Family and food

We had a family get-together at our place today; I believe there were 22 of us in the end. My aunt and uncle, three cousins, their spouses and their kids. It was fab to just chill and enjoy each others' company and the kids loved playing together.

The food was fabulous - we all brought something to the table. For dessert I made four flavours of cupcakes:

Chocolate with chocolate icing and sprinkles





Vanilla with vanilla buttercream and colourful nonpareils





Lemon with lemon buttercream and a dusting of icing sugar





Ginger with ginger cream cheese frosting and a piece of candied ginger





(All recipes in my e-book.)

Jandal cake

As promised, here is the jandal (flip-flop) themed birthday cake that I made for my friend's daughter.









And just to keep things down-to-earth, this is what my kitchen looked like - was decorating the cake and baking and icing 132 cupcakes, in different flavours, at the same time. Yes, 132, although not all of them got iced, some got frozen for later use.

Yellow and blue

"Oh, the comfort, the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person, having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but pouring them all out, just as they are, chaff and grain together, certain that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping, and with a breath of kindness blow the rest away."

- Dinah Craik

Necessity is the mother of invention

I am doing a jandal (flip-flop) themed cake for a friend and needed a jandal cutter for the fondant decorations. I wanted two different sizes but could only find super large cutters online. I decided to make my own.

I bought a can of L&P ("world famous in New Zealand"), emptied it (yum), washed and dried it.



Then I stabbed holes in it and used scissors to cut the top and bottom off.







I carefully cut it open.



Then I used my craft knife and metal ruler to cut two neat strips of metal. And yes, slicing the metal with a metal craft blade is exactly as set-your-teeth-on-edge as you would expect. *shudder*



I found a jandal template online and printed it to the size I wanted.



Then, roughly following the templates, I carefully formed the cutters out of the metal strips, closing them with a dab of hot glue.



While nowhere near as sturdy or durable as regular cutters they worked just fine for the decorations.



Check back on Friday for photos of the completed cake!

T-shirt makeover

Daniel complained that he was bored of his clothes but I knew for a fact that there were some items that he never wears. We went to look through his wardrobe. I pointed out this greyish-purple t-shirt and he said he didn't like it because it was too plain.



I asked him if he wanted one of his own designs on it, but he wanted a particular character (Bowser Jr from Super Mario) and he asked if I would trace it for him.

I found a picture on the internet, printed it and rigged up a makeshift light table - basically a semi-transparent plastic tub upended with a lamp inside - and traced it onto his t-shirt with fabric marker.



Daniel added the wording to the sleeve.



I took the advice of a reader and ironed it - hopefully it will keep the marker from fading in the wash. Here it is on Daniel, who loves it and is now happy to wear it. (He said he didn't want his face showing.)

My boys

When Noah realised he was wearing the exact same shorts as Daniel the other day he ran to change his t-shirt too. Unfortunately he doesn't have one like Daniel was wearing so he just chose a white one with a design on it.

Head

“God is eagerly waiting for the chance to answer your prayers and fulfill your dreams, just as he always has. But he can't if you don't pray, and he can't if you don't dream. In short, he can't if you don't believe.”

- Jeffrey R. Holland

Black and white

"Happiness is not a matter of events, it depends upon the tides of the mind."

- Alice Meynell

Jandal storage

Here in New Zealand flip-flops are called jandals. We have a bunch of them and they always seem to be lying around. I saw this product on Pinterest and decided to make my own. It's on the back of the door from the garage into the house.





It's fastened with velcro straps through these over-door hooks from the dollar store - one at the top and one at the bottom.





It's not perfect, and I should have either used a sturdier fabric and / or sewn through a button at the back where the elastic is sewn onto the backing fabric as I can see how it will probably rip out there. But for now it works fine.

Tonight's sunset

"Love does not consist of gazing at each other, but in looking together in
the same direction."

- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Karioitahi beach blues

"There are two things to aim at in life; first to get what you want and, after that, to enjoy it. Only the wisest of mankind has achieved the second."

- Logan Persall Smith

Plums

"If the divine creator has taken pains to give us delicious and exquisite things to eat, the least we can do is prepare them well and serve them with ceremony."

- Fernand Point.