Mardi Gras - King Cake Cupcakes

It's time to wrap up Mardi Gras week with a super simple and amazingly delicious recipe. King Cake Cupcakes! Our grocery stores have been stocked with king cakes for weeks now and I am always browsing to see which one has the most sprinkles. I've eaten my share of two king cakes so far this year and have resisted the temptation for many more on numerous trips to the grocery. The King Cake is my absolute favorite part about Mardi Gras! They come filled with all sorts of flavors and fruits, but my favorite is the cinnamon filling. So when I was flipping through the Jan/Feb issue of my Cooking with Paula Deen magazine and came across these King Cake Cupcakes this was quickly moved to the top of my baking list for February!

I have made a king cake from scratch before although it's been a few years, which I'm sure you can tell from the photo quality. But when you are given the opportunity to take a few shortcuts and come out with equally impressive results by using crescent rolls, well that's the path I chose to take this year! Thanks Paula for the fabulous idea!

So grab 3 tubes of Crescent Rolls and all the yummy stuff for your filling...cinnamon, brown sugar and pecans.

Unroll 1 tube of crescent rolls at a time and form them into 4 rectangles.

Spread your filling down the center of each rectangle, leaving a small border around the edges.

Sugar and nuts...

Fold the top of the rectangle towards the center, then fold the bottom of the rectangle towards the center.

Fold the left side to the middle. Fold the right side on top of the left side.

Place the dough, spiral side up into cupcake liner and bake.

Prepare vanilla glaze and grab the sprinkles. It's time to decorate!

King Cake Cupcakes (recipe adapted from Paula Deen)
(makes 12)

3/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 cup chopped pecans
1 tsp ground cinnamon
3 (8 oz) cans refrigerated crescent rolls
1 cup confectioners' sugar
2 Tbsp milk
green, purple & yellow sprinkles

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a 12-cup muffin pan with cupcake liners.
2. In small bowl, combine brown sugar, cinnamon and pecans.
3. On lightly floured surface, unroll each can of crescent rolls and separate each into 4 rectangles. Press perforations to seal.
4. Sprinkle about 2 Tbsp brown sugar mixture down center of each rectangle. leaving a 1/2-inch border around the edges.
5. Working with 1 rectangle at a time fold the top of the dough towards the center, then fold the bottom of the dough toward the center and overlap.
6. Fold the left side of the dough in to the middle. Fold the right side on top of the left side.
7. Place dough spiral side up into prepared muffin pan.
8. Repeat procedure with remaining rectangles.
9. Bake for 18-22 minutes or until brown.
10. In a small bowl, whisk confectioners' sugar, and milk until smooth. Drizzle over warm cakes while in pan.
11. Sprinkle with green, purple & yellow sugars.

You really need to give this recipe a try! You will wow all your friends with how amazing these mini king cakes look and taste! I think I'm going to have to keep crescent rolls on hand at all times just in case I need a King Cake fix throughout the year!

Happy Mardi Gras!

Mardi Gras - Mask Cookies

I'm back again with another fun way to celebrate Mardi Gras...mask cookies! You may remember I made some mask cookies a few years ago. Back then I didn't have a mask cookie cutter so I found clip art online and hand traced all my cookies...boy was that a lot of work! This year since I'm planning Sam's 1st birthday and mustaches & ties are the theme I just so happen to have a mask cookie cutter because, well the mustache flipped around makes a mask! It's two for one, gotta love that!

So whip up a batch of masks using your favorite sugar cookie & royal icing recipes. This is my go to recipe! Tint your royal icing green, yellow and purple.

Then pipe the outline of the masks and the shapes of the eyes.

Then grab some sprinkles and get ready to decorate!

Flood your cookies. I always work in groups of 6 cookies at a time when flooding. So after you flood 6 stop and add the sprinkles! Then flood 6 more, sprinkle, and repeat until your are done with all your cookies.

Time for sprinkles, give a generous coating! This is one of my favorite and quickest ways to decorate cookies. You can hide any flaws from your flooding and you don't have to wait for the flooding to dry before you pipe on decorations! And as an extra bonus I love the crunch you get when you bite into a sprinkle covered cookie!

Tip: Allow your flooded & sprinkled cookies to dry for several hours. Then tip the cookie sideways and allow the extra sprinkles to fall off. Any sprinkles that get stuck inside the mask eye holes you can easily remove by gently scraping a toothpick in between.

Look at how they sparkle! I packaged these up this weekend and delivered to some of our friends with kids! They absolutely went crazy over them! I've got one more Mardi Gras recipe coming up on Friday! I've saved the best and yummiest for last so you won't want to miss it! Any guesses what it could be?

Mardi Gras - Push-Up Pops

Mardi Gras is in full swing here in Mobile. Everywhere you look you see purple, green and yellow. Every weekend there are parades all day long with stuffed animals, cups, moon pies and beads a flying! This week I thought it would be fun to share a few easy and festive Mardi Gras treats with you all!

