, but somehow, at the moment, I have a peace in the journey and I will hang onto it. Yes Please.
We had a bit of a city escapade for a couple of nights this week. There is an exhibition from the British Museum (sigh…number 1 on my Bucket List) on Ancient Egypt that I have been trying to get the kids to for aaages. Finally the stars and planets aligned and we got there. Oh my heart. It was incredible. Like three and a half thousand year old bread in the tomb incredible….I feel things deeply and to stand there looking at ancient tablets from before the time of Moses impacted me profoundly. These people were so intelligent, talented and skilful. I was impressed by their attention to detail and artistry. By the painstaking ritual of respect shown to the departed in preparation for the afterlife. Amazing.
One day I will head to London and spend an entire week in the British Museum. I know it’s big, but I want to see every single thing. Ironically, history and things past fill my heart with life. As I said goodbye to the artefacts, mummies, childrens shoes and three and a half thousand year old bread, I felt I had made new friends. I shared in the tiniest part of living history and it absolutely filled my heart to full and overflowing.
Yeah, I’m a bit of a sentimental old fool like that.
Back to reality driving home as we were expecting nearly twenty young Christian Surfers to arrive and set up camp in our back yard for the night. Our oldest daughter is also bringing a carload up from Sydney to join them for a weekend of surfing, fun, eating, sitting by the open fire and enjoying sweet fellowship. I love having these precious young adults in our home. They are so full of life and energy and see the world as it should be seen, full of hope and opportunity.
Speaking of hope, is there anything more gloriously hopeful than welcoming precious new life into the world? This baby shower is very close to my heart as the family are sweet friends of mine. You may even recognise my lovely model from the Easter shoot I did recently. This baby shower was for her sister.
We kept everything minimal (new for me!) as it was quite a small gathering. I helped out with some gluten and dairy free cupcakes and the feature cake. The family provided all the savoury food and I set up a very simple dessert table to showcase the sweets.
The shower was held in the stunning Blackwood House AirBnB. Oh my. If you are after luxury accommodation near glorious ByronBay, then look no further. It is truly spectacular.
I kept the styling fairly minimal, with a distinct earthy focus. Wooden cake stands and handmade tree slice cake stands were used for the succulent cupcakes which I decorated in deep shades of violet and avacado green. I threw in a bit of bling with gold sequin fabric draped over the timber trestle. I love to add a touch of quirky to my tables so I used vintage salt and pepper shakers as name card holders.
One request was a photo backdrop. I loved creating this very bohemian feature piece with lace and doilies fitted into embroidery hoops, sewn together with fishing line. I cut strips of old lace curtains from the op shop and sewed them onto the edges of the doilies (just in case you were wondering how I made it!) It looked quite dramatic up against the beautiful black timber wall. While it was not a quick project to make, it now hangs proudly in our entry way here at home.
It was an honour to play a small role in celebrating the imminent arrival of this dear little one. Baby showers are definitely my favourite parties to style. Those darling bundles of gorgeousness just take my breath away every single time. I am so thrilled for this precious new mother, who is about to embark on the greatest adventure of her life.
Welcome to the world darling Husky. You are perfection.
XX
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Good morning my Lovelies,
I know I have said this more than a few times this week, but Oh my heart!! I struggle to express how delighted I am to share my Easter photo shoot with you. To be able to turn this little idea of mine into a reality, and oh my what a beautiful reality it was, just about fills this mama’s heart to full and overflowing.
My inspiration came from a few areas. Firstly, I have been longing to do a shoot in this location for years. It is a local farm with grazing cows and the most picturesque trees. As chance would have it, I was driving along the cute bumpy road one morning and met the owner of the farm, who readily gave me permission to do a shoot on his property. Win. All we needed to do was avoid the warm fresh cow pads as we hauled our goodies through the boggy grass, as it had been raining for a week. Well, we missed most of them. Yikes!
My vision was to create a whimsical Easter desert table in pastel tones, with a distinct vintage style. Lots of pretty pale pinks and baby blues with pops of yellow and fresh flowers. Instead of one feature cake I wanted to be a little bit more extravagant with three cakes taking centre stage.
I filled the dessert table with some of my favourite treats, including passionfruit curd meringue cupcakes, choc coated Oreo pods with edible nests made from vermicilli noodles mixed with green tinted white chocolate, Easter themed sugar cookies and meringue kisses.
