Mince Pies and Mulled Wine

It's Saturday, which in the zoo means it's baking day!! 

As we are in the festive mood we went for some mince pies and alcohol-free mulled wine 

I had a bottle of alcohol-free red wine, and added:

200g of caster sugar

2 satsuma's, including peel

2 cinnamon sticks

10 whole cloves 

1 tbsp nutmeg

3 bay leaves 

Cap of vanilla essence 

Stick it all in a pan on a high heat until the sugar dissolves on a rolling boil. Let it simmer for at least 20 minutes. I left it bubbling until our mince pies were ready

For the mince pies you will need:

1 jar of mincemeat for the filling

180g plain flour

130g butter

60g caster sugar

2 eggs

Icing sugar to decorate 

****preheat oven to 180****

Tip the flour into a bowl

Add the sugar 

And the butter 

Whisk one of the eggs and pour in

Mix well until you have pastry

Wrap in cling film and leave in the fridge for at least 10 minutes 

As our table cloth is covered in glitter glue, I stuck down some grease-proof paper to roll out the pastry on

Cut out 6 big circles for the bases and 6 small circles for the lids

Fill the cases with the jar of mincemeat

Whisk the second egg and use to brush the top of the cases before adding the lids - it helps seal them when cooking

Pop in the oven for 15 minutes and have a tantrum when they take too long...

The middle will be boiling hot and take a long time to cool down 

They are worth the wait!!

The smell of the mince pies baking and mulled wine boiling really has made the house smell of Christmas 

Christmas Tree Plates

Another quick and easy make to occupy the Zebra in this rubbish weather!

I got three paper plates and painted them green. I then let the Zebra loose with different paints 

As our tree is gold and red, we used matching paints 

For the final paper, I squirted on some PVA and gave her the shaking glitter

Once dried, I cut the plates into thirds and stuck onto a strip of cardboard.

As easy as that! 

Christmas Cards

We made our Christmas cards a while ago but I've held back from posting so people could receive them first!

Cut an A4 piece of black card into 3. Bend it in half to make the card, and paint the front with PVA glue and then cover in glitter

Take some sheets of green card and swish patterns of glue all across

Shake glitter across all the glue

Leave everything to dry! Be warned, it gets messy as there is a lot of glitter.. 

Cut the green card into Christmas Tree shapes

Stick the tree to the card, make a star ontop with some glitter glue, and use cotton wool for the snow!

There was much more work from Mummy than the Zebra on these cards, but they look cute and there are many more years ahead for her to design her own!

Toddler Ice Play, Eden Project, Cornwall

I would like to start by saying a massive thank you to Liz, Tony, and C.O.P.S for arranging yet another amazing day out! The Zebra and I are very grateful that we get to make such fun memories with lovely company :) thank you x

The Eden Project always come up with some fab events and is a brilliant setting to spend the day - so much room for little legs to run around, even in the rain

I didn't understand how toddler ice play would work at first and it seems a bit dangerous. However, it works and it works well! Everyone (including the parents) had so much fun and not a single injury amongst us. I even had a good run about and my clumsy bum didn't touch ice once...

For total contrast to the ice play, we visited the rainforest biome. We discovered snowmen, birds and bananas, and found that lots of ants run out if you stick your finger in wooden holes...

Christmas Painting

I realised today that we hadn't done any painting in a long time, so this afternoon we had a bit of free-play with the paints. 

Before the Zebra had even put brush to paper, she started to paint her feet!!

This was followed by lots of stomping on the paper. Clearly her foot-painting at nursery had left a favourable impression...

We had to have a quick break from painting so the Zebra could feed her fish! 

With toes totally covered, it was time to move onto hands...

She had great fun just letting loose with all the paints and brushes 

Once I had put the prints up to dry, I realised they would make great wrapping paper for presents! 

I glued one sheet of paper around a toilet roll tube, then pinched in the ends to make a gift box for a little pressie!

Some of the better footprints got turned into Christmas trees...

...adding a bow turned these into mistletoes!

Christmas wreath

A very simple craft to make a Christnas essential!

I had some green paper covered in glitter left over from our Christnas cards. Other than that I just needed some feathers, paper plates, ribbon and glue

Cut the middle out of the plates and cut the paper into little bits

Cover the plate in glue 

Stick on the paper 

Dip the feathers in glue 

Stick the feathers onto the paper!

Cut a piece of ribbon to make a hook and glue on. I pegged it while it was drying to help secure it.

And there you have it! A festive wreath that can be made in any colour