Wordless Wednesday- Mamia's Birthday surprise....

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAMIA!!!!

All in all... the cake was a hit (and delicious as well!)

Love you Mamia!!!  I hope you enjoyed your party and that God blesses you with many, many more years filled with love, happiness and family!

:oP

Happy Birthdays

Today is both my Mother's and my daughter's birthday!!! I want to wish them both the most wonderful day ever and that God bless them with another year of life filled with love and happiness!

Isabel's birthday party will be this saturday... thankfully giving me a few more days to get her cake going.

My mom is getting a surprise dinner tonight!

So I made her cake... my sister and I decided that we needed something that would match her personality.  LOUD AND VIVACIOUS... so that being said, this is what we decided on....

It is a white cake with strawberry shortcake filling (homemade whipped cream with chopped strawberries)  covered with fondant.  I like the gift box look so that is what we decided on. 

What do you think???

Let me tell you that I can not wait to take a bite of this one!!!

Check in a bit later for pics of the party!

:OP

Happy Birthday Sebastian!!!

I'm a little late... but this past week was a whirlwind of prepartaions and fun! 

Believe it or not... Carlos Sebastian turned 1 on July 29th!!!  I still find it hard to believe that it has been a year since my baby was born!  I can vividly remember that day like it was yesterday... and it makes me a little sappy.  Yes I get the oooh my baby is getting big.... but I'm fighting it back!

So we threw a birthday bash a week ago, mostly because my sister was flying to Colombia this friday and wouldn't be here if we threw the party this past saturday.  But it was great!!!!

I was very excited to make his birthday cake... what with all my vast experience as a cake baker.  So I got the Wilton's Year Book to check out the cute cake ideas and see what I could come up with.  So I picked the most complicated cake I could possibly find and said "What the hell... I know I can do it!!"

Yes, its completely edible.... and I was determined to make it!

So I began, 3 days befor the birthday to create the circus creatures that would decorate the cake.

Here are the "heads" and the other pieces of fondant I would need to make the animals.

Oh, did I mention that I have NO EXPERIENCE WHAT SO EVER working with fondant???  Oh yes, my cake decorating experience is limited to buttercream frosting and roses.

GULP!!!

These are the brownie "bodies" 

Yes, I know I look awful... it was only like 98 degrees for four days straight!!!  Even the AC wasn't cooling the apartment down enough to make it comfortable.

Monkeys and Tigers

The completed product!!!

Isn't it cute?  Yes... I noticed AFTER that I left a HUGE gap in between the two circles on the front of the cake...and of course by this point they were pretty much stuck on the cake so I had to leave them.  Oh well... it is an ORIGINAL.

Then off to the party... and the big reveal!  I was sweating bullets, because I didn't want anyone to say that it looked crappy.  I knew it wasn't horrible, but I was stll worried that it wasn't good enough. 

So breath held, I brought the cake out....

AND

THEY ALL LOVED IT!!!!

The kids all ran over calling the animals they wanted....

The adults asked me what bakery I had bought it from and if it had cost a lot....

The birthday boy couldn't wait to grab the elephants!

I was ecstatic!  I really didn't expect anyone other than the kids to love it... but they did!

I made a butter cake with strawberry jam filling, buttercream frosting and fondant!

I loved the fact that when my cousin asked me what bakery I had gotten the cake from, my mom's friend quickly stated that "SHE MADE THIS HERSELF!!!"

I couldn't stop smiling!

Isn't he cute as a button???  My mother-in-law sent me this outfit and I think he looks like a little doll.

The birthday pavillion...

Sebastian enjoying his fondant elephant...

The birthday boy taking a wack at the pinata!

hee hee hee... He's sooo scrawny!  poor Tyler...

Sneaking a peek at the big gift bag...

He LOVED this dinosaur walker thingy...

Then a dip in the pool...

I love this pic of all my boys!

Surfing on dad's flip flops!