Part of my signature style is the use of vintage props on dessert tables. I love picking up quirky bits and pieces to incorporate onto my tables, keeping them unique and interesting. I am especially fond of kitsch baby planters and egg cups. Their pastel tones and very cute characteristics make for delightful cake toppers or sweets holders.
Every time I do a photo shoot my girls take turns modelling for me. They are all so adorable and love dressing up and posing for me. Miss Kitty was so excited that she would practice standing and smiling for everyone at home to show us how she was going to pose for the photo shoot! Too cute. I love that we are making memories together and I can give them a childhood filled with creativity, wonder and beauty.
Life is a gift that needs to be cherished. I know I often get lost in the everydayness of the pressing needs around me and fail to look up, look beyond my messy house and breathe. As I scroll through these pretty photos I am reminded that life, childhood, family and friendships all need to be celebrated. For me, I guess that looks like creating beautiful dessert tables, sweet treats and having fun baking and dressing up with my girls. For others it is taking the boards to the beach or riding bikes through a park together. Whatever it is you love to do with your tribe, let me encourage you to get out and do something fun together this Easter weekend. Create memories, build up the family love tank and leave the washing till next week.
Happy Easter.
All my love xx
Concept, styling, props and desserts || Mama Bears Kitchen
Photography || Sarah Rickard Photography
Flowers || Alstonville Florist
Cookie stamps || The Cookie Stamp Co
Models || Kitty, Daisy & Parker
Hello dear ones,
It’s been an age since I have joined you here, but oh it’s nice to be back! As we all know, blogging is only a snippet of my life and it takes pretty much all of me to love my hubby and dear sweet lambs plus run our home and pastor a church. I have spent the first part of the year getting the tribe sorted and into the rhythm of our family / school / homeschool life and routine.
The good news is that I am now resuming my weekly blog posts. Every Saturday morning you will find my latest creative ventures, themed party, styled shoot or cupcake recipe. I hope you will join me. Despite my blogging absence, I have been quite busy creating new content and I can’t wait to share it all with you.
First up for 2018 is this Easter dessert table I set up for a flower crown workshop I hosted in my home. My goal was to create a pastel sweets table with a distinct vintage feel. I wanted to draw out the child in each of us, with matching lollies, cookies, cake pops and cake.
The girls and I got our bunny cookie cutters out to give homemade coconut ice an Easter makeover. I was pleased with how easy it was, and how cute they looked. Even your toddlers could help in the kitchen with this one.
Another super easy snack I made with the kids was choc dipped Oreos. We simply melted white chocolate (with a drop or two of candy oil colour, or you could use candy melts if you have a microwave, which we don’t). Dip half an Oreo biscuit into the chocolate and sprinkle with your favourite sprinkle mix.
I’m not much of a cookie decorator, but I couldn’t resist these adorable radish and carrot cutters. Piped with pastel coloured buttercream and displayed in cute Easter bowls and plates, they added a bit of Easter cheer to the table.
What’s an easter dessert table without lollies? I know I shouldn’t, but I have a bit of a weakness for these tempting little sweeties. I have many a fond childhood memory buying bags of lollies, back in the day when twenty cents filled a huge bag to the brim! Ahh..the good ole days…
I love displaying sweets in cute little vintage planters, jars or timeless white milk glass dishes. They just look soo good all dressed up.
Perhaps my favourite element of any party is the take home favours. A gift giver at heart, I love to bless my guests with goodies to take home, which are preferably edible. For my Easter party I decorated cheap gift bags with fabric strips, ribbon, paper flowers, string and cute vintage easter tags, for guests to put their lollies in. I also spray painted the lids of plastic cylinders and filled them with jelly beans for the children to take home.
For the ladies I set up a tea station with my pretty tea cups on a white vintage dresser, decorated with a simple fabric bunting to tie in with the theme. I also decorated glass milk bottles with string and paper flowers in pastel colours.
Another weakness of mine is vintage aprons. Oh my heart, they are just soo adorable and make the perfect decorating accesory! My favourite way to use them is strung across the dessert table as a garland, or even as a backdrop. The colours are so pretty and I love that real women wore them as they cared and cooked for their families. A reminder of beauty in the every day.
Thanks for taking the time to scroll through my photos. Hopefully you go away inspired to create your own Easter gathering with the kids, family and friends.
I am so happy to be here. Life is pretty big for all of us, and I am so thankful for the tiny time and space I get to meet with you and share my passion for all things sweet, pretty and vintage. Stay tuned and don’t forget to pop in next Saturday morning where I will share with you my latest Easter photo shoot, which I am so excited about, I think my heart will burst!
