Vegan Mulberry Handbag Cake!

Well, it's finally the week of my birthday and celebrating has already started!!

My lovely friend Hannah made me the MOST amazing birthday cake. I requested a Mulberry handbag flavoured with chocolate and peanut butter and boy, did she deliver!



Hannah Banana Bakery Vegan Mulberry Handbag cake.



Here's the picture she copied!

  How epic is that??




Stitching detail




From the side

There are a few marks on the side there where I took it out of the box..

It has some yummy tasting icing and chocolate cake inside:

Super tasty. Luckily, the boys don't like peanut butter so I have to try and eat the whole cake myself. What a shame....
Hannah even iced the board:

This is actually the second birthday cake I've had as my lovely friend Natalie (nickname Geoffrey) from work made me a strawberry and cream filled sponge cake.
Unfortunately, the vultures at work ate it before I could take a picture!

It looked a bit like this:



Again, super tasty! Thank you lovely ladies!!!

P.s You can find the Hannah Banana Bakery online here

A week in pictures...

Evening!  I've bought a few things recently and even had some adventurous days out so I thought I'd share them with you!

The first things I bought were from Primark - I got a pink onesie from the kids section for a bargain £7 but I ended up taking it back as it made me look fat!! Fail. The boyfriend was mucho glad that I took it back...

The second thing I bought was also Primarni.....this beautiful parka for just £26...

It doesn't look great in the photo but it's better in real life and so cosy!

I also got a Diplodocus! Random, I know. He is microwaveable!

Diplodocus £10 from Sainsburys

I just love him.

The rest of my photos are from my trip to Brighton on Saturday with the boyfriend. I had an awesome day, enjoying Starbucks Christmas coffees and Wagamama's Cha Han for lunch. My favourite! There were so many good shops that we spent most of the day wondering why Southampton is so lame in comparison.
  We would probably move there if the houses weren't so expensive. There is so much to see and do and a much more creative vibe to the place.

The Xmas coffees at Starbucks were on 2 for 1 for a couple of days last week so I had the Toffee Nut Latte (my all time favourite) and tried the new Praline Mocha which was too bitter for my tastes.

Starbucks toffee nut latte and praline mocha.

That was actually our second trip to Starbucks that day as we started our day of shopping with tea and luxury fruit bread. The fruit bread is AMAZING so if you haven't tried it....don't because then there will be less left for me.

Starbucks luxury fruit bread.

From the window of Wagamama's you can see some of the graffiti near the North Lane. Inspiring stuff.

If only all graffiti was so inspiring.

Up the road from here is a cool bike shop with some lovely Pashley cycles in the window and outside. If I ever get on a bike again (it's been years) then it will have to be a Pashley.

Pashley bike £625

Another beautiful bike.

Eventually we ended up at the seafront for the obligatory tourist shots of the pier....

Me and the boyfriend..

And my final purchase was a pair of shoes from Barrats for £27. They aren't the best quality but they are exactly what I was looking for and they are actually reasonably comfortable. I plan to wear them with my new playsuit for my birthday in a few weeks.

Mary Janes £27 from Barrats.

And there you go. My week in photos!

Carve it up!

I have to admit that I have done absolutely nothing for Halloween......apart from admiring everyone elses' efforts that is! (And thinking that it all looks like a lot of hard work...)

Being an arty type, my favourite part of Halloween is the carving pumpkin and a quick scout around Google images brings up some impressive "art!"

Some people have too much time on their hands.....but respect anyway!

Cake pops: Top tips!

Evening! I just found some pictures on my mobile form the last time I made cake pops. This was only the second batch I had ever made but they were so much more successful due to a few small tricks.

Pink cake pops with sprinkles

The most obvious difference was that I used proper lolly sticks, bought from Hobby Craft. They are longer than regular lolly sticks which makes it easier to dip and allows you to use a larger ball of cake mixture.

