Sweet Pea Kayleigh & Little Ainsleigh too!

Welcome Baby Logan!

2019-01-27T17:04:00.000-08:00

Today was a great day! We celebrated my nephew and his girlfriend's arrival of their little son! They chose a hunting theme and my niece asked me to make the cake and cupcakes. Amazon has awesome choices for sugar sheets with edible images on them. Pop them in the freezer for 15 seconds to 1 minute and apply them to the cake. So easy!

I colored the vanilla cake batter three different colors and plopped spoonfuls into baking pans. Swirled it slightly with a knife and baked them. This created a camouflage pattern on the inside. Grass tip added to the piping bag gave an edging of dark green grass around the top. It came out great! Cupcake pics with black deer head silhouettes on them adorned the chocolate cupcakes. Can't wait until the next shower!

Welcome Baby Logan! Auntie loves you!

Happy First Birthday Ainsleigh and Liam!

2018-09-30T08:40:00.000-07:00

I cannot believe my littlest angel is a year old already! What a fun day we planned for her! We chose a "Somebunny Is Turning One" theme and since my nephew was turning a year two weeks later, we got his family in on the fun with a "Liam's Lumberjack Bash" birthday theme.

Woodsy accents, black bears, s'mores, lace, flowers, bunnies, and plaid combined to make an adorable themed party! Of course, Daddy had his birthday too and we needed an ice cream cake for him!

I designed the invites and they came out fantastic! I love Power Point for this stuff- so much better than Word. Seriously, try it if you haven't. The formatting is so much easier!

The cakes were so much fun to make too. Liam had a log smash cake, Ainsleigh had a white frosted cake with pink and green flowers. Their main cakes were a white frosted cake with gold bunny ears and a huge peony on top, and a brown bear cake for the special boy.

Everything came out great! Pink plates with gold bunnies that I got on clearance after Easter from Micheal's and black and red plates, napkins and forks for our lumberjack.

Big sister donated moose and bears to the decorating and everyone had a great time.

Enjoy! Happy 1st Birthday Ainsleigh and Liam!

xoxo

These pictures I created with free clip art online. They are not my images.

Additional Cakes and Parties

2018-07-10T08:59:00.002-07:00

So I have been quite busy these past few months! Not only did we welcome a beautiful baby girl to our family in September, but I have had some showers and parties that needed cakes! Here are some pictures of them!

Kayleigh's 11th birthday Galaxy Mario/ Luma star cake!

My niece's baby shower cake- one of three :)

A friend's husband's birthday cake! Chocolate cake with peanut butter icing! Thank you for your service and Happy Birthday!

My nephew's and daughter's baptism cakes :) So cute!

Little Whale/ Nautical Baby Shower- August 2017

2017-08-19T06:19:00.000-07:00

So one niece got married at the start of the summer, and my other niece is expecting her first little boy in September at the end of the summer! We are so excited for her and when baby shower planning came along, of course I had to jump in! She loves the ocean and selected a little whale/ nautical theme for her little sailor. So, I started scouring Pinterest for as many cute little whale cakes as I could find. They came out so cute and I was quite proud of myself :)

I did three cakes, two vanilla, and one tiered chocolate cake. I made a 9 inch four layer cake covered in vanilla buttercream turquoise rosettes, a smaller 6 inch 4 layer cake that I covered in turquiose fondant and made to look like a little whale, and the larger tiered cake made of chocolate that I covered in a light blue fondant, fondant waves, and a little whale topper with pink cheeks. He came out so cute. She was very pleased with all the decorations and we are excited to meet her little bundle. I too am expecting and this was very special as she is my God-Daughter and we are due a day apart!

Welcome Liam David!

Whale Fins, Tail, and Water Spout

Little Whale Cake Topper

Whale Topper is Finished! Just need to add the pink luster powder for his cheeks!

Start of the Little Whale cake

Pardon the dimples/ unsmooth fondant in the back....

Dessert Table

Whale Cake at the ready!

Tiered Whale Cake with fondant waves

See my pink cheeks?

Summer Wedding 2017

2017-06-04T19:37:00.000-07:00

This weekend I had the pleasure of attending the marriage of my niece and her husband! I was honored when she asked me to make the cupcakes for her wedding. We chatted and decided we wanted delicate pinks and whites and then I saw a tutorial for making lace impressioned fondant toppers and I knew that I had to incorporate that somehow. We found pink lace cupcake wrappers on Amazon and after viewing Pinterest for a bit, I got my inspiration. The day was gorgeous and sunny and the cupcakes were a hit.

