TODAY'S GUEST BLOGGER IS.....

Hi There!

My name is Annie, known in the virtual world as Mrs Crafty B. I live in Cambridge with Hubby B, my beautiful Baby B, a grumpy old ginger tom cat called Tigger and a crazy little young cat called Tess. I recently left my job as an office manager to be a full time mummy, a child minder and a crazy crafter. I run a community crafts group and hope to hold more charity crafts fairs like the one I held this year for the Rosie Maternity Hospital.

I started writing my blog ‘Crafting a Daydream’ at the start of 2012 with a view to sharing my crafty world. I am sure as all of you who craft will know, the project list is never ending, just like the collections of crafting goodies. I wanted a place to share as I learned new skills and looked into crafts on a deeper level and I hoped to connect with lots of like minded people. The latter has most definitely happened!

I really hope that I can inspire something in others. It’s a totally selfish act. It brings me immense pleasure when I give someone a recipe and they make something they are so proud of, or when I teach someone how to cook something. A smile comes across my face when I realise that I roused something in a friend that has seen them start to craft as a sort of therapy and start their own blog. I absolutely love it down to my core. I love to see others enjoy something as much as I do and if I can help from the sidelines then great!

I’m a strong believer in crafts for children and encouraging creative thinking. Crafting is such social activity and gives opportunity to count, see colours and shapes, help the development of motor skills and so many other things that I could never see a downside. An afternoon spent drawing, playing with playdough, painting or picking blackberries for baking with Baby B is an afternoon well spent.

I have always been a bit crafty and I love to be creative. I’m never satisfied with following patterns or instructions. I have to make something my own! I am totally obsessed with crochet and I like to make gifts for the people around me. I hope that everything that I make brings a smile to at least one other person and I truly believe that the effort that goes into making a gift says as much as the gift itself. Sugarcraft is another craft that I like to dabble in and baking is where the love is! I love to make occasion cakes or whip up a batch of cupcakes for visitors or as an offering when visiting others. Some of my biggest achievements in the baking world are a white chocolate and caramac cheescake that I made for my friends wedding, my engagement cake decorated with self made sugar roses and my own wedding cupcake tower with self made sugar flowers for the topper.

As Christmas is almost upon us, I would like to share a couple of bakes from last years festivities in the hope that you will give them a go. Do you all have recipes for vanilla cupcakes, vanilla cookies and chocolate cookies that you love to use? I’ll tell you how to add a bit of a festive twist to these classics. First of all, take your cupcake mixture and add a bit of mixed spice. Spoon half of what you normally would into the cases, and then add a teaspoon of mincemeat. Fill the case with the other half of the mixture and bake. Top with some almond butter icing and you have yourself some yummy mince pie cupcakes. If you don’t want to use butter icing and decorate, why not add a crumble mixture to the top before you bake them. Here are some that I knocked up last year decorated with red and green stars. The green iced cupcakes are lemon and white chocolate flavour.

When it comes to your vanilla cookies, spoon a bit of mincemeat on top of the cookie mixture before baking and once cooled, sprinkle with some icing sugar. These went down very well.

The absolute favorites were my Christmas pudding cookies. I took a favourite chocolate cookie recipe and added a few cranberries and raisins. I used some glace icing to ice half of each cookie and decorated with some handmade holly leaves and berries.

Here are some Christmas shortbreads as well J

I hope that you feel inspired to give some of my ideas a try and if you do, please mention my blog if you decide to post them online. It would be fab if you could share the pictures with me as well. I blog at www.mrscraftyb.co.uk and you can post pictures on my Facebook page or Tweet them to me. Just find ‘Mrs Crafty B’ on either of these sites. I can’t wait to hear from you and see your pics!

Thanks for having me over here at Christmas Pie Crafts!

With love from
Mrs Crafty B