Making bath bombs with kids!

This post is titled "making bath bombs with kids" but to be honest it should be called "making bath bombs with my eldest, who's 7, because god knows what would happen if I let 2-year-old Phoebe near citric acid powder".  You get my point.

Lillia has been angling to make bath bombs at home ever since she went to her friend's birthday party at Lush and got to make their "space girl" bomb with glitter, purple dye and the works.  And to be honest I've been pretty keen on the idea ever since I was given James Wong's book Grow Your Own Medicine a few years ago.  So I finally ordered some citric acid powder from Amazon and bought up several pots of bicarbonate of soda and we were pretty much good to go.

 

We mixed up our bath bomb ingredients according to the recipe - citric acid powder, bicarb, olive oil and lavender oil and worked it into a dryish mix that could be pressed together in our moulds (unwilling to splash out on proper bath bomb moulds I used silicone baking cases which worked a treat.)  Lillia loved adding all the ingredients and measuring out the powders, though bear in mind we were clad in aprons and latex gloves! Lillia found the citric acid powder made her a little sneezey if we were too quick with our getting it into the bowl, but as long as we went slowly we found she was fine as we weren't creating too much "cloud".

Then we added dried lavender leaves that I had kept in a hand sewn pouch since I picked them in June 2009.  Four years ago!  FOUR!!

It still smells divine, and mixed with the lavender oil it smells even more so.  The first bomb we used in the girls' bath near enough knocked them unconscious with the sheer amount of relaxing aromas that exploded around the bathroom.

Lillia spent some time pressing the mix into the cases and making sure they were neat.  We made lemon and lavender ones too by using the same bowl we had mixed our 100% lavender ones in and adding lemon oil in place of lavender oil - this produced a lovely citrus bomb with a hint of lavender. Lovely.

The best part though of course is the moment they are ready to be dropped in a warm bath and release their oils and their fragrance in a fizzy explosion. Lillia can't get enough of these fizzling delights.  She is already planning her next range of flavours...watch out Lush! :)

Custard Powder

I have a tin of Bird's Custard Powder in my cupboard that really needs to be used up before it becomes an antique. 

So I searched the interwebs for decent custard powder recipes and was led staight back to a book I have on my shelf....

Ah, good old Nigella and her cake-making genius.  The Birthday Custard Sponge recipe has custard powder in the cake mix and in the buttercream.

 

I ommited the chocolate icing, which looked altogether too sickly for my tastes, and just used buttercream for the sandwiching and topping. I then grated some chocolate on top for a little decoration and flavour.

 

Of course I had a little helper to keep me on track.  She's particularly good at mixing!

 

It turned out to be delicious and had a lovely moist puddingy texture. Yum yum.

 

It was also incredibly easy to make - just shove all the ingredients in a food processor and blend!  Then the cake takes 20 minutes to bake, which is great if you need a speedy cakey treat double quick, you can have this whipped up, cooled and iced within the hour.

 

I made it again this morning in fact.  This time I used only 3 eggs instead of the recipe's 4. 

4 seems a little excessive for one cake don't you think?  Not that I want to question Nigella of course.  But it did seem a little lighter this time round :)

 

 

So there you have it! A great use for custard powder, highly recommended, yummity yum x

Half Term

It has been half-term this week so we've been enjoying some time together and some time off from the usual routines.  Early morning rushes and daily spelling practice have been replaced with leisurely colouring sessions, playing games and watching DVDs (favourites at the moment are Robin Hood and Tangled).





I did have to work on Monday and Tuesday, and I have had to check in most days to make sure everything is ok as it's just so busy at the moment.  I find it hard to be everything at the same time - employee, mother, housekeeper, all-round entertainer and provider of boredom-busting activities.  It's kind of exhausting.



But I am happy to be with my two girls every day, and I love being at home and being able to potter about tidying drawers here and there, playing Guess Who, arranging books on shelves, grabbing a bit of time to crochet here and there.



Lillia is very much into zoobles at the moment so we've played quite a few games with those.



And Phoebe is into breaking and entering - getting into the cupboards she shouldn't, removing felt-tips she shouldn't, grabbing TV remotes, opening drawers.  So meal times, when she is safely contained in her booster seat, provide five minutes of welcome (if messy) peace!



Lillia is more into "arts and crafts" as she calls it.  So we have been recreating the "puzzle pizza" she saw on Art Attack...



Lots of games, lots of time together, lots of mess.  But happy days.



Back to school on Monday and peace will reign again, at least between 9 and 3 :)

January - Colour

Happy New Year!  I trust you all had a wonderful Christmas time?

I can't believe it was only two weeks ago that I was looking forward to completing two more days of work before the holidays, seems like so long ago!  We've had a wonderful family Christmas and we managed to catch up with a lot of good friends too.  We had a quiet new year at home as Phoebe is still so young, it was lovely to just chill out with some champagne, watch the festivities on the telly, then be snuggled up in bed just after midnight :)  And of course a quiet night in means no new year's day hangover to contend with!

There's still a full FOUR days before Lillia goes back to school though, I have to admit I'll be glad when she does!  It's been utterly lovely to all be together but she needs to get back to the routine, as do we all really.

So here we are in January 2012, I've always rather loved January.  Yes it tends to be cold and wet, and nobody has any energy, money or liver function remaining, but it does signify the start of a brand new year, the time to make plans for a brighter future in the year ahead.  Even in this post last year, in the thick of post-natal depression, I managed to feel optimistic in January.

