Snickerdoodle-ish

I love cinnamon. Snickerdoodles are in my top 5 cookie picks-for sure. So when I saw this, I had to make these. In fact, I could hardly contain the excitement. I topped them off with plain vanilla buttercream(I am not the biggest fan of Martha's 7 min. frosting).

I made babies and regular cupcakes, because I think baby cupcakes are so adorable. Sure, you may end up wanting more or eating 5 of them, but they are so freaking cute!! They have a great texture that is reminiscent of their cookie namesake, but they don't have enough cinnamon for me. I would use at least twice the cinnamon in the batter next time. They're good, but I had bit higher expectations for them. I will definately try them again with more cinnamon.

Where the Wild Things are hits theaters tomorrow!! I am so excited.

The Fairy Party!

On Saturday Lorylei celebrated her 7th birthday again. We threw a fairy themed party, and it was a huge hit. I had an excess of Fairy party craft ideas, plus received a bunch of suggestions(thanks Erin & Jamie). But having been pressed for time in the week before the party I ended up going with a "less is more" approach. I did all the party prep the day of, and didn't end up having time to execute all of the ideas. Lorylei made each girl an edible necklace from fruit loops, and I made fairy headpieces from pipecleaners and ribbon.

These are the butterflies for the cupcakes. I ended up doing a slightly simpler design than is shown in the book, because I just couldn't get the candy melts to "swirl" in a way I liked.

Here they are all set up on a dessert rack. Overall, I am glad I tried candy melts, and will likely use the rest of the ones I bought, but I highly doubt I would buy more. They're fun and easy, but THE MESS! You can just melt them in a ziplock baggie, but I decided to use plastic squeeze bottles and cleaning them was quite the hassle. (actually, I threw the last one right in the trash instead of washing it) The cupcakes are made from my go-to chocolate cake recipe, which of course hails from Martha. The recipe makes a nice light chocolate cake, or perfect cupcakes, and it's really easy. The frosting is a simple cream cheese frosting that I tinted pink.

I had wanted to make a homemade glittery play-dough to include in the goody bags, but I ran out of time. But there were adorable butterfly bubble necklaces, fairy puzzles, stick on earrings, and various candy. I ordered some fairy themed stuff from Birthday In a Box. I love how their site is set up, and they have a lot of theme stuff that I had never seen in any party store, which was awesome. I would highly recommend the site if you are having a "theme" party. Or even if you are just looking for party items in general.

The girls ended up playing just one game, "pin the spot on the ladybug", and making one craft, beaded bracelets. They played a lot with Lorylei's My Little Ponies. We served pizza and fruit kebabs for dinner. The fruit kebabs were a huge hit.

It ended up being just the right amount of activities for the time we had(2 hours). If I were to do it over, I would plan for a longer party and throw in the activities I ended up skipping.

Overall, it was a great success, and Lorylei had a wonderful time.

Happy Fairy Party!

Butterflies and Birthday Cakes

I don't very frequently document my baking failures. It's not that they don't occur or that I am too proud to post my mis-steps. It's not that I don't think it's good to share tips about "how NOT to do" something. It's really that when something has gone wrong, my level of frustration is pretty high, and about the last thing I am going to do is photograph it. But this was a birthday cake, which would have inevitably ended up in pictures anyway.

I'm not calling this one a failure. But it's not high on my list of successes. If you are thinking that strawberry frosting is a popular option at our house, for Birthdays, or for tea parties, you're right. This is the third time in a year that my darling daughter has made the request for chocolate cake with strawberry frosting. I never actually looked up a recipe for strawberry frosting. Each of the three times I've made it I have flown by the ends of my apron strings, and each time made it a bit different. This one was the most frustrating attempt, but also the most well received by the tasters.

The butterflies are made from Wilton Candy Melts, and the design came from a book called "Hello, Cupcake" that my friend Mary gave to me a while back. It has some really adorable cupcake ideas in it that are all relatively easy-ish. If you are wondering about the totally random placement of the butterflies, it's because I started out with 6 butterflies and I killed two of them before they made it onto the cake.

What makes this cake far from a failure in my mind is the reaction from Lorylei when she saw it on the table. She gasped, she smiled and she expressed extreme delight. Because what could make a seventh birthday better than a pink cake topped with butterflies?

