Fathers Day Afternoon Tea

For my birthday my sister got me an afternoon tea  delivery, which was amazing - especially because we were living through Covid-19 lockdown so our usual cuppies out and about had been halted.  When it came to Fathers Day a few weeks later though we thought we could manage it between ourselves for our Dad, our husbands and our father-in laws. 

Between us we made...

Meringues (of course!)

Scones

Various fillings in rolls and wraps

Banana nutella mini loaves, rolo rocky road and chocolate truffles 

Mini quiches and (bought) sausage rolls 

Mini lemon cheesecakes 

Mini victoria sponges 

 We delivered our selection out to the father in laws and had a socially distanced picnic with the husbands and our own Dad.  It was really lovely.  The amount of food was amazing and all very tasty even if we do say so ourselves 🤣 

We did have a little practice run a few weeks before with just me and my sister and the kids and it went very well.  There is no wonder I am suffering from a lockdown gut but I have enjoyed the process 🐖🐷🐽

What is not to love about an afternoon tea?  Loads of food with tons of flavour and you get to keep eating until it is finished.  Need another excuse for an afternoon tea soon! 

Woodland Baby Boy Shower

What a lovely morning we had celebrating the impending arrival of a new member to our little Tuesday club.  Just a few more weeks until we meet the little man and we cannot wait.

After a shaky start where our pregnant buddy messaged to say she wouldn't make it today we managed to convince her to change her mind and come along or she would have missed her surprise shower!

Anne made the Baby Boy sign and now we all want a shot of the wood burning pen 🖋

 Chocolate log cake (another dairy free cake because Ivy cows milk protein allergy and I'm breastfeeding)  We had a dairy free farm party for Sturrock's 3rd birthday so I could eat everything there too 🥛⛔🐄

 Woodland trail mix

 Scones - made these fresh this morning and they were the best ones I've made so far.  Not dairy free I used them as part of the milk ladder but unfortunately Ivy has reacted to them 😭

 Toadstool raspberries (made these for Eliza's woodland party too)

 Laura made these  - acorn marshmallows

 Red sweets - I love a colour themed sweet for every party theme :)

 Laura made these too - peppermint cremes

 Not all unhealthy 🍇

 Such a lovely party theme for a baby shower

 Ready to pop popcorn

A little hamper of new baby clothes with a woodland theme 

Anne's handy work again - a woodland nappy cake

We only decided the theme a few days before but we went with it and it looked great - as always I love shopping the rest of the house to gather a theme together.  I have done a woodland theme before for Eliza so I had a few props ready to go.  I think I could do almost any theme now though 🤣

Ivy wore a little romper to fit the theme too and it turned out to be almost one year to the day since the girls threw me my baby shower for having Ivy and look at her now!  Why does that go so quickly? 😭😢⏲

Before I know it I will be posting about her first bitrthday party.

Deciding the theme very soon! 🥳🎉

Christmas Shortbread Jars

Today I quickly made some homemade little gifts for my friends.  I altered my shortbread recipe until it fit into these little jars I got from Ikea  called Korken

For my wedding favours I did the same but in mini milk bottles and they worked out really well so I just copied this but had to work out how the recipe would fit in different jars.  As usual I just guessed until I got it right 🤣

For the Ikea size of jar I needed 50g of plain flour, 25g of caster sugar and 25g of cornflour.

First I weighed out the plain flour and poured this in to the glass jars followed by the caster sugar and finished off with the cornflour.  

 I love how white they are and the cornflour is so smooth it feels like snow 🌨 

I tried to print off labels but as usual there was an issue with my printer when I needed it isn't that always the case?!  So I handwrote the instructions on brown card.  All you need is to add 50g of salted butter.  By hand or in a food processor mix everything together, roll out thinly and cut using a festive cookie cutter for Christmas biscuits.  Bake for 30 mins at 150°C or Gas Mark 2 (they will still be very pale) then immediately sprinkle with caster sugar.  Allow to cool completely before eating them.  Yum!! 

I rolled the instructions up and put them through the little metal handles.   For my wedding milk bottles I hung them with string and used vintage fabric cut into circles for the top of the bottles.





















I finished the Christmas jars off with some green and white twine.  Lovely festive little gifts when it's just the thought that counts.  I think I will give my neighbour one of these too.  I gave my daughter's teacher something similar one year also.  I do love a homemade gift and these are really easy to make and equally easy for the recipient to bake.  I am not sure how many biscuits this mix will make as it depends on the size of cutter you use but enough for you to eat with your festive cuppy! 

Let me know if you make these shorties yourself this year and who you would give them to!


For more recipes see my other posts here