Vlogmas day one - How to make a Christmas Cake

I've set myself a challenge this year and that is to take part in Vlogmas.

Vlogmas in a YouTube event that sees vloggers upload a video everyday in December. Some people do all of December, other do up to Christmas Day. I'm not sure what I will be doing yet, I'll see how it goes.

Our first vlogmas video is how to make a Christmas cake.

This year we are using Mary Berry's recipe. We love Mary Berry, but the problem is, I don't do any cooking, EVER!

My husband Mark likes to do all the cooking at home. But I have made a Christmas cake in the past using a Be-Ro recipe, so I thought I would give this one a go.

Here is our video of me and my son Jacob making the Christmas cake. We hope you enjoy it.

It would be great if you could subscribe to our channel.

Recipe below.

Ingredients

175g (6 oz) raisins
350g (12 oz) glace cherries, rinsed, thoroughly dried and quartered
500g (1lb 2oz) currants
350g (12oz) sultanas
150ml (¼ pint) sherry, plus extra for feeding
Finely grated zest of 2 oranges
250g (9oz) butter, softened
250g (9oz) light muscovado sugar
4 eggs
1 tbsp black treacle
75g (3oz) blanched almonds, chopped
75g (3oz) self-raising flour
175g (6oz) plain flour
1½ tsp mixed spice

To finish and decorate Mary Berry's Christmas cake:
About 3tbsp apricot jam, sieved and warmed
Icing sugar
675g shop-bought almond paste
Packet royal icing mix to cover 23cm/9in cake

Method

1. Put all the dried fruit in a container, pour over the sherry and stir in the orange zest. Cover with a lid, and leave to soak for 3 days, stirring daily. Grease and line a 23cm (9in) deep round tin with a double layer of greased greaseproof paper. Preheat the oven to 140C, 120C fan, gas 1.

2. Measure the butter, sugar, eggs, treacle and almonds into a very large bowl and beat well. Add the flours and mixed spice and mix thoroughly until blended. Stir in the soaked fruit. Spoon into the prepared cake tin and level the surface.

3. Bake in the centre of the preheated oven for 4-4½ hours or until the cake feels firm to the touch and is a rich golden brown. Check after 2 hours, and, if the cake is a perfect colour, cover with foil. A skewer inserted into the centre of the cake should come out clean. Leave the cake to cool in the tin.

4. When cool, pierce the cake at intervals with a fine skewer and feed with a little extra sherry. Wrap the completely cold cake in a double layer of greaseproof paper and again in foil and store in a cool place for up to 3 months, feeding at intervals with more sherry. (Don't remove the lining paper when storing as this helps to keep the cake moist.)

5. Decorate with almond paste and royal icing.

To prepare the Christmas cake ahead: Prepare the fruit and soak in sherry 3 days ahead - this is essential to plump up and flavour the fruit. Make the cake and wrap as in stage 4. Store in a cool place for up to 3 months, following stage 4. You could also freeze the cake before decorating, for up to 3 months; defrost at room temperature. Recipe taken from Mary Berry's Christmas Collection, available from Amazon, RRP £17.00 (Headline RRP £20.00)

Spooky fun at our Halloween party and how to make a zombie bite in 10 easy steps with this tutorial

I can't believe how big Halloween is now in the UK. 

I remember the days when I was a kid, we would go trick or treating in the close that I lived in wearing a bin liner and a cheap plastic mask!

I never did throw eggs at any windows as when we knocked on the door, no one said trick! But I wouldn't have dared anyway!

Those days are well and truly gone. 

Now, thanks in part to America, Halloween in the UK is a huge event. Aisles full of Halloween goodies, costumes and so many sweets can be found in every supermarket.

Everywhere you look, people have gone bigger each year with fancy dress and decorating their houses.

My daughter who loves a bit of gore and zombies, wanted to be made up to look like she had been bitten by a zombie (que the Walking Dead music).

So I took up the challenge and headed to YouTube to see if there was an easy tutorial I could find and use things I had lying around the house instead of having to buy lots of expensive special effects make-up.

Luckily for me, I found one, and I managed to create an open wound on Amber's head and arm.

How to make a wound, what you need:

PVA glue
Toilet paper/cotton wool
Foundation (to match your skin tone)
Black eyeshadow
Fake blood (we used lighter red and a congealed looking gloopy dark red fake blood)
An old small paintbrush (to apply the PVA and blood)
Make-up sponge to dab the foundation on

I can't tell you how easy this is to do, and the effect is brilliant. See for yourself in the pictures of Amber.

Here's what I did:

Step one: Using the paintbrush apply a thin layer of PVA glue onto the skin.

Step two: Rip off small bits of toilet paper and stick to the glue.

Step three: Continue with the PVA glue and toilet paper layers.

Step four: Once you have got about 6 layers on, leave to dry. Or cheat and use a hairdryer on a cool setting for quickness.

Step five: Very carefully using small scissors, gently cut a small hole at one end of where the wound will be, just in from the edge.

Step six: Cut the glue and toilet paper to the desired length of the wound you would like.

Step seven: Gently open the glue to create an opening.

Step seven: Trim the excess off, but leave some of the edge sticking up.

Step eight: Use foundation and sponge to gently pat make up all over the outside, on the top of the glue and toilet paper. Cover well.

Step nine: Dab black eyeshadow in the opening.

Step ten: Dip some of the congealed blood and spread it out inside the wound, then add some of the lighter (fresh looking) blood around the outside.

