Cordially Invited : Book Review

I have had this book for a while but I’m only just getting round to really looking into each section of the book! I love hosting/entertaining books. I also want to write my own (one day)

So firstly my copy is signed!

What I like about the book is how asthetically pleasing some of the patterns are that have been used across different themes. What I have done because it’s a big book with lots of different sections I’ve picked my favourite bits and then looked at our traditions! So here goes:

The Perfect Brunch

So I’ve used this recipe a few times and it’s definitely a nice treat to do on a Sunday.

Here are a few different versions of our brunch. I made my own balsamic glazes for them. I did boiled eggs and tortilla. I like both versions!

I definitely recommend trying this one!

American Pancakes

Firstly I have tried her pancakes recipe a few times! I do like to do pancakes for special occasions like birthdays! I’ve tried a few different combination:

A strawberries, cream and a drizzle of honey. We also did a cute Christmassy one with toasted marshmallows and Biscoff biscuits crumbled over! It was delicious! I love my gingerbread teapot from Asda George. (see my tea-tabacle blog post) !

Summer

Summer Garden Party

So yesterday was actually the first garden party I’ve actually attended and they had this Bell tent there! It’s on my list to get! I can’t wait to move and put one one of these up!

It was a lovely afternoon and evening with a BBQ and a campfire. We brought some salads and I made bonfire cones (definitely doing them a for us!)

And Phoebe enjoying her Bonfire cone!

I absolutely love this idea of the Summer party and I hope when we move we can definitely do more of this type of thing but maybe on a smaller scale! I do try to decorate each season and do little gatherings!

My specialist summer dish is my Paella dish in my huge pan! At our Seafood Festival they have massive ones!

My version and I like to vary this one too!

I love lemons in the kitchen to brighten it up and they smell amazing! It’s reminds me of our Italian holiday! I love the Mediterranean style of the blue and white and the beautiful ceramic tiles!

Autumn

Autumn is so much fun! I love it so much!

Pumpkin patches, cauldrons, pumpkin carving and pumpkin spiced lattes are some of favourites of the season!

I wasn't a massive Halloween fan before but a daughter who loves Halloween after discovering Steve and Maggie, we can’t get away from it! I do enjoy the pumpkin patch and the pumpkin spiced lattes now a days!

I also enjoy decorating now! I never used to decorate for Autumn/Fall but now it seems to be the done thing!

So I did a Harry Potter themed Halloween last year! My hubby thought our wanted posters were hilarious!

These were in our kitchen! Need I saw more! We had fun with these up!

So here Zoe has got a lot of decorations and created a spooky vide! I made a felt Autumn wreath a few years ago but I want to make a bigger one for the new house.

For the first time I bought orange candles and I lit my BIG Christmas Eve Yankee candle because I love it.

I made some Platform 9 3/4 tickets for our family Halloween night. I made the theme Prisoner of Azkaban. Follow the spiders...... (my decorations are toddler friendly-ish (you can see they've already played with the pompom!

I loved cooking a delicious dinner for us. I cooked heritage carrots to make it it look more spooky!

My Wintery Cottage pie is one of my favourite Autum/Winter dishes to make! I love make my mash toppin really really really cheesy. I love making mine really rich in flavour and I use a lot of different ingredient to create my delicious pie. I use Lea & Perrings and sneaky bit of marmite just to give it that richness! I also made my own ”humble crumble“

I made this cute pie with puff pastry! I used cute little cutters to add decoration to my pie! I think I can use some more elaborate cutters next time! A giant snowflake or a Minnie Mouse cutter! I’ve actually made a really lovely Christmas pie and I made a delicious venison pie too for Christmas Eve one year!

Friends visiting Cheese Board

A Christmas Cheese Paella Dish

So I love cheese and I’ve seen loads of cheese boards on Pinterest, I was inspired by our:

Wedding Cheese Board

Christmas Decorations & Hosting

Zoe has the same stockings as us but the grey versions! I love this big arch like this large fire place which leads to a cosy nook!

I have two trees!

Our table was set to be toddler friendly!

I have a silver and white tree which goes with my hand made plate I painted.

I then have my main tree which is my Candy Cane/sweety themed tree with all my handmade decorations.

Like Zoe I love dressing up for Christmas, I particularly like matching now With Phoebe particularly!

Our buffalo checked dresses and shirts!

Our Nutcracker dresses!

Our Fa la la la jumpers.

Us wearing our Nutcracker dresses pointing out my donors wings decoration!

I enjoyed flicking through this book and picking up some fun ideas! Although I wouldn’t do all the things in the book I do my own little things too like celebrating my kidneys anniversary!