party and pops pics

We had a joint birthday party for the two oldest kiddos last week with balloon themed cakes and cake pops.

 The kids were loved and blessed by family and friends and we are all so thankful for time with loved ones and the gifts given and received.Last year, we (that’s the royal “we.” I’ll have to post on that family phenomenon another time) tried cake pops for the first time. It was fun and lived in my memory as easy. Everything seems easy when it’s a year away and finished. Well, I wouldn’t say they were easy this time, but they were fun, albeit tedious and somewhat difficult. But, still worth it.

Do you notice the three children sitting on the counter helping me? They love to be in on the action. Not pictured is the fourth one, who was helping by emptying the cupboards around my feet.

The cakes above are balloon cakes, before they went under the knife and succumbed to frosting. Thankfully the birthday kids agreed that they wanted balloon cakes for their party. Simple and colorful=right up my alley!

One tip if you’re reading here to learn about how to make cake pops: don’t use almond bark as your dipping candy. I had read somewhere that if you didn’t have Candy Melts (found at Michael’s or JoAnn’s or online) you could use white almond bark and add food coloring. And you can, but the results weren’t quite as good as when I used the Candy Melts. Use Candy Melts!!!

The cake pop sticks get stuck in styrofoam to make them stand up. I covered our round styrofoam with tissue paper, for looks.

We added ribbon to the balloon cakes to make them more balloon-ish. The two balloons on the left were Seth’s and the two on the right were Eliza’s.

Cousins and cake on a stick: what could be better?

Thanks Lord, for children worth celebrating!

For more on making cake pops visit Bakerella.

a cake pop adventure and more

We enjoyed a joint birthday party today for Seth and Eliza.

Many discussions went on over the last couple months about what cake to make.  After making the rainbow cake and giant cupcake last year, I was hoping to find something equally cool.

At first Eliza settled on a flower cake, but then modified to want a butterfly cake.  So, I started perusing the web to find the perfect one.  While doing that I ran across something called cake pops.  Seth decided frog cake pops sounded great and I was excited to have an excuse to try them out! So I tried to capture a few of the steps involved.

I like to add food coloring to cakes. It makes cutting into them a little more fun.

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After baking the cakes, I crumbled one of them up in a bowl, stirred in some frosting, and started rolling them into balls for the cake pops!

Next, I dipped the lollipop stick in a little melted candy (like almond bark) and inserted it into the cake ball.  Then, out to the cold cold deck to firm up. Those cake pops went from room temperature to below freezing in no time!

Fortunately we don’t have many wild animals venturing up on our deck, or this could have been a big disaster. The garage or freezer would have worked as well, I suppose, but not nearly as much entertainment as this snowy deep freeze.

See?! There are advantages to living in Minnesota!

Then comes dipping them in the candy melts, which I got from Jo-Ann’s.  You can buy them in all different colors. I also got some edible markers that were a bust. They worked on a few of them, but it was like using a pen that was running out.. only the marker wasn’t running out, it just didn’t like the candy melt texture. I ended up piping frosting on, instead of using the markers.

Of course, I had a helper in all this.  It wasn’t like I had to brave these things on my own. I like to call her my hip helper. There’s a double meaning in that.

Eliza was in charge of decorating her butterfly cake.

Nice work girl!

And Seth and Elianna’s job was to give these frog’s their eyes.

Good job!

 

 

 

I had some un-popped cake pops left over, so during the party I convinced some people to try their hand at it. I knew they’d have some good ideas!

They came up with: a minion from Despicable Me, a chicken, a few weird looking dudes, and I tried my hand at hello kitty.

But I must say that some of the party guests were simply ruthless. You wouldn’t expect such behavior from your own mother. She seems so innocent.

But don’t be fooled. She’s just luring you in.  Be afraid.  Bea very afraid..

Ahhhh! Run away! Run away! Run away and go try these cake pops. They are a blast. And if you really want to see how it’s done, check out Bakerella.  That’s where I got all my ideas and inspiration.

Who knew I’d be one to like making cakes? That said, no guarantees for all the coming years. Store-bought can be a life-saver! No shame in that, my friends!