Kiwi fruits in cakes ?

Growing up i never liked kiwi fruits and it wasn't until my eldest daughter started eating solids , that i tried kiwifruits again and found that i liked them !

Anyway we always have a fridge full of them these days and more often that not they go off before we get to them all so i wanted to find a recipe that i could use them in .
I found a recipe online for a kiwifruit and ginger cake http://www.nzfavouriterecipe.co.nz/recipes/desserts/249-kiwifruit-ginger-cake

I then thought about how to decorate it they recommended a chocolate icing but i thought that  was a bit boring and then i remembered seeing candied oranges and wondered if i could do the same with kiwifruits so i did and they turned out great and super delicious !!
The cake was also divine and i will be making it again next time i want to try putting a kiwifruit jam swirl throughout the cake mmm yum will post when i do but i really do recommend this cake it is delicious and with kiwifruits being so cheap as well it's an added bonus :)

Trying out fondant

So after being inspired by Rosie cake diva on facebook i thought i would give it a go .
A lot of people talk about how they dread working with fondant but how i see it , is it's like clay you can make anything you want with the added bonus of being able to eat it .
So with my partner and I's anniversary coming up i thought it would be the perfect time to try it .
First i made my favorite chocolate cake in the whole world ( it's so good everyone that eats it wants the recipe , actually there is two , i will post the links to the pages )
http://www.todayinmississippi.com/index.php/recipes/details/2654

http://iambaker.net/the-best-chocolate-cake/

I then made a butter cream filling
Then it was on to the fondant ...
I really enjoyed it , i made a few roses and leaves and then just placed them on the cake in which i had covered in white fondant .
I ended up being short on time so my roses didn't have enough time to dry but for my first ever fondant I was very happy with how it turned out :)

I am going to attempt to make my girls birthday cakes this year and hoping to get some more practice before i do so which i will be sure to post

In the Night Garden

My girls havn't shown much interest in television or dvd's which was fine but my partner works very long hours so is never really home and so it's just me and the girls and as every mother knows there is so much housework and jobs to be done so i tried to get them to watch a show so i could get on with jobs but they didn't like anything until my sister gave them an In the Night Garden dvd , well my girls were mesmerized i could't believe it , i finally could get on with jobs :)
My eldest is obsessed now she has an Iggle Piggle and Upsy Daisy doll thats both sing , she plays with them all the time even when she see's a picture of one of the characters she gets excited , so yay i found something they love but we live in New Zealand , so finding In the Night Garden merchandise can be very hard and expensive !!

My eldest daughter with her Upsy Daisy doll .

Anyway with trying to find merchandise i stubbled across forums of other parents talking about how their children will only watch in the night garden as well so this has made me want to find out what is it about the show that makes children like it so ...
Being made by the BBC i wondered if it was educational ..
This is a link i found from the BBC
http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/grownups/shows/in-the-night-garden

The educational value of the show

In The Night Garden helps children to:

• Learn to care for others unconditionally.
• Appreciate diversity - understand that everyone is different.
• Enjoy the wonder of the world around them and to make connections between different places and things.

Now i know there will be people out there thinking and saying T.V is not educational , and that children shouldn't watch t.v and that is fine that is your opinion but i need the t.v to "babysit " my girls so that in that 30mins that it is on i can do a whole days worth of jobs

My opinion on in the Night Garden is that it is great , we watch the same dvd and even i don't get sick of it , i love all the colors , i like that the characters don't get annoying and mist of all i love the joy it brings to my girls

Favorite ad / you tube video at the moment

I saw this a while back and i still love it makes me laugh every time i think mostly because i can relate to almost everything she is saying hope you enjoy it too !!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNVde5HPhYo

Swiss roll fun

Being a housewife/homemaker i have found i have found a new love for baking and sewing of all things i think mostly because i need to do baking for bake sales and playdates and sewing because i am constantly mending things !!
Anyway in regards to baking i stumbled across an amazing baker called Rosie Cake Diva
https://www.facebook.com/rosieoriginals?fref=ts
She does the most amaing cakes and has inspied me to really explore with my baking

The first thing i had stumbled across was the mighty swiss roll and what you can do with it , mine are no where near as good as some of the amazing swiss rolls out there but here are a few of  my first atempts

This was the fist swiss roll i ever made and too be honest i was quite proud of it not to mention it tasted AMAZING !! 

I then made this for when my sister and 3 neices came to visit and they loved it too !

I then made the giraffe roll when my mum came to visit , i didn't really have a recipe for this one hence why it cracked once i had done it i realised that in adding the cocoa it made it too dry and crack so i know now for next time to subsidise some of the flour for cocoa :)

To my suprise , swiss rolls are not too hard to make and the recipe is rather simple but nothing can prepare you for the amount of mixing you have to do , i did however read somewhere that warming the eggs and sugar over boiling water on the stove helps to speed things up a bit and this did work :)