I decided on a white chocolate raspberry cake with a variety of decorations and frosting flavorings. I had raspberry buttercream, sweet cream buttercream, and a cream cheese buttercream topped with a fresh raspberry. I was very pleased with how they all came out. Take a look!

Congrats Steph and Joe!

Tsum Tsum Birthday- K is 10!

2017-05-25T14:36:00.000-07:00

This year my little girl is 10! I can't believe it. She chose a Tsum Tsum birthday theme so we decided to go to lunch, glow golf, and then have cake/ cupcakes. She had such a blast and they all came out so cute!

She asked for a jumbo cupcake cake so I made it in chocolate. Then for the outside, I piped turquoise rosettes all over the top and added a fondant Oswald the Lucky Rabbit topper. She loves him. For the bottom, I melted pink sprinkle chocolate wafers and painted the inside of the cupcake mold and let it harden in the fridge for about 20 minutes. You have to paint it on really thick or it will crack. After it was ready, I popped it out of the mold and added it to the bottom of the cake.

Happy Birthday K!!

Love, Mumma

First Communion Cake 2017

2017-05-06T14:24:00.000-07:00

So once again, I got to make a cake for a customer's daughter's First Communion! It came out great! I used a fabulous vanilla cake recipe from Yolanda Gamp from How to Cake It- I LOVE her! She is so funny and extremely talented too!

I covered it with chocolate buttercream and white chocolate/marshmallow fondant. I made tons of white, light turquoise and teal flowers and a pretty teal cross topper that I embossed using various icing tips.

I used a tappits curly letter cutters to make the letters and pretty sugar pearls to adorn the top. The sides were embossed with a diamond print and garnished with pearls and smaller flowers. I used dental floss to lace small fondant beads and hand cut a cross to make the rosary. I love this cake.

I was very happy with how it came out, but boy was it a heavy cake!! Check it out!! Feel free to message me on FB if you are in the area and I can make a creation for you! I work great from pictures as a base and can customize the cake to your liking! Find me on Facebook too!!

Ariane :)

Our Halloween Gathering of 2016

2016-10-29T17:24:00.000-07:00

A Nightmare Before Christmas party

This year we opted for a fun Nightmare Before Christmas Party :) We immediately began to look for props and look for ideas. We found a cute printable banner and wreath ideas on Pinterest. I created the invitations using clip art and the free Nightmare Before Christmas font that I found here.

We decided to have guests bring their flashlights and after creepy crafts we watched the movie and then headed outside for a themed scavenger hunt and flashlight tag!

I made a cute little Zero ghost out of pipe cleaners, cheap white fabric, cheesecloth, stuffing, and felt and small imitation pumpkins. Here he is! I love him. there are various tutorials out there but I just looked at a picture and "winged" it. (No pun intended).

The printable banner was found here. Sally's recipe book tutorial was found here. This woman has so many great ideas and tutorials! She even has things for sale! Be sure to check her out! Her stuff is amazing! She also has free printable labels for Sally's potion jars. I bought glass and plastic jars and sprayed them a matte black then glued the labels to them.

I was sure to get plenty of gummy worms (Oogie Boogie's Bugs), Twizzlers for Sally's hair, chocolate Chex mix with white chocolate chips for Zero's Kibble, and made little Zero cupcake toppers from fondant. I also made a great cake with jack's face and bowtie. I scanned cyberspace for ideas and settled on combining a bunch of different ideas.

I used a black tablecloth that I cut into strips and put it across our sliding door as a curtain. I used white foam to cut out 3 skulls and used a sharpie marker to draw Jack's face and placed them in the center and sides of the curtains to hold them open. Zero was put by our slider to the backyard and I hung various purple lights and decor outside. I got black spiderweb plates, napkins, and orange cups. Purple flatware was placed in black containers and I got a cheap black plastic cauldron and two plastic web bowls for three dollars each at stop and shop that completed the look.

The scavenger hunt cards I created and have shared them with you! Please remember to give me credit for them! Also, I have included the invitation card covers that I used. I got black cards and envelopes and glued on the inner portions and using white gel pens, wrote the guest's names and addresses on them.
Savenger Hunt Printables
Invite Cover

The invites came out so great!!!

