Lambs! Lambs Everywhere!

Warning: this post contains adorableness galore and may result in a cuteness overload. Read on if you dare.

Hello my lovelies!

Recently I had the absolute pleasure of meeting and playing with some little lambs and so I decided to bring my trusty camera along and capture some of the action!

I also got to name a pair of twins that were born the day I visited, they were both girls and one was the tiniest most adorable thing you ever did see.This year the names all had to begin with P so I named them Pandora and Paisley, which I think suited them both perfectly!

(I'm sorry if some of the pictures are a little bit blurry, lambs move pretty fast)

Meet Pandora!

Hello Paisley!

"Yum! This camera's tasty!"

*Wink*

"What are these?"

"This welly is tasty too!"

"What does this taste like?!"

"Do you like my bum?"

Om nom nom

"Time for bed!"

Tanya Burr Nails | Review

Hello my lovelies!

Package had just arrived!

If you haven't already heard, Tanya Burr has created and released her own make-up line of lip glosses and nail varnishes. I've been so excited for the release since she first announced it many months ago and as soon as the release on Feel Unique was announced I bought 3 products straight away, 2 nail varnishes and 1 lip gloss. (I will be reviewing the lip gloss I purchased in another post) Unfortunately my order was delayed and in the end took 13 days to arrive but I don't really mind because I have them now!

Love the packaging

Before I get into the review I would just like to give my congratulations to the amazing Tanya Burr. Releasing your own make-up line is a truly great achievement and I am so proud of her for everything! The products have turned out brilliant and I'm sure it's a dream come true for her. Well done Tanya! If you don't know who Tanya is, here are the links to her blog and her YouTube channel.

All three products

Nail Varnishes
All the nail varnishes in the collection are £5.99 and every single colour is gorgeous! It was so difficult not to put all of them in my basket, but in the end I chose these two beautiful colours, Mini Marshmallows and Little Duck:

Mini Marshmallow

Little Duck

I bought these two particular colours because ever since I started wearing nail varnish I've loved painting my nails in pastel shades. They always seem to compliment with my skin tone and always look amazing on my nails. Pastel shades are also quite subtle but yet stand out too which I love!

As both Little Duck and Mini Marshmallow are gorgeous pastel shades I couldn't not buy them!

Such gorgeous colours!

The first thing I noticed about these products is that they have Tanya's signature heart on their lids, which I think is a super cute touch! But unfortunately my Mini Marshmallow has a design flaw and so doesn't have the heart on the lid, although I don't really mind because it doesn't take away from the amazing quality of the product.

I'm actually very surprised about how high the quality of these nail varnishes are. I applied both colours to my nails on Wednesday and still there has not been a single chip. And that is not because I haven't been doing anything, I even went swimming for 2 hours on Saturday and still no chips!

Little Duck is amazing, it goes opaque with one coat and completely covers your nails! It has a beautiful pigmentation which I love and overall is a top notch product! Even though they are both gorgeous colours I think that Little Duck is my favourite!

Mini Marshmallow also has a beautiful pigmentation but to experience it in it's full glory you need to apply about 3 coats, this is as it is a very light colour compared to little duck. Mini marshmallow is also very 'liquidy'. So 'liquidy' that it becomes annoying to apply. It drips absolutely everywhere and so you have to make sure that you only have a tiny amount on the brush. 

I would definitely recommend both of these nail varnishes to everyone reading. And don't be put off by the long delivery because it's definitely worth the wait! If you would like to purchase any of the Tanya Burr Nail Varnishes just click here to go to the Feel Unique website.

Valentine's Cupcakes | Tutorial

Hello my lovelies!

Seeing as my first baking post did so well I thought that I would try my hand at making Valentine's cupcakes! If you're interested in making Valentine's cookies just click here

Ingredients

6 Cupcakes:

2 eggs (room temp) , 4 oz margarine, 1 tsp baking powder, 4 oz self
raising flour and 4 oz granulated sugar

Icing:

4 oz Icing sugar, 2 oz softened margarine, 1/4 tsp vanilla extract

Method

To make heart shaped Cupcakes I made cake moulds, I did this using tin foil and a heart shaped cookie cutter. You need to put the cutter in the middle of the foil and shape the foil around it, like so:

Next you need to put a cupcake case inside the foil mould and then place them inside a round cake tin with the pointed ends in the middle. (this is so when baking the pressure of the rising cakes will not cause the mould to misshape)

Preheat your oven to: 180°C electric
                                160°C fan
                                Gas mark 4

Now it's time for making the cupcake mixture. Weigh out all of the ingredients (listed above) and then put them into a bowl. Mix thoroughly until the mixture is smooth. Now you need to carefully spoon it into the cupcake cases, using approximately a generous tablespoon of mixture.

