You've Got A Friend In Me..

My daughter is currently obsessed with Toy Story 1, 2, & 3.  So naturally, this quickly became the theme of her second birthday party.  I thought I would share some of the items we made for her party.

I made her invitations to look like an Etch A Sketch.  I used round label stickers for the knobs and gold ink at the top just like the toy.  For the text, I typed out the information in Photoshop and then connected the letters with a series of horizontal and vertical lines to mimic what it looks like when you use an Etch A Sketch.  This took some time, but put a nice touch on the invites.

We didn't go crazy with decorations, we kept it simple

My mom made this cute banner with her Cricut, "Happy Birthday" was flanked by aliens.  We also had small hanging decorations that had Woody on one side and the Toy Story logo on the other.  We hung them from all of our chandeliers and hanging lights.

The cake was a classic white cake that my mother is famous for.  I am getting closer and closer to her perfection every time I take a try at it.  I think this was my 4th or 5th try.  I originally wanted to decorate the entire cake with fondant, but due to lack of experience, the base quickly became the icing that we normally use for this cake recipe.  I used cookie cutters to utilize the fondant by making small decorations I placed around the base of the cake and I used miniature figurines that my daughter already had.

      

I wanted to give people the option to have a chocolate dessert, so I made chocolate cupcakes.  Here are the websites that I found the decorating ideas from...

For the BoPeep's sheep-

http://family.go.com/food/recipe-909608-bo-peep-sheep-cupcake-t/

For the aliens-

http://family.go.com/food/recipe-857832-green-alien-cupcakes-t/

The only difference from these was that I used dried kiwi fruit for the ears and antennas instead of mint candies.

I had a lot of fun planning out the cookie decor.  These cookies are what I passed out as favors at the end of the party.  I made a mixture of 4-5 cookies in each bag.

I hope you enjoy these ideas.  We had so much fun with this party!

Until next time,

Blair

A New Twist On An Old Favorite

I recently brought dessert to a family get together.  I was thinking cookies, but wanted to step it up a notch.

One of the favorite cookies in our household is Quaker Oats own oatmeal cookie recipe called Vanishing Oatmeal Cookies, and they are named that for a reason!  I usually make a double batch because they are eaten so fast.  The only thing I do differently is leave out the raisins.  I decided to start with the idea of the oatmeal cookie we love so much.  Then I started thinking of Little Debbie's Oatmeal Creme Pies.

*Side Note:  If you ever have leftover cookie dough, here is a suggestion.  I place the leftovers in a small container and stick it in the freezer.  The next time I bake muffins, I grate the frozen dough over the tops of each muffin cup of batter and bake as the muffin recipe recommends.  It adds a little pizazz to an everyday muffin!

For the filling, I searched online and combined a few recipes to make it my own.  The biggest difference was using some butter.  I don't think there is one original recipe for this because I saw many similar if not the same recipes for the filling while searching.  After whipping all the ingredients together I added them to a piping bag fitted with a large piping tip.

Here are a few tips, if you do not have any cake decorating supplies, use a quart freezer bag and cut a small snippet off one of the bottom corners.  Line a tall glass with the bag and fold over the top of the bag around the outside of the cup.  The cup enables you to use two hands to fill the bag and keeps the top of the bag much cleaner.

Then I piped the filling onto half of the cookies and placed the other half of the cookies on top.

After all cookies were in place, I firmly pushed on each sandwich to make sure that they would not come apart.

This is the finished product.  Want the recipe?  See below.

Here is the link to the Vanishing Oatmeal Cookie recipe-

http://www.quakeroats.com/cooking-and-recipes/content/recipes/recipe-detail.aspx?recipeid=474

For the filling-

1/4 cup unsalted butter at room temperature

1/2 cup shortening

3 cups powdered sugar

7 oz. of marshmallow creme

1 to 2 tablespoons milk

Please enjoy!

Until next time,

Blair

Here's To The Start Of MY New Year!

I do believe this has been the most unproductive start to a new year I have ever had.  I think its weather & lack of sun mixed with stress and a touch of laziness.  I started with a detox, failed miserably, partially due to a back problem and the rest was just purely awfully!  Now that I am reflecting and realizing how bad this month has started, I am ready for a change!

I have realized I don't need to detox, I need to eat healthy.  I don't need to train for a marathon, I need to get some physical activity.  I don't need to label every bin, basket, and shelf, I just need to slowly go through what we have, get rid of what we don't use and straighten the rest.

Here goes the start of my new year now that motivation has set in.  I plan on using the Lose It app on my iPhone.  We'll see.  Here is to a new year!  Cheers!  

Until Next Time,

Blair