• Hobbycraft Advent calendar
    Christmas - gingerbread - Handmade gifts

    Christmas ideas from Hobbycraft

    November 16, 2015 - By 

    As an avid crafter I love to see which crafts are going to be big at Christmas. On a very hot day in the summer holidays I went into London for the Hobbycraft Autumn/Winter press show which featured ideas for Halloween and Christmas. There were so many lovely things to see and I’ve been patiently waiting for the items to hit the shelves of my local Hobbycraft for weeks! Christmas ideas from Hobbycraft I’m going to share some of the many photos I snapped at the press show. First there was a large area dedicated to Advent calendars. Hobbycraft sell…

  • baking - Christmas - gingerbread

    Cookie Crumbles Fabulous Gingerbread Biscuit Mix

    November 13, 2015 - By 

    Yesterday Little Sis and I had a baking session. She only attends nursery in the afternoon which means we get to spend every morning together and we usually craft or make something. She loves to bake so I knew she would enjoy baking some festive gingerbread biscuits. We were sent a pack of  the latest product in the Cookie Crumbles range – the Fabulous Gingerbread Biscuit Mix with wholemeal flour – to try. This mix contained everything we needed except for the butter and Golden Syrup. I made the dough as Little Sis picked her cutters. When she was ready…

  • Christmas - gingerbread - handmade - Handmade gifts

    Gingerbread jumping jack decoration

    November 13, 2015 - By 

    I know it’s November but we got our Christmas decorations out of the loft at the weekend. I wanted to go through the boxes and have a sort out before the children start rifling through them, demanding we put up every Christmas decoration we own. I took out all our Christmassy craft supplies as the children want to start making Christmas crafts too. We love gingerbread and gingerbread crafts so today we’re going to share our gingerbread jumping jack decorations. They are a really fun craft, can be decorated however you like, and look great hung on the tree or…

  • gingerbread - sewing

    Sew your own gingerbread cookie couple tea towel

    November 11, 2015 - By 

    A couple of weeks ago I was reading one of my favourite blogs, asking for trouble. Marcelline designs the cutest characters, including gingerbread men and women. She mentioned that there was a free shipping day on Spoonflower so I took the opportunity to order her ‘Sew your own’ gingerbread cookie couple tea towel fabric and it finally arrived, along with some gorgeous prints from Mollie Johnson! It came as a printed panel, featuring a cute gingerbread cookie couple and a handy 2016 calendar. The version is designed to fit Linen-Cotton Canvas, the best choice for tea towels. I was very…

  • Christmas - competition - gingerbread - Kids crafts

    Gingerbread play dough hearts and a giveaway

    November 2, 2015 - By 

    November means I can officially start my Christmas preparations. I’ve started writing lists and am feeling pretty on top of everything at the moment. I know there will be lots of Christmas crafting and last week we made our first Christmas craft – gingerbread play dough hearts. Have you seen the decorated gingerbread hearts hanging up in Christmas markets? They always look so pretty, decorated with coloured icing, and wrapped in pretty cellophane bags. I thought it would be fun to make our own version so today I’m sharing a tutorial for them. Read on because I’m also taking part in…

  • baking - gingerbread - gingerbread house - Halloween crafts - Kids crafts - STEM activity - tutorial

    Decorating a Halloween gingerbread house

    October 28, 2015 - By 

    I posted a few pics of our gingerbread house on Instagram yesterday and got comments saying I was far too early for Christmas! Since when was a gingerbread house just for Christmas? I think they make a pretty good treat for Halloween too as they are really versatile and easy to decorate for any season. Decorating a Halloween gingerbread house As we’re currently in the middle of half term we decorated a gingerbread house as part of our Halloween celebrations. This is always a great activity to do with my children and it kept them occupied all afternoon. It also…

  • days out - gingerbread - sewing

    Monday happy things

    October 26, 2015 - By 

    How can I not start off my weekly Monday Happy Things post with Parents evening? Now both my children attend the local school I had the pleasure of two parents evenings. It’s always lovely to hear other people saying nice things about your children and they both got glowing school reports. At 3 and 5 they are both young but it’s still great to hear they try their best and enjoy learning new things. They both got new books as a reward ( Little Sis received a set of The Dinosaur Who Pooped books and Big Brother received The BFG…

  • Chocolate Gingerbread recipe
    baking - Crafts for adults - gingerbread

    Chocolate gingerbread recipe

    October 4, 2015 - By 

    I’m always on the look out for gingerbread recipes and a friend recently introduced me to an amazing Nigella Lawson recipe for Chocolate Gingerbread. Once I’d made it I couldn’t believe I hadn’t discovered it before, the combination of gingerbread and chocolate makes an amazingly rich cake, and a ginger glaze really sets it off. Chocolate Gingerbread cake ingredients: 175g unsalted butter 125g muscovado sugar 2tblsp caster sugar 200g golden syrup 200g black treacle 1/4tsp ground cloves 1 tsp ground cinnamon 2 tsp ground ginger 1 1/4tsp Bicarbonate of Soda 2 eggs 250ml milk 275g plain flour 40g cocoa 175g…

  • Halloween gingerbread ghosts
    baking - gingerbread - Halloween crafts

    Halloween gingerbread ghosts

    September 28, 2015 - By 

    We’ve had a steady stream of visitors recently so thought we should give our baking a seasonal twist. We love gingerbread so made our favourite gingerbread biscuit recipe and used a great Halloween cutter to make Halloween gingerbread ghosts. Ingredients for Halloween gingerbread ghosts: 350g Plain flour 1tsp Bicarbonate of soda 2 tsp Ground ginger 100g Butter 175g Light muscovado sugar 4 tbsp Golden Syrup 1 large egg How to make Halloween gingerbread ghosts: Place the flour, bicarbonate of soda and ginger in a bowl. Rub in the butter with your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs, then stir…