Moist Alert!

I know that I have some friends who absolutely abhor the word "moist" ... and you know who you are! So you're either going to have to suck it up, or just skip this post, because I'll probably say the word about 10 more times at least.

Moist moist moist moist moist. :) Happy?

For my dad's birthday this past August, he basically gave me the reins to make any dessert for him that I wanted. I picked a new cupcake recipe I had been wanting to try out - Moist Mint Chocolate Cupcakes!

Never before had I made a cupcake better that was A) so liquidy and B) so dark. Honestly, I thought that I had made a mistake and that the cupcakes would not turn out. The only real problem I had was that the tops were so sticky after I took the pan out of the oven, that one little touch would tear off the top of the cake.

DO NOT, under ANY circumstances, underestimate the level of MOISTNESS in these cupcakes.

They are rich. They are dark and decadent. They are MOIST. Please believe me on this.

I about had a heart attack with the frosting too. For the life of me, I could not get the right consistency using this Mint Buttercream Icing recipe from chocolatecupcakes.net. (Although it says you can use mint and chocolate, I opted out of both and just did a vanilla buttercream)

Spreading was impossible. I ended up, with the help of my mom, dipping the cupcakes in the purple frosting. Then I very carefully used a piping bag to decorate with the letters on top in gold.

GO DAWGS!

Because my dad graduated from the University of Washington, I thought he would appreciate these for his birthday. Every bite was like a little bit of Husky victory.

I do recommend these cupcakes, but for the love of all things delicious, have some MILK on hand.

Birthday Treats!

In the first week and a half of September, my nephew turned 1 and my niece turned 3. It was so much fun to celebrate with family, and I got to do some baking and decorating!

For Evan's 1st birthday, my sister-in-law baked a cake for his treat and cupcakes for the rest of the party guests. The theme for the evening was BASEBALL and I was ecstatic when she asked me to decorate the cakes.

Evan's cake was a funfetti cake slathered in cream cheese frosting. The decoration was very simple. I took my frosting spreader and with a cleaned end, lightly traced the curved lines. Then I took my red dyed frosting to create the stitching.

The hardest and most nerve-wracking part for me was the writing, because I had never done it before, but I think it turned out pretty nice, no?

The cupcakes were also funfetti with the funfetti frosting! My mom and I cut up some cherry twizzler strands to make the initial lines and then decided to add the stitching for fun, baseball cupcakes for all to eat!

Hailey's actual 3rd birthday was after my parents were leaving to go back home, so we had a small party with cupcakes and presents while they were in Idaho still. Since her real party was a princess theme, I made ladybug cupcakes for the special party.

These were SO much fun to make! I made red velvet cupcakes and then just colored the cream cheese frosting red and black. I actually had a nightmare that it wasn't going to turn out, but behold - it worked like magic!

Just a base of red frosting with a line down the middle, a half circle for the head and dots! Easy as pie...or, cake, I suppose.

My niece had fun watching me in action all that day, and she loved the cupcakes that night too! She kept talking about them afterwards, and that was the greatest success in my book.

My first real experiment with decorating, and I think it turned out great! The desserts were fantastic and everyone had a great time, including my niece and nephew. I absolutely love being an aunt. :)