First Ever Craft Market

Well, I did it, I went and had a stall at my first ever craft market! I was so nervous in the lead up to it and very stressed about how it would all go, but it turns out there was no need.

The market was a new one held at Mia Flora in Karragullen (sorry, they do not have a web page to link to). Mia Flora is a beautiful tea house and garden centre that I first heard about from my parents. Mostly the locals in the area go to have a nice meal in beautiful surroundings, and having been there myself now I can see why.

We had fantastic weather, with the sun shining, so there were a fair number of people who came. However, with it not being a well established market not many people seemed to be buying anything. I only sold a couple of items myself, but I'm taking it as a good learning experience. I now know how long it takes for me to set up a table and what people are interested in.

In spite of most people not buying, I did have a lot of people stop to chat to me and look at my animals. I now know that I should have a sign made up stating that my animals are made from socks as most people had no idea and didn't know such a thing could be done/existed! I also think that in the future I will make up a sign stating that I do take custom orders for animals as well (got a bit tired of repeating myself).

All in all I think it was worth going and now I'm starting to look around for a more established market to try again soon!

Not Just Sock Animals

Well, yesterday was my mums birthday and so we were having a family dinner at my parents house to celebrate. We were also celebrating my older brother’s birthday which is one week before my mum’s. Now, since we no longer exchange birthday gifts between siblings, I didn’t have to worry about a gift for my brother, but what to get for my mum? She continually tells us that we don’t need to get her anything, she just wants our time (as in, spend time with her). However, I already see a lot of my mum and so I felt that wasn’t really a big gift from me. So I decided that I would make her a gift this year.

I purchased a counted cross stitch kit that I was going to do for her for mothers day, but I had unfortunately misplaced it somewhere and so she didn’t get it. Thankfully it turned up just in time for me to make it for her birthday (I found it the week before). So, I spent all my spare time in the week leading up to my mum’s birthday making this beautiful cross stitch for her. In that week, I did also have a wedding to attend and spent most of the weekend doing that, and hanging out at my in-laws, so that cut into my stitching time – and I forgot how long counted cross stitch takes. This resulted in me being up quite late on Thursday night so I had it done in time to present it to my mum last night at dinner! 

I also baked my mum a cake for her birthday (and a spare one to take to work). My mum’s favourite cake is carrot cake, so that’s what she got. I tried a new recipe out for this cake as the previous cake recipes I’ve tried have been nice, but nothing special. This recipe came from a Planet Cake cake decorating book that I have at home. The icing however, is my recipe and is a beautiful white chocolate cream cheese icing. I was really happy with how it turned out and everyone at my mum’s work raved about the cake, and everyone last night really enjoyed it as well.

Icing Recipe:

Ingredients:

250g Cream Cheese

210g Nestle White Chocolate Melts

100mL Sour Cream

3 Cups Icing Sugar

1 – 3 Tablespoons Vanilla

Method:

Beat cream cheese until light and fluffy. Add sour cream and continue beating. Melt chocolate in microwave in 30 second increments, stirring until smooth with no lumps. Add to cream cheese mixture and beat until smoothly combined. Add icing sugar 1 cup at a time until your icing is a consistency that you are happy with. Add vanilla to taste (personally I like a stronger vanilla flavour) while the mixer is going. Ice cake!

Now, I used triple the amount of ingredients as I was icing two cakes and they were layer cakes. I also wasn’t measuring what I was using so the figures in my recipe are approximations. As with all baking, make sure you taste as you go to get a texture and flavour that you are happy with.

Hope you enjoy it!