Father's Day Candy Bar Card

For Father's Day Adrianna and I put this card together for Gregory's enjoyment.  I don't know if it was more fun to watch Addie helping make the card or watching Gregory's face when he saw the card for the first time?

This is a little collage of some 6 month belly bump photos.

The background of the baby bump collage is the wall of our new baby girls nursery.  

I finished painting and stenciling yesterday. Here are some photos of the finished paint job...

I was impressed that even with the texture on the drywall the stencil still turned out pretty and neat.  Ignore the paint supplies mess in the corner. ;)

I will post more pictures when we bring the furniture in.

Lemon Crinkle Cookies

I saw this recipe on Pinterest and anything Lemon I have to Pin!  I love the fresh taste of lemon in desserts.  These Cookies are more like a sugar cookie with a hint of lemon.  They are soft and chewy and really delicious.

Lemon Crinkle Cookies
Makes 2 dozen

Ingredients:
½ cups butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
½ teaspoons vanilla extract
1 whole egg
1 teaspoon lemon zest
1 Tablespoon fresh lemon juice
¼ teaspoons salt
¼ teaspoons baking powder
⅛ teaspoons baking soda
1-½ cup all-purpose flour
½ cups powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease light colored baking sheets with non-stick cooking spray and set aside.  Or use Silpats as I always do and no need to grease cookie sheet.

In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Whip in vanilla, egg, lemon zest, and juice. Scrape sides and mix again. Stir in all dry ingredients slowly until just combined, excluding the powdered sugar. Scrape sides of bowl and mix again briefly. 

Pour powdered sugar onto a large plate. Roll a heaping teaspoon of dough into a ball and roll in powdered sugar. Place on baking sheet and repeat with remaining dough.

Bake for 9-11 minutes or until bottoms begin to barely brown and cookies look matte {not melty or shiny}. Remove from oven and cool cookies about 3 minutes before transferring to cooling rack.

*If using a non-stick darker baking tray, reduce baking time by about 2 minutes.

A Night in Paris

For my birthday I really wanted to have a nice mellow night with a few besties and no kids! ;)  Gregory was awesome and ambitious enough to take the kiddos out to Red Robin for a nice romantic dinner while the girls hung out and did our share of girl talk and then buried into the couch to watch Midnight in Paris.

The Menu was simple (it was my birthday after all, I didn't want to spend all day in the kitchen) & delicious.

We had an assortment of French Cheeses.  Brie, Comte & Boursin 

Assorted Quiche (Spinach, Mushroom & 3 Cheese) as well as simplified Croque Monsieur's (Ham & Cheese) Croissants

The salad was Bibb Lettuce with Apple, Toasted Walnuts and Roquefort Cheese.  Then topped with homemade Vinaigrette.

Princess Birthday Cake Castle

Sophia has always been near and dear to our hearts ever since she was born.  When Trina asked me to make Sophia's 4th Birthday cake, I was very excited.  Sophia's favorite themes were Princess and Barbie, so Trina and I started researching some cake ideas.  Even little Sophia did some research on her own.  I had never made a two-tiered cake before so I thought, now is the perfect time.  A little princess deserves a two-tiered cake for her birthday.  I had a lot of different ideas in my head but after going through cake cookbooks with Sophia and getting a feel for her favorites, I knew we had to do something with Barbie and her Castle... 

And this is what was created...

Sophia and all of her girlfriends crowded around the birthday cake as she blew out the candles and made her wish.

 It was worth every minute of baking & decorating to see Sophia and a room full of 4-year-old's eyes light up, when they saw the castle cake.

Captain Mason's 1st Birthday Party!

Our Good friend's Ashleigh & Archie threw an amazing Pirate Party for there son Mason's 1st birthday!  

I was able to help contribute to the pirate theme celebration by making the dessert table.

The treasure chest was a lot of fun to assemble.  I used Hershey's Gold & Silver Nuggets, Gold and Silver Chocolate Coins, Ring pops and Candy Necklaces for the "Treasures."

The amazing Pirate Ship Cake was made by Cinderella Cakes (www.cinderellacakes.com)

 It was a the perfect "centerpiece" for the dessert table!

This was my first time using royal icing on sugar cookies.  (You would think with my love of baking it wouldn't take me 32 years to decorate a cookie with royal icing).  It was definitely intimidating because I wanted everything to be perfect, but I can't be too hard on myself for my first try!  And most importantly they were delicious!!  I am excited for more cookie decorating/practice/tasting in the near future! :)

Ashleigh really wanted to try and keep the table colorful and fun because it was for just a little one's birthday after all!  I decided to keep the frosting colors bright and fun and I couldn't resist when I saw the adorable pirate themed cupcake decorations.  I especially loved the ship and parrot cupcake toppers!

These adorable pirate skull lollipops were found online

The Canon balls were really easy and fun to make.  When the Rice Krispies were ready, I used a cookie scoop to shape the rice krispie treats into balls.  They were chewy and delicious and I added some red and blue sprinkles to the mix to bring a little color to treat!

Adrianna's 2nd Birthday

One of Adrianna's first words was "Elmo!"  So it was a no brainer when deciding a theme for her 2nd birthday party.

 I had some ideas of how I wanted the invitation to look but my skill at Graphic Designing just was not up to the same standard as the vision in my head.  With the help of some talented friends they were able to bring my image to life.  I started by picking up the letters from JoAnn's Fabrics and used  scrapbook paper to wrap the letters.  Then Trina Akiyama and I spent a long day at the park in front of our house and Trina with her patience galore was able to capture some amazing pictures of Addie holding the letters.  When I was telling my sister about the idea I had for the invitation she told me about Beka Clement with http://paixaodesigns.blogspot.com/.  Beka took my vision and made it into reality.  I was so pleased with the end result.

Adrianna loves her Elmo, but she also loves her colors as well.  We stuck with the Elmo theme but threw in rainbow colors to the mix.  I really knew we would get the wow factor from our two year old when we decorated with bright colors.  "Whoa, Mommy!!" "Is gween, and back and arnge, and bew, and purpal!" "IS ELMO!!"  And of course we threw in little bits of "Cookie." (her nickname for cookie monster)

My favorite part of party planning is the dessert table. 

Fortunately we had Elmo there to keep a close watch on Addie's Personal Rainbow Cake.

The dessert table was filled with Cookie Monster's Cookies,  Elmo and Cookie Cupcakes, Homeade S'mores Pops and more!

These Rainbow ribbon topairy's were a lot of fun to make.  For a detailed step by step on how to make them check out... http://www.polkadotbirthday.com/2008/06/table-decor-polka-dot-ribbon-topiary.html

The base you can be creative.  I just bought some terra cotta pots from Micheals and painted them my desired colors.

We set up a fun "make your own elmo" cookie station.  The kids loved decorating there cookies and of course a couple tastes of icing along the way doesn't hurt.

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We had a book there for people to sign for Adrianna to look at when she is older.  The favors of course included goldfish and crayons and some other fun treats for toddlers.