60th Birthday Party

My wonderful MIL just turned 60 last month. My sister in law planned an awesome surprise party for her! The theme was "Your 50s are Gone with the Wind!" One of her favorite books is Gone with the Wind so it was perfect! It had a garden party setting and was really beautiful.

I was in charge of the cake so we settled on a simple white icing and some beautiful flowers. I used real flowers to make it really easy on myself! I used the Duff brand icing comb to make the lines. It was definitely a trial and error process! You have to have a lot of smooth and even icing on the cake in order for it to look right. I also should have had it on a turn table to get it to be more consistent. Plus my icing texture needed some work. I still need some practice but I knew that I wasn't going to be able to make it perfect! Hopefully I can make more like this in the future and keep getting better! That's always my goal in cake decorating!

A Ballet Birthday for Maclayne

Maclayne decided that she wanted a ballet party for her 5th Birthday. The only color that she knew she wanted for sure was gold. First she wanted purple and gold, then settled on black and gold. It was really easy to find black and gold decor at Hobby Lobby. They had a gold and white striped poster board that I used for the background. We put "Happy Birthday Maclayne" across it using black vinyl. Our only issue is that the transfer paper took off the gold when we pulled it away. It looked fine from a distance, but you could see it up close. I cut gold ballerinas and triangles from black, gold, and white paper to make the banner. I used black and gold wrapping paper as the runner.

This year she was very opinionated about her dessert! She turned down every kind of cake option I threw out there. She wanted a peanut butter cake, but the recipe I tried did not turn out well. Then I introduced her to the Peanut Butter Trifle and she was on board. It was so delicious!

I also made some ballerina sugar cookies. I decorated them with white royal icing and finished them by spraying on a light coat of Wilton Color Mist. I really love the way they turned out and the mist worked so well (on dry cookies).

It turned out to be such a cute party and she had a blast! 

Horse Party

I'm going back a little ways in our birthday party archives to show you Mackenzie's horse party that we had for her 7th birthday. It was such a fun party to plan and everyone had a blast taking turns riding the horse!

I had the idea to have root beer for our "Waterin Hole." The kids loved having the glass bottles and they were outside so that was nice! I made the sign on my Silhouette Cameo using adhesive card stock. I really love that stuff because it is so versatile!

I used bandannas for a lot of the decorating and we also gave one to each child that came! They all felt like real cowgirls and cowboys then!

I made "Haystacks" for party favors. They were really easy to make. I used this recipe to make them, but left out the peanuts. They were yummy! I found some bandanna ribbon at Hobby Lobby and made some tags on the silhouette that said "Haystacks."

I also made some boot shaped sugar cookies. These were really simple to make. I always follow these directions for the royal icing. All I had to do was flood the cookies with the brown icing, wait for them to dry, and then go back and pipe the detailing. 

The cupcakes were also really easy to make. I just piped the turquoise frosting on top. Next, I used a small horse cookie cutter and cut out the shape from brown fondant. I used an edible marker to create the mane and face details. They were also very easy to make!

I loved the horse theme and it is so easy to find decorations and party supplies! This was definitely one of my favorite parties that we have thrown for the girls!

Under Construction Baby Shower

When my sisters and I found out that our brother and sister in law were having a little boy, we were so excited! There had not been a boy baby since my oldest sister had one 16 years before! We had gotten so used to planning girl baby showers so this was new for us! My sister really liked the "Under Construction" theme, which is all boy and so cute! We had a lot of fun coming up with the decor and food.

We had chocolate donuts as truck tires. I found most of the decorations at Hobby Lobby, but I made the signs on my Silhouette Cameo. They were really easy, just print and cut a diamond shape with the food name. We did Nothing Bundt Cake Bundtinis for the dessert because my SIL loves them and they are so delicious! 

We had different dessert breads and muffins as rocks and boulders and had them spilling out of the back of the dump truck. We gave all of the trucks and tractors as part of our gift. 

A bowl of fruit was nuts and bolts. We also had concrete mix or more appetizing, hashbrown casserole!

The beverages were placed in the fueling station! 

For favors we did Mounds Candy Bars with tags that said "Thanks for the mound of gifts!"

It really turned out to be a cute shower and it was fun to do something that was completely different than what we normally do with all of our girlie parties!

Nutcracker Cookies

We just finished another year of Nutcracker rehearsals and shows! This year my daughter had a solo as the Columbine Doll so we were all super excited! We finished the week with a cast party after the Saturday show. I decided to make decorated sugar cookies. I made mice, snowflakes and tutus. Tim made the cookie cutters on his 3D printer, which was very convenient! I was really happy with how they turned out, I just wish I had more time to make more! They went fast!

Colorado Springs Trip

We took a quick trip up to Colorado Springs recently and had such a great time! We crammed a lot of driving and activities into just a few days! It took us about 12 1/2 hours to get there, but it was so worth it! We arrived in Colorado Springs on a Friday and decided to drive right up Pike's Peak. I was extremely nervous about this, but I managed to hold it together. I was even able to snap a few pics on the way up!

