Strawberry Lemonade Cupcakes!!

One of my favorite friends, Sabrina, recently had a birthday!! A quarter century birthday to be exact!! I wanted to bake something for her birthday party and I knew I wanted it to be summer-y so I went on a little blog hunt! I landed on one of my favorite blogs ever...Annie's Eats!! Must be in the name ;-)

I instantly decided to make her Strawberry Lemonade Cupcakes. And I am SO glad I did!! I ended up making 1 1/2 batches because she said her recipe only made 21 cupcakes. With a batch and a half I ended up with 27...so just about right. I might have overfilled a few but that's okay ;-)

It was one of those days that Jason was working, the party wasn't until 7...and I had a full camera battery. Enjoy some pictures and make sure to head over to Annie's Eats to see what she's all about!!

Yummy!!!

A little owl for the birthday girl!

Happy birthday to one of my best friends!!

new beater & PB cupcakes...

For Easter the Easter Bunny got me these items...

These gifts just about sum me up.

I'd been waiting and wanting to use my new KitchenAid beater. It's one of the ones that is supposed to clean the side of the bowl as it goes. Supposed to is the KEY phrase. As I found on yesterday...it works significantly better on wet ingredients than dry...

look at the floor...

Turns out the rubber paddle FLINGS the dry ingredients around! This was about 5 - 8 seconds worth of flinging. For second 1 - 4 I wasn't quite looking at the bowl {I was reading the next step} and from second 5 - 8 I was just starting at the bowl thinking {insert bleep here}. This is the aftermath. At least it wasn't in liquid stage. This beater worked MUCH better on the frosting of these delicious cupcakes!!

I'd been craving peanut butter and chocolate cupcakes for a while now. I couldn't decide on which I wanted to be frosting and which I wanted to be cake. I decided on this combo and it was yummy! Now, I think it could be yummier yet and I will be tweaking it in the future!!

I used the MS One Bowl Chocolate Cupcakes recipe {minus the safflower oil - whatever that is} and then the MS Creamy Peanut Butter Frosting. I used my micro plane to put chocolate shavings on top, the results would have been much more dramatic if I'd had dark chocolate. Also, the safflower oil isn't called for in the MS Cupcakes Book...I'll have to investigate!!

crissy's first birthday (baking extravaganza)...

One of my dearest friends Stacy had a baby girl about a year ago and this weekend we celebrated her first birthday! Stacy and I grew up two houses down from each other and I consider her more family than friend. I was honored to be invited to the celebration and even more honored to bake for it! Actually, Stacy baked and made the frosting for the cat cake and I did the rest!

The cat cake was chocolate with chocolate covered in vanilla fondant. The cupcakes were vanilla with Swiss meringue butter creme. The cakepops were vanilla/vanilla pop dipped in white chocolate.

This was my first real trial at cakepops. I had tried a few before cupcake camp because I knew that at camp I'd be meeting and learning from Bakerella - who 'invented' these little things, but they'd all been flubs! While at camp I learned about the real difference between melting chips, which is the coating on the outside of the cakepop. Then on Friday I visited my friend Megan who I made this farm cake for a few months ago, and she happens to live a few blocks from The Decorette Shop in Portland! There I bought too many just enough new supplies to make me happy :)

On to the pictures!!

Crissy's kitty cake!

The set up. Stacy did a wonderful job making it all look pretty!

Setting up the cakepop station! Please mind the mess.

Patting and Patting the cakepop!

Look at them!!

My favorite. Mrs. Purple cat cakepop.

My second favorite!

Pretty pretty cakepops.

Cupcakes! I always forget I have this stand :-)

Happy First Birthday Christine Elizabeth!!!

Oregon Coast Cupcake Camp!!!

I spent this last Friday and Saturday at cupcake camp! By now you know I love baking and have began to dable in cake/cupcake decorating. I found out about this camp through a friend I went to high school with who was one of the main volunteers. And then once I found out that Bakerella was going to be there I was SET! I also got to meet, take a class from, and actually assist Michelle Bommarito!!! I also entered some cupcakes into a contest and donated some to the worthy cause of Donate Life Northwest. You see, this whole cupcake camp was a charity even put on by Celeste of Nye Beach Market in Newport, Oregon. Everyone there had something to share, learn, or give about this event. I myself am an organ donar should that time ever come. It was a toucing, exciting, fun, and pretty much "one of the best things I've ever done for myself" kind of weekend.