For food, I made a Jack Skellington cake and used an idea found on Pinterest (I LOVE that site!) that used melted marshmallows strung around the cake to look like spiderwebs! So cute! Twizzlers were "Sally's Hair", and we had "Boo Cheese", pumpkin dip served with apples and graham crackers, little clementine oranges, Oogie's Bugs which were sour gummy worms, pizza, salad, a veggie platter, witch's hat cupcakes, and pulled pork and meatball sandwiches. We also had monster donuts (I took vampire teeth and put them in the center of them) and Caramel Apple Sangria for the adults. The table came out amazing and because I ran out of time, I realized I never took a picture of it set up! I am so disappointed, but it looked amazing- trust me. I do have pictures of the rest of the decorations though and the cake and cupcakes- at least I have those.

The kids arrived and we set them up to do a craft downstairs.

After that, we had pizza and watched the movie, "The Nightmare Before Christmas". Since it was raining that day, I was unsure if we could do the scavenger hunt, but after the movie, we were able to do it. I hid the items during the movie and then gave 6 cards to the kids and as each item was found, the next child read their card. We then played "Pin the nose on Zero" and used the mayor's pumpkin tie as a blindfold. The kids loved it. We did have plans to do a pumpkin ring toss with glow stick rings and a pumpkin but the kids opted for a double feature instead and "Hotel Transylvania" was shown instead. Finally, flashlight tag was played outside when it got dark and they had a blast! Overall, they were amazing and everyone had fun!

Enjoy!!

Lego Cake!

2016-08-09T09:23:00.000-07:00

So my neighbor's sweet little boy turned 5 and I had a request to make a Lego theme cake. I knew exactly what would be perfect. This is my second attempt at this cake, I didn't like the way the first one came out so I made another and it was so much better! I think that the fondant was the hard part. I found a much better fondant recipe here. Scroll down to the bottom and the recipe is there. It tastes great and you also get great recipes for cakes and buttercream!

This cake was egg free chocolate cake and it tasted like fudge. No frosting needed but you can't have a chocolate Lego head when classic yellow is what I was going for! So crumb coat with chocolate butter cream and the four 8 inch round layers were ready to go!

Fondant was used to make the face and Lego blocks. Picky me didn't like the cracks but after 12 hours of making the cake start to finish, my eyes were glazing over....

The birthday boy loved his cake and said it was yummy!

Five Nights at Freddy's Cake

2016-08-09T09:13:00.001-07:00

So this cake was by far the most challenging and also one of the most fun. While I don't watch the show, it was interesting to challenge my fondant skills to take it to the next level.

The cake was an 8 inch square vanilla cake, with three layers, and chocolate buttercream. The toppers were made from modeling chocolate and marshmallow fondant. I have since tried out another fondant recipe made with glycerin and gelatin and it works so much better. Marshmallow fondant has always been, well, sticky, but maybe I need to use Crisco instead of more powdered sugar. Sigh- my kitchen will never be clean.... anyway. Here are the pictures:

Such a fun cake! Happy Birthday Ben!

A Perfectly Pleasant Purple 40th Birthday Party!

2016-07-31T07:27:00.000-07:00

One of my best friends turned 40 and to celebrate we had a cookout with many friends. I made the cakes and as she loves purple, light houses and the beach, an ocean theme with purple was definitely on the menu. Did I mention she loves Donald Duck too?

I made a 6 inch round cake with an awesome vanilla cake and I made a larger 8 inch chocolate cake. I decorate both with vanilla buttercream, brown sugar sand, shimmer purple candy rocks, and molded chocolate shells. I sell the 6 inch for $60 and the 8 inch for $90 decorated as is. This includes the homemade cake, frosting, seashell decorations and packaging. Each cake has three layers of cake and two layers of luscious buttercream.

Donald Duck cupcakes were also on the menu! These sell for $4 each (minimum of 12)! They feature delicious marshmallow fondant beaks, hats, and eyes, and candy hearts, vanilla buttercream and white cake.

Donald Duck fondant topper is $5 and is made of marshmallow fondant.

Here are photos of the display at her party!!! Happy Birthday Sarah!

My favorite was this guy! So cute! I told Sarah she couldn't eat him but we needed to keep him because he was so cute! Tsum Tsum fondant creations may be my new thing!

Enjoy all!

~Ariane

Boston Terrier Hot Tub Cake

2016-07-30T07:31:00.000-07:00

Here is a cute hot tub cake that was made with fondant Boston Terrier toppers, Kit Kats, blue white chocolate ganache, chocolate cake and vanilla buttercream! Came out really cute!

Enjoy!