See you then. xx
Good morning dear ones, are you getting excited about Christmas yet?
Today we broke out Bing Crosby’s Christmas carols which I freely confess caused a little flutter of the heart as I sighed out loud. Apart from being a baking stylist’s dream, Christmas really is a special time for me. I love everything about it. The music, food, presents (gift giving is wayyy up there in my love language), hustle and bustle and even the tacky store decorations…..well, maybe except tinsel…..yeah, I don’t like tinsel.
As pastors, Christmas day is a pretty busy time for our family. We usually host a church service for the community at a local lake, then head to the cemetary to remember our precious Heavenly son, Noah, before finally chugging home to open presents, eat and reflect on the goodness of God.
I try to delegate as much of the Christmas dinner as I can to my capable oldest son, who can cook up a feast with more skill than me. We have learnt to keep it simple with a realistic amount of food, which usually involves a baked ham or lamb, roast veggies and salads. We aren’t much of a seafood family, so that’s easy.
The sweets are another matter entirely.
The girls and I spend the weeks prior to Christmas whipping up all sorts of celebratory confections. Sugar cookies, cupcakes, coconut ice, rocky road, not to mention a delicious gingerbread cake and gingerbread men….and that’s not even dessert. Have I ever mentioned to you that I am a frustrated baker with an insatiable neeeed to bake? Every Christmas I love turning my kitchen into a festive frenzy. Thankfully I have quite a few willing helpers.
Every year I like to set up a dessert and sweets table for my family….well, more for my own creative satisfaction really. (Did I ever tell you I am just a creatively starved housewife? Plus my older children don’t eat sugar. I know right.)
The first place I go to find inspiration is our local fabric store. I will often find a colour combination or pattern that catches my eye and I’ll build an entire Christmas theme around it. Last year I found this funky colourful fabric range and knew it would be perfect.
You should know by now about my love affair with bright colours. I was going to call this my ‘pastel Christmas’ but realised that I am probably the only person on the planet who would consider these colours pastel. I fell in love with the hot pink, aqua blue, lime green and red. A crazy gorgeous colour combo.
The next thing I do is hunt around for matching bibs and bobs that bring out the colours in the fabric. Raiding my prop collection I found a couple of super cute neon faux deer and a hot pink chalk board frame from my Summer Boho NY Eve party. I also used a cheap red glass cake stand I bought from Woolies last Christmas (score!) and others from my collection. The wooden churches and pastel ( yes, really pastel ) Christmas trees were picked up from bargain shops. The next time you rummage through tacky store decorations, try to visualise them out of context, in a nicer setting, ie: on your styled dessert table. You will be surprised how good they can look when you cobble them together with nicer pieces.
For a simple table covering I put a strip of hot pink hessian over a white wooden trestle table with a piece of the feature fabric as a runner. You can also see how a string of matching baubles and paper lanterns can dress up a table.
It’s good to buy a couple of metres of each chosen fabric to use throughout your display and main table. Here I used a narrow strip as a runner on our dining table to bring continuity to the theme.
One of our family traditions is to give each guest a Darrell Lea nougat pudding for Christmas. They are sooo delicious, and such a treat. I always wrap one for each place setting and label them with handmade tags. For this theme I used fabric strips as ribbons to tie around the boxes.
As I mentioned in my Lavender & Lace wedding post, one of my signature styling elements is using marquee light letters on my dessert tables. I’m pretty crazy about them. All you need to do is change the fabric to match any theme you have. This is the beauty of using fabric as your inspiration source. There are countless ways you can include it to bring cohesion to your display.
Well, there you have it. Our pastel , I mean bright Christmas dessert table. I hope you enjoyed a little peak into our family celebration. With only three weeks until the happy day, I need to get cracking with this year’s plans. About now my girls usually beg me to do a red and green Christmas theme and last year forced me to buy a green Christmas tree (!) to replace the really cool dark purple one I found a few years ago. What is that!? What’s not to love about a purple Christmas tree? Seriously. I think it’s fabulous, but apparently it isn’t, so I finally succumbed to family pressure and (gasp) bought a traditional green tree. (Can you feel my disappointment?)
Sooo, this year, I am biting the bullet and have chosen very traditionally…..wait for it….red and green checked tartan. I know. Aren’t you proud of me? (applause please). I’m pretty impressed myself. I found some gorgeous tartan in Spotlight, and have a few old plaid tins and thermoses, so you’d better watch this space!
