Macy’s orchestra concert was today. Don’t worry…I’m not posting the whole thing. Here’s less than a minute of her solo.
More cupcakes???
June 20, 2009 By 8 Comments
There’s a bake sale tonight at church. I decided to give the rainbow cupcakes another shot. Turns out if you follow the directions exactly and don’t have 13 tween girls helping you, they turn out awesome. I use this recipe from Pampered Chef for frosting, only I add a pinch or two of salt. The other cupcakes are chocolate with peanut butter frosting. I doctored a cake mix a la Amber: an extra egg, a box of pudding, and about 1/3 c of sour cream. The frosting is this one, but I followed the directions in the first review and (again) added a little salt. Maybe I’ll stop posting about cupcakes now?
Indulge me
June 18, 2009 By 15 Comments
Cupcake Party!
June 15, 2009 By 30 Comments
Invitations: Got my idea here.
Cake: Borrowed this pan from a friend. The verdict is that you should use about 1.5 cake mixes. And there’s a very fine line between getting enough batter in the top half of the cupcake (so that you get all the detailing) and so much that you end up with a teeny tiny fire in your oven. I also frosted the bottom and edges of the top before I stuck the halves together.
The cake plate is an upside down bowl and a plate I got from Dollar Tree and then epoxy-ed (totally a word) together.
Upon arrival, each girl got her own apron and chef’s hat. I used this tutorial to make the hats. There’s also a free ebook over at You Can Make This. A complete tutorial for the aprons, along with template will be up in the next day or two. Or three.
Then we made rainbow cupcakes, like these. Ours looked a little more like tumors or something, but maybe that’s because I bought the cheap cake mix. The girls didn’t seem to mind, though.
And there’s my friend Jane finishing them up. She came all the way from Arizona to clean up after me at my kid’s party. OK, that’s not really why she came, but her help saved my life! Thanks again, Janer. I owe you big time.
While the cupcakes were baking, the girls decorated the brims of their hats. I had fabric markers and stuff for them to stitch. All of them but like 3 chose the markers.
Then the girls decorated cake boxes to carry home their cupcakes. I got the boxes locally at Orson Gygi for 99 cents each, but I bet the bakery at your grocery store would be willing to sell you some, too. They decorated with markers and booklets of cupcake stickers that I found at JoAnn’s for $1.
Next we opened presents, so that our rainbow cupcakes would have plenty of time to cool.
After that, we decorated cupcakes. I’d pre-baked about 2 dozen vanilla and 2 dozen chocolate. The girls got 2 of each flavor plus one or two of the rainbow ones.
I made 6 colors of frosting and put it in Ziploc bags with the corners cut off. Be sure you use freezer bags if you do this. We had a little “incident” when we tried it with regular bags. I also had white and chocolate frosting in pastry bags with tips. There were 9 or 10 different sprinkle and candy options. We put those in little glass bowls (similar to these) from IKEA.
Man those girls like frosting!
Finally, we had cake and ice cream with pink lemonade and blue raspberry lemonade in glass spigot jars that I found at Target. Apparently our singing was so loud that the neighbors could hear. Sorry Jenn. :o)
The girls got to take home their hats and aprons, cupcakes, left over stickers, and a bottle of sprinkles.
Why does my kid always pull faces? Wait. Don’t answer that.
Super fun day, but I’m glad we’re done with birthdays ’til January!
Whilst I’m working on the party post…
June 14, 2009 By 10 Comments
It’s been raining here. Like A LOT. Pretty much every day for weeks. And my kids have been off track.
Anyway, it was nice Friday. The kids were outside most of the day. It had been quiet for a while, so I did some investigating. I found my boys and the neighbor kid out front like this:
Let’s look closer.
What exactly was for sael free?
Let’s look closer again.
(Click on it)
Pattern Review: Little Flirty Skirty Apron
June 12, 2009 By 9 Comments
This is the Little Flirty Skirty apron from The Apron Lady. I made a size 10/12. Cute, right? However, I probably won’t ever make this pattern again. The directions were a mess. I think they’re the same ones included with the adult version, and that might be the problem.
I’m not sure why the neck strap is cut in two pieces and then seamed together. Also, in order for the neck strap to fit over my kid’s neck, the apron had to hang low.
I added an inch or two to the suggested waist tie length and don’t have enough to tie a bow. And Macy’s skinny, remember? If you want to tie a bow, you’ll need to add WAY more.
The bodice is very narrow. Another inch or so on each side would be better.
Some sort of facing would have made the top edge neater and attaching the neck strap look neater, too.
It calls for 4yards of ric rac. The store I was at only had 3.5 yards so I got some smaller stuff for the pockets. I had 42″ left of my 3.5 yards. Even if I’d done the pockets with the same stuff I’d have used just over 2.5 yards.
You’re supposed to hem the apron and put on the ric rac before you attach the bottom ruffle. I did neither. I hemmed the bottom by attaching the ruffle and then applied the ric rac.
The pattern says to apply the ric rac before attaching the back ties. I wouldn’t do it this way again. I’d attach the ties and then cover my stitches with the ric rac.
In other news…I got a ruffler foot and it’s SO fun. Carla has a tutorial on them, if you’re curious. There’s also a video here. I used it to make the polka dot ruffle for the bottom of the apron. Look at those evenly spaced pleats!
And the real reason Macy’s head is cut off in the first shot:
Nine?!?!
June 11, 2009 By 10 Comments
My sweet Macy is nine today. I’m not really sure how that happened.
NINE!
Did I mention she was actually due in May? I was 42 weeks and 2 days pregnant when she finally decided to grace us with her presence.
I should have known then what I was in for.
No, really…she’s the best kid ever.
This is the picture I used when I made the silhouettes a while back. It’s *so* Macy. See that Harry Potter book she couldn’t put down? See how she’s trying really hard to pretend she’s annoyed with me and to not smile no matter what? Also, I love that sweater. It’s very “her”.
Her Mother’s Day card she made for me at school said “Thanks for letting me use the oven.” I nearly peed my pants.
Happy birthday, Mace!
The bane of my existence
June 9, 2009 By 16 Comments
Macy’s birthday party is in 4 days. It’s going to be a good one, if I do say so myself. Look forward to that post. :o)
My friend Val loaned me this pan. I Googled. I read all the tips. I decided to do a test run last week using a regular old cake mix. Not enough batter. I did another test run yesterday using this recipe from the Wilton site (minus the coffee…don’t call the Mormon police on me just yet). WAY too much batter. Whatever you do, DO NOT put 4 and 1/2 cups of batter in the top of that thing!
Today I try again. After I clean my oven.
And seriously…if anyone has used this pan and lived to tell about it, leave me a comment. Please?
Peanut Butter Truffle Brownies
June 4, 2009 By 5 Comments
We sewed our guts out last night….’til almost midnight. Good fun, ladies.
Here’s the recipe for the brownies. And I snuck downstairs to eat the last one for breakfast this morning and then told my kids there weren’t any left.
