Having Fun In The Kitchen

As I'm currently waiting on peanut butter truffles setting in the fridge, I thought I'd write a progress update of my day in the kitchen so far - good excuse to sit down for a few minutes too!

• First up, was The Pink Whisk's Christmas Pudding Fudge. This was my first time making fudge using a sugar thermometer (I've previously made fudge that utilised a load of peanut butter/nutella to set it, much easier!) so I'm crossing my fingers until it's ready to cut that it's worked! So far so good though...

I really hope this has worked!!

• Next was Maria's Spiced Nuts with Cranberries and Coconut. I was so pleased when I saw this recipe yesterday - I'd known that one of the things I'd wanted to make was some kind of roasted nut, but I hadn't settled on a recipe yet so this was perfect timing! I've already completed and taste-tested these (of course!) and I'm pleased to report that they are delicious! Thanks Maria! :)

• On Wednesday I also made some chocolate covered pretzels - I just melted some dark chocolate and gave the pretzels a chocolate bath, before sticking a couple of peanut m&ms on. These were a trial run and also to give to my Grandparents yesterday, as they have gone away for Christmas.

These tasted great, but I'm not sure I'll make anymore today. Even straight from the fridge, they were super melty - lots of messy fingers probably not a good idea for Christmas Day!

• Progress pic - the spiced nuts in jars will be "prettied up" with the with ribbon, card to make labels etc that Liam has just brought back from town. The fudge is still setting, and at the back are the flavoured vodkas - Christmas Pudding, Toffee (just a bag of werther's original toffees dissolved in 1 litre of vodka) and Raspberry flavours.

• Finally (for now), there was this...

aka peanut butter heaven - How Sweet It Is' Crispy Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookie Dough Truffles. The recipe says it makes 50-60 truffles, I made 40. No one ever said I was elegant!

These are currently chilling in the fridge, next step will be covering them in melted chocolate, mmmm! The peanut butter 'dough' tastes divine so I can't wait to try these once finished!

Still on the list:

• Brownies (which I'll make tomorrow as the fudge is currently in my brownie pan)
• Cookies (which I'm tempted to "stuff" with chopped up Mars bar or something)

Clearly I decided to make the more interesting things first - cookies and brownies are things I always make, but some of my family (and Liam) aren't keen on things with nuts/dried fruit etc, so I thought I better make a couple of more simple things too!


Any other suggestions of things for me to make?? Have you done any baking/homemade food gifts for Christmas? I think I've probably made enough, but I'm having fun!! :-D Liam is looking after the children (well, Toby is asleep at the moment) so it is so nice to have some time in the kitchen that isn't just about getting food on the table as quickly as possible!

It Was All Yellow...

If you've been wondering why I haven't posted much about my food lately (and indeed have missed the last two WIAWs, sad times) it is because there have been way too many of these type of meals for my liking...

Today's lunch - quorn bbq & cheese fillet, potato waffles, curly fries (Liam wanted both so I felt I needed to too?!!) and sweetcorn:

Tuesday dinner - breaded camembert, nachos and dips:

Monday dinner - paneer & pea curry with white rice (I normally have brown, but Liam has decided he's allergic to brown rice so I ended up cooking all white):

Monday lunch - breaded mozzarella fingers & cranberry sauce:

Random breakfast - toast with pear preserve. This is an example of a "good" breakfast, normally I just have coffee.

Urgh! I miss green vegetables! And porridge! And cooking proper meals rather than just chucking frozen "party food" into the oven!

We are also now without a car as it failed its MOT this morning and the garage don't have time to do the repairs until after Christmas (our own fault for not realising the MOT was due until past the last minute!) which doesn't help. But we are borrowing my Mum's car to do a Waitrose/Lidl shop this afternoon, so I am planning to stock up on lots of fruit and vegetables, tofu etc - we don't need any more party food! Although Liam will no doubt want more curly fries as we just used the last of them. I don't even really like this type of food - I find it way too greasy - but if Liam wants to eat it then I usually just give in and cook it for us both. I need to get some energy back and do some proper meal plans to get us back on track with eating healthy meals!