Hello Little Piggie! (Piggy in a Hot Tub Cake)

2016-07-26T12:56:00.002-07:00

Here is another cute little cake that I made for a pig roast! I used chocolate cake, Kit Kats (yum) and made little fondant piggies! I made chocolate ganache and although it took some time to set up, it was very delicious and worked perfectly! The cake was a hit!

Oink Oink! Enjoy!

Ariane :)

A Tangled Affair!

2016-05-21T15:47:00.000-07:00

K’s 9^th Birthday

I cannot believe that my little angel is turning 9!

This year, K decided she wanted a Rapunzel theme. So, we set to work creating a vintage style party fit for a princess! I created her invitation using some really pretty font and the sun in the background. Then I printed the guest's names on the envelopes and sent them out! So pretty! The link can be found here! Feel free to use the template but please cite back to where it came from!

I did not want to to the typical party in a box idea. I think those are great in a pinch, but it just isn't me. I like to bring in elements of the movie but with a more rustic, vintage twist. I LOVE Disney- don't get me wrong, but I also like the challenge of adding more realistic elements.

Our party was going to be held at Palette's. This is a paint studio that offers step by step painting classes for adults and kids. They offer private parties or you can sign up online to take a class of your choice. Their link is here. I have gone before and love it. Adults can get a beverage of their choice or some appetizers at the bar and then sit down to paint with the instructor. The upstairs offered a space for the party goers after the painting was done. I wanted to re-create the "Snuggly Duckling" tavern from the movie. I used foam board to draw out the sign and then using paint and colored pencils, and markers added the color. I got a little wire easel for $3 at JoAnn's and stood it at the top of the stairs.

I saw this awesome tutorial to make Rapunzel's hair and revised it because I wasn't looking for one for K to wear, just one to use as decoration. There are a ton out there and any of them look great depending on what you want to do with them. I used a ton of gold homespun yarn that I got on clearance and wrapped it around two kitchen chairs. Then I tied one end together with a strand of yarn and clipped the other end with scissors. I found some clearance flowers at the craft store and a gorgeous purple with gold threads ribbon completed the look. I was so happy with how it came out!

For the favors, I used beautiful crocheted lace with fabric stiffener to make lace crowns for all the guests. The tutorial that I used can be found here.

Here is the link for the printable Flynn Ryder posters!! I also created food labels and used a gold hued lavender ribbon to attach them to the canisters for decorations. I made a dessert and food list to match. You can find them here and here. Each guest got to take a little Pascal tsum tsum home with them in addition to the lace crowns. The sign was so cute! You can find it here.

I used the featured painting of Rapunzel looking out at the night's sky at the lanterns and painted a replica of it to put over the dessert table. A golden tablecloth was used with a moss runner. There were wooden platters with fruits, cheese, and crackers and desserts.

I wanted rustic details that made it seem like the girls were stepping into the "Snuggly Duckling". We had wooden forks and spoons, black paper plates and water to drink. I could have added black knives to the plates to look like handles of the frying pans and we could have also had silver or gold cups to look like goblets.
The girls table had a gold table cloth with the Rapunzel braid and lanterns along the center. I found a gorgeous metal lantern at Homegoods that matched the theme perfectly! Water bottles, juice boxes and Maximus' Apples were in wooden baskets. The little Pascal's were in a gold and lavender box next to the sign but they could also have been placed at each place setting with the crowns.

K's cake was a Blackberry Buttercream over a tiered lavender/blackberry pink ombre cake. The buttercream was swirled in rosettes over the top of the cake while the sides were ridged with the tip of the spatula, and was topped with a small lace crown and a fondant Pascal peeking over the edge. I was going for this look:

So cute!

Here is a close up of the little fondant Pascal that I made for her cake! You can purchase him or a dozen of his buddies at my Etsy shop here or here!

I also made cupcakes with two types of decorations. Around Halloween, I found little sugar long axe decorations that I thought would be perfect for the Ruffian's Cupcakes. I made golden flowers from fondant using a Petunia maker. I tinted the buttercream golden yellow for this, swirled the golden icing, and we have Golden Flower Cupcakes to go with our Ruffian Cupcakes! I also created little Pascal toppers from royal icing and the cookies were cupcake shapes that I turned into Pascals little face!

The wrappers were gold and set off the colors beautifully. I placed the cookies on a metal tiered stand that I found at the Christmas Tree Shops. The cutlery was placed in metal buckets by the desserts. Banners with the words "Best Day Ever" were strung at the dessert table and across the door.

