Caroline's White Cake With Chocolate Frosting

Caroline is six.  Don't you think it's high time she should know how to bake a cake and make frosting? 

She certainly thinks so. 

So first thing this morning - 7AM - we put our aprons on and got to baking.  She made me promise that she could do the WHOLE THING by herself.  Luckily enough for me, I didn't have a single thing planned this weekend, so at 7am we went at it.  Well, she did.

I tried to show her how to crack the eggs to separate them and she kept breaking the yolks.  She looked me straight in the eye and said "If you just leave me alone and let me do it, they won't break."  She didn't break a single one after I let her be!

Normally I don't let the kids get too dirty in the kitchen and make a big mess, but she wanted to feel what the yolks felt like.  :)  She said they were squishy.

Our next door neighbor Megan came over right when it was time to taste the batter.  She has great timing!

Semi-sweet chocolate for the frosting, ready to go into the food processor.

I've tried several different methods of melting chocolate that are much quicker than this. Using a double broiler seems to produce a better consistency though.

My son happened to wander over when the frosting was done.  He has good timing too!

Don't you just want to eat this?  Click Here for the frosting recipe.

Ever wonder how people frost a chocolate cake and never seem to get any of the frosting on their cake plate?  This is how: cut up four squares of parchement paper and overlap them so no part of the cake plate is exposed.  When the cake is set, then pull out the parchment and voila!

Sampling her work....

Click Here

for the recipe

We made a special trip to the store to get ice cream for her.  *Of course, she added sprinkles.**  it's just not finished without sprinkes!

Valentine's Day at School

I have been making the kid's Valentines for a few years now, instead of buying them.  This year was a tad overwhelming though as both kids have *30* kids in their class.  That's 60 homemade Valentines that require multiple steps to make each one.  Good times, I know.

Using my handy new paper trimmer, I cut some red and pink cardstock.  It took five batches of Rice Krispie treats to get 30 individual hearts cut out with a heart shaped cookie cutter.  Luckily, the treats are super sticky and stuck right to the paper all by themselves.

I was also tapped to make some cookies for my son's class.  I am sure each kid noted how long it took me to make all these cookies, right?

I tried hard to find an idea that wasn't too girly for my son's Valentines.  Obviously I didn't succeed.  Let's face it, Valentine's Day in general is pretty girly. 

This project was incredibly simple, just a little time consuming.  I found a heart punch that I used to cut out the cardstock heart shapes.  Each flower has four hearts.  Then, I took a hole punch and punched a hole in the bottom of each heart.  I lined up the holes and then glued them down.  Dum-Dums were the suckers that I used, but Blow Pops would work too.  At the last minute I added some hot glue to the Dum-Dums to make sure they didn't come loose.

How cute are these?!

Birthday Cookies

Caroline's birthday is on December 15th which falls on a weekday this year.  I try and make her birthday extra special as I don't want her to feel lost with Christmas coming right around the corner. 

This is her first year in school and I decided to make her some cookies to take to class so they can celebrate her birthday with her.  I picked up this crown cookie cutter when I was still pregnant with her. I knew it would come in handy someday!

I wanted to make the jewels really sparkle, so I sprinkled some Disco Dust on them right after I piped them in.  Can I just say... Disco Dust is my new favorite thing!  It's alot more sparkly in person than in these pictures.  I don't think it photographs well.  Or, it could be my camera that I really don't know how to use!  *HA HA*

Caroline has nearly 30 kids in her class, so I made some cupcake cookies too.  I think they turned out super cute!

Into the treat bags and tied with purple ribbons...

 I sure hope you can still bring homemade treats into school.   We're going to find out!

Caroline's Birthday

Sweet Caroline (bah bah bah) celebrated her 6th birthday this weekend!

There's this great little place down the road that throws girly-girl parties that are just fabulous.  This year's party was all about glamour.  *ooohhh*  *ahhhh*

When the girls arrived, they were treated to pedicures and manicures.

Next came the makeup and hair.

They must have had 40 different dresses for the girls to choose from.  Of course *my daughter* chose the red one!

Then, the paparazzi arrived... look how cute they are blowing kisses for the cameras!

  The girls toasted to Caroline's birthday with pizza and sparkling cider in their margarita glasses!  They felt so grown up and looked so cute.

Let them eat cake!

After a few more shots from the paparazzi, then it was on to presents!

Since the girly-girl party was just for girls, we had an after party at our house for the family and our friends.  We couldn't serve cake that had already been cut into, so I made these cupcakes with the rest of the cake batter. 

My goal was to make them look like ice cream sundaes, complete with maraschino cherries on top.  I think they look like ice cream, don't you?

Her shirt says simply: I heart fashion.  So, of course she put on her tutu and black knee high boots (both presents from earlier in the day) right when we got home.

Happy Birthday baby!  I hope it was a good one!

Tree Lighting Festival

This was our first trip over to Leavenworth for their annual Tree Lighting Festival.

Brian and I both grew up here and neither of us had been to this event before.  The picture above is from the city's website... when I showed it to the kids, they thought we were going to the North Pole!

The whole town was all decked out with Christmas trimmings.  There were choirs singing and bands playing every half hour all day long.  The aroma from roasting chestnuts filled the air as holiday music echoed throughout the town.

We just happened to see St. Nicholas as he arrived in a carriage...  they told us that in Europe it is traditional for St. Nicholas to bring oranges, representing gold, to all the children.

This little bakery was so great!  How could something called the Gingerbread Factory, not be fabulous?

The next day was more mingling around town, shopping, visiting with Santa Claus, Saint Nick and Father Christmas.  We also saw the Nutcracker, Frosty the Snowman, Scrooge and the Grinch.

The kids discovered all the leaves that had fallen from the trees and made their own leaf pile to toss in the air, then jump in.

Finally, the moment we'd been waiting for all day!  By this time, there was about 20,000 people standing shoulder to shoulder in the street.  Right before they lit the town up, the mayor came out and made a speech, then everyone sang Silent Night.  So peaceful.

Of course, once the kids went to bed, it started to snow.  They woke us up at 6am screaming "Snow! Snow!"  So we threw on our boots and jackets and did what any parents would do... we had a snowball fight at 6am in our pajamas!  Kids really don't care if they are dressed properly or not.  Snow is snow.  We had a great time pelting each other while the neighborhood was still asleep.

We were on the road two hours later... Brian couldn't miss the kickoff of the Seahawks game...  All in all a great weekend and a fun way to start the season!  Merry Chistmas!