See you next week. xx
Good morning dear ones, thanks so much for dropping into my little happy place today.
In September two years ago, our precious son and his beautiful bride got married. (You can see their lovely vintage wedding here). Between August and December of that year we actually had five weddings! Hubby, being a minister, officiated at most of them, while I had the honour of styling desserts and cakes as well. Most of them were young friends of our son, so it was pretty special, albeit quite busy, being a part of such celebrations.
For this wedding, the young bride’s vision was for a vintage wedding with burlap, lace and lavender as the chosen colour scheme. She wanted an extensive dessert table, catered largely by myself, with added homemade sweets. She also requested a lolly buffet, providing the sweets and glassware herself, which I styled.
I really love lolly buffets. They are always such a hit at weddings and the potential for colour coordinated styling sends me into a frenzy! I’m just crazy about them! All you need are a few key vintage pieces, and by matching the colour palette to your theme you can lift your desserts to the next level. Take a look at a similar lolly buffet I created for my son’s wedding, using a different colour scheme.
Two of the easiest ways to jazz up your lolly buffet are making a fabric garland backdrop to frame your display, and marquee letters to create an eye catching centrepiece.
As a very tactile person, I love working with fabric and paper. It’s easy to make a backdrop garland by using a selection of cheap fabric cut into two inch strips and bunching them together on a length of string. Go for volume and make a lot of strips. Include lace and ribbon for added texture.
Marque letters are available from Spotlight stores, for around $15 on special. I glue coordinating fabric letters onto a cardboard template and pop the lights back in. Too easy.
The dessert table had a more rustic look than the lolly buffet, while some elements were carried through to give continuity. Touches of lavender on the food cards and some pastel sweets softened the look. A bunch of fresh of lavender in an old silver teapot on top of some of my favourite books kept in with the vintage theme.
A generous hessian tablecloth topped with vintage lace covered the long table, with timber palettes giving height and interest to the display, along with my gorgeous tin cake stands, wood slices and timber boxes.
For the dessert menu I made white chocolate Tim Tam pops and white choc covered Oreos, plus a selection of cupcakes including lime & pistachio, lavender & earl grey and cookies & cream. They didn’t last long!
I couldn’t resist sneaking a few photos of my dear ones as they were clearly delighted in being together so close to their own special day. Young love. Sigh.
Good morning Lovelies. How’s things? The girls and I flew solo this week as hubby took our 18 year old son adventuring in Tassie for a dose of hiking, snow seeking, white water rafting and bush walks. He has worked so hard this year, often at three jobs, so we wanted to give him a pat on the back and tell him how proud we are of the amazing young man he is becoming.
Time out is good for all of us. As stay at home mums of littlies and middle size kiddies would know, it’s not that easy to go on adventurous holidays. Actually, even just holidays. I think we’ve tried about three times to get away this year, but between the dog, two cats, rabbit, chickens, brand new chickies and kids agendas, its been nigh impossible.
To be honest though, I’m not that adventurous anyway. I really love my home, my kitchen, my books, tea, hearth and larder….ahh Bilbo Baggins, I see you. We don’t use our hearth much, but I am honestly very happy in my own space. This week one of my daughters suggested I should go out into the veggie garden more often…I can’t remember why she was saying that, but the first words that popped into my mouth were…”Why would I want to leave my kitchen?” Even I was taken aback by my candid reply. I was instantly struck by my own honesty….yes, I would rather be baking in my kitchen than pretty much anywhere else.
One thing I can do from home, to my delight, is create adorable baby showers and parties. When we heard our first grandchild was on the way, I was quick to talk with my son and his wife about the baby shower. As I was the stylist and sweets caterer for their gorgeous Vintage barefoot wedding, I knew pretty well what style they both like. Mostly vintage with a splash of sunshine, green from the earth, timber, natural textures and pops of colour.
My son requested that the shower be suitable for both guys and girls, as they wanted their friends to attend. I therefore kept to a fairly neutral palette, with lots of light timber, raw textures, white and hints of pink to celebrate that their baby is a girl. You can read about my heartfelt reflections on becoming a grandmother in Part 1 of this baby shower post HERE
I chose a bit of a boho woodland theme, keeping the design elements simple and not overly cluttered. I used some greenery, grasses, succulents, and one of my favourite vintage design elements, a homemade fabric garland, as a statement piece along the front of the dessert table. The timber pallets were a main feature of the display, which are a cheap and versatile way to dress up any dessert table. My husband made the backdrop timber board with wood panels from Bunnings, which was painted white.