I recreated the Golden Flower using a fake lily that I spray painted gold and placed in a painted flower pot with fake moss. I used golden flower wire for the tall stamens and overall it came out great! Here is a picture. You can purchase one from my Etsy shop here!

Happy 9th Birthday, Angel!

I hope you enjoyed this post!! I had a blast creating this for my little girl! Feel free to leave comments or questions!!

Ariane

Muck You MS! (viewer discretion advised)

2016-05-13T17:40:00.003-07:00

Here is the cake that a coworker asked me to make for her sister's fundraiser this weekend. She gave me a picture of the t-shirt and I went to work! It was a double layer chocolate cake with hot pink vanilla buttercream and hot pink marshmallow fondant. The cake came out so cute! However viewer discretion due to the fact she wanted a hand flipping off MS (Multiple Sclerosis). For the rest of you who are not concerned about the bird, scroll down and take a peek!

Enjoy!!

Ariane

Fondant Pascal the Chameleon on Etsy!

2016-05-08T08:48:00.003-07:00

Wacky Watermelons Girls U10 Spring Soccer 2016! DIY Pony-O Hair Bows and Cake!

2016-04-17T08:00:00.002-07:00

This season, K's soccer team name is the Wacky Watermelons. So cute! Immediately we went to JoAnn's and found some really sweet watermelon themed ribbon. I wanted to make hair bows like I do every year but we have a girl with really short hair on our team and I wanted her to be included too. The hair ties were perfect because the girls could wear them on their wrists, in their hair, or over their shoe laces.

Here is the tutorial I found.

Here's how they came out!

Stay tuned for the soccer party!!! Watermelon themed!

Opening Day at Fenway 2016

2016-04-17T07:54:00.002-07:00

So no opening day party would be complete without a Red Sox cake! I scoured the internet looking for inspiration and came across this beauty! I noticed that on the red jerseys, the writing was blue and on the white, it was red. On this cake, the picture featured blue writing instead of red. Well, I thought red would work great. I also made little chocolate cupcakes with icing "grass" and baseball gloves using Tootsie Rolls and white sixlet candies I had left over from my Polar Bear Cupcakes. You can find the tutorial here.

I realized that getting the right red color was difficult because adding red to white royal icing is going to produce various levels of pink. I eventually resorted to putting some of the ready made red icing into the royal icing and it worked well.

Using wax paper and a sheet of the logo that I printed out, I piped the letters "RED SOX" with blue and red icing and set it to dry. Then I took the Tootsie Rolls and microwaved them for 5 seconds to soften them up. I shaped them using fondant tools into little gloves and set them to dry with the royal icing letters.

I made a blue velvet cake for the jersey cake and marshmallow fondant (MMF) to cover it. I used Duff's red fondant for the red piping along the sides of the buttons and made little buttons from the MMF and set those to dry.

It all came out so cute!

I LOVE how it came out and each time I work with marshmallow fondant it gets easier and easier. Practice does make perfect. I would have piped the icing letters thicker next time but otherwise, I was so happy it came out like this. My coworkers were thrilled when I brought it in as well. So fun!

Enjoy! Go Sox!

Ariane

Little Elephant Baby Shower

2016-01-10T09:07:00.000-08:00

This past weekend was my niece's baby shower! I cannot believe that she is having a baby! I cannot wait to meet her little girl! This was officially my first "big" event, as I was making the favors, cookies, and cake pops for the dessert table.

My niece decided on a silver gray and baby pink color theme and I must stay it all came together beautifully! The centerpieces were galvanized buckets of baby's breath (compliments to my sister in law!) placed in the center of round tables covered with a baby pink table cloth. Little hand made elephant confetti was sprinkled around the centerpiece and it was perfect.

I thought it might be cute to have guests sign in when they came to add to a scrapbook or photo book and when scrolling over the internet, I came across a similar idea to this, but used another free elephant graphic instead. I bought a balloon hole punch and glued the balloons all over the paper. It came out so cute!!!

Then I thought, wouldn't it be nice to have guests write little notes to the baby and her Mumma and Daddy? Michael's was having a sale on the Valentine's Day supplies so I bought a pink Valentine box and decorated it then made a cute card and placed it on the gift table. I made a little Gift and Card sign as well.

Gift and Present labels

The favors were little elephant sugar cookies and I used royal icing and pink glitter dust to make the cheeks. A black edible marker was used to make the eyes of the elephants on the cookies and cake pops.

