Take Me Out to the Ballgame - A Very Special First Birthday

My baby boy turned one, and I chose a baseball theme for his very small family party. It was really fun, because there was so much out there for baseball. And since our colors were red and blue, all the 4th of July party stuff worked too! I really enjoyed doing all the concession stand inspired food too.

Thank you to my mom who helped me with a lot of the party,  and to my mother-in-law who made the precious party hat.

Here are pics of the decor and treats:

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Party Hats and Number Ones

I made these first birthday cookies for a dear friend's little girl. Due to an egg allergy, I used a new "royal icing" recipe, and I absolutely loved it! It's technically a glaze, but it will be my go-to icing from now on, unless I need to make something intricate or precise. I got the recipe from this website. You can make it thicker or thinner just by adding more sugar or more water. So easy!!

Peanut Butter Jelly Time!

The sweetest 6 year old I know had her birthday party a few weeks ago. And since her momma (my BFF) is the best party thrower, it was a peanut butter and jelly themed party! 

I offered my cookie services, and she sent me the link to a cookie that is so precious! I think they turned out cute, but I did have a few challenges this project. Biggest one- my flood icing never fully hardened! It could have been one or more of a few possibilities, but I think it was the fact that I put almond extract in the royal icing. I won't make that mistake again. 

Okay, so I'm not going to post a tutorial for this one, because a. Sweet Sugarbelle already did that here and b. My cookies weren't quite as cute as hers.

This post is about how I made these cookies with very little time.
Start backwards from the "due date" and then you will know when to start. I have an infant who needs me to hold him- a lot. Which I love!!! But it's hard to get anything done. So, I've had to plan a little better this time. He sleeps very well in my baby carrier, so I can get things done in small increments of time. 

Here is the schedule I used for this project (2 dozen cookies):

Saturday- make 2 batches of cookie dough, put in freezer

Tuesday- make 1 small batch of royal icing, put in fridge, put dough in fridge to thaw
Wednesday- make icing colors and put in piping bags and bottles, put in fridge
Thursday morning- roll, cut, and bake 2 dozen cookies, put leftover dough in freezer
Thursday mid morning- pipe the crust along the outside of the cookie
Thursday afternoon- phase one of icing (use 20 second icing to do the bread color)
Thursday night- phase two (use flood icing to make peanut butter or jelly)
Friday night- phase three (pipe the smiley face and pink cheeks)
Saturday- Party day!!

Here is how mine turned out:

I'm currently working on the baptism cookies. I hope my royal icing turns put better this time! 

My Man's Birthday

Happy 32nd birthday to the love of my life!

In the past, I've always made Justin a boxed yellow cake with a jar of chocolate frosting. He was perfectly happy with that. But, this year I set out to make a homemade version of his fave. I browsed the internet for the perfect recipe and came upon this one from Bakerella. And then to find a yummy chocolate buttercream- here from Lauren's Latest.
How to make it beautiful and personalized is up to you. I used more chocolate!

First of all, if you use this cake recipe, go ahead and try the spray bottle trick she suggests. My aversion to soggy cake of any kind made me leery of doing it, and my cake was, IMO, dry. I think I also overcooked it a tad. It went from wiggly and raw to overdone in such a small amount of time. I can only blame myself for that.

The buttercream turned out so delicious. I could have eaten it by the spoonful for sure. My almost-4-year-old taste tester liked it very much. It also ended up crusting very well, so next time I'll bust out my Viva paper towels and make it look nice and smooth. 

So, after assembling my cake in two layers, I iced it generously. I then used the mini Reese's peanut butter cups that are already unwrapped, cut them in half, and arranged them on the cake. The original plan was to stick them all around the sides of the cake, but I felt they were too heavy to do that. This particular design used just a few more than one bag of them, so you could easily do two rings on top and just use one bag. (This is an 8" cake.)

You could, of course, put them in a bag and pound them with a mallet and place them on the sides for a more "rustic" look. I ended up alternating them up and down on the bottom. The 32 on top was an afterthought, but I thought it looked better than getting out my piping bag and scribbling "Happy Birthday" across my cake. That is definitely not my forte. 

So easy! After posting a quick pic on Facebook, I was surprised (or not so surprised) that a picture of a chocolate cake gets more likes and comments than two really cute babies. Lol!

Here is the finished product:

Please excuse my lack of photography skills. I'm taking a photography class this Saturday as a a birthday present from my mom and dad. Yay!

I have three upcoming cookie projects in the next two months. I'm super excited- one birthday party, one baptism, and a wedding shower... Coming soon!

A Low-key Cinderella Party

Princess Leah turned 3! She wanted a Cinderella cake, so I wanted to give her a Cinderella party. We decided to fore-go the big blowout birthday party this year for a few reasons. So, we just had family over for dinner, cake, and fun!