I don't have any more pics because I got lazy and then put the birthday boy to bed.

But all in all it was a fabulous party! 

AND I got a bunch of requests for birthday cakes! 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SEBAS!!!

:oP

hearts, strawberries and buttercream

I originally was planning on just posting these pics yesterday for Wordless Wednesday... but I left my camera at my dad's and that idea went right out the window.  So I'll have to come up with a witty narrative to go along with them.

My dad's wife decided that she wanted to throw my dad a surprise birthday party on saturday because his birthday is on the 16th and on a tuesday (who does that??).  So she enlisted my "help" because since I'm home all day and she doesn't drive we make a great pair.  Ok, I like to do party planning stuff... and for some unknown reason I volunteered to make the birthday cake.  I think since I was fresh on the heels of a successful spiderman cake, I was feeling very confident. 

WHAT???  I'm making the birthday cake? two tiered (which I had never done before), filled with strawberry jam, in heart shapes, and oh you want fresh berries on it too... Ok.  I can do that.   WHAT, WHAT, WHAT???  I think I was sniffing too much glue or something  (I DO NOT SNIFF GLUE!!! Its just a saying), but since I had already volunteered I had to go all or nothing.

So I bought the heart shaped cake pans, and pulled a receipe for butter cake with a touch of almond flavoring- which is yummilicious!, and decided screw it... I'll make it and if it comes out inedible or ugly, there's always the Dutch Kitchen down the street and we can pick up a cake on saturday morning.

Oh, and did I mention that I also volunteered to make the food!  Now apparently I'm a catering service as well.  I must have been hitting the glue jar hard that day!   Any hoo... I decided on making chicken breasts stuffed with spinach, mozzarella and ricotta cheese with tomatoe sauce and shredded cheese, as well as a coleslaw that is to die for!

So, I began with the cake on friday night... I made my batter, greased my pans, and filled them with batter and popped them into the oven.  Then about 40 minutes later my house was filled with that wonderful aroma of fresh baked cake.

So I first cut off the pouffy middle piece so that my cake would sit flat, and let the cake cool in the pan.

Then I popped the cake out of the pan and let it cool on a wire rack.

Now came the fun part... since I have never made a two-tiered cake, I read a bit online at the Wilton's website and figured, its easy enough, I can do it.  So I put the tiers on, and frosted the cakes... not the BEST frosting job, but could be worse.

 

Then I decided on this rope frosting border around the bottoms of the cakes, to add some pizzaz.

Then I added the strawberries around the border of the cakes to add color and outline the heart shapes.

Looking good...

I want to eat it everytime I look at it!!!

Taa - Daaaaaaahhh!!!! The finished cake!

Soooooo...... what do you think???

Let me tell you that it tastes as good as it looks.  I used strawberry jam to fill the middle of both tiers.  I looked at it and could hardly believe that I, ME... had made this cake!

Now, being my own worse critic, this is pretty good props.  BUT I still had to see what everyone else thought.  I always worry that others will not like my cooking or baking.

WELL, let me tell you... my dad saw the cake and asked me why I had bought a cake for his birthday when he knows I could have made it myself!?  What? Really?  I was sooo happy.  I couldn't believe he actually thought that I had bought him the cake!  Well... everyone was impressed with the cake and they couldn't say enough about how yummy it was.

Then when everyone ate, they raved about the stuffed chicken breasts and coleslaw!  I was so happy and proud of myself.  And yes, I am tooting my own horn... this is MY blog after all...and if I can't brag a little here then WHERE is one expected to be able to brag????  ;o)

So, we had a great time, my dad was surprised, and everyone ate and loved the food, and we celebrated my dad's birthday as well as Valentine's Day.  All in all it was fun.

Oh and we also celebrated my cousin's birthday which conveniently is shared with my dad's!!!