I made additional cookies for the dessert table using marshmallow fondant and heart sprinkles. The cookies were sugar cookies with royal icing and sprinkles as well. Everything came together great!!

Dessert tag labels

Dessert Ingredients- for allergy awareness

The cake pops were a hit. I used vanilla cake with buttercream frosting and they came out fabulous!!! They were the cutest baby elephant cake pops ever!!! Click on the link to find out how I did it! I modified the original design by using royal icing for the ears rather than the chocolate wafers, but they still came out cute!!! Here are some photos from the dessert table and the event!! What a great day. The cakes were not my creation but the woman who did them is amazing!!! Check out her work too!

A marshmallow fondant elephant that I made to go with the theme :)

I made this to go with the decor but also for the baby's room using ribbon, a gift box, stick on bows, and a paper lantern.

This was such a great time and everyone had a blast. This was by far my favorite party to do and although the cake pops were time consuming, it was well worth the effort!!! Enjoy!!!!

Congrats to Steph and Joe!!!

Welcome Charlotte!

Winter Party 2015

2015-12-13T13:52:00.000-08:00

Polar Express Party!

This winter I decided to throw Kayleigh and her friends a “Polar Express” party to celebrate winter and the Christmas holiday. I figured that the kids could watch the movie and drink hot chocolate. Of course Pinterest was not short on ideas for sure!

I decided to use red plates and red plaid napkins that I had left over from our North Pole party a few years back. I used red velvet scrapbook paper as placemats for the tables and created a postcard type invitation like this.

I purchased gold vellum from Michael’s and printed the gold tickets to put inside the invitations. The printable I found for free here. I also found little tags to put on the bells here.

I decided on a white, red, and light blue color scheme and invited the kids to bring sleeping bags and wear their pajamas. We turned the downstairs into the “North Pole Movie Theater” and they watched the movie while the adults had the upstairs to chat and mingle. Here is a printable for you!

I used white Christmas lights behind the bar and set up the goodies for the kids there including pizza. For the most part, the popcorn stayed in the boxes! They were the cutest red and white striped boxes that I got from Christmas Tree Shops for only $1.69! I grabbed four and used them to serve the popcorn.

We had powdered donuts, salted caramel and pumpkin spice cookies, popcorn, hot chocolate, cheese and crackers, a veggie platter that I arranged to look like a Christmas tree, sugar cookies that I decorated, home made Chex mix, egg nog dip, and pizza! I also made delicious Peppermint Whip. It is the easiest thing ever. Pulverize candy canes into a powder and stir into your favorite whipped topping. Serve with cookies, pretzels or Pirouline wafter cookies and Voila! It is awesome in hot cocoa as well! The grown-ups also enjoyed white chocolate hot cocoa. You can find the recipe here. It is so delicious and easy to make in the crock pot!

One of the cutest cupcakes of all time came from Bakerella. Her post here is what I used to create these cuties! Check them out!

Seriously, how cute is this guy's little tongue?!

I bought red paper containers to put the favors in. Of course the night would not be complete without bells from Santa! I made little packets of Magic Reindeer Food and placed them inside as well. You can find printables of them here.

The kids had a blast!!! Enjoy some more pictures of our party!

Merry Christmas!!

Ariane

Elf Breakfast 2015! The Year of the Reindeer!

2015-11-29T06:34:00.000-08:00

Kayleigh & Kaylin

Welcome to your Elf Breakfast

2015

This year was the “Year of the Reindeer”! I love that there are always new and exciting things coming from the North Pole! K loves her elves Selsie and Cherry Cinnamon and this year, they brought a special reindeer to visit! She named him Hazelnut and was so happy that she could hold him!

The elves brought special goodies for K and her best friend and they munched on French toast and chocolate chips. The elves had a picnic as well with tiny m&m’s, gingerbread marshmallows and chocolate chips. They even had tiny red solo cups for their orange juice! Such fun!!

I hope you have a wonderful and magical holiday season!

Ariane

An Engagement Party

2015-09-19T07:21:00.000-07:00

This year, my wonderful niece, Stephanie got engaged and I am so happy! I helped to plan the party of course and made the cakes and chocolate dipped strawberries. Here are some photos of the fun event!! Enjoy!

2015-06-06T19:06:00.000-07:00

Frozen Winter Wonderland Birthday Party!