So to celebrate my love of January as a month of new beginnings and positive thinking all my blog posts this month are going to be about COLOUR...

Lillia strolling with her Aerial doll, pink boots & her "gregoire" bag (still to be blogged about!)

Phoebe put together this ensemble by herself

I've been playing with an app on my iPhone called "coloursplash", it's a lot of fun, especially with my two girls and the array of girly colours they adorn themselves with on a daily basis!

In the park on Christmas day

 

I especially love Phoebe's blue eyes in this last picture.  The app converts your photo to black and white and then you select the areas to turn back to colour, so this is her actual eye colour it's not a tint or anything.

So that's my first dose of colour for you, there will be much more to come throughout this grey yet optimistic month!  Happy New Year!

xx

Horge - a crochet creature

Sometimes I come across a crochet pattern I just have to have.  My eyes go all starey, I get the look of a hunter about me, my debit card twitches in my purse... Horge was one of those patterns. 

The pattern is from Mr Fox's Toy Emporium on Etsy, a UK seller whose shop is stuffed (geddit?) full of wonderous, and sometimes scary, crochet creatures.

 

Horge is small so is incredibly quick to make - I made mine over the course of two evenings in front of the telly. I couldn't find the recommended 16mm eyes, so mine are 10mm (from Hobbycraft) but I think they work just as well (dare I say even better...)

 

If you too now have the starey eyed look of one desperate to make your own Horge you can buy the pattern here.

Thanks for those who left comments on the last post, at least now I know it is possible...even if I can't do it myself.  I am still trying to sort out my laptop problems, in the meantime I am stealing time on my mum's and...sssssh...at work (during breaks of course...ahem). 

Speaking of work, I am still slowly trying to find the balance between working four days a week, commuting, doing the school run, being a mum in general, crafting and blogging...as well as being rather unwell with this blasted ulcerative colitis.  Will there ever be a balance?  Probably not.  In the meantime I am finding lots of cheats to get through.  Today for example I took these pictures using my iPhone 4 on the window-sill at work...the light is pretty good at 7:30am. If you look closely you can see the London Gherkin building...

Horge is now off to live with his new owner, K, who writes over at Grillyfish.  K is my friend and co-worker (and talented children's book illustrator/writer) who is selfishly abandoning us in return for nothing more than a higher salary and a better job, pffft, some people...

:)

Ali

x

Mei tai baby carrier!

Phoebe is now almost eight months old.  Breastfeeding has ceased, in fact milk in general is consumed far less and she favours the huge variety of fruits, vegetables, meats and fish that she is munching her way through.  Like her sister this little girl loves her food.  Unlike her sister though Phoebe is now a whopping 21lbs!  (Lillia was only 18lbs at 1-year-old.) 

Quite a few lovely people told me about the "mei tai" baby sling when Phoebe was still tiny (ok, she has never been tiny...but smaller than she is now anyway) but it has taken me until now to get around to making one.  One of the school mums gave me some information and links and I scooted about on the interweb for a bit and eventually made my very own mei tai!

(me faffing about getting it sorted..)

I make a lot of stuff, as you know, but seldom have I felt this excited by something I've sewn myself for two main reasons.  Firstly whilst following the tutorial I learnt that you can rip fabric to create one long accurate piece.  I never knew this! Endless fun! (I am now thinking of all the long things I could possibly make in order to rip long pieces of fabric - draught excluders, curtains, snakes...) Secondly, even though it is essentially a square and three long bits sewn together it holds my 21lb baby as though she is a teddy bear stuffed with feathers...and she loves it...

(me looking like a human being at last!)

I used a combination of this tutorial and this one and made some bits up.  I used two bits of fabric for the body panel - I sewed them together right sides together leaving the two openings for the straps un-sewed.  I then turned it out and pressed the seams, then I inserted my straps into the holes with about three inches inside, pinned them and then sewed a sturdy x-box to secure them. 

This way I had a good sturdy reversible sling and it was very simple.  I used a heavy canvas type fabric from Ikea, I bought two metres and used the full length for all the straps, which fits me (and hubby) perfectly.

Although she likes the front carry she especially loves the back carry...

Hubby requested that I make the sling in a "manly" fabric so he can use it too.  I think I chose quite well, just look at Mr Snipsnaphappy, manly man! Grrr...girls...lager...football...

Wish I'd made one earlier now!  And Phoebe wasn't the only one who wanted a go...

It can even hold a 5-year-old without batting a mei tai eyelid.  Impressive.

So, as you may have picked up I am VERY pleased with the mei tai and hubby and I are looking forward to putting it to good use on holiday as we trudge around the glorious Kent countryside. (A big thanks to the two girls who shared their mei tai making wisdom in their tutorials!)

xx

February: Progress

Well here we are already at the start of another month. The grey months of January and February now behind us with the first month of Spring ahead. February has been a definite improvement for me, though I still have a way to go, progress has been made.

My February in summary looked like this...







Click on any of the photos to be taken to the original post.  Not a lot of blogging from me this last month.  Mainly because of this...

My first half term with two children!  It was busy and hectic (and messy as you can see) but a lot of fun, much to my surprise.  Baby Phoebe treated us to a full week of sleeping through from 7pm until gone 7am which helped tremendously, daytimes are so much easier after a good night :)

More from me tomorrow with an update on The Big Happy blanket!  For now though there is a post-injection baby snuffling for my attention....