Create-Celebrate-Explore

Pilgrim Cupcakes

The kids have been learning about the Pilgrims at school.  Last year I made Fall cupcakes and turkey cupcakes, so I thought I'd make something a little different this year and surprised them after school with little Pilgrim cupcakes.

What you need to make these:

• Plain vanilla cupcakes in brown cupcake liners
• White icing
• Cocoa powder
• Chocolate for melting (perfect excuse to use up some of that Halloween candy)
• Large Marshmallows
• Chocolate coated cookies
• Wilton Sparkle Gel - white, yellow, and black
• Large round Wilton tip with a piping bag and tape.
• Toothpicks (or any other kind of pick or narrow skewer)

Begin by making the Pilgrim hat.  Melt the chocolate in the microwave and using a pick coat each marshmallow in melted chocolate.  Place it carefully on top of the cookie and pop it in the refrigerator until set.  Once set gently remove the pick. Using the sparkle gel add on a white band and yellow buckle, then set aside.

Mix a small amount of cocoa at a time with plain white icing until you get a color you are happy with.   Place the tip inside the bag (cut off the end of the bag) and tape the bag onto the tip.  Fill the bag with icing and holding your hand very steady and keeping the tip just above the top of the cupcake pipe a face onto each cupcake.  If you push down just a little while piping you will see that the icing fills out so it covers more of the top of the cupcake.

Place the hat on top of the icing and using the black sparkle gel add facial features.

AS SEEN ON:

Lil Kid Things ... Love From The Oven ... Happy Home Fairy ... Mental Floss ... Kitchen Lore

A Cowboy and Cowgirl Birthday Party

The twins turned 5 on Sunday. 5! I can hardly believe it.  Marisol wanted to ride a horse for her birthday (as she does most days).  So we decided to have a Cowboy and Cowgirl themed party.  Flynn tends to just go with the flow, he generally thinks everything is a great idea ... unless I'm taking him shopping of course, he tends to voice his opinion on that subject.

It didn't take me long to find a location for the party.  A quick google search of horse riding in San Diego took me to the Mega Arte Riding Academy.  By chance this wonderful place also hosts parties.  The party was split into three parts - horse riding, feeding the animals, and then party time.  Each portion lasted about an hour.

Before I share a ton of photographs though, here are the precious birthday kids.

Horse Riding

There were three instructors to look after the kids.  They took them around the ring, through cones, over small jumps, and some kids even trotted.  Flynn thought trotting was hysterical, he couldn't stop laughing as he bounced up and down around the ring.

Animal Feeding

The kids were each given a bucket of food for the animals (which needed to be topped up numerous times throughout our tour - the animals were very well fed).  There were pigs, roosters, horses, llama, peacocks, bunnies and goats to feed.

The Party

Activities

I had set up number of activities for the kids. 

There were wooden horses to throw hoops over, horseshoe toss, tin cans to knock down, and a playground with swings, a slide and toys to play on.

The wooden horse idea came from Growing Home (which I found via Ohdeedoh).  I contacted a friend (who was also a party guest) who's dad loves making things with wood and had him make a couple for me - you can contact them at Nana's Tutu Trunk.

We had the token mustache photo station which is popular at the moment.

I purchased the mustaches from Piccadilly Party Co on Etsy.  The frame I found at a thrift shop for $1.99 and I had my husband hang some rope from it.  I put the collection of mustaches in a silver bucket along with a bandanna for those wanting to use that in photographs too.

I lined all of the tables with brown paper and set out buckets of crayons for the kids to draw.  There was also a bucket of western themed coloring book and crayon packs (that the kids could also take home with him), and we had cookie decorating.

For the cookie decorating I had the Edelweiss Bakery I have been using for years make cowboy cookies for me with plain white icing.  I set out an assortment of Wilton Sparkle Gel and Edible Color markers in buckets for the kids to decorate their cowboys.

The Mini Western Activity Kits were purchased from Oriental Trading.

The Food and Drink

The twins are not allowed to have soda, so we decided to go with milk and water for the party.  For those who didn't want plain milk or water though I set out containers containing chocolate powder and crystal light to fancy their drinks up a bit.

I found the great idea for the personalized party straws on Pinterest, they were made by On To Baby.  I simply took large address labels, folded them (before peeling off the backing), used some mini western themed letters and stamped the names on, then cut a small triangle in the side of each, peeled the backing off and attached them to the straws. 

The milk bottles are actually wine carafs I purchased at World Market.  I was worried about bugs getting into the milk though so I made little covers for them.  I simply cut out a circle of oil cloth, turned it upside down and placed it over the top of the bottle.  Then I stitched a thin piece of elastic together to make a circle and slipped it over the top of the oil cloth and bottle.  While it was on the bottle I hand-stitched the elastic onto the oil cloth every centimeter or so.  Once stitched together I flipped it inside out and put it over the top of the bottle as a lid.