I had fun creating the dessert menu for this baby shower. I decorated sugar cookies to look like flowers and gave chocolate coated peanut butter crackers a touch of cactus love. Caramel corn cupcakes were topped with cute foxes and woodland animal printables and the most delicious raw cakes topped off the dessert table.
I found these cute birch log card holders on eBay that matched my theme perfectly.
Apart from the main dessert table, my talented son made up antipasto platters for an extensive grazing table. He has a natural way of putting savoury food together, so I left that in his capable hands. I pulled out some of my quirky props, including old suitcases, wooden crates, enamelware and even an old set of scales. It is so easy to dress up a food table by using whatever funky things you have around your home to add height and interest to serve your food.
One of my go to serving ideas is to wrap small luncheon rolls in coordinating fabric or ribbon scraps. Such an easy way to dress up your table. It’s the little touches that turn an ordinary gathering into something special.
Another little idea I almost always do is get my kiddies baking biscuits or cookies for the table. A sweet homemade touch that goes the extra mile in making your guests feel spoilt, and your kids will feel important too.
Something else the kids can help with is decorating the drink glasses or bottles. I usually use mason jars or glass milk bottles, both available from cheap shops. They are so versatile and can literally be dressed to suit any theme or event. Personalising the name tags also helps make your guests feel valued, and encourages them to keep the same glass throughout the day.
Of course no baby shower in my home is complete without a tea station. I saved up most of the pink to use on my funky pink dresser that I just adore. I made up a ‘tea’ banner with coordinating printables and embellished it with matching fabric scraps and hung it across the mirror. Carefully selected tea cups sitting on the dresser were pretty enough to make any tea lover sigh with immense satisfaction! Not to leave the coffee drinkers out of action, I set up my retro Johnson Australia coffee cups, which also happened to match my theme. Score.
Whenever I host a baby shower I love to decorate a baby or doll cradle to hold gifts for the expectant mother. In this case, a dear friend painted the cradle as a gift itself to the delighted mama.
Lastly, and perhaps my favourite element of any party is the take home favours. I am a gift giver at heart, so I’m always on the lookout for cheap, suitable party favours that say a hearty ‘Thanks for coming!’ to any party I host. I found these brightly coloured fragrant candles half price in Lincraft and knew they would be perfect for the baby shower. By adding cute ‘thank you’ tags tied with string I had gorgeous little gifts for guests to enjoy at home.
Thank you for taking a little tour around my baby shower with me. As I mentioned in Part 1, this event was especially close to my heart. I am so blessed to have a loving family and it was an honour to create this special party for them.
Next week I will be sharing with you my absolute favourite cake I have made so far. It’s a bit of a bomb! Stay tuned, and have a great weekend. xx
Good morning Lovelies. Another glorious day here in paradise. What are you up to this weekend? We might take the kiddies for a swim in the lake before I decorate my orange and poppyseed cake for church tomorrow. I am thinking of doing more succulents, just because I want to and they are way too much fun.
Oh hold your hat!! As I am sitting here chatting with you I hear a faint cheepy chirpy sound coming from our incubator. Low and behold we have the first of our teeny tiny chicks hatching into the world today! Yayy! How exciting. Don’t you just love new life?
Anyway, as I was intending to say ….last Saturday we had our third 18th birthday party. I gave myself the challenge of creating my very first non vintage monochromatic dessert table and donut board. Not an old rusty, weather beaten prop in sight. As modern decor is not my native tongue, so to speak, I am quite pleased that I managed to pull out shiny, black, brand new non vintage items.
As for the monochromatic look…..well, I tried really really hard. I honestly did, but then I found this deliciously blue Mosser glass cake stand online, that I had been searching all over the country for. As soon as I had it in my hot little hand I just knew it would provide the perfect pop of colour to send my dessert table to the next level. Before I knew it, I had blue isomalt to make a sugar sail for my cake and matching cupcakes, colour coordinated candy and hues of blue on my cake that would make Van Gogh proud. What can I say, resist as I might, colour is my passion and as my twelve year old daughter expressively declares, “It’s just my natural musk!”
