"September"

I hope I meet my future husband in the month of September, so this song can be "Our Song" forever.  I have loved this song, "September", by Earth, Wind & Fire for as long as I can remember. And I finally googled the words to it the other day and it all makes sense! This MUST be my song!

SEPTEMBER
Do you remember the
21st night of September?
Love was changing the minds of pretenders
While chasing the clouds away

Our hearts were ringing
In the key that our souls were singing.
As we danced in the night,
Remember how the stars stole the night away

Ba de ya - say do you remember
Ba de ya - dancing in September
Ba de ya - never was a cloudy day

My thoughts are with you
Holding hands with your heart to see you
Only blue talk and love,
Remember how we knew love was here to stay

Now December found the love that we shared in September.
Only blue talk and love,
Remember the true love we share today

Ba de ya - say do you remember
Ba de ya - dancing in September
Ba de ya - never was a cloudy day

Ba de ya - say do you remember
Ba de ya - dancing in September
Ba de ya - golden dreams were shiny days

Makenzie's Bachelorette Party

For my sister's bachelorette party a couple of weeks ago I did a "Margarita" theme, complete with Margaritas, Margarita cupcakes, homemade empanadas, taquitos, guacamole, chips and shrimp ceviche. I really enjoyed planning and decorating for it, even though I had to make it all fit in a hotel room! But it was fun! To "spice up" my margarita cupcakes and do something different, I made little sombreros to go on top of each cupcake with some ribbon that matched the decor.  I think they turned out pretty cute.

 This is a topiary I made out of drink umbrellas, and by far my favorite part of the tablescape! 

 I found this adorable "fiesta" looking ribbon and had to put it on everything! Including the topiary, utensil basket, and its even the ribbon I cut up in strips to glue on the mini sombreros. 

 The Margarita Bar (the Margarita mix is a Hungry Girl recipe, only 100 calories a serving!)

From left to right, the taquitos with sourcream, the homemade beef and cheese empanadas, the quac, the shrimp ceviche and the chips. 

Tie-Dye Cupcakes

Again, another cupcake post. But I've already admitted my obsession, so I make no apologies. I first made tie dye cupcakes when I was babysitting for a family that had just adopted 3 kids from Haiti. These kids had never had cupcakes before, can you believe it!? I had been babysitting the family's 2 biological children for about 4 years and for every birthday we made cupcakes. But when challenged with making cupcakes with 5 children, 3 of whom at the time spoke minimal english, I was a bit overwhelmed on how to make it "fun" yet an organized chaos. So I decided to dye the batter 5 different colors, a color for each kid, and gave them each a spoon with the objective to put their color in each cupcake "hole".  It worked like a charm! And ever since I've been making tie dye cupcakes for my friends!

Here are the cupcakes I made the other day for an event:

 

Long Awaited "Margarita Cupcakes"

For Cinco de Mayo the past couple of years I have been making "Margarita Cupcakes".  They are so cute and really not that hard to make. I usually make the cupcakes a day a head of time and put them in the fridge to keep them moist. And then ice and decorate the day they will be eaten. Below are pictures of when I made them last month, but of course, I forgot to take a picture of them "on location" all completed. So imagine the final picture with a lime slice on the edge.

                                                                                                  Margarita Cupcake Recipe

9 oz Margarita mix (non-frozen kind)
3 oz tequila
1 box yellow cake mix 
3 egg whites
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
1 Tbsp lime zest 


Mix together the margarita mix and tequila. Use 1 and 1/4 cup of this in the cupcake mix and pour the rest over ice for a mini-rita while you're baking! 


With an electric mixer, add the cake mix, egg whites, vegetable oil, lime zest and margarita
mixture and mix on low until no lumps are left.
Spoon 1/3 cup batter into lined cupcake tin and bake at 350 for about 25 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool completely before icing. 

Lime Royal Icing
2 large egg whites
2 teaspoons fresh lime juice
3 cups powdered sugar, sifted


In the bowl of electric mixer, beat the egg whites on medium to high speed until fluffy, about a minute. Add lime juice. Return to low speed and slowly add in powdered sugar. Beat until smooth    (you may need to add extra lime juice). You want icing to be semi thick and not runny, so that sprinkles do not run off. (think canned icing consistency) 

I ice the cupcakes and let them sit out on the counter for about 10 minutes, enough for icing to set but not harden. Royal icing hardens quickly, so do not leave sitting more than 20 minutes. I pour red and green sugared sprinkles on a plate and roll the edges of the cupcake through the sprinkles, like you would do with a margarita glass lined with sugar or salt. 

After rolling cupcakes in sugar sprinkles, I then cut up plastic straws into thirds and insert a third into each cupcake. Before displaying for your guests or party, top with a slice of lime on the opposite corner of the straw and you have the perfect "Margarita Cupcake"!! (thats the picture I forgot to take)

Be sure and store in air tight container because the royal icing hardens within an hour or so and sucks out the moisture from the cake, and nothing is worse than a rock hard cupcake!  ENJOY!!!

I'm Baaaaaaaack!!!


I know, it has been a while. But I'm free for the summer now and ready to fully tackle this blogging thing. And boy do I have TONS to blog about! From baking to cooking to sewing and shopping, I'm ready to blog! I even spent a couple of hours updating my template, how do you like it? I'm terrible with all this technology stuff, so combined with my minimal attention span, this is a big feat on my part! I'm awfully proud of myself right now, and might even use the sweat I broke trying to figure it all out as an excuse not to work out today?! Hmmm, we'll see. But keep in touch, I've got three types of cupcakes, a margarita themed bachelorette party, homemade coasters and more to share with you!