I am really excited to be able to share this news with you today. You all know how much I champion independent brands and I am thrilled to announce that one of our favourite small baby brands has been shortlisted in the Amazon Small Business […]
We ventured onto the Potty Train about 8 weeks ago and while it started off okay, we ended up putting on the brakes as Florence was just getting super stressed out and I figured she just wasn’t ready. This time around I took a bit […]
As I type this, we are on the road to a little weekend away. It’s been such a long time since we went away just us, and it’s the first time we’ve ever taken William so I’m hoping for a truly special weekend of making memories with my favourite people. I mentioned on Instagram that we are having a bit of a Julia Donaldson themed summer as Florence’s imagination has suddenly been captured by her stories and one of the things on our Summer bucket list was to meet the Gruffalo. Well, after a day of exploring and visiting family today, we are heading to Chessington to do just that! So so excited.
So what better road trip snacks to take than these homemade Gruffalo Cupcakes! I quickly rustled them up this morning ready to pack up in the picnic basket and I was so pleased with how they turned out (usually I’m a bit of a baking disaster!) I thought I’d share how I made them with you guys.
I’ve also packed ‘Scrambled Snake’ pasta, ‘Little brown Mouse’ Cheeses sticks & ‘Roasted Fox’ snack size pies. I might share the recipes to all of these too in the next week or so.
I’ll warn you now, I’m a bit of a convenience baker. As a busy Mama with very little baking skill I am not ashamed to admit to using some shop bought packet ingredients so if you’re anything like me, you’ll love this recipe.
125g self raising flour
125g caster sugar
125g softened butter / margarine
2 large eggs
Betty Crocker Chocolate Fudge Frosting
Ready made orange modelling icing
Chocolate sprinkles & balls
White chocolate sprinkles
Mini marshmallows (12, chopped in half diagonally)
Preheat the oven to 180• Combine the flour, caster sugar, butter & eggs in a large mixing bowl. Whisk together until you have a smooth mixture.
Place 12 cupcake cases into a muffin tin and spoon equal amounts of the mixture into each one and pop in the oven for 12-15 minutes or until they’re risen and golden brown. I always do the knife test to check there’s no raw mixture inside.
Once baked, remove from the oven and leave to cool.
Once cooled it’s time to decorate! Using a spatula or straight side of a dinner knife spread chocolate frosting across the top of each cake. For these I scooped about a teaspoon of frosting onto each and then spread it in circular motions. Remember, it doesn’t have to be neat as you’re making a furry monster!
Next, make 24 pea sized balls from the orange icing by rolling small amounts in the palms of your hands. Add a chocolate ball sprinkle to make the pupil and then put the eyes in place on top of each cake.
Cut 12 mini marshmallows diagonally in half and place them on either side at the top of the cakes to make the Gruffalo’s horns.
Squeeze a dot of green writing icing in the middle to represent the ‘poisonous wart on the end of his nose followed by a handful of white chocolate sprinkles to make his terrible teeth in his terrible jaws!
Finally shake some chocolate sprinkles all over each cake for his fur.
These Gruffalo inspired cupcakes make the perfect snack for a day out at one of the many gruffalo trails & forests across the UK as well as fab party treats! They’re super tasty and bound to be a hit with any Gruffalo fans!
Back when I ordered those first three newborn nappies from Baba + Boo I had all the best intentions but if I’m being totally honest, I didn’t think I’d stick with the whole reusable nappy idea. The constant need for washing and reported long drying […]
Hey little girl, It seems like Mama’s fallen a bit behind on all the birthday bits on here. I can only say that it’s because we’ve been super busy celebrating you turning two over the last few weeks and I just haven’t had a second […]
There we have it, day one of potty training complete. It wasn’t planned but when we woke up to yet another day of rain keeping us indoors it seemed like a sensible time to do it. And so we did.
I started the day making a bit of a make shift hey duggee potty training chart. ‘ The Potty Train’ where each time she does a wee or poop on the potty she gets to put a sticker on the track. At the end, she’ll get her Potty Training Badge!
We’ve had the potty kicking around for a while and we had a brief encounter with it a couple of weeks ago but other than that, until today Florence has only ever tried to wear it as a hat / stand in it.
She was SO excited to wear her new ‘pants’. She’s told me about them over and over again today and it’s just the cutest thing. I’ve had them ready for a couple of months and right now I think they might be the key to our potty training success.
While we had a couple of little accidents and didn’t have any toilet triumphs on the potty she was so happy to sit on the potty and try which is Such a huge step in itself. In fact she voluntarily sat there for three hours waiting for a poop that never came. She wouldn’t get off until I bought her dinner in and gladly chilled out on her potty asking me to bring different random things to her – her toy lawn mower, spanner, wiggly snake, some wotsits and her baby all joined her at some point.
Wish us luck for day two!
You might remember the little sensory herb garden we made for Florence this time last year. Now that she is almost two, Florence is starting to understand things a bit more and so I’ve really focussed this year on giving her ownership of her little […]
I’m really excited to share this latest review with you. Fellow blogger and mother of two, Jo Middleton AKA Slummy Single Mummy, has written her debut novel and I feel super honoured to be among the first to read it. Even more exciting is that […]