Does anyone else find that they eat more unhealthily at this time of year? Do you buy lots of frozen "party" food too? We did a Tesco shop a couple of weeks ago and ended up buying lots of breaded cheese, curly fries etc for the freezer, which we never normally do during the rest of the year. We have been relying on it too much though - it's been so busy the last few weeks that I haven't been cooking properly, but I definitely miss it. Tomorrow my only plan is to spend the whole day in the kitchen baking holiday gifts, so I will try to eat some healthy meals in between spoonfuls of cookie dough!!

All Day In, All Day Out

I can't believe that two "school days" of the holidays have already gone! Our two days couldn't have been more different - yesterday we didn't leave the house once, today we were out of the house for more than 11 hours straight!

Let's start with yesterday. Whilst I normally like getting lots of fresh air, it was actually really nice to have a day doing absolutely nothing. The children definitely needed the rest too. Despite staying in, we still had lots of fun.

Izzy enjoyed a "tea party" with her toy horse...did you know that horses love lebkuchen as much as humans do??

The children also did colouring...

and then we conked in front of the TV to watch CBeebies Strictly Cinderella - panto time!

Izzy thought it would be too babyish for her, but I saw her smile!! ;)

Once Liam got home from work, it was sing song time!

And when the children went to bed, Liam we finally got round to wrapping the presents!

There are now some more presents waiting to be wrapped though...as today we went Christmas shopping!!

Liam was only working a half day today - he now has a week off for Christmas, whoop! So I took the children shopping in the morning, and then Liam met us for lunch and more shopping.

The children and I went to Starbucks first though - needed some breakfast to fuel being on our feet for so long!! ;) I had a chai tea latte and some toasted fruit bread - love this!

Izzy chose a mini hot chocolate and a ham cheese croissant, bless her - she looks happy!

We spent most of the morning shopping for presents for Liam. I just hope Izzy does a better job of keeping them secret than she did last year - she's already started trying to give him hints, but luckily he stops her from telling him! (he is better at wanting gifts to be kept secret than I am!!)

We stopped mid-morning for a coffee break - toffee nut latte for me, smoothies for the children...

and once Liam finished work we went to Pizza Express for lunch - pizza with spinach, caramelised onions and goats cheese for me :) Sorry for the awful photo - iPhone + bad light + trying to help cut up Izzy's pizza does not a good photo make!!

After lunch we switched - Liam took the children shopping for a couple of little presents for them to give me (I was getting my main present later, exciting!) and I finished off the shopping we hadn't managed to get done earlier. Plus a few extras. Shopping with children is expensive! I thought we'd bought all the presents for Izzy and Toby, but while we were looking for other things, Izzy "fell in love" with a bright pink, sleeping beauty fancy dress outfit, and soft touch that I am, I bought it for her! Luckily it was 25% off in M&S!!

The children were so well behaved though - Toby stayed in his pushchair for most of the morning, with just a little walking break...

and then slept in his pushchair for most of the time that Liam had them! Izzy was fantastic too - hardly any whinging, and she was helpful in passing me things, keeping Toby entertained etc - very good considering we were out of the house 7.30am-6.30pm!

Our shopping trip was even longer than usual as Liam insisted we stopped off at PC World on the way home to buy my main present. I hate that place - we always seem to be there soooo long - but as the trip had a very positive outcome, I can't complain! I'm getting a new laptop for Christmas!! :-D Eeek, so excited! My current laptop has been on its last legs for quite a while (yesterday it took more than 20 minutes to transfer photos from my camera to laptop, when it used to only take a minute or so!) so I can't wait to be able to use my (hopefully!) quick new laptop after Christmas! I've recommended to Liam that he wrap it up tonight to stop me being tempted to open it early!! ;)

While we were at PC World, we quickly popped to Tesco to buy the children sandwiches to eat on the way home for dinner - it was getting so late! We haven't eaten yet, but I think baked nachos and breaded Camembert is on the menu...I need to think of something green to go with that too!!

How are you all enjoying the Christmas holidays if you have them? Have they been quiet or busy so far? Do you receive a "main" present from your parents/partner/whoever, or do you prefer getting lots of little things? I don't normally get such a big present - this laptop has cost way more than we usually spend, but I figure I would've needed a new laptop soon so having it as my Christmas present kind of saves money right?!! ;) Liam didn't really know what he wanted for Christmas, so Izzy and I had fun today buying lots of small-medium sized things...it's just a shame I now have to wrap them all!! I hate wrapping, so Liam normally does it all - you can always tell which presents are for him as they are the ones that are badly wrapped!

Three Parties In One Day...

