Cupcakes and Cakes Up To My Eyeballs

Please accept my apology for the length of time in between posts this week. I have been so busy! It's been hard to stay caught up on everything, but I hope these pictures of cupcakes make up for the delay.

I offered to make all the grub for my niece's birthday party this past week. If there is any excuse I can come up with to bake, I usually use it. I made a mini four-layer yellow butter cake with white chocolate cream cheese butter cream frosting for the birthday girl. She was a little shy and didn't dive in like we thought! For everyone else, we munched on cupcakes with the same batter and frosting, and I also made Pioneer Woman's Chocolate Sheet Cake, which is a fail-proof family favorite.

One could say that I started baking the night before, since that is when the butter came out to get to room temperature. However, our house gets a little chilly each night, and the butter didn't do a whole lot of softening! After I cranked up the heater the next morning and fired up the oven for a baking day extravaganza, the butter was soon a perfect temperature to whip into a yellow cake. I have two six-inch cake pans from Fat Diddio that I love, and they were used to make the miniature cake. Thirty cupcakes were the result of the remaining batter that I had doubled. Since some people had requested chocolate, and I am always happy to oblige, I next made the best chocolate sheet cake known to man.

After the cupcakes and cake were cooled, I got to frosting. I love piping, and it was fun to decorate with little edible pearls and a chocolate "cherry" on top. Then I loaded everything into the new cupcake carrier that John gave me for Christmas. It worked like a charm! Yet another excuse to bake cupcakes...I now have an easy and safe way to transport them! I love how everything turned out, and the taste wasn't anything to be ashamed of, either. Miraculously, I only tried one cupcake and one tiny slice of chocolate cake. I know...I don't know who I am any more, either!

I was amazed at how tired I was after spending all day on my feet in the kitchen. It was a complete blast and quite fulfilling, but it wiped me out! Luckily, I didn't have enough sugar in me to keep me awake for long!