Hi guys and welcome back to the #weekendblogshare.  You may have noticed that there was no weekend blog share last week. Hmm. Sorry about that. The reason why? My son’s 5th birthday and party.  My gorgeous Bear turned 5 years old on Thursday January 12th and you can imagine the build up to that! On Wednesday night I scrambled his gifts and wrapped them and collected them on the sofa with balloons and gifts from my parents and sister and husband and our so very generous neighbours. I had just the day before, begun my giant bake off – an epic 3 tier cake in DC/Marvel style.

 

   

 

In the end, the cake took 3 layers of chocolate fudge cake on the bottom tier, a two layer Victoria sponge for the middle, and a 3 layer, dairy free, coconut and dark chocolate ganache tier on the top for a couple of his friends who are, you’ve guessed, it, dairy free. All was good. I began the icon process, one by one and as you’d imagine, the top tier was last. I made the ganache and put it in the fridge to cool. I completely forgot about it, when in the middle of my sugar paste nightmare, and when I came to whip it up to use, it was too hard. Of course it was. It needed time to warm up and then it would be easier to spread.  I didn’t have this time. So what did I do? I added a dash of coconut milk. Well, my hand slipped and I added enough to drown a mouse a splash, followed by some icing sugar to rectify my mistake, and in the end, had a delicious, smooth, but maybe a little too wet, dairy free icing. On I went and then this happened:  

 

Sorry that I’ve totally been MIA for the last few days- this cake has been the bane of my life. Why do I do this, year after year? It’s a 3 layer chocolate fudge and ganache batman cake with cape and logo. Then a 2 later Victoria sponge with tiptree raspberry jam (the best) Superman layer with cape and finally a 3 layer dairy free chocolate fudge cake with coconut milk and dark chocolate ganache. All iced with sugar paste (I’m getting better but still hate the stuff ) and handmade superhero symbols. So this was Friday night. We woke up Saturday morning to the last bit of prep (sandwich making etc) and found that the red top layer had melted and bled all over the lower two layers and ruined the symbols etc I had accidentally torn a hole in the icing and so patched it with another piece, stuck on with teeniest drop of water. That, combined with the sticky coconut milk ganache meant ruined sugar paste. So instead of an easy morning, I had to re ice the top to layers, re make the symbols and make sandwiches and organise the rest of the food and party bags etc. I cannot thank my Mum and sister enough for saving the day. Thankfully the swimming party was brilliant and Bear should hopefully have some great memories. We hope that you’re all well xxx

A photo posted by H a n n a h (@_hannahspannah_) on Jan 15, 2017 at 12:32pm PST

 

As you can read, I thought the tiny finger tip of water that I used was the problem but when the same happened after the party, I realised that it was down to the ganache. Ah well, you live and you learn and my boy had a wonderful swimming party and tea afterwards with about 20 of his friends. However, this is the reason why there was no blog share. I was up to my elbows in chocolate, icing sugar and cream. So since I last ‘saw’ you guys, I have written:

 

My Living Arrows Week 2 shows my son is his first ever Cyclocross race at 4 years old. 

Yes, I am very, very proud.

 

 

Mt 3rd Living Arrow’s picture is pretty self explanatory if you’ve read the above description of last week. 

I look a combination of relieved, exhausted and melancholy in the background!

   

and finally, if your children like watching unboxing videos and / or Num Noms, then this next one is for them!

 

 

 

I can’t wait to see what you’ve been up to. I’m reading my way through the last link ups now.   On to the blog share:

 

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