The biodegradable gray and white paper straws were purchased from Amazon.

The drink cups and lids, as well as the containers for the drink mixes were purchased from Smart & Final.

We order Subway for our guests for lunch.  Along with that there was plenty of candy, horseshoe shaped cookies, grapes, meringues, cupcakes, popcorn, pretzels, cowboy cookies, and dip with veggies.

The lollipops were purchased from Party City, you can customize your own labels for them.

The adorable farm house candy holders with little silver scoops were purchased from World Market.  They were filled with jelly lollies, jelly beans, M&M's and yogurt covered raisins.

The dip and veggie cups were very easy to make.  I put a spoonful of hummus, yogurt dip, or tzatziki dip in alternate souffle cups then popped a few green beans, celery sticks and cucumber sticks in each.

The Cupcakes

I made yummy chocolate cupcakes with chocolate icing and dunked each into a bowl of chocolate sprinkles.  Each cupcake was topped with a horse.  I found tubes of horses at Joann's.  Most places carried tubes of assorted farm animals so I was ecstatic when I found ones with just horses in them.

There was a very cheeky girl who somehow managed to sneak a second cupcake.

Party Favors

Each guest went home with a handmade hobby horse, cowboy hat and a bandanna on a stick to fill with decorated cookies, a horse from their cupcake, gifts from the 'pass the parcel' game, lollipops, and Mini Western Activity Kits.

The hobby horses ended up being a lot of fun for the kids to play with during the party too.

The Hobby Horses - my husband purchased the pre-cut sticks at Home Depot.  The horse heads were made out of socks.  I found the idea on Dandee however made a few changes.  I used regular buttons for eyes.  I used a combination of rope, grommets (found at Beverlys), and canvas straps (similar to what you would use for a bag handle).   The mane was made out of Lion Brand Wool-Ease in wheat.  I used leftover rope from the hula-hoops to wrap tightly attach the sock onto the stick (along with gorilla glue).

The bandannas on sticks - The sticks were the exact same ones we used for the hobby horses.  The bandannas were purchased from Amazon.

The cowboy hats were purchased from Oriental Trading.

Invitations were sent using Punchbowl.  They have a lovely horse invitation that has twin horses on it.

 

This post linked to:

Blooming Cupcakes

I purchased the Blooming Cupcakes Baking Kit for the twins for Easter thinking it would be a great way to get them into the kitchen.  And it was.  They had so much fun with it. 

And their lovely blooms:

Wouldn't this make a lovely idea for a little girls garden party.  The kids would have a wonderful time decorating their own little pot of cupcake to eat, or take home.

Note:  This particular kit doesn't appear on the Crafty Cooking Kits website, but take a look at their other kits, they look like a ton of fun for kids.  I purchased ours from Cost Plus World Market.

How to: Decorate Spring Cupcakes

It's been a while since I've made cupcakes for the kids, but Spring is in the air, flowers are blooming outside and I was craving something a little bit sweet.   Of course though I have three children who each have their own idea on how I should decorates cakes.  I have one who cannot stand fondant, one who loves fondant and one who will take it or leave it as long as there is a whole lot of icing he can lick off.

Here is how you please picky cupcake eaters.

Aren't these perfect for a Spring or garden party.

And, this is how you make them.

Flower cupcake (image 1): Using green icing in an icing bag with a no.12 tip (on my wishlist are the 1A and 2A) put the tip face down hovering just above the center of the cupcake.  Squeeze the bag holding your hand steady until a large circular blob of icing appears. Tip: As the icing comes out, you may feel like you need to lift your hand higher. Don't.  Keep your hand steady, this will make the mound more full and spread it out as opposed to making it higher. Plus it creates lovely little ridges around the side.

Sprinkles cupcake (image 2): Again, using green icing in a bag with a no.12 tip, starting around the outside of the cupcake, begin to spiral into the center of the cupcake, squeezing the bag the entire time.  This does no have to perfect, because they will be covered in sprinkles (you can see where I had air pockets as I piped).  There is a reason I do this instead of slapping icing onto the cupcake, it gives it a nice tidy edge for the sprinkles, instead of them flailing all over the cupcake.

Flower cupcake (image 1): Roll out fondant until it is about 3mm thick.  Take a flower fondant cutter (or cookie cutter) and a small round fondant cutter and cut out your shapes.  Brush a little water onto the back of the center of the flower and attach it to the flower, set aside to dry.  Once dry push it down on an angle onto the icing.

Sprinkles cupcake (image 2): Pour sprinkles into a small bowl (just large enough to fit the cupcake in), turn the cupcake upside down and dunk it into the sprinkles. 

This is also a great activity that the kids can help out with.  They will love stamping out the fondant, attaching the center of each flower and dunking the cupcakes in sprinkles.

