Silly Season has arrived !!!

                                      Here is my 6 year old tree with poundland and asda decorations .

Well its finally here and im so glad we have decided not to go completly loopy and try and spend every available penny and to hell with the concequeces ( sadly I have done this in the past ) .
The tree is up the presents ( carefully chosen by the kids within a budget and even more carefully sourced by me for the best possible deals ) are wrapped and we need to go food shopping within a budget of £100 .

We have had a busy week or so ( I keep meaning to post as its very theraputic but have been very tired ) I have done lots of cleaning and ironing the kids "helped" to decorate the tree last week when they were off school due to the strike so I feel quite prepared for xmas this year , I have started on some home made pressies I am having a practice with a pair of wristwarmers for myself it took 1hour20mins last night to do one start to finish so can quickly knock these up for mum & sis with a nice matching scarf ( the wool incidently is some I have had years bought for 75p a ball so very cheap pressies ) .

http://www.allaboutyou.com/craft/pattern-finder/knitting-patterns/knits-for-women/knit-winter-mittens-free-knitting-pattern-57322

                                                 

Another thing I have started to do ( well been doing for over a year now ) is cook a little bit extra and make some home made ready meals .

Just one example a bit of leftover lasagne which hubby will warm up one night when he gets in late after college , I also love my slow cooker its such an easy way to cook good hearty meals just chuck in a load of meat and veggies leave while you work or just get on with your day and hey presto a meal for practically no effort .

A lovely lady called Sally who I caht to on netmums has just told me how to make butter so I will be having a go at that its seems a bit too easy but I will let you know how I get on with that one .

Yesterdays frugal bake was 2 " brownie cakes" its an adapted recipe from when I havent had the right ingredients but now I use it all the time .

Pre-heat oven to 180oc

Grease and line 2 , 8" cake tins

Ing -   200g marg
          100g milk chocolate ( value will do )
          200g sugar
          4 eggs
          1tsp vanilla extarct ( optional )
          180g S R Flour
          40g cocoa
          good pinch of salt  

1 - In a bowl melt marg and chocolate in microwave mix together .
2 - Stir in sugar , eggs and vanilla .
3 - Add flour , cocoa and salt .
4 - Mix well and divide between tins .
5 - Bake for 25-30 mins ( depending on oven ) the cakes should be still slightly soft in the centre .
6 - Cool on a rack then slice .

I have also added 50g of either white choc , crushed smarties , nuts or raisins .

                                           Heres the finished product they never last very long !

I have estimated that the 2 cakes cost roughly £2.20 to make and I get 16 good sized slices so less than 14p a slice .