How to deal: a one part series about my dog-child not speaking to me

I have a problem. You see, I haven't been home for a while, with the whole getting married thing and then honeymooning thing and the still reeling thing from being married to the most amazing person on earth (yes, I am allowed to gush, I am a newlywed) and also still reeling from the thousands of kilometres we did cross-country. I cannot wait to share my views of beautiful South Africa with you.

But look, right now I am reeling and tomorrow will officially be my first Saturday at our house in over a month. This means that you will find me probably on the couch with Mila. Besides for the hour or two we will be showing our garden cottage to potential tenants. (Something that honestly scares me, because I don't know any of these people and what they are capable of. What if one of them is just using the excuse of looking at the flat to gain access to our house, and they will tie us up and clean it out? And I don't mean clean it out as in making it look neat. This is a genuine thing in South Africa, skelms are clever.)

Back to Mila. New here, and don't know who I am talking about? Well, she is my dog-child, along with her brother Jethro.

You can read more about them here:

All posts about Mila

All posts about Jethro

But here are some pics so you know what they look like. As you can see, they are quite spoiled. And this might be the contributing factor as to why Mila is not speaking to me.

For the time I was away, I had to let them stay with my parents, who spoiled them just as much as I do, letting them sleep inside with them all day. But Mila must think that I have abandoned her, because when my dad dropped them off the other morning, she was sullen. She didn't want to look at m, she wasn't excited to see me -even though she was crazy excited to see Flip. She doesn't want to play all the games she and I used to play - like her trying to kill my hairdryer when I'm blowdrying my hair, or the hide-and-seek game we play in the corridor of the house. She ignores me when I call her and no matter how many beenos and treats I give her, she doesn't even want to wag her tail.

I'm reckoning she needs some defrosting and that's exactly what I intend to do tomorrow. I will just sit with her and chat with her until she starts responding. Have you ever had a situation like this? What do you think I should do?

I just want to see her smile again. 

Consumed

I am consumed with wedding stuff at the moment and don't have much to post about. 

See you on the flip side. 

Maybe.

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Pic by Kikitography
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Getting baked with Tracy: peppermint crisp cupcakes!

So as you know by know, last weekend was my kitchen tea and bachelorettes {or hen party} and for the tea, which was held at Die Werf, my bridesmaid, Tracy baked the most delicious peppermint crisp cupakes. Oh my goodness, I had to stop myself from eating more than one - but also had to cajole myself to eat at least one - guilty conscience and all, you know! 

Tracy, the amazing person that she is, remembered that peppermint crisp tart is one of my vices, my favourite pudding and ultimate self-reward, so used this as her prompt for the flavour of the cupcakes. Guys, believe me when I say that it was beyond delicious! 

In fact, it was so tasty that almost everyone asked me for the recipe, so I decided to share it here today.

Light Fairy Cupcakes

       {roughly makes 12}

       Batter

       (500 ml) 250 ml cake flour

       (2 ml) 1 ml salt

       (12.5 ml) 7 ml baking powder

       (150 g) 75 g soft baking margarine or butter (salted butter is fine)

       (200 ml) 100 ml sugar

       (2) 1 large egg

       (+/- 50 ml) +/- 25 ml milk

       (2 ml) 1 ml caramel essence

       {the measurements in brackets are if you would like to double the recipe}

        Icing
        450 g icing sugar

        250 g soft baking margarine

        2 ml vanilla essence

        2 ml almond essence

For the cupcake batter: Preheat oven to 220̊C. Sieve flour, salt and baking powder into a medium bowl. Soften margarine/butter with a wooden spoon in a large mixing bowl. Add sugar to margarine/butter one teaspoonful at a time, beating well after each addition using an electric beater. The mixture should be light and crumb-like.  Beat the egg lightly with a fork. Add it to the mixture using the  same method when incorporating the sugar. The mixture should be creamy and a lighter shade.  

