Making Dresses

The first dress I made came after I saw the dresses that my sister bought Nisee for her 1st birthday!  I had never heard of a pillow case dress until this point.   It made such great pictures for her 1st birthday that I decided she had to have one for her 2nd birthday so I found a pattern and made her a pillow case dress.  I had to have my mom help me of course because the last thing time I sewed anything would have been in 8th grade home economics class.  I did most of the work but I needed help understanding the pattern.  Then I found this really cool link online about a mock smock dress.  These are probably the easiest thing I have ever seen to make.  The lady is right the material is expensive but you can find it on sale and for a 2 year old you only need a little over half a yard but most places sell it by the inch.  Currenly Walmart has it on sale for $6 a yard and if like my little one you only need 20 inches you can make a dress for about $4.  They also have it on ebay pretty cheap and if you can find the coupons right then you can get it on sale there too.  I have made 4 of them so far.  Then for Lacee's valentines day pictures I made her a pillow case dress.  I am all about sewing now.  I have plans to make a lot more stuff from more dresses to quilts. 

The dress that inspired me to start sewing!

Nisee's Mermaid dress for her 2nd Birthday

My 1st Mock Smock dress in Disney Princesses
 Nisee was tired and didn't feel like modeling

Pillowcase dress for Lacee's Valentines Day Pics

This is 2nd Mock Smock dress I made. I also made a tinkerbell one but I haven't put ribbons on it yet.

Credits:  Mock Smock Dress

Festival of Tables 2012

Every March my UMW group holds a festival of tables.  This year my tables theme was A Night at the Movies!  I am super happy with how my table turned out! 

the plan was to pop our own popcorn but my it wouldn't work ... had to return it to the store and get another one! 

Cake Test #2 for Nisee's Birthday Cake

So really this is cake #3 but this is only the 2nd type.  I made this cake the same time as I made the cake pops but it fell and I was very depressed about it so I just threw it away and didn't even try to frost it! I think I was trying to do too much by making the cake, the mints and the cake pops all in one day! So I decided to give it another try and I am glad I did because it turned out great!  It is a cherry pound cake that I did in 3 layers.  So that I could practice my icing skills I used a traditional wedding cake icing but I added a little cream cheese to it to help cut down on the sweetness but it didn't help all that much. I am super happy with how the cake turned out taste wise and looks wise!  This one I took to work and I got loads of compliments on it!

The Recipie is as follows:

Cherry Pound Cake:

1 1/2 cups Crisco

3 cups sugar

6 large eggs

3/4 milk (add enough cherry juice to make 1 cup)

3 3/4 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon vanilla flavoring

1/2 teaspoon almond flavoring

1/2 of 10oz bottle Maraschion cherries (chopped and drained)

Cream crisco and sugar until light and fluffy.  Add eggs one at a time. Add milk and cherry juice alternately with flour (should be sifted).  Add flavorings and stir in cherries.  Bake in a greased and floured 10" tube cake pan at 300 degrees for 1 1/2 hours or until done.  You can also put it in a cold oven and set it to 300 degrees and bake for 2 hours if you wish.  Let stand in pan for 15 minutes before removing.   To make it in 3 layers I used 3 8 inch layer pans and I adjusted baking time to 60 mins. 

I used a wedding cake icing on this cake and the recipie for that is:

1/2 cup crisco

1/2 cup margerine

2 tablespoons milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

4 cups confectioners sugar (one box)

Cream all together except sugar and then add sugar slowly mixing until well blended.

That is the traditional recipe but for this specific icing I made some adjustments.  I tripled the recipe to make sure I had enough to cover the frosting and instead of using 1 1/2 cups crisco I just used 1/2 cup crisco and 1 8oz package of cream cheese!  It made it creamier but still had the stiffness I needed for the decorations.  I also replaced the milk with heavy whipping cream which I have used in other buttercream icing recipies.  While it is not required sifting your sugar also helps the icing be more fluffy!

Please note this is a pound cake so it tastes as such!  It is heavier and more dense than other cake mix type cakes. 

Cake Pops for Church Dessert Auction and Butter Mints

Our church had a poor man's lunch after church this past week to raise money for the youth group to go to Aquire the Fire in Greensboro.  After lunch they had a dessert auction to raise money for the Relay for Life and the MDA Muscle Walk.  I made butter mints to go with dinner as a dessert and then I made 4 kinds of cake pops for the auction.  I put them in bundles and I think I had around 13 bundles.  I made red velvet cake with cream cheese icing dipped in vanilla chocolate, chocolate cake with chocolate icing dipped in chocolate,  cherry cake with whipped white icing dipped in chocolate, and lemon cake with lemon icing dipped in white chocolate.  All of them tasted great!  They were a huge hit at the auction which I am happy about but even more I am happy that I was able to raise money for 2 great events one of which is very near and dear to me! 

waiting to be auctioned off

Lotus loves mints so I made her a little bag of swirls just for her and dropped them off on our way home from church!

Cross shaped butter mints!  

Trying to find a cake for Nisee's Birthday

So I decided that I am going to make Nisee's cake this year.  Her Wonder Pets theme leaves me with limited options from bakers but I found a lot of great ideas online and finally decided on what I am goig to do.  Now I just need to figure out what kind of cake I want.  My first attempt at a vanilla cake from a recipie online did NOT turn out well at all.  The cake tasted ok but not what I was looking for.  The icing was good.  The cake was sagging in the middle too when I got it out.  I also got to take my first crack at doing a cake with ruffles.  It was really easy and if I had been paying attention then I would have messed up the top.  I didn't get to frost the cake until really late that night which didn't help either.  Anyways I end up throwing the cake away after we sampled it and decided it wasn't what we were looking for.  Yes I said we threw the cake away!  I am still trying to lose this baby weight so we taste the cake and enjoy a piece and then it either gets tossed or I will take it to work and share it with my team and peers there. 

Here are a few pictures of the vanilla cake: