Spring Birthdays

Spring Birthdays

Yesterday we took a stay-cation out to Queen Creek for a Birthday BBQ for my older sister Sandi, who just turned 25, and her husband Steven, who will be turning 26 this coming Tuesday.

Two things on our ever-growing wish list: Big TV & Rock Band.

Duets with my sister Shannon are a recipe for laughter and disaster. I could barely make it through Love Song by Sara Bareilles without snorting to my nose's utter distress.

I made the tastiest artichoke dip from a cookbook I haven't pulled out in a while. It was the first time ever making the dish and what better guinea pigs than your family right? You know they'll be honest with you. Luckily for me, there were no family members profusely up-chucking into the trash can. Coming home with an empty 9x13 pan added a little shoulder patting to the internal celebratory dance I did for myself. :)

Of course, since it was a celebration of birthdays, what better way to do so than with cupcakes. I decided to try out a frosting recipe that can be found here. {I'm picking up a tool like this in the coming week from C&B that I've been drooling over for a few days now}. I altered the recipe by adding banana flavoring instead of the mint. A variety of flavorings can be found in the spice aisle of most grocery stores. I buy mine at Fry's Food & Drug Stores, also known as Kroger for the rest of the country. Their selection seems to be the most vast I've found thus far. So I made the delicious banana frosting to top none other than strawberry cupcakes (recipe found here.) The frosting came out a really light shade of yellow (compliments of the vanilla pudding mix), so I tinted it with Wilton's lemon yellow shade of icing tint.

Since the cupcakes weren't a birthday cake, I had to decorate them to make them birthday specific somehow. A little digital scrapbook action, a printer, toothpicks, and some Scotch tape and you've hot Happy Birthday S & S to stick into the tasty treats. This test run...success!

{See why I NEED that decorater's tool. My old-fashioned pastry bag just doesn't cut it.}