Jikana Damaru

Halloween candy jars

Skull Marshmallows

Licorice Allsorts

Blackberry Domes

Jelly Skulls

Pink Glass Candy Jar, Poison Label.

Having admired Amy Atlas candy tables for a while now, I really wanted to create one for Halloween. The top image is of my experiments with what it could look like.

I did a post back in July called Candy Jars. I used the same candy jars this time, but changed the ribbons to match my colour theme. I also strung "Happy Halloween" alphabet beads onto pink elastic and tied them around the middle of the jars.

Don't forget the Halloween party tomorrow!

Have a sweet day!

Sunshine

It has finally stopped raining (shhh... I know I'm not supposed to say that living in Melbourne) and the sun has come out for the afternoon, its meant to be a lovely weekend here too.

So here are some of my favourite pics to inspire the creativity in you all, over the weekend. Happy Friday!

Susannah Tucker Photography

Skull candy

Skull lollipop mould

Lollipop wrapping kit

Skull chocolate moulds. To get the different colours, I used white chocolate, white chocolate with natural pink food colouring, and dark chocolate.

To get the shiny, flawless appearance of chocolate you must temper it, otherwise you can be left with dull chocolate that has white streaks running through it. It also makes for better melt-in-the-mouth chocolate.

How to temper chocolate

Finely chop 750-1000g (1 1/2 to 2 pounds) of chocolate; with any less than this it is difficult to control the temperature.
Place two thirds of the chocolate in a metal bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. Place a candy thermometer in the chocolate and stir frequently with a rubber spatula. Do not let the temperature exceed 105 deg F for white and 120 deg F for dark chocolate.
When the chocolate is fully melted remove from the heat and add the remainder of the chocolate gradually whilst continuing to stir.
Let the chocolate cool to 82 deg F, then return to the heat until it reaches 86 deg F for white chocolate and 90 deg F for dark.
Remove from heat and carefully pour into moulds. For the lollipops, add sticks when you have half filled the mould, then fill to the top.

Easy alternative

Finely chop 750g-1000g (1 1/2 to 2 pounds) of chocolate, and place in a microwaveable bowl.
Microwave on 50% power in 10 second increments, stirring after each interval till chocolate is almost melted.
Remove from microwave and stir till chocolate is fully melted.

Packaging for skull cones

You will need:
Cone wrapper
Double sided tape
Cellophane
10mm Ribbon

Print cone wrapper (choose a "cone wrapper" below which you can save and print).
Cut around cone wrapper and along lines to give 3 wrappers.
Roll one of the wrappers into a cone shape and, using double sided tape, fix in shape.
Place a second piece of tape inside the cone along one side and peel off backing.
Cut out cellophane (use the "cellophane pattern" below as a stencil to cut out your cellophane). Note each straight line is 24cm long).
Roll cellophane into a cone shape and place inside cone wrapper. Press against the tape to fix in place.
Fill with candy.
Tie ribbon around the top.

Packaging for Poison Candy Bags

You will need:
Shocking Pink Candy Stripe bags
Double sided tape
Poison labels
Masking tape

Print the "Poison" label below.
Using double sided tape stick the label to the front of a bag
Fill with candy
Fold the top over towards the back and masking tape in place.

If you don't have time to make your own skull candy my new affiliate, A Quarter Of... has some great ready-made skull candy that can be packaged as above.

Skull crushers from A Quarter Of...

Psycho skulls from A Quarter Of...

Check back tomorrow for my Halloween candy table ideas!

Have a sweet day!

~ International Baby Loss Day ~

Today is International Baby Loss Day - a day particularly close to my heart after the loss of our precious Laura 6 and a half years ago. I would love you all to watch this wonderful presentation we put together earlier this year for our annual ball and remember all our precious angels in heaven.

In addition to raising funds for stillbirth research, the Stillbirth Foundation Australia also aims to increase public awareness about stillbirth. We have recently created this video which beautifully demonstrates the reality of stillbirth whilst highlighting the need for further funding and are thrilled to be able to now share this with you.

The Stillbirth Foundation Australia would like to thank all of the families and photographers that have kindly shared their photos with us in order to make this possible, as well as Emily Bird for helping us to create this wonderful video.

One Lovely Blog

Thanks so much to Virginia from Mum Toddler Babe for awarding me a 'One Lovely Blog' award! So sweet of you... now, I just need to reciprocate by awarding other blogs I have recently discovered. hmmm so many amazing blogs, might have to give me a few days on this one.... xo

Glitter Skulls

I bought the glitter skull candle holder from TK Maxx for £4.99 about a month ago. I love it! It was the inspiration for my glitter skulls.

Plastic bones before glittering by Torie Jayne

I bought two "Bag of Bones" from Pound Land. Each bag contained six plastic mini skulls and six bones, and cost £1 for the bag! I painted them in PVA glue and then covered them in silver glitter. I used a spoon to spoon up the excess glitter and re-cover the skulls and bones. A 50g glitter shaker covered all the 12 bones, 12 mini skulls and 2 larger skulls. On the smaller skull I put pink beads for the eyes to give them more definition. I love how they turned out!

Plastic skull before glittering by Torie Jayne

Plastic skull during glittering by Torie Jayne

So, when I saw these plastic skulls in Asda for a £1 I had to buy them and glitter them too!

Have a sweet day!

Lost in Translation

Ok, so almost all of us have typed our own name into Google at least once, whether we would admit to it or not, right? I take a macabre sort of pleasure in knowing there are 278,000 articles with my name in them, even though I know around 277,997 of them don't relate to me personally at all.

Today, I went one step further and typed my blog details in, just to see what came up. I discovered a strange reference to a site I didn't recognise. Intrigued, I probed further and discovered the following website, written in a language I think (though I am far from multilingual and can only guess) is German: www.kinderraeume-kreativ.de.

I then discovered a very fun interpreting website, which translates one language into another. It turns out that this...

ein schönes babyzimmer, das auf den ersten blick ungeplant aussieht und scheinbar keinen gestaltungsgrundsatz folgt. trotzdem entwickelt es einen ungeheuren charme und strahlt unglaublich viel wärme und geborgenheit aus.

translates to this...

a beautiful baby room, which looks at first glance unplanned and apparently follow no principle of design. Nevertheless, it develops a tremendous charm and exudes an incredible amount of warmth and comfort from.

The site then links back to the pics of Fern's nursery on my blog! I don't know whether to be flattered that Fern's nursery has found its way onto a German children's design website... or slightly perturbed that the room is "unplanned and apparently follow no principle of design." I think I'll go with the former.

Regardless, there are some really sweet nursery pics on the site that require no language skills to appreciate. Here are a couple of my faves:

Hallo Deutschland!