Happy 2nd Birthday to Remy & Violetta!

Iggle Piggle sits atop a lemon cake smothered in blue cream cheese frosting with rainbow non pariels on top.

Upsy Daisy sits on top of a lemon cake smothered in pink cream cheese frosting, sprinkled with rainbow jimmies!

Dora & Bat cupcakes for daycare Birthday Parties.

Too much celebration?  NEVER.  Besides, I wanted to test two colours of cake layered and see if it really works just poured into the baking cups.  My bucket list has a rainbow cake project on it, so this was a chance for me to get my feet wet.

Griff chose bat cupcake cups so we decorated with orange icing and chocolate chips

Clearly left over from halloween but my kid is a big Nightmare before Christmas fan, so these worked.

1st attempt at layering two shades of batter.  Not a bad result.

Griffin eagerly trying to eat up his macaroni and cheese so he can have a cupcake and fruit.

Claire was very excited to get her little hands on a Dora topper.  She finger painted icing all over the tabletop, but didn't eat a bite.

Have I mentioned how much I love this cupcake carrier?

Claire ran off with one of my mini Dora's, so I had to use a Royal icing Dora head on one of these.

Canada Day Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins for Sauble Beach Trip

For my sweeties to celebrate Canada Day. 
Have I mentioned how much I love this new use for all of my Gymboree and Crazy 8 clothing boxes?

This is what I made with my leftover mini chocolate chips.  Easy raisin, peanut and chocolate chip trail mix.

No Egg Cocoa Chocolate Buttercream Icing for Last Day of Grade 2

I found a tutorial on youtube for an easy no-egg, no-cook, chocolate icing.  I was really pleased with the flavour although I think that the fry's cocoa gives it more sophistication than a kid can handle.  Keep in mind that I omitted the Frangelico for obvious grade 2 type reasons.  Deeply delicious.  For these cupcakes, I used a mix.  This post is about my experiment in new icing recipes.

Cookies N' Cream Cupcakes for Last Day of Grade 2

Here is one batch that I made for my girl on her last day in Mr. Stanley's Grade 2 class. 

This cupcake recipe has the best of 2 worlds: cookies & cupcakes. You can use any kind of cookie you'd like and the results will be spectacular!

● 1/2 cup butter, cut into cubes
● 2/3 cup sugar
● 3 eggs
● 1 t. vanilla
● 1-1/2 cups flour
● 1-1/2 t. baking powder
● 1/4 t. salt
● 1/4 cup milk
● 10 chocolate sandwich cookies, chopped
Frosting:
● 1/2 cup butter, cut into pieces
● 2 cups powdered sugar
● 2 T. milk
● 1 t. vanilla
● 10 chocolate sandwich cookies, chopped, plus 6 cookies cut in half for garnish

Preheat oven to 350 ̊F. Line 12 muffin cups with paper liners. Spritz the top of the pan with
baking spray.
1. In mixing bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Make sure to scrap down the sides of the bowl.
2. In another bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
3. Add the eggs, one at a time, to the butter mixture. Beat well after each addition. Add the vanilla.
4. With the mixer on a low speed, alternately add 1/3 of the flour mixture and 1/2 of the milk. Fold in the crushed cookies.
5. Evenly fill the muffin cups with the batter and bake for about 18 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into a cupcake comes out clean. Leave cupcakes in pan for 10 minutes, then remove with a fork and place on cooling rack. Once the cupcakes have completely cooled, you can then frost them.
6. To make frosting: Cream the butter, powdered sugar, vanilla and milk until fluffy (about 4-5 minutes). With standing mixer, use whisk attachment. Fold in the chopped cookies.
7. Frost cupcakes, then take cookie halves and place on top to garnish.

Nonna's No Bake White Cheesecake for Griff's 5th Birthday

I can't take credit for this.  Paul made this cheesecake and it was super soft because he bought the cream cheese in the tub instead of by the brick.  Melt in your mouth goodness.  Griffin wanted lemon on top (which we did serve on the side) but in the last minute, Griffin decided we should hold the lemon.

5 stick candles, plus a #5 for a wish.  We added a sparkler for pizzaz.

Dora Fiesta Dress Cake for Claire's 2nd Birthday

Here is the Dora Fiesta Dress cake that I made with my Wilton Wonder Mold pan.
Time to scratch another project off of my list.  Here she is!

I removed my frozen cake from the freezer and let it defrost.  Set it atop a foil covered lazy suzan with parchment paper pieces tucked under it.

The Dora Accessory

The ingredients for Buttercream Icing as specified in my Wilton Basics book.

I went with half butter and half crisco instead of all shortening.  It ended up somewhat soft this way.

Creamed it in my mixer.

Used an old damp dishtowel to keep the icing sugar from flying all over the kitchen.

Looks great!  But I forgot to divide it in two, and mistakenly dyed it all purple so my Fiesta Dress cake was monochromatic. 
There were supposed to be orange ruffles also.

Beginning to apply the icing.

Love the Wilton Icing applicator!

It was 11pm so I decided on an easier version and made these upward pleats instead of filling the entire skirt with piped ruffles.

Bottom ruffles complete.  I added silver balls to make up for my lack of orange icing.

Certainly not perfect but you can see that my piping along the bottom WAS flat before I pulled my paper pieces back out.

Hola Amigos!  Top ruffles complete. 

Stained my hand too.

Special cake for my sweethearts second birthday!