Luckily I didn't attend them all, but it gives you an idea of how busy we have been the last couple of weeks! And yes, yesterday, between the children, they attended three separate parties.


First up, was the toddler group Christmas party in the morning. We go to toddler group every week, but the party session is even more fun than usual as they hire a bouncy castle! Last year Toby was too little to go on the bouncy castle, and this year he wasn't 100% sure about it - he kept going on for a minute or so, falling over, quickly scooting off it, and then wanting to go back on! This photo was taken soon after we arrived - he did start enjoying himself a bit more after a while!

Each parent contributes some food for the party, and this year I made cookies. Lots and lots of cookies!

This x2 - I was very glad I had 3 cookie sheets to get them all cooked in 2 batches!

I use this recipe for Millie's style cookies. Normally I make them quite large and get about 25 cookies from the recipe, but this time I made them mini-sized and got 60-70 cookies! I still cooked them for the full 10 minutes so that they were crispy rather than gooey - not my preference, but easier for toddlers to eat!.I also used 100g milk and 100g white chocolate chips, rather than chunks of dark chocolate that I love - again to suit toddler palates/less mess.

I only took about 35 cookies to the toddler group party as there is always too much food as it is.

While we were playing on the bouncy castle, playing pass the parcel etc, the ladies who run toddler group set up the "lunch" in the other part of the hall. There were 4 tables this size, plus a double sized table at the end. Sensibly, they put out the savoury food first...so this was just round #1!

Blurry photo - rush to take before everyone sat down!

Toby didn't actually eat much which surprised me. He'd been awake since 5am so I wasn't sure how well he'd last, but he did ok. He just wandered off to play with toys, leaving me to munch on cheese pizza, mini egg sandwiches, cookies and jaffa cakes in his absence!

Not surprisingly, once we left the party, the tiredness overtook him...zzzzz!

The second party of the day was in the afternoon - Isabelle's school party. I actually knew about this since Sunday - when I saw her teacher at another party - but we were only officially told about it at school pick up on Tuesday afternoon (!) I'd been planning to make a double batch of cookies to cover both parties, but luckily I hadn't already made them as on Tuesday afternoon it was requested that we bring in a food contribution, shop-bought only. Don't really understand why homemade wasn't allowed at Izzy's school when it was at the other infants school  in town (and they supposedly merged in September so officially all one school), but hey ho, luckily I had some kit-kats lurking in the cupboard!

The third and final party of the day took place 4.30pm-6pm and was for one of Izzy's classmates. I hadn't been planning to send Izzy as a) I thought she'd be too tired and b) she doesn't seem to play with this little boy much, but then I found out that he'd only originally wanted to invite 5 boys and Izzy, and had subsequently been persuaded to also invite Izzy's best friend so they could play together! So I thought I'd better send her, bless. As it was, they all played really well together and Izzy had a great time. She came home with a new flowery headband and her face painted with snowflakes!

*****

Today, thankfully, is much quieter. It's so far consisted of a latte by the Christmas tree (my new favourite tradition if I get time before the school run!)...



A trip into town, with lots of the time spent playing in the area at the back of the toy shop...

And chocolates. I bought a box of these for my friend and they were on offer, buy 2 for £5...so I just "had" to get a box for myself to check they were nice enough to give to my friend, right?! ;-) These definitely get a thumbs up from me!

Only 1.5 more days to go until the Christmas holidays! I can't wait!

Who else is counting down until the holidays?? How long do you have off for Christmas? I know all the teachers, parents and children that I've spoken to are looking forward to a bit of time off...it's been a long term! Liam has to work next Monday and Tuesday, but then he has a week off which will be lovely. His office is only closed 24th-27th but he had some holiday left to use so was able to extend his time off. It will be the first year since we've known each other that neither of us have worked Christmas Eve - I'll miss the amazing reductions/free food Waitrose used to give to the staff at the end of that shift, but I'm definitely glad we'll all be home instead!

Putting up the Christmas tree & a busy weekend

Evening! I can't believe it is Sunday evening already - this weekend has been ridiculously busy!

Let's start from the start shall we? Saturday morning was the part of the weekend I was most looking forward to anyway - getting and decorating the Christmas tree! :-D Which started with sending Liam up into the loft to bring down the decorations and check the tree lights were still working. Our loft doesn't have a ladder or anything so Liam balances on a chest of drawers and then 'climbs' up the walls to get into the loft - funny to watch! This is him climbing back down again afterwards...

and Toby hiding in the chest below!