 Fold in half of the dry ingredients and a little milk. Be gentle. Do not mix in the dry ingredients as this will remove the air that you have worked into the mixture.  Fold in the rest of the dry and ingredients and milk. Add vanilla essence. The mixture must be a soft, dropping consistency. If it seems too dry,  add a drop of milk. Fill the paper cups with a about a dessertspoonful of the mixture. Bake at once for 10 to 15 minutes. 

Cool on a wire rack and decorate as desired.

Now for the stuff that made it so good! Tracy explains that she cored out the middle of the cupcake and proceeded to add whipped caramel treat in the hole. It was such a delicious surprise!

For the icing, Tracy used: 250 g margerine; 500 g icing sugar; 5 ml mint essence; 15 ml water and colouring of course. She then mixed it up, spread it and topped it off with broken peppermint crisp chocolate bars. 

Bon appetit!

Light Fairy Cupcakes

       {roughly makes 12}

       Batter

       (500 ml) 250 ml cake flour

       (2 ml) 1 ml salt

       (12.5 ml) 7 ml baking powder

       (150 g) 75 g soft baking margarine or butter (salted butter is fine)

       (200 ml) 100 ml sugar

       (2) 1 large egg

       (+/- 50 ml) +/- 25 ml milk

       (2 ml) 1 ml vanilla essence

       {the measurements in brackets are if you would like to double the recipe}

        Icing
        450 g icing sugar

        250 g soft baking margarine

        2 ml vanilla essence

        2 ml almond essence

- See more at: http://waitingformeg.blogspot.com/2012/09/getting-baked-with-tracy-fairy-cupcakes.html#sthash.jcSbrQxP.dpuf

Light Fairy Cupcakes

       {roughly makes 12}

       Batter

       (500 ml) 250 ml cake flour

       (2 ml) 1 ml salt

       (12.5 ml) 7 ml baking powder

       (150 g) 75 g soft baking margarine or butter (salted butter is fine)

       (200 ml) 100 ml sugar

       (2) 1 large egg

       (+/- 50 ml) +/- 25 ml milk

       (2 ml) 1 ml vanilla essence

       {the measurements in brackets are if you would like to double the recipe}

        Icing
        450 g icing sugar

        250 g soft baking margarine

        2 ml vanilla essence

        2 ml almond essence

- See more at: http://waitingformeg.blogspot.com/2012/09/getting-baked-with-tracy-fairy-cupcakes.html#sthash.jcSbrQxP.dpuf

Light Fairy Cupcakes

       {roughly makes 12}

       Batter

       (500 ml) 250 ml cake flour

       (2 ml) 1 ml salt

       (12.5 ml) 7 ml baking powder

       (150 g) 75 g soft baking margarine or butter (salted butter is fine)

       (200 ml) 100 ml sugar

       (2) 1 large egg

       (+/- 50 ml) +/- 25 ml milk

       (2 ml) 1 ml vanilla essence

       {the measurements in brackets are if you would like to double the recipe}

        Icing
        450 g icing sugar

        250 g soft baking margarine

        2 ml vanilla essence

        2 ml almond essence

- See more at: http://waitingformeg.blogspot.com/2012/09/getting-baked-with-tracy-fairy-cupcakes.html#sthash.jcSbrQxP.dpuf

{My Kitchen Tea} The invites

Can I tell you something funny? I was invited to my own kitchen tea and bachelorettes! And I love it. I think my friend's would have liked to keep it a surprise until the day itself, but I would have driven them crazy with questions and would have gone mad. So, to make it very special, they gave me a super special invite!

The sweet box was filled with all kinds of treats, including nougat!! which is an all time favourite of mine, and my favourite flavour of tea - chai. It also had the goodies I would need on the day, my sash, a mask, my entry ticket ;) Unfortunately, I was sick as a horse when they brought the goodies to my house and thus, there are no pictures of me in this post. Narcissism much?

The set also had a sweet little vintage teacup and saucer in it, and I just had to use it immediately. How cute are my bridesmaids? 

I chose them well!