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We have had a really wet start to winter, and as a result the kids have been stuck indoors quite a bit.
To brighten up their day, we had a tea party this afternoon, complete with Bohemia Crystal, Fine Bone China, muffins, and Oreos! The girls loved it 
So, my 30th is only bout 4.5 weeks away, and to celebrate I am having a Vintage Inspired/Shabby Chic High Tea at my sister’s house. We have been scouring the second-hand stores and eBay for all kinds of vintage and shabby chic serving ware to use on the day. So far I have collected a few fine bone china pieces, some glass and crystal ware, and even some chrome serving platters and tiered cake stands. We have a menu drafted ready to refine, and I have just now finished making the invitations ready to go out to female friends and family. I decided to create invitations that represented a colour theme I would like to work with. That came in the form of paper doilies, and Christina Re Butterfly Garden. Apologies for the phone pics- my camera batteries are flat again!
The invitations themselves are quite simple to make, but I think they have a little bit of ‘wow factor’ to make them just that little bit special. If you would like to make some similar, you will need some basics:
To begin with, I cut my butterfly paper into 4 (half, then half again- this just happened to be a good size for my doilies). Once I had enough cut, I went through and lined them up on the wrong side of the doilies, and folded the sides of the doilies in before cutting off the excess. I attached the paper to the doilies with the tape adhesive.
Next I typed, printed, and cut my vellum inserts to size, before securing them to the butterfly paper with a small amount of adhesive tape in each of the top corners. I cut the inserts slightly smaller than the butterfly paper so that there would be a ‘border’ around them.
To finish off the invitations I tied them with some ribbon
Ok, so it is not a traditional Risotto, and it is nowhere near as creamy, but it is a bit of a different take on the oven baked Risotto that I have made in the past. It was quick and easy, and the family seemed to enjoy it. The texture will vary based on the amount of stock used for cooking, and the amount of cream and cheese added at the end, but it cam be easily tweaked to get the desired result.
Firstly, I diced my onion, chicken, and bacon and sautéed them in some oil and butter until the onions were translucent, and the chicken just cooked through. I then added 2 cups of rice and stirred until it was all coated in the remnants of butter and oil. I then tipped this mixture into the rice cooker and added about 2/3 cup of diced pumpkin. I pored over some chicken stock, gave it a stir, then put the lid on and turned the rice cooker to ‘cook’.
When the rice cooker switched itself to ‘warm’ (ie: keep warm) I left the risotto sit for a while with the lid on. While this was happening, I prepared some baby spinach leaves, and fried some mushroom to add to mine, as no-one else eats mushrooms. I then put the risotto in a large mixing bowl to stir through the baby spinach, some cream and parmesan, and salt and pepper to taste.
To serve, I simple sprinkled with a little extra parmesan, and added the mushrooms to my bowl.
Ingredients (feeds 5-6 easily)
500g chicken breast, cut into about 2cm chunks
2 rashers bacon, diced
1 small onion, diced
2/3 cup pumpkin, cut into about 1cm pieces
1L chicken stock (I used stock cubes)
handful of baby spinach leaves
4 mushrooms, sliced
cream, parmesan, salt and pepper to taste
Method
Sautee chicken, onion and bacon in oil and butter.
Add rice to frying pan and stir well until each frain is coated, and starts to appear translucent. Transfer to rice cooker.
Add pumpkin, and stock, then stir well.
Place lid on cooker and turn on to cook. Once cooking has ceased, leave lid on for approx 10 minutes.
Fry mushrooms, or any other extras, and wash baby spinach.
Place risotto in large bowl and add cream, parmesan, salt and pepper, baby spinach, and mushrooms. Stir well, and add extra cream if desired to obtain a suitable consistency.
Note: if you like a more ‘liquid’ risotto, maybe try cutting the amount of rice by half a cup. I haven’t tried this yet, but I will next time as this made so much risotto!!
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Ok, so this is what it all looked like. I used coloured metal buckets, paper doilies, glass jars, streamers and tissue paper from the local discount stores; a cupcake stand borrowed from my sister; a chrome 2 tier cake stand I got on eBay; and a glass cake stand that belonged to my husbands Nanna.
The cake board is just a standard one that I purchased a few years ago. Every time I use it, I cover it to suit the theme. This time I have used wrapping paper, and clear contact. It is also sitting on an upturned serving bowl.
For fun and games we had a Rainbow Pinata that was hanging in the garage. We were going to hang it up outside, but it rained 
We also had a home-made ‘pin the cloud on the rainbow’ that was a hit!
Winter has arrived. It is cold, and windy, and perfect scarf weather……now only if I could get the ‘look’ right!
I do like wearing scarves, but I must admit, I am not very creative when it comes to ways of wearing them. Some people seem to make them look so funky/cool and stylish. I want to look funky in a scarf…not frumpy!!!
This is how I am wearing my scarf today……but it keeps coming undone, and then just looks a bit odd. I think I need to get a cool shawl pin or something for it.
I have grand plans to knit myself a few scarves and shawls this winter ( need to get a move on!!), so I went searching for some inspiration on how to wear them. I hopw these help some others also.
Source: saifou.com via Lya on Pinterest
Source: tipjunkie.com via Sandra on Pinterest
Source: pinterest.com via Mary on Pinterest
Source: sorakeem.tumblr.com via Emily on Pinterest
Source: springpadit.com via Mika on Pinterest
Source: tumblr.elle.com via J on Pinterest
Source: laviepetite.blogspot.com via Brittany on Pinterest
Source: wildaddiction.tumblr.com via Emily on Pinterest
Ahhhh, the cake. Anyone who really knows me, knows that I always do a special cake for my kids’ birthdays, and I let them pick what they want. This time, the delightful Miss C chose a Rainbow Layer Cake, with plain icing, and Smarties. Simple really compared the Pirate Ships, Thomas the Tank Engines, and Fairy Castles of birthdays past.
Once again, I used my trusty 69c cake mix from Coles, and yet again I had other parents asking me what type of cake it was, and if I had made it from scratch. All were shocked to learn it was the cheapest packet mix around!
To create the cake I simple mixed up 3 packets to the directions, and divided each in half. I then coloured each half batch, and baked 6 thin cakes. I assembled them by slightly levelling the tops with a knife as needed, and stacked them on top of each other, using a small amount of Butter Cream Frosting to ‘glue’ them together.
After layering them, I did a thin ‘crumb’ coat of butter cream. A crumb coat is basically an undercoat that collects any cake crumbs, and cements them so that they don’t show up in your main icing, and ruin its impact. I refrigerated the cake after the crumb coat to set it, then iced the cake and made it all pretty.
The Rainbow Layer Cake is such a simple concept, but has such wow factor. The small gasps that came from the kids when the first piece of cake was cut was amazing, and made the whole process so worthwhile.
PS: The Bunting cake decoration is simply coloured paper triangles, tapes onto some yarn, and help up by straws.