This was supposed to be a pic of just me, Carlos Sebastian and my dad... when the camera flashed ALL these jokers were in the picture!  That would be my cousin Juancho, my sister Mitzi (right behind me), my cousin Ferno, birthday boy Rob, my aunt Carmen, and my dad looking like he's had one to many glasses of champagne!

This one I'm putting here because I love this pic... aren't they handsome???

Ok, so I tried to get this picture about 5 times!  In each one, either Sebastian or Tyler weren't looking!  So this is as good as it gets!

Oh, and this is Sebastian sitting up alone for the first time!  He can now sit alone for upwards of a half hour! My baby is getting sooo big!

Ok... so other than that... this week has been occupied with Tyler having the stomach bug since SUNDAY!!!  Yes he is on day 5 of this stupid virus, and just when I think he is feeling better he gets sick again!  Like last night... ALL over the bathroom!  Now let me tell you if there are things in life that I do not like the top two are 1. cleaning up vomit and 2. cleaning the bathroom.  Can you tell me what I did wrong to deserve to have to clean a pukey bathroom last night????  But after cleaning up the bathroom and cleaning up Tyler, he went to bed, and is once again claiming to be feeling well.  I'm not buying it today!  I have him on a strick toast, chicken soup and flat coca cola diet!  We are getting rid of this stomach flu TODAY!

So that's everything.  Now I'm off to tend to my sleepy Sebastian that is about seconds from falling asleep in his jumpy! 

;o)

catching up...

The last two weeks have been ridiculously hectic for me... so much so that I haven't wanted to update my blog even when I had the free time!

But, now I'm up to the task... you'll be surprised of how much nothing I've really done but I've been running around like a mad woman!  Go figure...

So, lets start with Saturday

SATURDAY

January 30th was my baby boy's birthday.... Tyler turned 6 on saturday!!!  I can hardly believe it still.  My little man is getting so big and I feel like the time has flown.

So my boy wanted his birthday party at Chuck E Cheese... he loves himself some CEC!! We've had his birthday there for the last 3 years!!!  I always let him pick what he wants to do for his birthday and he ALWAYS pick CEC! 

I don't mind, it lets me actually enjoy the party!  I don't have to cook, to be much of host, to tend to other people's children, try to keep said children entertained, AND the best part... NO CLEAN UP! Wooo Hooo!! That alone sells me every time!

So, after a week of trying to get Tyler to draw up a guest list, I finally got the final list and the invitees all showed!  Nice turn out!  He invited his friends from school, which was great since he insists that he doesn't have any friends... funny because this boy is MORE social than his sister!!! 

By request I made the birthday cake!  I was a little nervous to say the least, but I had taken the level one Wilton's cake decorating class at Michaels in the fall... so I was fairly confident that I could make the cake.  Of course it HAD to be a SPIDERMAN cake... now I was scared!  You really can't b.s. that type of cake, because Spiderman is a little popular!  No goofing there!  But I gave it a shot because Tyler was really excited about me making the cake....

So I got the pan, baked the yummy yellow cake, and began the outlining process....

Ok.. not much to brag about and at this point I was still VERY nervous as to how it was going to look...

Ok, so the webbing was looking good and the red was the right shade!!!

I gotta say... I did a DAMN GOOD JOB!!!  I could hardly believe that I MADE THIS!!!! It was tastey and it actually looked like Spidey!

Tyler LOVED IT!!! and he made me feel like a master baker because he couldn't tell me enough that it was awesome!

He wanted to stare at the cake forever before we left for the party!

So... all in all it was a great day, his friends showed up, they all played great, we had good food, good cake AND one of the mom's asked me if I was a cake baker/decorator by profession!!!

So, here are some pics from the party... no need to put descriptions... I think they are pretty self explanatory!

YES, that is Carlos sneaking into the pic in the back!!!

Yes, we are a bunch of goof balls!

:o)

All in all we had a blast and Tyler LOVED his birthday party!

So that was Saturday...  since it ended up being ridiculously long... I'll leave it at that and post a bit more later...