I didn't have a whole lot of time left when I decided I wanted to make a banner. I made this simple banner in about 45 minutes using my Cricut. If you can't see it, it just says, "Leah is 3!" I used 5" circles for the background, 4.5" circles for the patterned paper, and 4.5" letters. I used the Lyrical Letters cartridge for the font. It took 2 pieces of patterned 12x12 paper, 4 pieces of background paper (also used for letters), one spool of ribbon, and mini glue dots.

I ordered the balloons on Amazon in a pack and had them blown up at Kroger.  

For some simple decor, I spent a few minutes and dollars at Party City. I bought paper goods, blue and white streamers, blue tissue paper balls ( I know I can make my own, but I was short on time), and a princess crown for the birthday girl.

The food

A little off of the theme of Cinderella, we had a taco bar. It included all the fixins and soft and hard taco shells. I also included two appetizer dips (jalapeno popper dip from Pinterest and Texas Caviar), chips, rice, and beans. 

The Cake!

This was the inspiration for the party. I had many different ideas about how to make her a "Cinderella cake," but eventually saw the pumpkin coach and had to give it a try. I used a homemade funfetti cake recipe and traditional buttercream for the bottom layer. For the top layer, I just used a boxed mix, a coat of buttercream, and fondant. To shape the top layer, I bought a sphere-shaped pan from Michael's.

Since I am not a professional and don't have tons of experience, this cake was quite a labor of love. BUT the look on my precious daughter's face when she blew out her candles was worth every back-breaking second!

Ladybug Cupcake Toppers

Who doesn't love ladybugs??? And these were oh so cute and easy as pie! I made two dozen of these cupcake toppers for my friend Robin. Her daughter, Charli, was turning 2. Fun!

Materials needed: red and black fondant, a tiny amount of gum paste

Here are the tools I used: 
a small fondant roller with guide rings, a medium circle cutter, a small circle cutter, a Wilton #10 tip, a small bowl, and a pastry paint brush

Here's how I made them:

Step 1: I used the purple ring on my fondant roller to roll out the black. (I bought black fondant because it is time-consuming and messy to make.) I used a circle cutter the size of a cupcake to make 24 black bodies.

Step 2: I used a smaller circle to make 24 heads.

Step 3: I used a Wilton #10 tip to make a million dots! Ok, 6 x 24 isn't a million. This was the most tedious part. I sprayed a little Pam on my parchment to dip my tip in every few circles. And I used the opposite end of my decorating brush to poke the circles out if they got stuck. Line them up in groups of 6 to make counting much easier!

Step 4: I used the pink rings on my fondant roller to roll out the red. Then I used the same circle cutter I used for the black bodies. Then using a very sharp knife or bench scraper, cut them in half.

Step 5: In a very small bowl of hot water, dissolve a pea-sized amount of gum paste. Then, use a brush to "glue" dots on each red wing. One thing to know about gum glue- there will a sort of sheen on any part of the fondant that has gum glue on it, even when it dries. I covered most of the red surface on top with the glue, so it wouldn't look splotchy. Also, try not to get it too wet or your black may bleed on the red.

Step 6: Let dry. I dried mine overnight. I left all of it uncovered except for the heads. I still wanted them to be pliable the next morning.

Step 7: Attach the heads and bodies by using your gum glue liquid. I like to put glue on both surfaces before sticking the pieces together, but I'm not sure if it matters. Let dry a few minutes.

 Step 8: Attach the wings using gum glue. Let dry until they are secure. Done!

Here they are at the birthday party. Robin did a great job with the decor!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CHARLI!

Panda Cake

I made this cake for a former co-worker's daughter, who also happened to be one of my former students! So, I was happy to go all out.
It was orignally supposed to be pandas with bamboo, but the birthday girl loves purple, so I got some creative license. Here is how it turned out.

Not bad for my first big cake! And, the birthday girl liked it. That's what matters. :)

Elmo Party

Although Leah's 2nd birthday party was right smack in the middle of "busy season" for teachers (State Testing Time!), I had to handmake some of the cute things at her party. Sadly, I was unable to make the fondant decor. But I bought it from 1StopParty on Etsy, and she did a great job. The cake was made by a local bakery. They added the polka dot trim. I added the fondant decor to the cake, and Leah was ecstatic.

I also did not make the invitation. But, luckily for me, my bestie is in the card making business. She made this, and it was just what I had envisioned!!
Check out her website or her Etsy shop!

front

back

And my ma-in-law, Lori, made this precious party hat. Could it be any cuter????

But, the name of my blog is Handmade by Allison, so what did I make?? I bought a Cricut cartridge and got to work on the favors and a banner. It took many nights of work to finish, but it was all worth it in the end.
(Sorry my pics of the banner are awful! You can still get the idea though.)