As our son is a tradie, I thought it would be fun to use nails as pegs on the donut board. Do you have any idea how many nails there are in Bunnings? Oh my. I was standing there in front of hundreds of packets of the dear things..feeling a little out of my comfort zone to be honest. Now I know how hubby would feel if I sent him into Spotlight for quilters thread. Anyway, I finally found some that fit the peg board and they looked really effective.
I have to say it. This was a very cheap DIY dessert table display. Totally budget friendly. Most of the props were sourced from Kmart and were under ten dollars each. The black metal grid framing the donuts are small clothes drying racks. I found a set of three round mirrors for $9:00 which I used under the cake and wire basket to create a reflective illusion of space. Flat metal trays served sweets and desserts, and a metal display shelf attached to the peg board backdrop held the cupcakes.
Some of my favourite DIY elements of the party included the cake stands I made. Again, all items were found in Kmart. I bought two round stone trivets and glued them to a geometric candle holder, which I turned upside down. Voila! A trendy modern cake stand for less than ten dollars. I also glued three black tin hexagon planters together to hold the lollies.
The sweets menu consisted of a chocolate orange blossom birthday cake and cupcakes…my new favourite combination (recipe coming soon to blog). Our daughter graciously carried four dozen Krispy Kreme donuts on the plane from Sydney, which were possibly the stars of the show. Everyone loves a good donut! Tim Tam pops and chocolate coated peanut butter crackers were decorated with edible metal gun grey paint and silver leaf. (Note to self, metallic edible paint is not actually designed to go on chocolate and gives a bitter taste. Hmm. All good, I conversed with the edible paint creator on that one and I obviously didn’t read the fine print. But boy, I loved how they looked! Presentation people!)
Without a doubt , the most fun I had was playing with isomalt. It’s the first time I have used it and yes, I was quite nervous. Isomalt is a sugar substance that lets you pour, pull, mould, drizzle and spread it, much like toffee. It is shiny and glamorous and makes you feel like you are holding glass. You have to work quickly, but oh it was fantastic to play with! I am absolutely addicted. The only down side is that it melts. My cool thin wispy threads were starting to melt by the time I got my camera out. Oh well, never mind. Isomalt and I are at the beginning of a beautiful friendship and I will overlook her flaws for now.
Well folks, that’s a wrap. My very first modern, mostly monochromatic geometric dessert table. Not a flower in sight. I am quite pleased with how it all came together. As a bonus, our son now gets a new black wire dirty clothes basket and a cool round shelf for his room. Now, if you will excuse me, our third little chicky is hatching and I must go and marvel at the wonder of it all. Have a great weekend.
xx
Good morning Lovelies. How was your week? If you read last week’s post on Motherhood musings you may have picked up that I was having a bit of a moment with my lack of organisational skills and ability to run a large household efficiently. Well, I am pleased to announce that I have gained the victory this week! Forgive me for boasting, but today I actually saw the bottom of our two huge washing baskets in the laundry. Yes, I did it. I washed every single piece of dirty clothing and can proudly respond to the children who are looking for a certain item “Well, it’s all clean, so you must be able to find it!”
Actually, that joy lasted about twenty three minutes as I soon discovered a small mountain of dirty clothes stuffed in obscure places in the kid’s bedroom. Sigh. Nevermind, I’m still going to own it and pat myself on the back. Good job Mum.
Tonight we are throwing an 18th birthday party for our youngest son. Like every mum, I can’t believe he is all grown up and charging head on into adulthood. He is certainly becoming his own man, forming his own views and finding his place in the world. It’s such an exciting time in a young man’s life. So much to look forward to. I remember being his age like it was yesterday. Gosh I loved those years. So much fun and laughter. Not a care in the world. However, I am grateful for different seasons in our lives and would never want to stay 18 forever. As good as those years were, I much prefer settling back into the wisdom of my years surrounded by my loving husband and precious babes.
And so, of course there must be a dessert table at the party. I’m a bit excited about my self imposed challenge to create a modern, male friendly, non vintage dessert table. No bright colours, no rusty old things and not a hint of clutter. I am also creating my first donut wall. I will post about the party next week, so stay tuned for some monochromatic marvels.
Now onto cacti. I am loving this trend in the cake and party world at the moment. There are so many talented cake artists who are rocking these buttercream succulents. This is my first humble attempt at a cactus cake. I am practicing for my daughter’s 10th birthday cactus party next month. While they are a bit rough, I’ve gotta say these succulents were a whole lot of fun and I can’t wait to go a bit cactus crazy!
I hope you enjoy my cake and your weekend. See you next week.
xx
