happy birthday...

Today is Claire's brithday, she is 24 which I think is great, yesterday to celebrate we went on the best drive, our favourite drive, early in the morning through Woodend, stopping off at Burkies, bypassing Trenthonem and then arriving in Daylesford to do a lot of scavagging. We start at the trash and treasure market, then on to some op's then down the main street to see the shops then up to the mill to have a good good look around, somewhere in here we manage to stop of at Cliffy's for lunch and also the chocolate shop for a treat, Daylesford is the best, I really mean that, we always have the best time when we are here, it was a great way to celebrate a birthday I think!

This is what her gift looked like, all wrapped up in brown paper, with an origami crane to finish, its not hard to tell what it is but at least it looks a bit nice.


Happy Birthday Claire xo

Baked Today!

Well last night really as I knew I wouldn't of had enough time to do it all today, but they were decorated today, and look rather good I think. They are for a friends birthday, I hope she enjoys them.

Sponge Cake!

I was lucky (and I mean very lucky) enough to get a Kitchen Aid mixer for my birthday, even though that was a while ago I still hadn't had enough time to put it to use. Today though Claire and I decided to make a sponge cake, I've never made one before, mainly because I was to scared it would fail, but with my mixer I thought it may just be possible. 

I used a recipe I found in mum's very old and well used nursing mothers cook book. Everything seemed to be going well, even the fact that we didn't have a round tin, we managed with a square, the mixer whisked the eggs really well and really fast and I folded it all together with extreme care. We put it in the oven and were quite optimistic everything would turn out okay, but it didn't it flopped right in the middle. We managed to hide the fact by cutting it in half and turning it upside down, and evening it out with cream, but it still didn't quite cut it, I don't know if it was because we didn't use a round tin, or the fact we only sifted the dry ingredients twice and not three times as some other recipes suggest. I'm only comforted by the fact that some CWA members are too frightened of ruining sponge cakes to try baking it themselves, but one day i hope to master it, if anyone has any tips, or fool proof recipes i would be very happy to hear about them.  

From Meaghan.