The last picture is of some sheep that were grazing very close to the top of the mountain. It was around 86 degrees at the bottom of the mountain and in the low 40s at the top, which we were very excited about! When we got to the top of the mountain, we had to try the donuts and hot chocolate. The girls did not like the donuts at all, but loved the hot chocolate. The donuts were a cakey texture with hints of nutmeg and other spices. They were OK, but I'm pretty sure they are only famous because of the mountain and experience! We snapped a few pics at the top and then headed back down. We happened to see a goat walking near a lookout point so we stopped and I got out to take some pics. 2 more walked up at that time, which was really exciting! 

Later that night we went to Cave of the Winds. This was one of my favorite parts of the trip. I didn't take any pics inside of the cave, but I did take some on their balcony. The place is located high in the mountains and extends over a canyon. They have some thrill rides but I would never have the guts to do them! After the cave tour, we waited for the free laser show. After dark, they cast the lasers onto one of the canyon walls. The show is set to music and was great. The breeze that came through was so nice! 

The next morning we attempted to go to Garden of the Gods, but it was way too crowded. We decided to drive up to Breckenridge, which was a nice 74 degrees. We rode the gondola (which is free in the summer) and got some awesome views. Afterwards, we played in the Blue River. This was probably the girls favorite part of the trip! The water was very cold but so clear and beautiful! 

Later that day we went back to Garden of the Gods and it was empty! We had a picnic in one of the picnic areas and enjoyed the views. Then we hiked one of the easy trails up to The Siamese Twins rocks. Both girls really enjoyed it and loved playing on the rocks. It was getting dark, but the views were still awesome!

On Sunday we went to Cañon Springs and went on a family raft trip. We really enjoyed this and I would highly recommend it! Next time we go we would like to try one that has a few more rapids since this one was very tame. We did the morning trip, which was nice because it got pretty warm. Our guide was great and the girls thought he was lots of fun. We didn't snap any pics and I really regret that because their picture prices were ridiculous! If you ever go, make sure to bring a waterproof or disposable camera!

We also decided to skip the tourist attraction of Seven Falls, but we still wanted to see the falls. I had done some research online and found that you can hike an "easy" trail to the top of Mt. Cutler. While this trail had no real obstacles, we still found it long and a little slippery. However, this was our first mountain trail and I am a bit of a scaredy cat! Maclayne actually did the whole thing without having to be carried (but not without whining)! We didn't go all the way up to the summit because it was thundering, but we got a great view of the falls! It was totally worth it!

We finished the trip with one last visit to Garden of the Gods so the girls could run and play. They had so much fun and were very sad to leave (so were mom and dad)! We left for home the next morning and drove all day! The girls were so good and we all can't wait for the next trip to Colorado!

Rustic Wedding Cake

My younger sister got married this past weekend and asked me to make the cake. I knew it would be a huge undertaking, but I decided to go for it. This is only the 2nd wedding cake I've made but it was by far the biggest . I usually just make birthday cakes, which are so much less stressful! My sister asked for a rustic cake so I thought I could handle it. I know I over thought the frosting technique because I was trying to duplicate a picture. I called her on the wedding day, freaking out a bit, to try to understand exactly what she was expecting(a little late, I know!). She simply stated that she wanted it to look intentionally messy. Messy is hard for me since I'm all about pattern and symmetry, but she was happy with the finished product! I'll explain a little more about the process!

I feel like one of the hardest parts of cake making is getting perfect tiers. This cake is 14 inches, then 10 inches, then 6 inches on top. I was worried about how the biggest layers would turn out, but they were some of the best I've made. That silver thing in the middle of the cake is a flower nail used to make buttercream flowers. It makes a perfect heat core! I made sure to grease it well and put it in the middle of the pan before adding the batter. I also always bang the pans on the counter to even the batter and get out any air bubbles. I only put 1 pan in the oven at a time to ensure that it baked evenly. The cakes baked up perfectly!

I felt kind of dumb, but I just recently learned the proper way to put a cake together. I used to always flip the cakes over and make the bottom of the cake sit on top, since it is always flat. This is all wrong. You want the tops of the cakes to be touching. This way you have the light colored crust in the middle of the layers, and the darker crusts around the edges. It makes for prettier slices, but also made my tiers very even. I didn't even have to cut these. I also cut and placed 4 dowels in each of the bottom two layers and then put 2 sharpened dowels through the middle of all 3 layers.This icing technique required a good, chilled crumb coat before adding the rustic look.

Once the cake had chilled for about an hour, I made a ton of buttercream icing. You want to be very generous when applying the icing. I used a small offset spatula and moved it back and forth and up and down, all over the cake. I would get big dollops of icing and just start moving it around the cake. At times, my husband would catch me creating too much of a pattern, so I would go back and try to mess it up a bit! I wrapped the twine and ribbon that I had lined with wax paper around the bottom of the tiers and secured it with clean sewing pins. It was very secure. After it was done, I placed it back in the fridge to set up a bit. It was pretty easy to transport and didn't move at all! It was a lot of work, but I felt a great sense of accomplishment when it was done!