I'm going to post some pictures tonight and I'll write more about the events of the weekend soon! Jason and I are currently cooking like crazy in the kitchen - we're finally trying to make a menu for one week, go shopping for the 'little' stuff that week (we do our big grocery shopping at Winco or Costco once a month). This will hopefully make us become more mindful of our food, our meals, and help us to not eat out as often, though that is still on the menu, but only a few times a month... baby steps :) More on that later too...

Onto the cupcake camp pictures!!!

:) Can't wait to make more cake pops!!

Meeting Bakerella :)

Dipping a cupcake pop in Bakerella's class.

Myself and Michelle Bommarito

Look at all the cupcakes! And they were all donated!!!

I bought some cupcakes!

The judges eating MY Marionberry cupcake!!!

Robyn & Annie picnic. 2010 edition...

I have this friend. She is great. Years ago before cars, college, weddings, boyfriends, and cell phones we started a tradition of going on a picnic. My friends name is Robyn. You've seen her in many other posts, probably because she is fun to have around!

It all started in 1998 and we've only missed two summer's since. One was 2008 when we climbed Mt. St. Helen's in place of the picnic. Okay, I should clarify. Robyn and Joe climbed it. Jason and I didn't make it, we ran out of water! Ooops! The other was 2009 when we were both busy getting MARRIED!!! Just 2 weeks apart at that! We always meet at Robyn's old elementary school which, when we were in high school we used to walk to and pack our own lunches. Then when we were in high school we drove to Bruchi's and got sandwiches. This time around Robyn made the food, all of which I tried and most of which I liked, and I made the desserts :) Perfect pair!!!

Here are a few pictures from our 2010 adventure.

The lunch Robyn put together. Cheese and bread. Fruits. Mozzarella, Tomato, Basil salad. Figs wrapped in some kind of meat...

Chocolate cupcake with fresh strawberry butter creme. All homemade by me!

The take home box for Robyn to bring to Joe. We also ate one of each there!

Robyn looking at picutres I brought from picnic's past.

2010. Who knows what will happen between this year and next :)

homemade gifts...

...for my Mom.

This year for my Mom's birthday I made her some homemade gifts!!! I was happy with how they turned out and she seemed happy to recieve them. She's really been the one over the years who's taken the time, money, and patients to teach me how to cook and sew. Thanks mom, I love you!!!

Making the "cheater" cake. PS. This ice cream scoop is THE best way to scoop cupcakes!! Try it!

cooling cupcakes.

German Chocolate Cake with the frosting. My Mom's favorite for her birthday!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!

the apron i made for my mom.

voltuneer tea with cupcakes...

I did do a little bit of cake decorating this month. After the hit of my last batch of mini cupcakes it was requested I make more for the Volunteer Tea my school puts on for all the volunteer parents. I happily obliged...with delicious and pretty results. Though next time I know not to put the fresh strawberries on top of white frosting too early...lesson learned. Also, this recipe was MUCH better than the batch I made for my own birthday. I'm sorry Martha but your recipe did not cut it. I got a recipe off OnDemand of the Sprinkles Capcakes show. It was AMAZING!!!

Mini Strawberry Cupcakes with chocolate and cream cheese frosting with fresh strawberries on top. I did cheat at use store bought frosting...next time I won't!!! I was in a time crunch!

One of the two trays. They were a huge hit. They've been requested again...

attack of the minis (cake version)...

Last week I made a good luck/good-bye cake for our two student teachers Katie & Kristin.

Here are the pictures :)

this is what a KitchenAid looks like with a double batch of icing!!!

this is what my husband does with the cake scraps!

a couple dozen mini cupcakes!

a mini 6 inch cake. covered in fondant and bordered with fondant circles.

the spread :)

cake and a peak at the cupcakes :)

mini goodness!