Pumpkin fun - mark 2

I apologise for all 10 monthly posts in one go, but i've been out of the country and this is the first opportunity i've got for posting this month!!

Putrid pumpkin brownies

...made with fresh pumpkin i promise!! No putrid ingredients here!! I needed to use up all the pumpkin flesh that i'd carved out and this is a really yummy way of doing it - it tastes a little like carrot cake, but more moist - i recommend!!

Pumpkin brownies

300g SR flour
300g brown sugar
3tsp mixed spice
2tsp bicarbonate of soda
500g grated pumpkin flesh
175g sultanas
1/2 tsp salt
4 eggs
200g butter (melted)
zest of 1 orange and 1tbsp orange juice

Icing
200g soft cheese
85g butter (softened)
100g icing sugar
zest of 1 orange and 1tsp orange juice

1. Beat eggs into melted butter 2. Stir in zest and juice 3. Pour into bowl with all all dry ingredients 4. Stir in pumpkin 5. Bake in a lined brownie tin for 30 mins at 180 oC 6. Beat together all icing ingredients and spread on cooled brownies
Enjoy!

Pumpkin fun - mark 1

So for my Halloween party this year i got 2 large pumpkins for carving. The first one i'm not really sure where i was going with the features - it was going to be cat-like, then I gave her eyelashes....and um...well it's not exactly very scary is it?? I'm going to have to go classic scary face with the second one.

dire decoration pics!

I totally forgot to take photos of the little hanging decorations that i made for the halloween party (taking pictures of crafts is my least favourite part - i can never be bothered setting up the pics properly) so basically i don't have any decent pics of the many bats, pumpkins, black cats and other creepy things that i cut out and painted black and gold and strung everywhere around the house.

I strung up little garlands of orange and black pompoms as well just to tie in the halloween-y colours.
You can just about see them in this pic - sorry it's so hopeless, but you get the idea!!

spiced skeletons

Rather than buy more cookie cutters in scary halloween shapes i decided to make my own scary version of the standard gingerbread man. The icing was a little difficult to use, i think i made it too stiff for fear of it dripping off - so i really had to sacrifice all the fine details i had hoped to add! Oh well...you get the idea i hope!
Recipe is easy peasy...

Mixed spice biscuits
250g plain flour
125g butter
125g brown sugar
1 egg
2 tsp mixed spice pinch of salt

1. Beat butter and sugar until fluffy
2. Beat in egg slowly
3. Sift in flour, salt and spice
4. Mix well and roll out dough
5. Cut out shapes and bake for 15 mins at 190 oC

not-so-scary napkins

I couldn't buy orange or black napkins anywhere for my halloween party! So i resorted to buying boring cream and stamping them up with a not-so-scary bat motif. I also stamped up the serviettes for round the cutlery etc.In the end I actually like them better than just plain ones - yay!

scary sweets

So yeah i had some egg whites left over from some other baking and wanted to make meringues for the halloween party. I used the same recipe as the meringue mushrooms but this time tried to make them halloween-y. Did i succeed???

Umm...don't answer that - they're supposed to be ghosts.

I was pleasantly surprised when many of the guests actually recognised that!! lol!!

baby cuddle cushion

So poog's little baby is hungry pretty much all of the time and she was spending so much time feeding him that she wanted me to spice up her cushion for supporting the baby. She picked this gorgeous farm fabric and it was the matter of 10 mins to rustle up a cushion cover to house the big squishy support cushion - plus point is...now i have the pattern, i don't need to buy one, just make another cover and stuff it up nice and tight.

rainbow rasta baby

So i made another version of the Baby Sophisticate cardigan, this time for my baby. I'll admit that i bought the wool before i found out that it's a boy....but he can still wear rainbows right??
It's perhaps not the most masculine of cardigan colours but he'll just have to embrace his flamboyant side and wear it, now that i've bothered to make it.
I did have some beautiful orange heart-shaped buttons but i vetoed those in favour of the slightly less girly rainbow round buttons. I can't help loving this cardigan, so it will definitely be worn!
Ah the lure of rainbows...i just can't resist!

rainbow rattle

So i made a quick and easy little baby toy for poog's baby - at first it was going to be a wrist rattle, you know, attached to his wrist on a little bracelet, but he is always hitting himself in the face with his hands and i was afraid he would poke himself in the eye if i tied something to his wrist.
So instead i just made a little ring handle for the little pudgy hand to grip onto. There isn't a pattern as such, i just crocheted a sphere, stuffed it and inserted a bell, and then crocheted a tube, which i then sewed round to the base of the sphere....easy peasy!