Her Fairy party is this coming weekend, and I will report back about all the crafts and activities.

baby quilts and fairy games

Recently, my dear friend Sarah had her second baby. I love her little family so much. She and her hubby are some of the nicest people I know, and they make baby girls that are too cute for words. We live way too far away from each other, but I did get to have a tiny visit with her while I was on vacation this summer.

Anyhow, her friendship has meant so much to me over the years that presents for her babies have to be special. Like baby quilts, with embroidered names. Made with love.

For the little name badge, I embroidered the name by hand on a double layer of flannel and then stitched it on with a fancy stitch on my machine. I love how it made a little rectangle of the fancy stitch on the top of the quilt.

So, Lorylei's birthday is coming up, and she's having a "fairy" theme party. I can think of a million crafts for fairies to do, but not really any games. I have scoured the internet and not come up with much. We have "pin the spot on the ladybug", and "fairy, fairy, toadstool"(duck, duck, goose), but I would really appreciate ideas and suggestions. It doesn't necessarily have to be a theme game, just something that's fun for 6 and 7 year olds. Thanks!

and the winner is...

comment #3- from Jaime. ( I emailed you, so check your inbox!)

Thanks everyone for playing!

This weekend I made Martha's Chocolate Cherry Crumb Bars. I found the recipe in one of her Annual Recipe books that I checked out from the library, but later realized that it's also in her "Cookies" book.

At first bite(still warm from the oven), I was really disappointed. I could hardly taste the cherry at all. So, I called it a failure and headed off to work. But the next morning(when they had cooled properly), I tried them again and now declare them a success! They would be awesome warmed up and paired with vanilla ice cream, but they are pretty darn tasty on their own. Also, I baked them in a 9 x 13 pan(the recipe says to use a 9 x 9), so they aren't quite as thick, but there are more of them! These would make a nice little thank-you gift(in fact, I wrapped some up in the freezer for our babysitter).

Side note/tip: For this recipe, and any recipe that calls for you to "cut in" butter with a pastry blender, I use my Kitchenaid stand mixer with the paddle attachment. I just cut the butter up small-ish and throw it in on top of the dry ingredients. Mix until it looks like coarse crumbs. I have done this with quite a few recipes now and have found that it works like a charm! I have also read that you can get the same result by creaming room temp butter, and then adding the dry ingredients on top. Has anyone tried it this way? Let me know if you have or if you've heard it works!

in case you think I fell off the face of the earth...(and forgot about my giveaway)

... I didn't.(well, I didn't fall off the earth, I DID forget about the giveaway) I did have a ridiculously fun and very, very busy summer. I have done hardly anything crafty, but I made a few blogworthy food items that I neglected to photograph.

My Critter started first grade yesterday, and I was way more okay about that then I had been about the big, scary start of Kindergarten. We updated our to-do list, making a "morning" and a "night" version, which is off to a good start.

My new camera is on it's way back to Canon right now for a repair, which breaks my heart into a million little pieces. Ok, not really, but it is frustrating and also a bit sad.

Two very creative/crafty people that I know have both started up Etsy shops. They happen to be sisters(not mine) and wonderful people.

Kerry has made wonderful little greeting cards that have birds embroidered on them!

Isn't that darling? You can check out the rest of them here, in Kerry's shop.

Erin has made a collection of aprons, napkins, potholders and other kitchen-y things.
I love this apron! You can check out her shop here.

Ok, so, the giveaway. I am giving away two reusable fabric shopping bags. They fold away neatly into a sew-in pocket. I will cover shipping(US only, please), all I ask is that you promise to use them instead of taking icky plastic bags at the store. They are identical to the bags I gave away last year, which you can see here. These are made from the same fabrics and pattern. One winner will win both bags.

To enter:: leave a comment on this post before next Friday, September 19th. Please leave your email address, so that I can contact you if are the winner.

for Hannah

When I learned that Erin was going to name her daughter "Hannah", I had an itch to do something name-y to give to them. I love that name and think it looks so pretty spelled out. I ruminated on the idea for quite a while, since Erin had already hung up Hannah's name in the nursery. I had already picked out fabrics that would be matchy for the nursery, but was still stuck about what exactly to make. Then I came across these fabric flowers over at katie did. That's when it all sort of clicked. I love the idea of a "trail" of some sort spelling something out. Like I did with this SnailMail project. I was going for a dragonfly, but I think it ended up looking more kite-ish, which I am totally okay with.

I will have a couple more Green Bags ready for giveaway next week!