Okay, so I know it's been forever, but I kind of broke my computer and have been using the hubby's to check my email here and there. He's at work today so I snagged it for a little bit longer. Heads up: Dr. Pepper and a laptop keyboard don't mix.

Anyway, I'd like to use this post to share about the hubby's birthday bash. We had family come up on the 5th and spent the afternoon at the beach. My mom, grandparents, my cousin, his girlfriend, Mike's mom, my two nephews and niece, three little cousins, and Mike's cousin and his girlfriend had a blast! Everyone brought a dish and we grilled chicken and hot dogs. I made my devil's chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter and Nutella swirled frosting.

That's the hubs and the cupcakes

It was so hot and humid that day that my trees didn't stay straight, but it looked great before the picture was snapped. The trees are pretzel rods with marzipan tops. The hammock is a "blazin' blue-green" fruit roll-up. You can't really see it in the photo, but there's a green fishing pole, blue fishing pole, tackle box, and his Five-Finger shoes he also wanted me to make from Marzipan. All edible. :) It was super fun to make and they tasted so good!

Here's the recipe for the frosting:

Peanut Butter Frosting:

1 cup Peanut Butter

4 cups powdered sugar (I didn't use the full 4 cups because I wanted it thinner for piping)

2 sticks butter (room temperature)

Up to 2 tsps milk.

Cream butter and peanut butter. Add powdered sugar one cup at a time. Mix until blended. Add milk to desired consistency. For the Nutella frosting, just substitute Nutella for the Peanut butter. 

Then, I just made quick-change bags using plastic wrap and put one peanut butter and one Nutella bag in the decorating bag and piped it out onto the cupcake. By putting each quick-change bags side-by side in the large bag, it came out swirled. :)

Note: it may be a good idea to keep the hubby out of the kitchen during this process unless you want missing frosting. Haha. I had plenty extra, so I kept him around. 

Photo Challenge days 15 and 16

Day 15 - A picture of something you want to do before you die: See Ireland.

Day 16 - A picture of someone who inspires you: My family. Each and every person in it. :) 

Day 15

Day 13 - A picture of your favorite band or artist: Josh Turner. 

Oh, you want to listen to him? Here ya go! 

This song rocks. :) 

Marzipan

Ha. So, I attempted to use Marzipan today. Let's just say this: I love to bake and decorate, but I've never used the stuff before, so naturally, I did a little research and dove into it. Apparently, it takes A LOT of time to get it to what you want it to look like. I've played with modeling clay/play-dough before, but this is a bit different. After throwing a bit of it away, I got to where I wanted to.

The hubby's birthday is coming up soon and we're doing a family birthday gathering next week. I prefer baking/decorating cupcakes, but wanted to add a little special flare since he didn't really celebrate his birthday last year (everyone was busy doing wedding stuff). I decided to do a hammock attached to two trees (one tree in one cupcake, the other in another cupcake) and it would hang over a few more cupcakes. The hammock was so hard to figure out because I'm not sure how well it'll hang once it dries/hardens, whatever Marzipan does.....yeah, haven't figured that one out yet either! Ha. Anyway, I couldn't leave it at two trees and a hammock though. What would I put next to the trees? Well, I'll tell you. Brown flip-flops (match the hubby's), two fishing poles (complete with line and worm), and a tackle-box equipped with a hook and yellow bobber. Yes, all made of Marzipan (except for the fishing line). Those turned out pretty cute and are currently drying.  I'll post pictures later.

For the rest of the cupcakes, Mike wanted devil's chocolate cake with nutella and peanut butter swirled butter-cream frosting. YUM. He's in love with peanut butter frosting, but when I told him that I found a recipe for Nutella frosting, he said he couldn't decide which he wanted, so he chose both. It should look pretty. :) So yep, that was my day. Died fingers and all.

Hubby will be home in a half hour and we're going to pop in a movie and chow down on cupcakes. :) Mmm.

Day 14

Day 12 - A picture of something you love: MY LIFE! Seriously. I have been blessed so incredibly much! I have a great family, an amazing husband, a cozy apartment, food, everything in my home, an education, and my health! I couldn't ask for more! God has provided so much and then some! 

Day 11 and a trip to the beach.

Day 11 - A picture of something you hate: Spiders. Double Yuck. We have them in our house and they seem to stalk me in the shower....

I don't even like posting a picture of one, but I'll suck it up for now. 


Moving on to things I love, I had a great time at the beach with the hubby yesterday! It was such a beautiful day and I got to wear the super comfy dress he bought me. :) All in all, it was a good day! 

Just-because

So, I had some left over card-stock that I had already cut pieces out of that I didn't want to put back in my stack, so I decided to play around with a "just because" card for the hubby. He has a Glock 19 and it's his baby. He loves it, so I decided to make a card in the shape of one. Some of the pieces pop out, but you can't really see that from the photos. On the inside, there's a bullet that says "you're a killer husband" :) It's cheesy but true: he is a GREAT husband. :)

Here's my end result:

I wish I had black card stock, but the crayons worked pretty nicely. For the grips, I crumpled up the paper to give it kind of a texture. I thought it turned out pretty cool for a last minute-card.