Sticker Place Mats - Building Fine Motor Skills

Well hello there!

It feels like forever since I have done anything lately, well blog related, at present I seem to be running around everywhere. I remembered something the little two did a while back and they had aan absolute ball. Please mind the photos they were never intended for the blog, but hey what the heck I might as well share it.

We've been working on our fine motor skills, some of us are a little uncoordinated...truly they get that from me, I am the sort of person who trips over imaginary lines and you should see my attempts at learning crochet, disaster. Anyway I'd been researching things the kids could do that would be fun but help build fine motor skills, and I discovered playing with stickers was really good for them.

They had a lovely afternoon of sticking stickers onto painted wooden place mats, then I just sealed them.

Good, cheap fun, just like me, since I have done nothing Christmassy and my blog license will be revoked, lets all just pretend that they're Christmas stickers.

So what have you all been up to? I feel like I have been neglecting my online friendships, honestly not intentional and I miss you guys so much!

Thanks for reading,

Mel xo

Roadside Stool Makeover

Hey Guys,

So things have been bouncing along here at the mansion. I haven't had much time for anything although IU have managed to score a few amazing items, which I hope to get poictures of very soon. In the mean time here is a guest post you might have missed during the year.

This post first appeared on The Thrifty Rebel

Sometimes I think my neighbours know I am going to take their roadside trash. You see I found five of these wooden stools on my neighbours front lawn ready for pick up. 

Instead of just being thrown on like the rest of the crap these were neatly tied together making it easy to carry 2  at a time. When I asked if I could have them, he smiled like he had been waiting for me and said of course.

I only needed two of them for my craft room so I gave them a couple of coats of chalk paint. They need something else, I was thinking grain sack, but for the life of me I could not get them to line up and it was peeling the paint. So I left them white until further inspiration hits and the paint cures

Then Tuula invited me to play,  inspiration hit and I got the paint out again, TADA pink seats, but even better that, the stools inspired something else that caused my very mild mannered husband Jules to freak out!!

and if you're new here I have already posted the makeover that had my husband wondering whether or not he was living in the Barbie Dream House here.

Thanks for reading

Mel xo

Oven Baked Bread, Without Kneading!

Hi Guys,

Can't believe I checked out of bloglandia for so long! Lately life has been going a million miles a minute and I just haven't had any spare time. I have been trying to catch up with all the happenings but aty this point I am so far behind if I haven't said hi in a while I am coming. Since I haven't been doing much in the way of crafting or DIY I thought I would share a guest post from earlier in the year.

The post first appeared at With a Blast

Now I must admit, I am not a fan of cooking but I love to bake and one of my favourite things to bake is bread. Before you say baking bread is hard and annoying and time consuming, what if I told you all you have to do was chuck it in the bread maker and then get on with your normal routine then come back to it when you're ready to bake?

That's exactly what I do. Using my bulk bread maker recipe which you can find here

Ingredients - Add to bread maker in the exact order.

3&1/2 cups of Bread Maker Mix - recipe for bulk mix here

2 tsp of Dried Yeast

1 cup of Mixed Dried Fruit

1 tsp of Cinnamon

1&1/2 tbs of Olive Oil

1&1/4 cups of warm water (just slightly warm to touch, water that's too hot will kill the yeast and your dough won't rise 

Now I think you all know how to pour stuff into a bread maker but I like to use the dough setting rather than the bread so I can have these rustic free form loaves. Once the bread maker is set, go shopping for an hour or more, your bread will sit quite happily in the bread maker until you're ready to come back to it.

First spray down the tray, really well or use olive oil to oil the spray. I like quick and easy so I just use the spray, and dump the dough onto the tray.

Wrap it in plastic wrap but allow room for the bread to rise, leave it in a warm place then go and have a coffee or do something fun.

Come back in half an hour and it should have doubled in size.

Bake it in a moderate oven 180 Celsius or 350F for approximatly 30 mins. Be aware that this does depend on your oven, mine is brand new and it's exactly 30 mins, my old oven was dying and running very hot I found 22 minutes was enough in that oven. Isn't that bread just awesome.

Then slice it up and watch it disappear in front of your eyes. My 5 kids can eat 2 loaves of this for afternoon tea between them. (I admit two of them are teenage boys and never seem able to fill their stomachs)

Truly delicious and almost no work! you can shop and sit around drinking coffee because this is pretty much a waiting game and don't forget to check out my bread maker mix, it is seriously the best thing......since sliced bread. (bad joke lets all groan together)

 Or come and follow me at any or all of these places.

    

Mel xo