After Eights (along with Bailres, Advocaat and Chocolate Oranges) are things that I only really buy at Christmas so when I was trying to think of what I would use to make some Christmassy cupcakes, I decided to go with After Eight themed cakes.I bought the supermarket's own make though as I didn't know how they'd turn out and I would have been gutted if they'd turned out wrong and I'd wasted a whole pack of After Eights! They were only 99p and to be honest they tasted exactly the same as the usual ones so I'll be buying them in future anyway!150g butter or margarine 150g sugar 3 … [Read more...]
Frugal alternatives to Christmas cards….
What sort of person are you when it comes to Christmas cards? Do you...a) love writing out Christmas cards.b) make your own Christmas cards and take great pleasure in giving them out to your nearest and dearest.c) only give Christmas because you feel like it's expected but hate having to sit down and write them out.d) just not bother with them at all.I'm a definite C with my Christmas cards although I'm very jealous of all you A, B and D's ;-)Over the last few years though, I've found a few ways to reduce the number of cards I write our by lots (without making me look … [Read more...]
Is anyone else not feeling as festive as they want to be feeling….
I'm not feeling as festive as I want to be this year - I'm trying and trying but it's not happening.Don't get me wrong, I am excited and I am looking forward to Christmas but somethings's missing and I just can't seem to get myself into the Christmas spirit.I usually start feeling it as soon as the first door on the advent calendar is open but in the last few weeks, I've been ill, Mr Frugal's had to have a chest Xray and an Ultrasound to check and see if he has kidney stones (they don't think he has), Master Frugal has had a week off school and to top it off my laptop died. And as if … [Read more...]
We’ve reached Official Helper status….
Today was a proud day in our house.It was the day that Miss Frugal was finally awarded 'Official Helper' status. She gets a shiny green badge of her own to wear on her school jumper and she is so proud of the fact that she's been given this badge that I'm sure she'll be wearing it with pride every day.She's been after one of these coveted badges for ages but all the important jobs were taken so she had to wait for an opening and today, one of the other girls was controversially sacked from her job so a vacancy became unexpectedly available.There was much arguing at school over who … [Read more...]
Make your own Christmas Tree chocolates….
Christmas tree chocolates usually cost between two and three pounds for eight (sometimes just six) but you can make your own for much less and it only takes a few minutes to do.All you need are some wrapped sweets or chocolates, some sellotape and some thread (or Christmas tree lametta).I *borrowed* a few sweets from my friends box of Cadbury's roses and bought a few of those Freddo bars from the shop to make ours with. The Elf ones with popping candy would have been better but they had none in so we settled for these ones!Just sellotape your thread to the chocolates and … [Read more...]
Cupcake Sunday – The best chocolate butter-cream you’ll every try and Reindeer cupcakes….
A couple of weeks ago it was Mr Frugal's birthday and as he was at work all day, I decided to make him a birthday cake ready for when he got in from work. Not just any chocolate cake though, I wanted to make him the best chocolate cake he'd ever had - I'm nothing if not ambitious you know! I made a normal 2 layer chocolate sponge cake using this recipe (except I left the choc chips out). I sandwiched the layers together with cherry jam and covered it in the most amazing chocolate buttercream you've ever tasted. Next up I covered it with Minstrels and Maltesers and added a candle and Voila … [Read more...]
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