Poppy's Lorax Party

My daughter turned 7 last week and after much conversation we decided on a pizza and movie party with optional sleepover. The next question was which movie. I knew I needed a movie so I could figure out the theme of the cake and food. I was so happy when she decided on the Lorax. There was just so much colour and fun things to work with. So off we went and found some fun stuff for invitations. 

Then I searched the internet for ideas. I immediately found a beautiful cake that I knew I wanted to make... Pinterest of course. And a few other Pinterest finds. All in all it was a wonderful party and the girls had a fantastic time. 

I love how the cake turned out. The cotton candy/fairy floss didn't last long. It was a very hot day. 

I found these on pinterest. They were very popular with the girls and super easy to make. Just a marshmallow dipped in white chocolate and rolled in sprinkles. 

Poppy cookies for my Poppy. This is just a simple sugar cookie with lemon icing. 

Cucumber truffula trees

I found a mustache template by googling "Lorax Mustache" and then cut it out with an exacto knife. We used these on the straws and on popcorn bags and also on the goody bags.

These cake pops later became the candle holders. I was worried the fairy floss would catch fire so I decided to put the candles around the edge of the cake. 

The cake pops were a little fiddly but basically they were plain cake pops dipped in white chocolate. I was lucky enough to find these cool straws at the dollar store. I used the same mustache template just shrunk down. I then placed parchment over the template and piped white chocolate with yellow food colouring. The eyes were dots of white chocolate and I drew the pupils with a food writer pen. I just "glued everything in place with melted white chocolate.

I made the "save the trees" banner with cardboard triangles and letters I printed from a word document. I think the font was Baskerville 300pt. I punched holes and threaded it on string. And the tissue paper pompoms (I thought they looked like the tops of truffula trees) are dollar store finds. 

These goodie bags were just orange paper bags I found in the party store. I used a Lorax pumpkin carving template and just printed it the size I wanted on yellow paper. We added googly eyes for fun.

We decided to do a quick take home craft so I found these paper pots and put together this little poem from Lorax quotes and printed it to attach to the pots. The girls planted pompom marigolds and zinnias.

This is the aftermath of hours in the baby pool, planting seeds, pass the parcel, pizza making, dancing, a movie, popcorn, milk shakes, slushies and cake. These kids were wrecked.

All in all this was a great party. The next morning we had fruit and crepes with nutella. Out of 10 girls 5 slept over. Everyone was picked up on time and we were exhausted. What an experience. I think maybe we will leave the sleepovers until they are a little older but we are very lucky that these are all wonderful kids. 

The Dinner Cup Menu

A few weeks ago I wrote about the dinner cup. Which is by the way still working great. In fact my daughter asked the other day if we could add some more "food I haven't tried" to the mix. I gladly obliged. I thought I might share with you some of the meals we have in there.
I am going to write a list and then as time goes by I will put recipes for as many as I can. So this is what is currently in the dinner cup.
Pizza- homemade dough with whatever toppings we feel like on the day. She likes plain cheese and tomato sauce. Roasted cauliflower, bacon and fontina cheese is another favorite as is broccoli and bacon and this unusual combo of blue cheese, bacon, grapes and caramelized onions.
Crispy Honey Chicken-  This is a new addition and it is delicious! I found this one on Pinterest.
 Double crunch honey garlic chicken
Lasagne/Pasta Bake- Made with our chock full of veggies spaghetti sauce.
Grilled Cheese sandwiches and Tomato Soup- This is a classic and most often we have it on a Friday night.
Mac 'n Cheese- Sometimes homemade sometimes from a box. It depends on if mummy wants to eat it too.
Meatloaf- Meatloaf Cupcakes with mashed potatoes and usually broccoli.
Tacos- With chicken or beef
Spaghetti- Loaded with veggies. The kids love this one.
Creamy Pork- Diced pork in an apple cider and cream sauce. With mashed potato, noodles or polenta.
Coconut Chicken Fingers- This is a favorite from one of my favorite mum cook books. The Jessica Seinfield book Deceptively Delicious.
Gnocchi- Home made delicious little potato dumplings.
Fried Rice- Again this is full of veggies.
Beef Stew/Meat Pie
Cottage Pie
Breakfast For Dinner- Most often pancakes but sometimes french toast or crepes.
Fish Fingers- Yep from a box. But not the ones made from icky minced fish. Usually they are fish fillets. And mashed potatoes, or noodles and peas and corn.
Risotto- 7 Veggie Risotto
Coconut Chicken- Coconut Lime Chicken we have this with stir fry veggies and rice.
Chicken Schnitzel- usually mashed potatoes and broccoli, cauliflower or peas and corn.
Asian Meatballs- Asian Meatballs I really must put this recipe on here first is is soooooo good.
Asian Meatball Coconut Soup
Quesadillas- Cheese, corn, chicken, tortillas.
Slow Cooker Beef Ribs- Rice and sugar snap peas.
Sausages and Mash
Ham and Chicken Rollups
Garden Of Eve Noodles- A concoction of bacon, apples, brussels sprouts with spaghetti. Made up by my husband.
I will put all these recipes on here as we make them that way I can put in pictures. All the dishes make the rounds. And we will be adding more soon. Feel free to ask questions.

Make this!

I saw a picture of potatoes cooked like this on pinterest last week and showed them to my husband (he loves potatoes) and he insisted I make them for dinner that night. And why not? They looked delicious. After looking in to the recipe I found they are sometimes called swedish potatoes. The original post was here http://foodgawker.com/popular/favorites/

Step one is to scrub the potatoes and slice them very thinly but not all the way through. After slicing through a few times I found it much easier to stick a cake tester (you could use a skewer) through the potato to stop me from cutting all the way through.









Step two is seasoning. We sliced garlic really thin and slipped it in each crack along with a sliver of butter. I added rosemary, salt and black pepper then drizzled the whole lot with olive oil. A few more dabs of butter on the top and into the oven.










Step three is patience and a very hot oven 220º C/450ºF for as long as it takes for them to get really crispy. About 40 mins.

They were delicious and definitely worth the wait and the calories. We had them with a steak and some amazing horseradish my aunt brought back for us from Tasmania.

Pin madness.

I have recently re-acquired my fantastic Singer sewing machine that I bought for my self in 1989... yep that long ago. I had sold it when I left the country and my wonderful aunt who bought it has given it back. I am in sewing heaven. Any way I can't find enough things to sew. I have gone crazy on pajamas. I am in the middle of a footie pj binge and I am soon moving on to cutie rainbow pjs for my 6.5 yr old. I am even going to attempt to draft a peter pan collar. (we will see how that goes)I have gone a little homemade crazy since I found Pinterest and now I am half way through a few too many projects... oops. Don't tell my husband. The crochet and knitting bug has hit kinda hard too. There are so many amazing projects on Pinterest. I can't stop looking. Its lucky I'm not a quilter because I would have projects planned for years. As it is I will be making pot holders, dish cloths, sugar cubes, bouncy balls, bunting, sidewalk chalk and Olympic Torch Cupcakes in the next few weeks. I will keep you posted on my progress.

Update 13/9/2012: I have made 5 pairs of different pj's. The Olympic Torch cupcakes worked out great. I am in the middle of some baby wash cloths using the dishcloth pattern and since this post I found a great recipe for bathtub finger paint which my kids are crazy for. I have made it 5 times now.