Kayleigh's birthday is upon us again and I cannot believe it! She loved the movie "Frozen" when it came out and I thought what a fun idea it would be to have a "winter in June" theme. I wanted to use a lot of snowflakes, white snow, and winter birch branches. I reused the birch branches from Christmas and her First Communion. I placed one pot by the dessert table, and the other out by the door. On the porch, I covered it with buffalo snow that I got for 90% off after Christmas.

We used hues of silver, winter white, icy blue, and lavender to complete the theme. I used many items from my Winter Wonderland party and other winter parties. The white tablecloths and the white tulle table skirt that I made combined with discounted clearance buffalo snow on top made for a beautiful setting.

I found rolls of ribbon on clearance for $0.49 each and these I used to decorate the wands. Discounted iridescent snowflake ornaments were hot glued to the top of dowels to complete the look. Additional white sparkly snowflake ornaments were used to create more wands. These can be purchased through my Etsy shop here!

From Oriental Trading Company, I purchased the favor boxes, acrylic clear, pink, and blue ice, and snowflake stickers. From Michael's I purchased white, lavender, and light blue gift bags to put the favors in. I included a baggie of heart and snowflake marshmallows, green and blue sugar crystals (which were the melted hearts, snowflakes, Elsa crystals, and troll glow stones), a crown, a plastic sparkle ice castle ornament (gotten on clearance after Christmas), silver or sparkle blue headbands, and white gumballs.

I also bought a canvas and using wax paper, ironed a stencil of Elsa's silouette on the canvas and then used shimmer paint to paint over it. Once dry, I pulled it off and behold the masterpiece. This was the centerpiece of the dessert table. I also used a jar and decorated it with snowflake stickers and filled it with shimmery gumballs.

Additional items included, white sparkle clear flatware (Christmas Tree Shops- $2.99 each), stickers on clearance from AC Moore and Michael's, 3 icy look rings that I placed around the glass votive containers, and tons of paper snowflakes that Kayleigh and I made together.

Food was simple fair placed in clear canisters. I created a gorgeous shimmery white 6x9 inch cake using white buttercream, white cake, and white sanding sugar. It came out amazing! The top layer was white, middle blue, and bottom was lavender. Fondant snowflakes completed it and I didn't want to cut into it! Other treats included:

Olaf's Noses: Carrots

Elsa's Snowflakes: snowflake shaped cookies

Shimmer White Gumballs

Fruit Salad: Grapes and blueberries

Olaf's Arms: Pretzel sticks

Olaf in Summer: Fondant Olaf in blue jello

Frozen Hearts: Strawberries in white chocolate

Games included Pin the Carrot on Olaf, snogie and Sven construction craft, and outdoor play!

The kids had a great time and it was so fun! Can't wait to plan for next year!

Happy 8th Birthday K!!!
xoxo,
Mumma

Birthday Scavenger Hunt/ Surprise Disney Trip 2015!- Part 1

2015-05-23T05:56:00.000-07:00

I am so super excited to share what I have been up to these past few months- well really years- while planning our Disney trip. You might remember the huge scrapbook that I had put together to use from this post here, but then I started thinking about all of the research I had been doing. One thing that stuck out to me was that I did not want to be lugging around such a huge autograph book in the Florida heat- no matter how great it turned out. I started looking at smaller ideas and finally after a few drafts, settled on a simpler version using a Frozen theme, binder rings, and 5x7 scrapbook pages. I had the holes punched at my local Fed Ex. The gentleman behind the counter was so nice and didn't even charge me for punching the holes! I had made a travel journal for my little princess (find the link here) and in that post there was also a smaller autograph book too. Here it is to refresh your memory :)

But the more that I thought about it (and tried to contort it), it still would not fit in the sling style back pack that I planned on taking (less is more, right?) so I came up with this beauty.

All of the pages have a shimmery look to them and I found all of the products (including the shimmery ribbon that I found in the $1 section) at Michael's. Oh Michael's how I love thee! I totally cannot get out of there without buying something. So, after the construction of all of this, I thought, "How can I give all of this to her? Should I surprise her?" And then in talking to hubby, we figured that her birthday weekend would be a great time to tell her. She loves everything Frozen so I purchased a lot of Frozen items as well that she could use on her trip- bathing suits, flip flops, books, a drawstring back pack to carry her autograph book and travel journal (hey one can dream right?) so that I don't have to.....
I also purchased other Disney theme items such as little tsum tsums- they are precious! So cute and little and squishable- I have one (ahem- four) of my own.

