Sweet Mince Cinnamon Rolls

I recently saw a recipe for apple cinnamon rolls using bread and thought that I could actually follow a similar recipe and make use of the sweet mince I had bought at reduced price. I tried it once and my children devoured them immediately and asked for more! So I now have another quick and easy recipe to add to my list. I tried to look for a recipe but couldn't find any, so I have made a new name for this recipe, 'Sweet Mince Cinnamon Rolls'. Here is how I made them:

Ingredients:

• Sliced bread
• Sweet Mince (Vegetarian)
• Melted butter
• Sugar
• Cinnamon
• Optional: Icing Sugar for decoration

Step 1: Preheat oven to 170 degrees
Step 2: Melt some butter and place in a bowl or plate to enable you to dip the roll of bread in.
Step 3: Remove the crusts from the slice of bread
Step 4: Using a Rolling Pin roll out the slice of bread.
Step 5: Place a tablespoon of sweet mince into the middle of the slice.
Step 6: Roll the bread up
Step 7: Place the rolled up bread into the melted butter.
Step 8: Roll the bread onto a plate which has the sugar and cinnamon on.

Step 9: Place the rolls onto a non-stick baking tray (I used oven sheet) and place into the pre-heated oven for about 15 minutes until golden brown.
Step 10: Remove from oven and allow to cool slightly.
Step 11: With a sieve sprinkle some icing sugar over the top
Step 12: Serve either warm or cold.

If you want some information regarding what Sweet Mince is here is a wiki link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mincemeat

Alice in Wonderland Art

My 8 year old recently produced a lovely piece of work that she entered into a local art competition. The theme was Alice in Wonderland, celebrating the 150 years of the book. Both my daughter's entered but unfortunately didn't win but nevertheless they enjoyed the challenge.

Photos of her doing her design on the canvas.

Photograph below of her big sister's Alice in Wonderland Art Piece. My 13 year old daughter has already written a blog piece about this on her blog. alice-in-wonderland-crafts

Photograph below of my 8 year old daughter in the gallery where her artwork was displayed.

Eid Cookies - Sheep

We had a great time making the Eid cookies last week so decided to make some more but this time try a different design. We decided on making Sheep Cookies which is linked with Eid.

I used the same cookie recipe and icing as I did with the other cookies I posted about yesterday. http://www.karimascrafts.com/2015/09/henna-style-decorated-cookies-for-eid.html

Instructions:

Step 1: Using a sheep cookie cutter I cut out the shapes from the cookie dough (see separate recipe)
Step 2: Bake and allow to cool down.
Step 3: Cover the sheep with one thin layer of white icing and allow to dry (about an hour)
Step 4: Using thick white incing decorate the sheep with swirls to look like wool.
Step 5: Add eyes and optional add a colour for the legs. I used cake decoration balls for the eyes and gold edible icing.

We had some spare cookie dough and icing leftover so we decided to make a couple of Muslima/Hijabi cookies too! Using a gingerbread cookie cutter I cut out the dough and then pressed the legs together to make it look like a skirt. Then decorated with the icing. I used a food pen to draw the face.

The link below shows the sugar cookie recipe I used.
http://sallysbakingaddiction.com/2014/05/27/soft-cut-out-sugar-cookies/

Henna Style Decorated Cookies for Eid

It will be Eid in a few days and my girls have been busy decorating some cookies that they can gift to friends.  We followed a sugar cookies recipe, apparently these are best for decorating on.

Then I also made my own icing following instructions I found online which is meant to be good for decorating with. I chose a recipe using egg whites.

I will post the link to the cookie recipe at the bottom of the post.

Instructions

Step 1: We baked the cookies and allowed them to cool down before decorating.

Step 2: Prepare the icing and divide into separate bowls and add food colouring.

Step 3: Apply a bottom layer of icing onto the cookies and allow to harden, took over an hour for ours.

Step 4: Then apply a design with a contrasting colour onto the cookies.

Allow to dry and then they are ready to eat or gift.


The photo below shows the cookies that my 13 year old daughter designed.

The photo below shows the cookies that my 8 year old daughter designed.

The link for the cookie recipe I followed is: http://sallysbakingaddiction.com/2014/05/27/soft-cut-out-sugar-cookies/

Teal Cushion Covers

My daughter has been busy decorating and furnishing her craft studio and went for a teal theme. She had one feature wall painted teal and painted some of the furniture with similar colours. She had been looking for some teal cushion covers to put on the sofa in the room, but we could not find any cheap ones. We did however find a bargain shower curtain which she loved. I managed to make 3 cushion covers for her from the piece of curtain fabric we bought.

We already had some cushion covers with cushion that we didn't need. So I removed the zips from the cushion covers to reuse and used the covers as a template to cut out the fabric for her new cushions. So total cost was just the price of the shower curtain which was about £2.00 if I remember rightly.

You will notice that the colour of the cushions look different in each photograph, that has just been the effects of the camera and lighting.  Below is a photo of her nearly finished craft studio.

Bookcase Makeover

If you are following my posts then you will know that my young 13 year old daughter now has her own craft studio for her to do her crafts. We have both been very busy the last few weeks getting the room sorted. This is a bookcase that I gave a crafty makeover.

For this makeover I simply sanded down the wood with sandpaper. Then gave a few coats of furniture paint. I used B&Q Made By Me make for this project. It looks lovely with the other painted pieces of furniture in the room. The room is nearly finished now, just a few finishing touches.

Cabinet Makeover

If you are following my posts and my daughter's posts you will know that she now has her own craft studio so we are all busy trying to furnish it and making everything look arty!  We bought this cabinet originally to use as a support for another desk but we haven't got around to that yet. It was cheaper to buy this second hand and paint it than it was to buy desk legs. Plus we get plenty of storage use from it. For now we are still using it as storage. She has placed all her lovely teacups that she has bought to make her candles and pincushions with.

We bought this for only £5 and used a tester pot paint for only £1 so the whole project has cost us £6 which is a real bargain.

If you have missed my previous posts or my daughter's posts below are some photographs. The one immediately below is a filing cabinet that I did a makeover on.

The photo below is a desk my daughter made using 2 old bedside cabinets she painted and a worktop.

My daughter made this arty desk from a bedroom dressing table that she painted.