The first up is the Push-Up Pops. You may have seen or even own this book written by Courtney Whitmore of the popular entertaining blog Pizzazzerie. Unfortunately I do not have this book, but I have thumbed through it a time or two while at Michael's. This book is super cute with lots of fun ideas and recipes for making Push-Up Pops. It's also on Amazon's top 100 list...pretty amazing!

I bought my push-up pop containers from Cake Art Party Store back in the fall but they are also available online. So this weekend I figured it was about time to bring out the pops and see what I could come up with! I decided a trio of green, purple and yellow was appropriate for Mardi Gras. So I whipped up a 3 layer white box cake mix and tinted each layer green, purple and yellow. Once the cakes were cool I took the push-up pop container and cut circles into each layer.

Vibrant circles of cake ready to assemble.

Once all cake circles were cut out, I placed the green cake in the bottom of the push-up pop first. Then the yellow cake and then purple until the pop was full.

Such a cute, fun and quick idea!

Swirl with a dollop of buttercream icing and add a few sprinkles!

It's the perfect Mardi  Gras treat! I shared a few with our neighbors and they loved them!

Check back soon, I've got 2 more Mardi Gras ideas you don't want to miss!

Sam's Nursery

I have been getting a lot of emails lately from expecting moms about Sam's Nursery that was featured on Baby Lifestyles last year. So I figured I would go ahead and do a non-baking related post today and instead showcase my little boys nursery and all the details that go along with it! This is honestly my absolute favorite room in our house. The fun patterns and bright colors bring me so much joy and definitely bring a smile to Sam's face every time he is in his room! I can't believe he will be ONE at the end of March. Boy how time sure does fly.

I hope you enjoy the pictures of Sam's lime, turquoise and orange nursery! It truly is a mix of old and new pieces, with a modern twist and I just love how everything came together. My goal was to create a room that reflected both mine and Randolph's personalities. I wanted a unique space, something that felt like it was created with lots of love and DIY projects. Since we live in the south and Randolph LOVES to be on the water..he will fish and go crabbing any free chance he can get I wanted to add a small touch of things that Randolph loves to do and can't wait to share with Sam some day in his room. So the crab accents in the picture frames and pillow and the fishing pole lamp turned out to be absolutely perfect.

A detailed list of all the sources with links is provided at the bottom.

 
Paint Color: Polished Sliver by Valspar from Lowe's

Glider & Ottoman: Siegel's Baby Room 
Crib: Siegel's Baby Room 
Dresser/Changing Table: Charles Phillips Antiques, custom painted by Audrey Phillips Paint and Design
Side Table: Cotton City Antique Mall, Mobile AL
Wall Frames: found at 2 local antique stores - Midtown Antiques & Cotton City Antique Mall, Mobile AL
Yarn Letters: DIY Project - bought the wood letters at Hobby Lobby and orange yarn from Michael's
Fabric: Carousel Designs
Curtains: Handmade by my step-mom (Lime & White Zig Zag Fabric)

Crib Skirt: Handmade by my step-mom (Lime & White Zig Zag, Lime Organic and Tangerine Fabric)

Quilt: Handmade by my dad (Lime & White Zig Zag and Tangerine and White Minky Chenille Fabric)

Pillows: Handmade by my step-mom (Aqua & White Zig Zag, Aqua Organic and Tangerine Fabric)
Toy Basket: liner was handmade by my step-mom (Aqua & White Zig Zag)
Fishing Pole Lamp: Gift from my step-mom, she bought the lamp at Hobby Lobby and then covered the existing plaid shade in aqua fabric to match the nursery
Baby Age Blocks: Montana Vintage Greens on etsy
ABC Print: Trendy Peas on etsy (size 16 x 20), bought the wood frame from Hobby Lobby and had the print matted in the frame at Michael's
Crab Art: DIY Project - had the white Pottery Barn Frames from our wedding, bought the wooden crabs and orange paint from Michael's
Diaper Caddy: Michael's
Green Lamp: Target
Plush Stacking Toy & Striped/Polka dot Plush Dog: gifts from Auntie Em


Hope you all enjoyed a peak into little Sam's nursery! 

Jake and the Neverland Pirates Birthday Cake

Yo ho ho! One of my favorite little guys just turned 5 last weekend! To help him celebrate such an important birthday I had the honor of creating his birthday cake for the fourth year in a row! This year he wanted Jake and the Neverland Pirates Theme! Let's just say Joshua is definitely paving the way for me and teaching me all kinds of things about what little boys like so I'll know what to expect as our little Sam gets older. We have just recently started turning on the tv for Sam to watch Disney Jr. and luckily I happened to catch a glimpse at Jake and the Neverland Pirates about a week before I made Joshua's birthday cake. I was getting a little worried that I would have no clue how to decorate a cake for a show I had never seen before! Luckily I was able to pick up a few of the key characters, Jake, Tick Tock Croc and Captain Hook at the store to use for cake toppers. In the past I have always created round cakes for Joshua so I thought it would be fun to switch things up this year and create a sheet cake to appear as both water and sand with a treasure hunt. Using some brown tinted fondant I made a map with the birthday boys name and age with a trail towards the treasure and crumbled crushed graham crackers on top to resemble sand. I had looked high and low for some gold deblumes at various stores and came up empty handed...what was I to do? Luckily Mardi Gras is in full swing right now and we just happened to go to the first parade the day before I needed to make this cake. And what do you know, the first float that comes by throws silver coins! Hooray...I finally have the treasure for the cake! I also added a strand of gold Mardi Gras beads. Joshua and his friends all loved the cake!

