See you after hols!

Is it a bit sad to love foam sheets?  They come in such beautifully saturated colours and a pile of them is very happy-making indeed.

I dug into my foam sheet stash to make the kiddy mask I mentioned  before for a masked party.  It was a fun little craft with my girly who is too young to wield scissors and glue, but not too young to luuuuurve stickers, or “stickies” as they are now known in our pad.

Want to make one too?  Click the pic to see it without your magnifying glass!

See?  Easy!  All you need:

1 red foam sheet

1 black foam sheet

Double sided sticky tape or craft glue – my fave is the tape (it’s not messy, it’s just like sticking a proper sticker down which my toddler loves with all her heart and it’s nice and secure without all that annoying waiting around to dry)

1 wooden or plastic spoon (by all means use a lollipop stick/drinking straw/ stick from the garden etc)

2 eyes (buttons or felt shapes would do)

2 pieces of matching ribbon (optional)

Cut out the shapes beforehand (I hope the photos help).  For this I sketched my shape (using her face dimensions for the main face piece which is the big black shape) and went from there.  I suppose an older child could manage cutting out their own shapes if pre-drawn onto the foam.

Staple or stick the ribbons (if using) to the either side of the black face shape.

Stick the shapes down in this order:  large black face shape- 2 red wing shapes- black dots.

Using a craft knife, cut out eye holes.  Don’t do this from the front as I did:  it makes for a very untidy cutout.  Whoops.

Stick the eyes on and the handle to the back and you’re done!

image from Bakerella.com

Bakerella puts so much effort into creating her tiny treats and possibly more into photographing them- it takes such a lot of patience and skill to produce pictures that  make you wish you had a Wonka television.  Just reach out your hand and grab one of those wonderful creations…

So very worth a quiet half hour of browsing- you’ll be hooked!

I love the Harry Potter-ish sound to Borwick’s Baking Powder.  Can’t you imagine Molly Weasley using it in her baking?

Toasting marshmallows round the fire- we made ours!  It’s a lot of fun to make marshmallows (if you’re that way inclined).  Our recipe is from the River Cottage Family Cookbook- you can view it on their site here.

We had bananas and we needed muffins, so I found this Nigella Lawson Chocolate Banana Muffins recipe on her website.  A mixed response: cutie and I loved making and eating these, Mr Enthusiast not so much.  More for me then!  Okay, they’re not going to win Richest Cake Prize, but they are comforting and they rose beautifully.  And any recipe where a child gets to mash and mix is a good one in my view (which I’ll admit is limited to six months of her prodding ingredients and stuffing uncooked foodstuffs into her mouth at regular intervals- so not a lot of experience so far).