Place the tin in the centre of the oven and bake for approx. 18 minutes, until the cakes have risen and are golden brown. To test if the cakes are baked pierce with a skewer and if it comes out clean i.e.. with no cake mixture on it, the cakes are cooked. Take the cupcakes out of the oven and leave them to cool.

Freshly baked cupcake!

After taking out the cupcakes and leaving them to cool, make the icing. As butter icing has only 3 ingredients, this bit's easy! Sieve the icing sugar into a bowl and add the margarine and vanilla extract. Beat the ingredients together until light and fluffy.

Cooled and ready to decorate!

Now, it's time for the icing. Put your butter icing into a piping bag and squeeze!

From here you can decorate however you please. But if you're looking for some inspiration, here are mine, along with the toppings I used:

Caramel Curls and Heart sweets (Morrisons)

Fresh Strawberries and Chocolate Sprinkles

Chocolate hearts and Chocolate (Lidl)

For this last design I used melted chocolate to draw with. To do this you need to melt chocolate in a microwavable food bag placed in hot water. Keep the bag in the hot water until you can feel no lumps. Dry the outside of the bag off and cut a small hole in the corner of the bag with scissors.

Chocolate Hearts!

Cutting a hole in the side of the bag

Finished cupcakes! Yum!

Looking tasty!

Cupcake 1

Cupcake 2

Cupcake 3

Cupcake 4

I hope I brought you a sprinkle of joy

Love

Claire

x

Valentine's Themed Cookies | Tutorial

Hello my lovelies!

Valentine's day is only a few days away and so I thought I'd make a valentine's themed post!

 This won't be my usual beauty or make-up related tutorial because I wanted to try something a little bit different, but I hope you'll enjoy it nonetheless! And it doesn't matter if you're in a relationship or single this Valentine's because anyone can bake and decorate cookies. Yum!

Ingredients:
100g Butter or Margarine
50g Sugar
A few drops of Vanilla extract
175g Plain Flour

Method:
1. Preheat your oven to 150°c (Gas mark 2)
2. Mix butter and sugar together in a bowl (until light and fluffy)
3. Add the few drops of Vanilla Extract and mix
4. Add  flour and mix well.
5. Knead the mixture until it becomes dough like and smooth
6. Using a rolling pin roll the dough out to approximately 5mm, to prevent the dough sticking lightly flour the surface before hand
7. Cut the dough into your desired shapes, lighting flour the cutter so dough doesn't stick (eg. Hearts)
8. Bake for 25 minutes or until golden brown
9. Leave to cool for approx. 20 minutes
10. Have some fun decorating!

My Valentine's themed cookies

I went for heart shaped cookies as I thought that they would turn out cutest:

Cookies cooling on a cooling rack

I left my cookies to cool for about 30 minutes because I didn't want to risk them still being hot and melting my icing and decorations! I would say about 15-20 minutes would have been long enough but I wanted to be 100% sure that they were completely cool.

Close up of a freshly baked Heart Cookie, yum!

Once I had made sure all my cookies were cool I put them all onto a tray ready for me to decorate, that's the really fun bit!

Lets get decorating!

I first outlined the cookies with a red icing gel pen. This was for aesthetics but also to keep the pink icing I used next from dripping off the sides of the cookie.

Don't you just want to eat them already?

It's really difficult to use icing pens when they're new and I'm also not a professional so that's why my outline is a bit messy in places. But it's the having fun that counts when you're decorating!

Om nom nom!

 I was lazy for this next bit and bought some ready made pink icing, all you had to do was mix it and add water, you can tell me off if you want.

Icing's on!

To get an even spread of icing all over the cookies I used the back of a tea spoon dipped in hot water.  You can use this technique with glacé icing or butter icing.

They're starting to look good!

Next I put a few pieces of milk chocolate into a strong food bag and put the bag into a cup of hot water. I then left the chocolate there to melt for 10 minutes. (Ensure that the food bags you use are suitable for reheating/cooking in a microwave)

After the 10 minutes I took the bag out of the water, dried it off and then cut a tiny hole in the corner of the bag. By doing this I was able to use the bag as a piping bag. Using the bag I squeezed the melted chocolate onto the cookies and spread it evenly with a knife.

(Remember do not use the spoon dipped in hot water for this because water ruins chocolate!)

Looking tasty!

I left the icing and chocolate to harden over night so that the next morning I could fully decorate the cookies. I used a variety of different toppings from sprinkles and chocolate gratings to white pearls and sweets.

Here are my finished cookies!

My personal favourite cookie is this one, I don't know why though, I just really like it:

I hope you enjoyed this post because I certainly enjoyed making it! ... And I enjoyed eating the cookies too xD

If you make some Valentine's cookies tag me or send me a picture of them on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram, I'd love to see what you do!

*I hope I brought you a sprinkle of joy*

Love

Claire

x