Minecraft Lego Birthday Party

My 1st grader turned 7 yesterday and we had a big party to celebrate! His two favorite things right now are Minecraft and Legos so we incorporated those into his party.  Two teachers from our local Bricks 4 Kidz came to organize the activities and games for the party.  The kids got to build motorized Lego cars, have free play with thousands of Legos and play some Minecraft games. They had so much fun! Then we enjoyed cake, ice cream, cookies, and Creeper Juice (aka water).  It was such a fun afternoon!

Here's the bright green creeper cake I made...

Minecraft creeper and "7" sugar cookies...

Creeper Juice...also known as water.  I just bought a case of water bottles at the grocery store, removed the labels, and purchased these wraps from Etsy for $3.95.  It's just a file that I printed on card stock at home, cut them out, and used shipping tape to wrap them around the water bottles.

Number 7 Lego sign made out of existing Legos that we already had...perfect for part of the decorations.

Utensil holder that the birthday boy put together himself. I then washed and sanitized it before placing the forks inside...

In the Minecraft video game, everything is in square blocks.  So I also made (but not pictured) blue jello jiggler squares that represented water.  My son had so much fun on his birthday and LOVED all the Minecraft and Lego inspired decorations and food.  So much so that he said, "This was the best birthday EVER!!!"  That's enough to make this momma smile from ear to ear.

Happy Birthday sweetie! I love you so much!!!

St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake...and ALASKA

This fall we ventured to Alaska for a vacation with my husband's side of the family.  It was AMAZING....absolutely breath-taking! If you've never been, I highly recommend that you add it to your bucket list.  It was our first time packing long johns and winter coats for a vacation instead of the usual shorts and bathing suits; however it is one of our favorite vacations so far. We went kayaking, on a helicopter ride, walked on top of a glacier, rode a boat to fetch live crabs, and I even won the black jack tournament on our cruise ship. What great memories were made!

On the cruise ship, we met a nice couple from St. Louis. Their room was right next to ours and {unsurprisingly} we started talking about food one day.  :)  After asking if we'd ever had St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake she promised to email it after our cruise.  I had never had it but just hearing about it made my mouth begin to drool.  

So here you have it, the St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake.  It is LOADED with sugar and definitely holds true to its name. It's gooey and rich and tasted like a little piece of heaven. Thank you so much for sharing this recipe with me, Leslie!

St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake

Crust:

1 Yellow Cake Mix

1 Egg

1 Stick Melted Butter

Mix above ingredients together and press into a 13" x 9" pan, press around edges to make a rim.

Filling:

1 8 oz. Package of Cream Cheese

1 (1 lb.) box Powdered Sugar (4 cups)

1 teaspoon Vanilla

Mix above ingredients until smooth. Pour over cake mix.

Bake 40 minutes at 350 degrees. Sprinkle with powdered sugar when cool. Cut into small squares.

Note: Cake will look Gooey even when done so, watch the time and crust for indication that it is done. I only ended up baking mine for about 20 minutes when it started browning.

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween everyone!  Our pumpkins are carved and the kids' costumes are neatly laid out and ready for the big day tomorrow. I'm excited to help at C's school party during the afternoon and our fingers are crossed for decent weather tomorrow night...it's not looking good!  Definitely one of my favorite days of the year. I can't wait to see everyone's costumes on Facebook over the next couple of days. :) Happy Halloween!!!

Halloween Cakes, Cookies & Cupcakes

Halloween is a little over two weeks away. It's one of my favorite times of the year and I've already started decorating some Halloween-inspired cakes at the bakery.  These next 2 weeks will be filled with pumpkins, spider webs, ghosts, and even Frankenstein cookies! I am also working on finishing up the kids' Halloween costumes this week. Just a few more pieces and they'll be all set! I can't wait!!!

Dress Shirt with Tie Birthday Cake

I had a fun request to make a cake that resembles a men's dress shirt and tie this weekend.  It was a blast! The cake was iced in buttercream frosting but the collar, pocket, and tie were made with fondant.

One of the reasons I love my job...each and every cake I make are so different! :)

At The Bakery...Cakes, Cakes, and More Cakes!

Sorry I've been too busy to post any new recipes lately!  Let me take a second (before heading off to dream land) to share some of the cakes I've made at the bakery recently. Each and every one of them are so different. Never a boring day at the bakery! :)

Despicable Me 2

I took the kids to see Despicable Me 2 at the theater last week.  Cute movie! Is it just me or does it seem like there are either no kid movies out in the theater or they come out all at once?  There are two more movies I really want to take the kids to see...Monsters University and Turbo.  Hopefully we'll get to see them both before summer is over.

Thanks to Pinterest, I made these adorable Despicable Me minion cupcakes using Twinkies for the bodies and Smarties for the eyes.  I'm in love with minions!  I bet we'll see lots of little minions running around this Halloween. :)

At The Bakery...

I've gotten a bit behind in posting some of the cakes I've recently made at the bakery so hopefully this post will get me caught up a bit.  Enjoy!

Owl Birthday Cake

My baby girl turned THREE last week and today was her big party.  We could not have asked for the weather to be any more perfect than it was today - sunny and absolutely beautiful!  Kadence has a love for owls lately.  Her big girl bedroom has an owl theme, some of her PJ's have owls and even her favorite pair of socks are those with owls on them!  So there was no question in my mind that she needed an owl cake for her birthday. This year I ventured out and used dark chocolate fondant!  Seeing her face when she saw her cake just melted my heart.  She is growing up so fast and I just love her to pieces!



My hubby and I had such a fun time decorating this cake. He helped by coloring all the fondant and cutting out the eyes, feet, branch, and leaves.  He did such a great job that I'll have to hire him for future work. ;P



I found a cute stamp at Michael's and made little individual bags for the potato chips. (Idea from Pinterest.)



Also served cheese and crackers in the shape of an owl! This adorable idea came from Beth over at Hungry Happenings.



Another idea from Pinterest was this lollipop flower pot. It took a JUMBO bag of Dum Dums to fill it up!



What a wonderful day spent with friends, food, and lots of sunshine!  Happy Birthday K!!!

At The Bakery...

We are gearing up for wedding season at the bakery. I've had several consultations already and getting excited about our busy season!  Our front window display needed something new, so I made this beauty. :) I love all the different shades of purple.