The second tip is to leave the cake pops in the fridge for a while before dipping them. This allows the chocolate around the stick to set so they are less likely to fall off, and also when the cake mix is cold it means that chocolate coating cools more quickly when you are dipping them. (Does that make sense?)


The only problem with this is that you have probably melted all your chocolate in order to dip the sticks, but then you have to leave it whilst the cakes are in the fridge. I worked around this by doing about 5 at a time and then sticking them in the fridge.......then I dipped another five etc and when I came to doing the coating the original ones had been refrigerated for long enough to be cold. Some people put them in the fridge overnight but then I guess they must only melt a little chocolate at a time.

We also bought some "oasis" foam from Hobby Craft. It's the stuff you use for flower arranging. It worked so much better than my DIY cardboard box idea. Don't they look great?!

It took a lot of time to get the chocolate coating to the right temperature.....too hot and it took ages to set, too cold and it wouldn't smooth out. We used regular white chocolate with some red food colouring in it to make pale pink.

The real secret to successful cake pops is PATIENCE. The whole process took about 2 hours I think which is really mental when you only get about 20 cake pops for all your efforts! And one last look at the finished product....

How to make perfect cake pops

This was my first attempt in case you hadn't seem them:

How not to make cake pops

I hope this helps you in your quest for perfect pops!

Bad day turns good

Hiya. Well, this morning was not so good. I woke up feeling super unhappy. (Sad face!)

Luckily, I am quite good these days at looking on the bright side of life and trying not to dwell on the less silver side.

So here are a few things to be thankful for:
1) I can eat stilton again. (Although now I'm allowed it, I'm not that bothered. Typical.)
2) It's my birthday next month and my lovely boyfriend has promised to order me this:

Playsuit £40 from River Island

3) I could go on a rollercoaster if I wanted to.
4) I don't need to save my money for a while so I can now buy clothes again. And get my hair cut.
5) I don't have to go around the shops thinking "will that stretch?"
6) I now know that I get pregnant quite easily.
7) I could go on holiday next month if I wanted without worrying about feeling sick on the train/tube/flight etc
8) We don't have to worry about trying to sell the house by next May.
9) I could go running again. If it wasn't so cold...

I can't think of a number 10......I'm also thankful for all the lovely support I have had from friends and family and work :)

Another thing I spotted today was this amazing necklace on the Swarovski website...

Passenger Angel Cat Pendant £82

It's a little cat with wings! Hard to tell from this picture but trust me that it's super cute.

So there you go. Oh, and I have another follower! I thought I would be stuck on 20 forever.....
Hello!

Update

Unfortunately it was bad news today. The baby had not been growing properly....
So I might be MIA for a little while as I get myself together and then it will be fashion as usual. I have already decided that a new pair of heels are in order for my birthday next month and also some new skinny jeans.

Trying to make the best of it by doing the things I wouldn't be able to do otherwise  :(

Long weekend

The title might suggest that I'm having a long, relaxing weekend but I'm not. I started to bleed on Friday night so went down to A and E.... I now have to wait til Monday morning to go back to the hospital before I can find out if things are ok with the baby :(    So I'm playing the waiting game.

Above is an outfit I had on the other day to go shopping at Gunwharf Quays. It was still strangely warm outside for October...

Hence the summery sandals!

I'm spending my time today lusting after some new Converse trainers and deciding whether Ugg Evera's might be a better choice. I tried a pair on at Gunwharf and they were so comfy....but Converse are an everlasting classic!

These are my current Converse:

I made the mistake of buying them a little small so they are starting to crack at the sides.

And here are the choices for new trainers!

Womens Converse All Star X Hi Shearling Trainers £68 from Schuh

Womens Ugg Evera Trainers around £75

Both have a shearling lining, both are neutral....the Uggs are more expensive but possibly more comfortable.
Decisions, decisions.

As I may have mentioned, it's my 30th birthday next month. I was thinking of getting a new camera but I'm not sure what to go for. Also, I thought getting a Kindle might be good. Again, undecided.

What to do? What to do?