Addie's thank you cards

Modern Stripe 3x5 folded card

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Reece's Rainbow --- and another giveaway!

Thank you all so much for rallying together to help sweet Olga! Together, we raised $12,354 for her adoption fund!!!! Woohoo!!! God is good and he is answering our prayers. It looks like Olga will find her forever family. I've been told that there have been several families inquire about her...now we are just waiting for someone to jump.

Now I want you to meet Kareen...



KareenBorn January 15, 2007

This pretty muffin is waiting for her family! She is healthy, with no heart condition noted in her records. She has brown hair and hazel eyes, and is already up and learning to walk! Her records indicate “meiotic nondisjunction”, but this is just a fancy word for what happens to create “Down syndrome” genetically. She is considered higher functioning and is really doing well. She is an orphanage favorite, and the director has asked for a family to save her from the institution.


So let's do this! :) We can come together for Kareen, just like we did for Olga! AND...if you help her out you will earn up to TEN chances to win an iPad!!! Plus other awesome prizes!

Go visit Patti and Lily to find out how!

Let's help Olga

This sweet little girl's story is really tugging at my heart strings today. Just look at that sweet, innocent face. If I could run and scoop her up in my arms and bring her home I would. But my family is just not in a place right now to do that. So I'm doing anything and everything else I can to get the word out. Care to join me? Let's all come together and help this sweet child, before it's too late.

Meet Olga

Head on over to THIS AWESOME BLOG to see how you can win a brand spankin' new iPod Touch by helping sweet Olga out!

UPDATE! Her fund has over $1660 already! Let's keep it going. Pass the word along, pray, donate. We can all help this sweet little one :)

Salted caramel cupcakes

I could have also titled this post: delicious little bites of baked up heaven.

Alternatively, I could call this: Call your tailor because you'll need your pants let out!

WOW. WOW. WOW.

These are good. Not too sweet. Very rich. Just a tiny hint of salt to really set off the caramel flavor. Delicious!

Want to make your own?

Cupcake ingredients:

• 1 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
• ¾ tsp baking powder
• ¼ tsp salt
• 1 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• ½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 2 large eggs, at room temperature
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• ½ cup milk

1. Position a rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 350°F. Line a standard 12-cup muffin pan with paper liners. I used fun polka dot ones that I got at.....target I *think*.
2. In a bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, using an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat the sugars and butter together until light and fluffy, 2-3 minutes. Add the eggs and vanilla and beat until combined. Add flour mixture in 3 additions, alternating with the milk in 2 additions, beating on low speed until just combined; scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed.
3. Divide the batter evenly among the prepared muffin cups, filling each about two-thirds full. I ended up with a bit extra...so instead of having overflowing cupcakes I could have made a few mini cupcakes to feed Thing 1 and Thing 2. You live and learn...
4. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center of a cupcake comes out clean, 20-22 minutes. Let the cupcakes cool in the pan on a wire rack for 5 minutes. Transfer the cupcakes to the wire rack and let cool completely.

Meanwhile....make your frosting!

• 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup milk (whole milk is best)
• 1 stick of unsalted butter (don't make any exceptions on this. Get quality butter) 
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup packed dark brown sugar 

1. Whisk together the flour and the milk. Heat in a small sauce pan on medium heat.
2. Whisk continuously until it starts to thicken. Let it cook, while stirring, until you can start to see the bottom of the pan. It might be lumpy....no big deal. Place the mixture in a fine mesh strainer and stir with a rubber spatula to push it through into a bowl.
3. You should end up with a nice, smooth mixture. Like semi-set pudding.
4. Put this mixture in the fridge and let it cool completely, it’s fine if it stays in there long enough to get chilly, you just don’t want it warm at all. Or be like me and throw that mush into the freezer for 10-15 minutes.
5. It an electric stand mixer with the whisk attachment, beat the butter and the sugars for a minute or two until well combined and fluffy. Then while beating, add in the thickened milk mixture. Beat to combine and then scrape down the sides. It going to look kind of gross at this stage, but just wait. This is where the magic goodness happens! 
6. Beat on med-high for 7-8 minutes. Don't worry...it's worth it.
7. After 7-8 minutes it will have transformed from that sloppy mess into something gorgeous, fluffy, and incredibly light and silky.

I transferred my frosting to a decorators bag (alternatively you could use a zippy bag and snip a corner off) and piped it on top.

Sprinkle a little bit of sea salt on top of each one.

THEN...to make it even better I drizzled melted chocolate on top :) Everything is better with chocolate!