Hope you all enjoy the Jake Cake too!

Someone is going to be ONE - {Party Planning}

Today my little guy is 10 months old! He is hardly a baby anymore but a toddler on the verge of walking any day now. I can't believe how much cuter he gets each day! He has a huge smile, 7 teeth coming in (4 on top, 3 on bottom) and loves to wave to the lights and say "da da da da" like crazy! With his FIRST birthday quickly approaching in 2 months, you better believe that the planning for his birthday bash is well underway! Here's a sneak peak at some of the colors I plan to use for his special day! This polka dot fabric jumped out at me and I quickly snatched it up realizing I could do so many things with these colors! And it just so happens I already had 3 cake pedestals to match!

Stripe straws are all the rage these days and I have seen them in every color of the rainbow on a ton of party planning sites online, but you'll never guess where I found these for half the price...Michaels for $2.00! Gotta love a good find like this! So I grabbed 3 bags just in case! So now that you know the color scheme...it's time to reveal the theme...drum roll please....

"Little Man" or "Lil Man" or "Mustache Bash"...not sure officially what I'm going to call it yet, but know for sure that there will be all kinds of little ties, bow ties and mustaches in plaids, stripes and polka dots for my little guys 1st birthday party! At first I was thinking about doing a beach themed party since we have a crab theme in Sam's nursery, and then I decided to explore the milk & cookie party route, but again changed my mind to the tie & mustache theme, which is the plan I'm sticking with! After all, Sam's daddy does wear a tie to work everyday and what little boy doesn't want to grow up and be just like their daddy, so I thought this would be a super fun idea!

Now it's time to start thinking about the party invitations. I've got a cute idea for a photo shoot in mind if I can pull it off! Of course I have already been thinking about all the sugary goodness that I plan to bake, decorate and serve for all the guests! And I'm sure you guessed that there will definitely be some cookies involved from the cookie cutters above! So stay tuned as I continue to plan our little Sam's 1st birthday, I'll be sure to share little peaks along the way!

Time to Get Organized - Baking Organization {Part 1}

Happy New Year! I know, we are already 21 days into the 2013, it's about time I made my blogging debut in the new year right? I've been enjoying some time away from the kitchen and instead spending time with my family. We've been working on house projects trying to give our living room and dining room a new look for the new year! We've been wanting to tackle these rooms for awhile now and finally decided it was time.

We've also been soaking up as much quality time we can with Sam these days. After taking a few weeks vacation for Christmas and now having to get back in a normal work routine, it's hard to go from seeing your baby all day long everyday to only getting to see him for about 5 hours a day while he is awake before and after day care! So of course, baking has been pushed aside lately so I can spend quality time with my little man! He's so much fun these days, talking like crazy, waving and standing on his own (I think he'll be walking soon!) He will be 10 months old on Friday! Where has the time gone?

So to kick off blogging for the new year I thought it would be appropriate to start with some organization! You see I have this little addiction with sprinkles, cupcake liners and ribbon. I have way too much of them all! The bright colors, fun shapes, and patterns, they draw me in and I can't help but continue to buy all of these baking gems whenever I'm out. My stash was getting a little out of control, so I decided it was finally time to put an end to the chaos and get my baking supplies organized!

This post is the first of what will be a multi-part Baking Organization series over the next few weeks. I've got some great ideas for organization that you won't want to miss. You'll also get to see a peek into my kitchen and the behind the scenes of all my baking supplies and props! So here we go!

Plastic bins (shoe size) are the perfect container to store your jars of sprinkles, cupcake liners and spools of ribbon in. I bought a ton of these aqua bins at Target a while back on sale and have finally found the perfect use for them...baking storage!

I grabbed a few packs of Martha Stewart's Home Office labels at Staples for easy identification of each bin.

Here is just a teeny tiny peak at my stash...there is LOTS more where that came from, trust me! Or ask my husband...he thinks I have a problem...he just doesn't quite understand that sprinkles and cupcake liners are a bakers best friend!

 

Look how nicely everything packs up in these plastic bins! The bins are clear which is perfect so you can see what you have inside, and they are stackable so they store nicely on a shelf.

Take off the lid and look how nice and visible all your spools of ribbon are!

Check back soon for more Baking Organization tips and ideas. I can't wait to show you how I store my cookie cutters!

Don't worry I've got a few fun baking ideas for Mardi Gras and Valentine's Day heading your way too! And I'm also in the middle of planning Sam's 1st birthday so you won't want to miss the big reveal of the theme for his party and pictures and the planning along the way!

It's going to be a great 2013 and I hope share in this journey with me!