Made some adorable cupcakes for my workmates to celebrate our last day of work for the year tomorrow. I had these cute red and white polkadot cupcake cases from Look Sharp ($5NZD for 25, bargain!), and filled them with lemon coconut cake.

The frosting is white chocolate marscapone buttercream, and I bought a bag of Jaffas (NZ candy) to top the frosting. I initially wanted to make green holly leaves to add a bit more of a festive theme, but (fortunately) thought that was a bit ambitious.

I remembered some red and white spotted Washi tape I’d bought from Wocolate a few weeks ago – perfect! Tiny flag toppers it is! 

Photos are just from my phone, but I hope they are useful for someone who’d like to get crafty and make their own wee flags. Here’s how…

Washi tape cupcake topper flags

You will need:

  • Washi tape – patterned masking tape – I got mine from Wocolate.
  • Plain white paper – this helps show off the pattern of your Washi tape, otherwise it can be too transparent.
  • Toothpicks – can be wooden or plastic, just remember they are going to go into food!
  • Scissors

How?

Cut a strip of white paper slightly narrower than your Washi tape.

From the strip, cut a small rectangle – about 1.5cm long, but you don’t need to be exact.

Unroll a little of your Washi tape and place the paper on the sticky side, about 5mm from the end of the tape as shown in the photo.

Further along the roll of tape (in my pictures, to the left of the rectangle of paper) place the top of a toothpick.

Fold the Washi tape with the paper, back over the toothpick to seal the toothpick in.

Trim the Washi tape at the edge of where the two sides of tape meet. The rectangular piece of paper should be surrounded on all sides by Washi tape stuck to itself.

You have a flag! At this stage I trimmed a triangle shape into the ends of my little flags to give them a bit more character.

Make sure you warn cupcake eaters to remove the flags before eating the cupcakes!


Knit another owl friend, this one’s for Nicki. I’m quite fond of him!

Knitting without a pattern is pretty liberating, and I love how these critters all have such personality.


This little guy came into being with no pattern, and I hadn’t had my needles out in months and months and months.

Pretty proud of him! He’s for my mum, who’s going away on holiday for a couple of weeks and will miss her bird (who I’m birdsitting). This little chap can join her on her trip.


My first ever amigurumi creature!

I learned crochet when I was a teenager, my mum showed me how to make a beanie (it was pretty average, of course). My boyfriend wanted one too, so I have a half finished blue crochet beanie floating around at home somewhere – the enthusiasm waned.

When I started knitting creatures, people started either commissioning them or asking me to show them how to make ‘em. When Anne found out I was going to teach a few people how to knit, she lent us her book – “Super Cute – 25 Amigurumi Animals to Make”.

Amigurumi is crochet, rather than knitting (knitting uses two needles, crochet uses a crochet hook), and Anne bought the book out of interest rather than to actually make something!

So, this pattern is from that book and is called “Cute Kitten”. I picked it because it looked pretty simple, and once I got back into the hang of the stitches it was fairly straightforward. Hoorah!

The kitten is going to find a new home with Anne, to thank her for lending me the book. Next, I’m going to try this adorable pattern (probably without tentacles).


These two little fellows came into being this weekend.

The octopus is by request, for Theunis. The bumble bee is the first creature I’ve made without following any sort of pattern – I plan to give him to my grandmother, who taught me how to knit when I was a little girl.