ENJOY! And let me know if you made them. I think the frosting would be great on chocolate cupcakes. In fact...I plan on making my favorite chocolate cupcakes from one of my favorite food bloggers here pretty soon. And I'll post of that too and let you know how it goes. I'm not sure how I'll be able to combine this awesomeness with all the sheer awesomeness of the PW....but I shall try!

Cupcake Camp--with Bakerella!!!

Ack! Sorry It's been so stinking long since I posted anything. I've been busy baking, sewing, mothering, wife..ing? Okay that's not really a word, but life took over and I got busy. But I'm back and I have pictures to share!!!!

A few weeks ago I had the best time at Cupcake Camp. Huh? Yeah. That's right...I said cupcake camp. It was SO much fun! And best of all I met Bakerella. She is quite possibly one of the sweetest ladies I have ever met. So humble too!

(pay no attention to the geeked out, crazy-eyed girl on the right)

She showed us all of her neat tricks to making awesome cakepops!

How to crumble your cake and make sure there are no lumps...

How to turn your rolled cake ball into a cupcake shape...

How to dip them and stick them...

And, of course...decorate them!

She showed us all of her prefered supplies....we even got to help make some cute pops!

That little ghosty is the one I made:

I had so much fun, got my Cake Pops book autographed and one for my sister too! She was too swollen and doped up on painkillers to attend with me.

 Word to the wise: don't put off getting your wisdom teeth out...it only gets worse.

I've been testing out different cake/frosting combos and making some cute cakepops lately. I will be posting some soon!

Adios Jenna! (aka Air Force cake)

My friend Jenna is in the Air Force and is being stationed in England...she's leaving Friday so we decided to have a going away party! And, of course, I wanted to surprise her with a cake :)

Chocolate and yellow butter cake layers with cheesecake mousse filling.

Speaking of cheesecake mousse...don't frost a cake with it if you plan on covering it in fondant. It is too wet and makes your fondant turn sticky and it kind of slides around. That makes your cake bumpy.

Lesson learned.

It still tasted yummy.

Oh...and another word for the wise: If you buy your spices and other baking staples in bulk...LABEL THEM. Otherwise your chocolate cake might not taste like chocolate. I'm not sure what I put it in...but I don't think it was cocoa powder. Everyone said it tasted "Christmas-y". Hahaha!

Take-out...errr, cake...out??

What's this?!!

I ordered sweet and sour chicken....not chocolate cake with strawberry filling!

Wait!

Chocolate cake?

Sweet!

So yesterday I had a stroke of pure genious! I thought to myself...cake is delicious....chinese take-out boxes are adorable....hmmm....let's bake some cake in them! And now you can too! :) Here's what you need:

Your favorite cake recipe (or boxed mix)

Your favorite filling (about a cup or so)

Frosting (anything delicious...about 2 cups)

8 16oz chinese take-out boxes

Bismark filling tip (if you want to fill your cake)

Non-stick cooking spray (or whatever you prefer to use for greasing the insides of your boxes)

Step 1: Preheat your oven to 375 degrees and prepare your take-out boxes by spraying the insides of them, or greasing the bottom and halfway up the sides with whatever method floats your boat. Place them in a large cake pan or on a cookie sheet.



Step 2: Make your cake batter...

Step 3: Laddle your batter carefully into your boxes. Start off with about 1/2 C. in each one and then divide the remaining batter as best you can. It's not an exact science...no one will compare who has the bigger cake. They'll all just be stoked to have cake in an adorable take-out box!

Step 4: Carefully wipe any batter that splashed or dripped on the sides or flaps of your boxes. I was super messy. Nothing new.

Step 5: Place your cakepan of take-out cakes in your oven and turn it down to 350 degrees. Time these babies for 15 minutes. Turn, and bake for 10 minutes more. Check them, if a knife or cake tester comes out clean...you're golden. If not, bake them a few minutes longer.

Step 6: Cool completely! I know it's hard. Really, I do. But it's worth it!

Step 7: FILL!!! I used Wilton's bismark filler tip from my cupcake decorating set and piped some organic strawberry preserves into the middle of my cakes...yummy!

Step 8: Frost those puppies! I made a simple chocolate buttercream frosting, but anything would be great--mix it up!

Step 9: Share the delicious, diabetic coma-inducing, adorable love!

These would be great if you made a nice vanilla cake and filled it with a fluffy vanilla buttercream (maybe with a bit of orange zest in it!) The possibilities are endless! Thank goodness I have a ton of these boxes left!