Enjoy!

Carrot Cake

Did you know that February 3rd is National Carrot Cake Day.  No?  Me either.  Until the lovely folks at Smart & Final announced it via Twitter and Facebook and after further investigation I found it to be true. 

Never one to miss an opportunity to make cake...

Cake Ingredients

• 2 cups white whole wheat flour
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp ground cinnamon
• pinch of salt
• 3 large eggs
• 2 cups sugar
• 3 tbs applesauce
• 1/2 cup buttermilk
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 cups grated carrot
• 1 can crushed pineapple (drained)
• 1 cup sweetened flaked coconut
• 1 cup chopped pecans

Cream Cheese Frosting Ingredients

• 1 12oz tub of cream cheese
• 1/2 cup butter (softened)
• 2 cups powdered sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Turn the oven to 350 (F).

Combine the first 5 ingredients in a medium sized bowl and set aside.

In a second bowl blend (on medium speed) the eggs, sugar, applesauce, buttermilk and vanilla. 

Gradually add the dry ingredients into the second bowl (about a cup at a time), blending as you go until all of the dry ingredients have been added and combined thoroughly.

Fold in the carrot, crushed pineapple, pecans and coconut.

Bake for approximately 15 minutes if doing mini cupcakes (pictured above), but if doing a cake (which I did in 2 loaf pans) then bake for approx 30 minutes.

Frosting:

Blend all 4 ingredients in a bowl on medium speed until combined.

Once piped on (I used a 4B tip), top with a little grated carrot.

And just because the photograph above doesn't show the delicious chunky ingredients in the cake...

Wouldn't these make a lovely Easter Party Treat too.

National Chocolate Cake Day

Did you know that today (January 27) is National Chocolate Cake Day.  It's an annual event apparently.  How could I have not known about this before?  I found out via Twitter this morning.

It would have been against everything I believe in (aka chocolate) to not participate in such a momentous day.

Frosting:

Whip equal parts nutella and cream cheese in a bowl, then pipe onto your cupcake, topping with a little shimmer dust.

Tip:

When you discover that there is a National Chocolate Cake Day and you are not prepared for it in any way, and have been traveling on and off for the past month and a half, so are seriously lacking supplies, then you MAY have to resort to using a trusty 'ole box of Betty Crocker that you have in your pantry for emergency situations ... like this ... hence the creative use of nutella and cream cheese for the frosting as well.   

Never fear though, I have a fantastic tip for you that I picked up when I visited the Martha Stewart Show last year.  Do not put vegetable oil in your cake as the box advises, instead, substitute with the same quantity of apple sauce.  Your cake and your tummy will thank you.

Also, did you know it's World Nutella Day on February 5th. 

 

This post linked to:

 

Thanksgiving Cupcakes

Once upon a time my kids LOVED pumpkin pie.  Now they love cupcakes.

So while there will now be extra pumpkin pie for me to devour this Thanksgiving, there will also be lots of little cupcakes for me the kids to enjoy for dessert too.

I was inspired by both the pinecone turkeys the kids made and also these little cupcakes I made many years ago for one of Jay's school celebrations.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

 

As seen on:

Really Easy Cupcakes

HALLOWEEN CUPCAKES

These are so simple, it's scary.

Whip up a batch of cupcakes.

Frost them.

Place a stencil over the top and sprinkle cake sparkles, or sugar sprinkles over the top.

 

P.S.  I purchased my stencils at Michael's.

Autumn Cupcakes

I decided that because I don't see the beautiful autumn colors that a lot of you do when I look outside, I was going to make some of my own.

Want to know how to make fondant leaves?  Let me show you.

Take small pieces of assorted fondant colors and mix them together.  Don't mix too much though or you will end up with plain brown.  Roll out the fondant and using a leaf cookie cutter cut out leaves.  No two will be alike.  Then using the back of a butter knife score some veins in each leaf.

To get my leaves to stand up on the top of the cupcakes, I very carefully pushed a toothpick up through the center of each and then pushed the other end of the toothpick into the cupcake.

AS SEEN ON

The TomKat Studio

How to Host a Tea Party

To: Marisol, Mummy, Pony, Ballerina and Dolly,

You are cordially invited to a tea party in the backyard.

Menu

Scones with Jam and Cream

Shortbread

Pineapple Cupcakes

Vanilla Wafers

Fresh Strawberries and Grapes

Pocky's

Butterfly Crackers

Beverages

Pink Lemonade

Vanilla Caramel Truffle Tea

 

We had a lovely time.

Once our afternoon tea was finished, we played on the swings and enjoyed a game of catch, we sniffed flowers and watched the birds flitting between branches over the fence.

This post linked to:

 

Disclosure: The "Cookies and Crackers" were sponsored by Collective Bias.