More Christmas gifts :)

I met up with my friends Dennis and Helen earlier in the week to finally exchange Christmas gifts - and aren't they fab! As well as an array of lovely Hello Kitty stuff, I got the GIANT Big Top silicone cupcake mould from Dennis, and the cupcake a day calender :) He also got me a bag from Original Cupcakes in Vancouver, which he'd visited since I last saw him in October - check out their website here.

The gorgeous door-mat is from Helen - as you can see I'm not the only one that fell in love with it - Demon rushed from sleeping the sofa as soon as I put it on the kitchen floor. You can see more pics of Demon here, if you so wish.

Finally, my lovely friend from Chicago, Renee, sent me a package filled with awesome stuff, including Hellbent for Cooking and more Hello Kitty stuff, and she also made me some super-cute little Christmas decorations, one of which you can see in the picture of the cupcake calendar. If you look closely you'll see the cork is from a bottle of wine from Cupcake Vineyards! I've wanted to try the wine for some time,but can never find it here. I've emailed Renee for some feedback on it!

I am lucky to have such awesome friends :)

Lakeland's gone cupcake crazy

I was very excited to see Lakeland's window display when I arrived in Bromley today - and there were even MORE cupcakes inside. They have changed some of their packaging to include cupcakes - isn't it cute! Sorry for the quality of the pics - I was trying to be discreet! They also have the HUGE cupcake pan for sale - every time I see it I resist buying it, but I think I'm going to have to get it at some point - if only to hang it up in my kitchen as decoration! They also had some tea-towels, but they were over a fiver and only one of them had a cupcake on so I resisted (I know I'm getting better at resisting stuff...unfortunately not cupcakes themselves as my expanding girth shows!)

I did buy some little cupcake cases  - football ones to make some football cupcakes for my friends 40th this weekend and some Halloween ones, which it turns out I already have..ooops! What I really want is those stickers from the window - wonder if I could ring them and ask them for them! They'd look FAB in my house!

Jelly Pong Pong cupcake cuteness

From Jelly Pong Pong -aren't these cupcake bath fizzers ultra cute? If you're in Covent Garden early on Saturday you so get them as part of JPP's birthday celebrations in a gift bag for a tenner with over £40 worth of other stuff...bargain! I'm in Germany this weekend or I'd be there for sure to pick up a gift bag. Think I'll have to pop along and get some of these kumquat and pomegranate fizzers asap though.

Pop these scrumptious fairy cakes into your bath & watch as they explode into a ball of effervescent fizz & froth, softening the water & coating your skin in moisturizing palm oil. The cake base actively sizzles away, releasing invigorating skin conditioners & scents, while crushing the meringue top creates a light bath froth.
Comes in a pair.

The added palm oil acts as a mild skin conditioner, softening skin while you bathe

Gesundheit!!!

If you've got the sniffles what better way to cheer yourself up as blow your nose so often you look like Rudolph than the cupcake tissue holder!

I've looked for a UK supplier but not luck, so if you want it you'll have to order it from Perpetual Kid in the US. Good news, if you do order it means you can get cupcake floss and cupcake bandages (plasters) as well! I've found the cupcake plasters in the UK but for about £9 which is just extortionate!

Comfy as a cupcake

Pink, pretty and flowery - what more can a girl want? This really cute cushion is from the London Cushion Co and comes in pink and white.

V.cute :)

Cupcakes sell houses

Roger Bailey became so fed up with his agents – over the 18-month period he was on the market, he tried two national estate agencies and two local ones – that he decided to take matters into his own hands and sell his £450,000 Berkshire home himself. Having already written the details and provided photographs for one of the agents – "we had to write the description because theirs was wrong and the photos we had were just better" – he produced his own sales brochure and went to distribute them at his local supermarket. His secret weapon? Cupcakes.

"We baked a tray of cupcakes and put picture transfers of the house on top," he says. "In my professional life I had sold million-dollar equipment at conferences but it was still so embarrassing standing there in the foyer of Costco trying to interest shoppers. But, you know, people said it was a brilliant idea."

Operation Cupcake was a strategy dreamed up for the brutally titled Axe the Agent? – the question-mark, by the way, is almost entirely dispensable – a whole recession-era series dedicated to bringing out your inner estate agent. And Roger is the programme's equivalent of a Blind Date wedding for, incredibly, he has now sold his house. By the time you read this, he and his wife Treva should have exchanged on their large family home near Reading, saving themselves several thousand pounds in commission and many more gloomy months in limbo.

From the Telegraph

Some recent cupcake purchases

Whilst hitting the shops to do some Christmas shopping I have managed to treat myself to a few cupcake items along the way!!

The gorgeous cupcake calender was bought at Paperchase, the air freshener (I got strawberry but you can order other scents direct from their website) by Naughty But Nice from Cards Galore and the teapot from Debenhams (if you hurry its still got 20% off!)

My house is becoming over-run with cupcakes - thankfully Manny is very understanding and encourages my cupcake love :)

Cupcake dreams come true..

for your pets on this v.cute cupcake bed, which I came across in my latest Freemans catalogue. It can be bought for £60 here. I'm not sure if I should buy it for Angel and Demon - I've bought them so many beds and still they sleep on my old handbag or on top of the shelving unit!