Upon looking at Pinterest and the internet I came across great ideas such as exploding boxes (no not the dangerous ones) and scavenger hunt ideas and decided to combine both into a Birthday Scavenger Hunt/ Disney Surprise!

Here is the exploding box. Frozen theme of course!

and here are the little hints and birthday gifts along the way!

The hunt begins with clue number 1 and the first present (Frozen books and tsum tsums!)

Hint number 5

Hint number 6!

Autograph and Travel Journal hiding out with the exploding box

We will be staying at Disney's Beach Club and will do a variety of character meals to help with the meet and greets rather than stand in line at the parks. We were able to save 30% off of our room rates and get a 5th day free at the parks! I booked a travel agent from Mouse Hunter Travels named Katie Covington. She rocks!! Be sure to check her out. She is patient and answered all of my questions. Since I am alot like Sheldon Cooper in the organizational department, I had actually made rough drafts of what I wanted to do and when as well as a planner that I will print out and take with me. She even looked over it and made suggestions to help our trip run smoother! These Disney travel agents are awesome- they will even make your dining and FP+ (Fast Pass) reservations for you if you like! We were able to get some difficult reservations that way!

I will be sure to post additional pictures of the actual scavenger hunt and birthday surprise! I am so excited!

2015-05-04T18:10:00.000-07:00

A Very Special First Holy Communion- May 2nd, 2015

An Irish Communion Blessing

May you always feel as close to Jesus as you do today,

May you always count on Him to gently guide your way,

May you always trust in God to answer every prayer,

May you always feel Him blessing you with His loving care.

May God grant you always

A sunbeam to warm you

A moonbeam to charm you

A sheltering angel so nothing can harm you

Laughter to cheer you

Faithful friends near you

And whenever you pray

Heaven to hear you.

This year, my little angel made her First Holy Communion! We were so proud, her Daddy and I, and I started planning her party well in advance of course! This was my Pinspiration board.

We chose or I should say, K chose a gorgeous dress that was a sleeveless, frilly and flowy floor length creation. It was a $200 dress knocked down to $75 that we found on www.prettyflowergirl.com. See the dress here. We got a dusty pink sash but you can customize the sash to compliment your theme. Then we got a cute little fur cape to cover her shoulders because it can get chilly here come May in New England. After the winter we just had I wasn't expecting to thaw out easily! It can be found here.

My original plan was to create a tiered cake similar to the one I made for her 7th birthday last year using a white cake mix with white butter cream frosting and fondant ruffles. Then I thought of using marshmallow fondant and covering the layers with that, smoothing it over the top layer and adding the ruffles for the bottom layer. I have a white ceramic cake stand I could use too. I also wanted to make a cupcake cake using the rosette swirled piping tip and form a communion dress with the cupcakes in white butter cream. I had the rectangular cake board all set and the pattern ready to go.

Then I also wanted to have angel feathers,white tulle and light pink accents with angels. I found really cute angel wings that I used to accent a tulle wreath I made and created a really cute feather wreath to go on the inside of the side door with pink ribbon.

I found really cute favors on Etsy. You can find the link here:

I chose the white pearl with the rose gold wings. They are gorgeous! I got them from Ava and Co. I also purchased these for the God Parents from EternityDesignsDria on Etsy. They are perfect:

I made a tulle table skirt from 10 yards of tulle and elastic. It was very quick to put together and came out great. I glued a 4-5 inch wide ribbon that was a shimmery white all the way around and it all came out beautiful. It will be used on the dessert table for both parties. I can reuse it for K's 8th birthday this year. It will be a Frozen theme but with more of the snow, shimmery white/silver and ice princess accents with some other accents to the Disney movie. Stay tuned for that post!!!

Little angel wings like these:

(but not those- they were on Pinterest), I used to accent the gorgeous wintery branches that I placed in styrofoam and flower pots sprayed with white paint that I put on either side of the dessert table as well as the tulle wreath that I hung on the front door. It went well with the tulle table skirt and both will be reused for K's birthday party.

I used alot of pink and shimmery white tableware with white platters. I made cross cookies decorated with royal icing and they came out so sweet. The favors I placed in little white organza bags for guests to take home and I found a really pretty white wire birdcage that I used for cards.

Here are some tablescape photos...

We had little mason jars filled with white and pink tulips that I decorated with lace ribbon and cross stickers for centerpieces.

It all came together so nicely! Her invitations were color photos of her in her communion wear that we used as a backdrop for the invite information.

Here are some more photos.....

Bless you my little Angel in all that you do.

Love Mumma
xoxo