Party Season

We are now entering party season around here, and I couldn't be happier.  In addition to planning my munchkin's summer birthday party, I got myself mixed up in another little foodplay project.  My daughter's school has a spring auction to raise money for the school.  What did I donate?  Food, of course!  I offered to bake two dozen custom cupcakes, to be delivered to a lucky child's classroom, home, or birthday party.  It sounds like a fun little project, don't you think?

The only problem is that I'm not that experienced at baking cupcakes.  I have just about never baked fancy cupcakes.  (The fanciest I've ever gotten were little cakes baked in bug cupcake molds and piped with the simplest of frostings ~ whipped cream!)  So there was definitely some risk in promising so much.  Afterall, the word "custom" pretty much implies free license on flavor, color, and even theme.

I was relieved to hear that the purchaser of my little cupcake project isn't overly demanding.  Her daughter is having a unicorn party.  She selected a very specific cake flavor that will be easy to do, and I have free rein on color and how to interpret the theme.  But wait . . . I don't think I can draw a unicorn to save my life.  Amazon doesn't sell unicorn cupcake rings or other types of cupcake toppers.  (Although they sell lots of great ones in other themes.)  What to do, what to DO?!?

I turned to Etsy for inspiration, and now I need feedback.  Any thoughts on these cupcake toppers?  Any idea how I might come up with an equally fantastic diy version?  Any other tips or ideas on how to create a masterful unicorn cupcake?  I'm all ears.

'Unicorn Birthday' by appetiteforconvo

Inspiration for making unicorn cupcakes!

Bottle Cap Image Sheet ... allgirlychicbo... $1.75	Unicorn Happy Birthday... ThePaperLot $21.00	Rainbow Unicorn Birthda... MyPartyGirlFri... $4.75
Unicorn Cupcake Toppers cmariedesigns $0.75	Rainbow Unicorn - Cupca... paperBIRDSonEt... $5.95	18 Unicorn Theme - Cupc... MMKids $18.00
Rainbow Unicorn Birthda... MyPartyGirlFri... $4.75	Cupcake Toppers "W... FlyingTurtleBo... $9.99	PRINT SALE Unicorn Cake... stoopidgerl $17.50

Treasury tool supported by the dog house

{Thank you to handmadeology for this etsy treasury posting tutorial.  I love that I can feature some of my Etsy faves without jeopardizing the legal rights of the individual artists.}

Baking for a Cause

I just completed a project that I'm really proud of.  For several years I've been inspired by the commercials on the food network about Share Our Strength's work to end childhood hunger.  Share Our Strength started a campaign encouraging people to hold bake sales to raise money  for their organization.  I've long wanted to host one myself.  Why?  Because it's a great cause, and I've always loved bake sales.  Bake sales remind me of the many summertime lemonade stands I held as a kid.  And nostalgia is a very powerful thing!

 

Share Our Strength has a great website with tons of resources to make hosting a bake sale easier.  So I signed up on their website and got started.  As it turned out, my daughter's kindergarten class needed to come up with what they call a "leadership project" for this quarter.  (Basically, they are supposed to learn about something as a class and present it to the rest of the school.)  My bake sale idea became this year's leadership project.

I worked with the kindergarten teachers to get the project up and running.  We wanted to keep the bakesale simple and pretty small scale, so we decided to sell treats to the school on a Friday afternoon when the school would normally sell ice cream.  The ice cream costs $1, so we decided we'd sell our treats for $1.  We limited the bake sale to brownies and rice krispie treats to keep it simple, and then I solicited volunteers via email to bake some treats for us.  I also used some of the tools on the Share Our Strength website to make a flier about the event.  

Next the kindergarten students made a poster advertising their bake sale, and they put together a presentation explaining what they were doing.  They went from classroom to classroom giving the presentation in small groups.  Then they handed out the fliers I had made to all the students in the school.  They were clearly very proud to be helping out other children.

Did you know that nearly 1 in 5 children suffer from hunger in the United States?  I thought that was a shocking statistic.  We put that fact on our fliers, and it definitely got people's attention.  The bake sale happened last Friday, and we raised just over $250!!!  I was amazed at how successful our little project was.  The students were so excited for their Friday afternoon treat.  And I was so impressed with how generous they were, too.  Many of them put $2 in the basket and then only took one treat.  In the end this bakesale was at least as fun as my childhood lemonade stands. 

By the way, my daughter pretty much made the rice krispie treats herself.  I always forget how easy (and yummy!) rice krispie treats are.  All you really have to do is melt the butter and marshmallows and then stir, stir, stir.  Plus, it's always fun cooking with kids. 

All in all, this project was a great experience that left me feeling so inspired.  My hope is that I will continue to find ways to be involved with Share Our Strength.  It really pains me to think about kids feeling hungry right here in this wealthy nation we live in.  So . . . if you're looking for a summer project to do with your kids, or you've been wanting to find a way to give back to your community, I definitely recommend hosting a Share Our Strength bakesale.

 http://join.strength.org/site/TR?fr_id=1190&pg=entry

Go Aunt B!

Now that all the parties have ended, reality is setting in. Unfortunately reality isn't so great at the moment. My aunt has been diagnosed with breast cancer and she goes to surgery this afternoon. We've lost a lot of family members to cancer over the years, so we're all trying hard not to overreact. Afterall, the doctors did catch the cancer early. We hope.

In any event, I'll be spending the afternoon and evening at the hospital. I just pumped myself up with some hot, nourishing oatmeal. I wish I was just meeting my aunt for lunch instead. Still, my aunt has been so brave. The way she looks at it, it's not as bad as losing an arm. Thank goodness us humans have the ability to put some perspective on things. Thank goodness!