Digital Scrapbooking Fun!

A few days ago I received a very exciting email from a lovely lady called Liz. Liz works for a company called My Memories and she contacted me to say she'd found my blog and thought my readers (that's you guys!) might enjoy a GIVEAWAY of their digital scrapbooking software! How cool is that?

So, the last few days I've had the chance to play with the software and boy am I enjoying it!!

It's super easy to use, very flexible and makes even a novice scrapbooker like myself look good!
Here's the latest page I made, scrapping about our engagement!



I love it!

Liz has asked me to do a review, so when I post that I'll also post details of the GIVEAWAY!

If you absolutely can't wait and must have the digital scrapbooking software before the giveaway, use my code STMMMS3472 and you'll get $10 off the software (usually $40, you'll get it for $30!) and you'll get $10 credit to use in the online store!

Stay tuned!

Whip It Up Wednesday: Easy Paper Lanterns

Here's another super quick, easy and fun party decorating idea! 

I whipped up a stack of these for our engagement party - what fun!

What You Need:

* Scrapbook or craft paper

* 2 split pins/brads

* Optional: LED tea light candle

Hole punch, scissors.

What To Do:

Cut strips of paper that are equal in length and width. About 2cm wide seems to work well. The length will determine how big your lantern is. I made mine in varying lengths, from shorties at 10cm to ones almost 30cm long. 

Tip: Bigger lanterns will look 'fuller' and better with more strips, smaller lanterns need fewer strips. 

Experiment and see what works for you.

Use your hole punch to pop a hole in both ends of all of your strips. If your hole punch is strong enough, stack all (or half, whatever works) of your strips and do them all in one hit. This has two benefits - 

1) It's fast! And I'm lazy so fast = a very good thing

2) It ensures that your holes are in the same position on all of your strips.

Stack all of your strips and put a split pin or brad through the lot of them.

Secure the strips, then repeat at the other end.

Now, gently spread your strips out to form a ball! 

If you have one handy, you can pop an LED tea light candle inside! 

It looks very cute in real life, sorry I fail at photography, you'll just have to trust me ;)

To hang them up, just tie some wire or fishing line around the split pin/brad at the top.

These are SO easy you'll be able to make a stack of them really quickly, and they look very effective hung together in groups of mixed colours and sizes!

Happy creating!

Whip It Up Wednesday: Berry Lemon Cupcakes

I'll tell you this right now, these babies went down a TREAT! I took them with me to family tea and they were goners! Now that's what I like to see ;) These are definitely on the engagement party food list - which is this weekend by the way :D

I found the recipe here at Vixen Made and altered slightly - I used raw sugar, raspberry swirl yoghurt and I used canned mixed berries instead of raspberry puree. If you use canned berries, just pick out the best looking ones and mush them with a fork - you still want the same amount of "mushed berries" as you would pureed raspberry. I also modified the method slightly to use fewer bowls because I'm lazy - less washing up!

Berry Lemon Cupcakes

1 egg

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup raw sugar

1 1/4 cups plain flour

1 tsp baking powder

2 tsp grated lemon zest

31/4 tsp freshly squeezed lemon juice 

1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled

1/2 cup raspberry swirl vanilla yogurt

1/4 cup mushed berries

What To Do:

Preheat oven to 180C (350F).

In a large bowl, whisk sugar, butter, and egg. Add yogurt, berries, lemon zest and juice and beat until smooth.

Add salt and baking power and stir well. Add flour a bit at a time and beat until smooth.

I made mini cupcakes and this filled a 24 cupcake tin AND a 12 cupcake tin. 

If you make big cupcakes it probably makes 12 normal sized cupcakes.

Line your tin(s) with cupcake liners and divide the mixture evenly between the liners. 

Bake for 20 minutes (about 5 minutes longer for normal sized cupcakes).

Let cool and enjoy :D

I topped mine with cream cheese icing (my favourite! Found at the bottom of this recipe) that had 1 drop of red food colouring. Then I added cachous because they're pretty :D