Royal Icing Butterflies

I've noticed a theme recently in my blogging. Cupcakes. Sorry. It's a hobby I've become fond of. And seriously, who doesn't like looking at cupcakes? Don't pretend you're suffering, it's not all THAT bad!

Yesterday I attempted to make royal icing butterflies. I'd never made or used royal icing before. The first batch I tried turned out really thick and pasty and the butterflies were horrendous, so I decided to add a little bit of water and they ended up looking a little more decent. I think they would have looked even better had I made the wings 3-D rather than flush with the body, but since it was my first rodeo with royal icing I figured I'd better take the easy route first. They turned out okay, not professional, but okay. I AM starting to get a lot better at the traditional 1M swirl though when it comes to piping, so that was encouraging.

I used a store bought black buttercream (out of a can that looks like cheeze-whiz. gasp!) for the bodies as I didn't have black food coloring when I made the royal icing and initially just did them blue like the wings. So today, having 15 royal icing butterflies on hand, I of course had to do what any cupcake lovin' gal would do, and gave them a cupcake home!

Cupcake specs:

• Chocolate-fudge cake
• D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S cream cheese frosting ( got the recipe from Wilton's website & colored it yellow. I love Wilton).
• Party Sprinkles

Outcome:

• Rich, creamy, and delectable

Mmmmm! Are you hungry yet? Stop by, I'd love to indulge your belly with cupcakes!

Blanding Trip

These people are my wonderful aunt and uncle who were kind enough to let us venture down to their home in Blanding and spend the weekend with them. We had a blast, as always with these people, and it was hard to come home so soon. My uncle Clayton's family has a beautiful ranch just outside of Blanding where we kicked the weekend off by meeting them Friday evening for dinner on our way down. We were served fajitias that were cooked over the fire (delicious!), rode 4 wheelers in the mountain, & just hung out and caught up.
Saturday morning we woke up to Clayton's amazing French Muffin Buns (I'm not sure if that's the exact name...I'm pretty sure "Muffin" and "buns" are contained in the name...all I know is that they were incredibly yummy and I know many of my cousins are gonna be jealous that they missed out as it's a family favorite :0)
Kim, Clayton, Jessi, Kyle, & Brad and I (Dany had some crazy shifts at work this weekend so she couldn't join us) then went galavanting out east of Blanding and explored & hiked around some ruins at Cave Towers & then headed over to Texas Flat and the Arch Canyon (?) Overlook where we had a picnic lunch. To think these ruins were built by Indians even before Christ was on Earth, and they are still standing today, is absolutely mind boggling.
(Can you believe it?! It's a photo of us! We do exist! It's been so long since I've had any photos of us to post...)

On the way home we hit up a spot to do some shooting, then went back to their home where we BBQ'd burgers, played Rockband & Wii ( I haven't laughed that hard in a long time! Between singing to the Beatles on Rockband so Kim could give a shot at the drums ---I don't sing. Ever.--And Kim's continuous "bubbling" in Mario Brothers, we had a lot of laughter happening)

We had such a fun time hanging out with the family & appreciate them housing & entertaining us all weekend!

Of course I have to finish this post up with a photo of Zuma. She is my cousin's Great Dane and she is hilarious. She is scared of everything, wild as heck, and cute cute cute. They've had her for about a year and Brad and I have been dying to meet her, so naturally I had to get a photo of her.

To : The Dirtbags Who Stole Our Stuff

Dear Dirtbags of the World---

Thank you so much for breaking into our car last night & stealing our stuff. Your mothers must be proud of how low-life & filthy their children have become. I appreciate that you so kindly broke off our entire exterior door handle while trying to carry out your plan. We were tired of it anyways, but just have never found the time to rip it off ourselves yet. I'm so glad to find that while you were tearing the dash and all of it's components completely apart to steal our stereo, that you stil had enough time to kick-back, relax, and enjoy smoking your cigarettes in our car- --I know it was probably the hardest work you've done in your life, and therefore the smokes were a well-deserved break.

It was wonderful to see your work ethic in your endeavors to rummage through every knook and cranny possible to be sure you didn't miss anything even remotely valuable, while managing to throw everything from those locations (paper, garbage, miscellaneous items) all over our car.

Oh yes, and thank you for so kindly taking all of our cds with you as you left, as well as Brad's greasy dirty coat. I'm assuming you needed the cd's to listen to while you wait at the laundry mat as you're probably taking the coat to be dry cleaned .... in which case I'm glad you were able to find and take every single & last penny (cause that's the only type of coin there was at the time) out of our ashtray with you, as I realize laundry mats aren't free. I'm assuming you will be returning the newly laundered coat promptly.

And how could I forget?! Ripping off & taking the tachometer right off the dash as you left was a long awaited blessing. It was SO annoying there.

Much Thanks,
The Dixons
(who you'll be sorry you stole from if we ever find you)

My Cupcake Topiary

Here it is, the cupcake project I've been dying to get my little frosting covered fingers on. (Okay...that sounds gross. Don't worry, I really am sanitary). I saw this in a magazine a while ago and have been dying to make it ever since. Pardon me for bragging, but I think this turned out so stinking cute!
I glued a cute ribbon on the trim of the clay pot, stuffed a Styrofoam ball in it, then used a glue gun to attach some of that mossy-grass stuff. I then stuck toothpicks in the ball (2 per cupcake) and slid the cupcakes onto them, before decorating them. I chose to make buttercream hydrangea flowers and created a pink and a red frosting that were just slightly different in value which really gave the flowers depth & helped make them look realistic (It also gave them a hint of shimmer, bonus!)
Here's the finished project. I also used that yummy Amaretto flavoring for the frosting again, but this time choose to do a yellow cake as the chocolate from my last cupcake extravaganza may have been a bit too rich with the frosting.

I Heart Cupcakes

Lately I have been on a cupcake kick, and I'm not talking appetite-craving wise, but more-so creating/baking-wise. There is something so delicate and simple about cupcakes that I just love, and I have been on a decorating extravaganza since Brad's family gave me a huge set of icing tips and pastry bags for my birthday. I'm still pretty amateur, but have been having a blast trying new things out.

This is my first cupcake decorating experience with my new gadgets. I decided to make some "thank you" cupcakes and take to my in-laws since they were the ones to provide me with all this good stuff that I have been having so much fun with.And this is today's, a two-toned frosting experiment that turned out great. Aren't they fun? Although next time I think I'll heighten the contrast & value of the two icing colors for more of a distinction. I also flavored this icing with an amaretto flavoring, and it was delicious.

Next on my cupcake decorating agenda, a mother's day project. I'm super excited.