Luckily all the lights were still working (although we did decide we needed to buy new tinsel - for some reason we had lots of green & black tinsel (from staff shopping at Waitrose two Halloweens ago!) but hardly any normal colours!) and we found a couple more brand new tree decorations to add to our ever growing collection! We'd bought these from Marks and Spencer in the January sale (reduced to 50p each!) but then completely forgotten about them! I think you can probably guess which one was intended for Izzy and which for Toby...that makes 4 new decorations each for them this year!!

Liam and Izzy then went to the garden centre to buy the Christmas tree and I decided to start a tradition by baking some cookies. A plate of cookies whilst decorating the Christmas tree sounds like a good tradition right? :)

I didn't have any milk or dark chocolate chips so I used 100g white chocolate chips and 100g dark chocolate bar broken into chunks. Lots of big chunks of melted chocolate = messy but worth it!

Once Liam and Izzy got back home, Liam got to work on putting the tree up...

and the rest of us ate cookies. Like I said, messy but worth it!

Soon it was time to decorate!

I took a ridiculous number of photos of us decorating the tree, but I will try to keep this relatively short. And don't worry - I hardly took any photos the rest of the weekend, so once you get past Saturday morning you're nearly at the end of the post!! ;) These are some of my favourite decorations on the tree:

One of my childhood decorations "Baby's First Christmas 1986"

The bootee I bought for Izzy's first Christmas (I couldn't find a "baby's first Christmas decoration anywhere!) and one of the named snowmen we bought them last year.

The latest named additions to the tree (and pretty pink baubles I bought in the sale last year!)

Angel on top!

The finished tree...

Once it got dark

Festive mantelpiece...

Toby was actually having a nap when we decorated the tree. The timing worked out like that, and we thought it would probably be easier anyway. He was fascinated when he came downstairs!

Right, that is Saturday morning done...well done if you got this far!! ;)

On Saturday afternoon, Izzy had a party to go to (as well as one this afternoon and one after school on Wednesday...busy girl!!) - party dress #1 of the weekend...

The party was at a sports centre about half an hour away, so Liam and I went to the big Tesco next door while she had fun. We ended up way more than usual - oops - but these are my highlights:

I was so excited to finally find the dark chocolate and caramel varieties of the soya puddings - can't wait to try them! :)

We ended up getting takeaway Saturday night - Indian. I stuck to what I normally get - a side dish each of gobi bhaji (cauliflower) and mattar paneer, plus a little bit of pilau rice and some unpictured naan:

Greasy but good! I was a bit too full after this though, tummy ache ensued!

*****

This morning, we went to visit Liam's Nan who is in hospital. We didn't stay long as she'd had a really bad night, but we did take her some wedding photos that we'd been meaning to print out for ages.

It was so sad to see Nan looking so fragile, and so distressed at being there. I don't think I'd really appreciated how ill she was until I saw her, and Liam said she'd got much worse even since he last saw her on Tuesday :( She was pleased to see us though, and especially to see the children, so I'm glad we went, just wish it could have been under better circumstances.

After we'd finished visiting Nan, we went to the hospital canteen for a quick lunch. I had the vegetarian carvery which was a spinach and mushroom pie with the usual sides. I checked that the potatoes etc were just cooked in oil before piling my plate with roasted parsnips!

We then went home to turn the last of the cookie dough into mini cookies...

before heading to party #2 of the weekend...

Today's party was actually for a 3 year-old. Toby goes to toddler group with him, and Izzy is the same age as his brother, so both children were invited.

Toby, of course, loved the food:

And they had fun dancing together! They play so well together (at this age anyway), it's nice to see :)

And that was the end of our busy weekend! Liam and I had planned to wrap all the Christmas presents this evening, but we were just too tired. Probably a good thing anyway - I have a feeling that as soon as presents start appearing under the tree, Toby (and most likely Izzy too) will want to unwrap them! :-D

How have your weekends been? Best thing you did/ate? I loved decorating the tree with Izzy, she was so excited to help out, and the room looks so festive now! I'd forgotten how much light the tree blocks out though - hence the position of the 2nd cookie picture - the only place in the sitting room that has decent light is sitting on the corner of the sofa right by the window!