Looks real doesn't it! Ewwww.

I'm really pleased with how it turned out to say I have never done it before. I love a YouTube tutorial.

Amber went out trick or treating with her friends, and we decided to do a little Halloween party at home for our son Jacob.

Jacob didn't know I would dress up, so he was a little scared when I opened the door when he came home from school. He wanted to wear his Dracula outfit, complete with fangs and dripping  blood!

We had great fun making Halloween biscuits, we had a couple of fails with the icing though which you will see in the video below.

Daddy carved the pumpkins after the kids designed the faces they would like. Does anyone ever make anything with the inside of pumpkins? We always end up throwing it all away!

When Amber got back from trick or treating, she had a bag full of sugary goodies.

Where we live, we never get anyone coming to our door on Halloween, as we live on a road without a pavement and the houses are quite spread out. But we always get sweets just in case, and what a shame, no one came again this year - oh well, we will have to eat them!

When Amber got back, my husband Mark asked if anyone said 'trick'. She just looked at us blankly. She had no idea that if people said 'trick' rather than 'treat', you would have to play some kind of trick on that house.

Let's face it, that never happens nowadays.

I think our little party was a great success, and now all the decorations have gone back in the loft to wait for an even bigger Halloween next year.

I made a video of our Halloween party, see below. We'd love you to subscribe to Our Family Life channel on YouTube.

A Day in the Life video - Scootering, chocolate cake and Skype

I am kind of getting to grips with my new Canon G7X camera, I love recording footage of our family when we are out and about.

I have uploaded our second Day in the Life video on to Our Family Life YouTube channel.

In this video we go out for some lunch to a lovely place in Folkestone, Kent called Googies Art Cafe. If ever you are in Folkestone, I'd recommend a visit to Googies, it's a great place and the food is yummy!

The kids (and Mark) go scootering on Dover seafront. We enjoy some chocolate cake in the Waterfront cafe where Jacob ends up eating most of the cake!

Then it's back home. While Jacob is tired from all that scootering and decides to have a nap, I get chance to chill out for a bit with a cup of tea and have a read of The Sunday People and Sunday Mirror newspapers.

In the evening on a Sunday we always like to Skype my mum and dad because they live in Yorkshire. It's a great way to keep in touch with them.

Then it's story time for Jacob and time for bed. When the kids are in bed, me and Mark enjoyed a Chinese takeaway and watched a film.

It's great to keep memories of those little days out, when in years to come we will have probably forgotten about it!

I don't think I am quite ready to take the daily vlogging challenge. I'm really impressed by people who vlog everyday. 

I don't think anyone who watch videos on YouTube realise just how long they take to edit. It usually takes me around 5-6 hours to edit one video! But I really enjoy the process.

I'd love you to have a watch and let me know what you think of it.

A Day in the Life video - Mother's Day 26th March 2017

Our Family Life have had a YouTube channel for just over 4 years.

We have a variety of videos on our channel, but I was never quite sure where it was going.

I have recently seen the growth of vlogs, especially parent vloggers. I really like watching A Day in the Life videos so I thought I would record one with our family.

I have just bought a new camera, a Canon Powershot G7X and I love it. The video quality is fantastic and there is a screen that flips up so you can make sure you're in the shot.

I really enjoy editing the videos in iMovie. I am self taught in this, with the help of a couple of 16 year olds on YouTube tutorials!

Have a look at our first Day in the Life vlog and let me know in the comments what you think.

If you would like to subscribe to our channel that would be fab.

HEXBUG BattleBots Arena toy review

Jacob was super excited when the HEXBUG® BattleBots® Arena™ arrived, and so was I.

If like me, you enjoyed watching the TV programme Robot Wars which started back in 1998. Then you will love this new toy from HEXBUG.

This huge box arrived and my son Jacob was desperate to open it. So we decided to record a video of Jacob opening the box and having a battle against daddy!

Here's a little bit about HEXBUG®. 

By leveraging our robotics expertise, we entered the toy industry in 2007 with the launch of the HEXBUG Micro Robotic Creatures product line. HEXBUG was designed to give children a positive experience with robotics at a young age. Our passion for robotics, as demonstrated by our VEX Robotics program, was the main catalyst fueling HEXBUG's inception. Hence, the brand was born! People are drawn to the HEXBUG brand for our products’ fascinating behaviour, intelligent bug-like attributes and eye-catching packaging. Some of the products are so animated, they even fool cats, dogs and some humans into thinking they are alive!

What's in the box?

The lights dim as the audience roars, you have just entered the ultimate robot showdown! Modeled after television’s favourite metallic war-zone comes HEXBUG® BattleBots® Arena™.

• Two push activated pulverizing hammers
• Battle-worn detachable robot pieces 
• BattleBots I/R Witch Doctor included
• BattleBots I/R Tombstone included
• Realistic protective walls 
• Fold-out game board
• Batteries Included
• Ages 8 and up

Jacob had so much fun playing with the BattleBots. The remote controls are a perfect size for little hands. He took great pleasure in trying to beat daddy. Even though he did cheat a bit!

Check out the video of Jacob and daddy's battle. If you like this video please give it a thumbs up and subscribe to Planet Jacob. Thank you for helping to grow our channel.

You can buy this fab HEXBUG BattleBots Arena from Toys R Us and Smyths Toys.

Disclaimer: We received the HEXBUG BattleBots Arena free of charge. All views our own.