My baby turns 4

Four years ago yesterday, our sweet princess was placed into our arms and I fell in love! I can't believe it's been four years!! It's been an amazingly fun, wonderful, hard, joyous and rewarding four years!! She is the most amazing little girl I have ever met and we thank God for her!!
Today we had a princess tea party with a few close friends and family. I made a tea pot cake for her and some tea cup muffins for her friends. I was actually pretty pleased with how everything turned out...of course, nothing is perfect, but mama was happy! :) Here are a few pics of the cake and one with me and my sweet girl!

I baked the cake mix right in the cups...makes for some easy tea cup cakes! :)

I learned a fun trick for all the chocolate swirls and lettering. You take some choco chips and melt them in a zip lock bag (slowly...20 sec at a time). Then, get out some wax paper, snip just the tip off the zip lock bag, and start "drawing" with the chocolate on the wax paper. Once dry, you can just peal them up...whalllllah...yummy chocolate writing/letters/swirls! :)

My bath boy

Easton is a kick in the pants! He makes me laugh soo much and is soooo much like his sister it's weird! I know they say that siblings' personalities are usually polar opposites, but my kids have more in common (as of now) than is usually expected! They both are so full of silly faces and joy...they LOVE to make me laugh! Easton was having such a fun time in the bath the other day, so I grabbed my camera and here's what I got...I couldn't decide because there are SO many faces, and each one has a story behind it! You'll just have to guess the story, but it's all fun!!

ARRRGGHHHHHH!!

My little pirate girl! She found this "alfit" in her drawer back from her cousin Ryder's b-day party!! I couldn't get any good ones of her with the patch on...she liked posing without it because "I can't see mom!" :)

My 3rd Cake...and more lessons learned!

I made my third fondant cake for my sister's "cute as a button" baby shower one of her girlfriends put on for her. This was a cake for my sweet nephew Jordan! - hence the "J" and the button on the cake and cupcakes! So, if you're all following my fondant journey...here are a few tips/lessons learned on this one!!
1. Try to minimize driving!!!! - the trip to Salem and all the vibrations on the highway definitely led to a bit of "settling"! - which brings me to my next lessons learned...
2. I put a TON of frosting on this one...I thought, the more the better right!? :) It's 4 layers inside with tons of frosting in each layer and on the outside of the cake part (pre-fondant). I had the shape in a perfect round, with nice tight corners and a flat top before I fondant'd it...however, because the frosting was so thick, it couldn't hold the perfectly squared off-corner'd look! - so, it got a bit saggy...and you can see more of the layers thanks to the "settling"...so, next time I think the frosting should only be a light coating just to make the fondant stick so that the fondant has a more rigid surface to adhere to...at least that's what I saw them do on "Ace of Cakes"! :)
3. Don't use food coloring to make brown fondant!! - BUY BROWN FONDANT or use cocoa powder in the melted marshmellows (if you're making your own fondant) before adding the powdered sugar! - by the time I added a half of a jar of brown food coloring, and kneaded it for over 20 min, the fondant got really hard and therefore hard to work with - it dried out a bit and gave me the texture of an elephant's skin!! But, at midnight last night I was like, "OH WELL!"...so, next time I would either minimize my brown accents and use tootsie rolls - rolled out/cut into shapes...or try the cocoa powder method. By the way, if anyone has tried the cocoa powder method...let me know!! :)
4. I would roll the stripes much thinner next time! - just a personal preference probably

I think that's it! - here are a few more pics! - Yes, I did the baby on top thing...but this time, it's a boy baby :) and has a hat and pacifier in his mouth!! :)