Mickey Mouse Clubhouse 1st Birthday

His birthday party, about four weeks ago, went really well. We had many snacks and good friends to share with. What I wanted to share today was the cakes I made and the tool I used to help me frost. Because let me tell you, I am in LOVE with this. It was really the coolest thing. 

The frosting decorator press. Now I am not actually 100% sure if this is the one I really bought but if I was going to buy one off of amazon right now this would be the one. They are not too spendy and it is so much easier than frosting by hand or buying the store bought frosting in a tube. You know exactly what is going in your frosting and can change flavors to suit your needs. Wish I wasn't avoiding having cupcakes all the time or I would use this everyday!

Anyways. The birthday party was Mickey Mouse Clubhouse themed, since this is his favorite show. I wanted to make a MMC cake. Well I looked all over Pinterest for ideas and I didn't think I could make any of them. They were all so intricate and required the use of fondant which I have never used. I went to a birthday party last year that had cupcake pull-apart cake and I thought it was really cool. And I love cupcakes. So I decided to go the cupcake route. 

Here's what I did:

1. Make your cake mix. I did store bought and made two batches. 
2. Separate the batter into three bowls. (One is not pictured. It is the original bowl I am keeping white.)
3. I made the batter the colors I wanted. I had to use a lot of food coloring to make it the blue and red that i needed. It took many drops of the coloring I used. I might try to use a different kind next time.
4. As soon as they were the vibrant color I wanted (I wish the red was less pink though), I got out my mini muffin pan, sprayed it, and got to work. 
5. I used a teaspoon or tablespoon to put the colors in each muffin tin. I did this at random and tried to do them each a little differently. More blue in some, red in others, and white in the ones left. When you have completed that they should look something like the picture above. 
6. I baked them about 10 minutes and repeated the process until all the batter was gone. 
7. While they were cooling I whipped up my frosting, I believe it was some kind of vanilla butter cream. I put yellow food coloring in it as bold as I could get it and put it in my frosting decorator press. Or what I refer to as my frosting gun.
8. I frosted each cupcake individually using just a simple spiral. While I was frosting I started placing them in the shape of a mickey mouse head.
9. I also mad a few big cupcakes and put 3 together to make the ears. I had to make them transportable so used 3 plates. I didn't have anything big enough to hold the whole thing.

This is for the moms who want to do something simple. The only time consuming part was making the cupcakes tie-dyed. Other than that the baking was quick and frosting with the frosting gun took less than 5 minutes to frost 2 boxes of cake worth of mini cupcakes!

I also made Colton his own little cake that he could use his whole hands to dig in. It turned out pretty good. It was a small round pyrex container and two mini cupcakes for the ears! HOT DOG! 

I can't wait to whip out the frosting gun again! Maybe for valentines day :)

Until next time,

-Amanda

Excitement

I remember a certain post a few months back where I said my New Year's Resolution would be to blog more. HA. Apparently I forgot how crazy life gets during the holidays and the last few days of winter break. I am about to start my third week of classes (OF MY LAST SEMESTER before student teaching!!!!) and have finally gotten ahead enough where I have a minute to do a post. 

First off, we are just under seven months on the wedding countdown. I can't believe It has almost been a full year since I got engaged and started planning this wedding. I also can't believe how little I have gotten done! I truly had no idea how much it takes to plan a wedding, and how crazy life as a single(ish), student mom is. We have found some really cool, cheap ideas for things to do for the wedding. I have been working on making is as cheap as possible for my mom. 

A few ways we are doing that:

1. Instead of hiring a band or DJ, we have decided to make a playlist, in advance, of the songs we want played and are going to put them on an iPod. My dad has all of the equipment to do the sound and we will have someone in charge of the iPod so nothing crazy gets played. I figure it saves us roughly $500-$1000, when you figure in the tip and all that. 
2. Buying a keg, or two, and the rest with be a cash bar. I figure most of the people will be okay with a Keg of Mich Golden Light. If they aren't they can buy their own drinks. I don't think it is necessary to provide people with unlimited free alcohol especially when they don't have to drive. That bill would be incredibly high!

There are definitely more things we have planned but I can't think of them because I have something bigger on my mind!

WE PICKED OUT A HOUSE! I am beyond excited. We are one step closer to not living back and forth between both of our parents houses and just having out own place! I am so happy all I wanna do is go buy stuff and start getting it ready for MAY! But then I remember I don't have time or money. :( 

Anyways it is a 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom with kitchen, laundry, living room dining room and den. Plenty of space for the three of us to live for a while. Best of all the master bedroom has plenty of room for our King bed and other stuff! It is a beautiful thought having more than just our bed in a room! I simply cannot wait. I am scouring Pinterest for ways to decorate my home. I took a million pictures so I remember what things look like and can do before and after shots! 

Anyways, life is good this week. Excited to finish school, wedding plans, and move into our own place! AND I am seriously going to try to get on here more. Wish me luck!

Until next time!

-Amanda