Nursing Home Trick-or-Treat

Colleen came with the kids and me to go trick-or-treating at a nearby nursing home with MOMS Club. The residents were happy to see all the kids in their costumes, and the kids were excited to trick-or-treat! Oliver went around the room with Colleen and trick-or-treated with everyone. He was a little ham and just had the best time. Joanna liked the candy and trick-or-treating, but she wasn't sure what to make of the residents at the nursing home. She started to cry a couple of times, so we ended up hanging back quite a bit.

After trick-or-treating, Colleen treated us to lunch and then took us to Gigi's Cupcakes as a special birthday surprise for Oliver. We each got a Halloween cupcake! Joanna got a red velvet mummy. See her hand in this next photo? That's her pulling the cupcake down. The moment after this photo was taken, it landed with a big splat on the floor.

I got a wedding cake skeleton. It was the perfect cupcake.

Grandma Colleen got a chocolate chip monster cupcake, and Oliver ended up with some sort of chocolate werewolf. The cupcakes look fantastic, and they tasted just as good as they look!

It was a day of sweets for the birthday boy. Earlier in the day, he got monkey pancakes for breakfast. Pancakes, trick-or-treating, cupcakes... and now tomorrow is Halloween! Well, I suppose it's OK to go overboard once a year, right?!

A Very Merry Un-Birthday Broncos Un-Party!

Our favorite baby nephew is turning 1! OK, so he's our only baby nephew. It still counts.

I didn't want my brother-in-law or sister-in-law to think we'd forgotten about his birthday in the midst of all the wedding stuff, so I asked Andrew to check with his brother to see if they wanted to celebrate while they were in town. They said no, as they had their own thing planned. I totally get how that goes because there's nothing worse than planning a little celebration only to be upstaged to your own kids.

Only there ended up being a big misunderstanding, and Colleen came to me later to tell me they did want cupcakes after all. So, Andrew went out Sunday afternoon to pick up some cake mix last minute, and I told Oliver he'd get to bake cupcakes for his cousin's birthday! He got excited, and even Jo started to sing, "Happy Birthday." It was right about the time we turned on the mixer that I found out about the mis-communication. Sawyer's birthday party was next weekend, and they planned their first baby's first birthday party. I felt so awful because I know what that feels like... I am the last person who would do something like that and take away a parent's fun and celebration with their own child. Thankfully, they were really understanding of what happened, but I felt awful. Plus, there were my kids, mixing up cake mix...

SO WE HAD BRONCOS VICTORY CUPCAKES INSTEAD! I told Oliver there would be no singing, and he was totally cool with that. At that point, the kids just wanted to eat cupcakes. So, I totally let them pig out.

Anyway, it was a good thing it ended up being a Broncos party instead of a birthday party because the little guy didn't make it to the end of the game. 

Here's the newest Broncos fan:

The un-birthday Broncos party:

(Happy early Birthday, Sawyer!)

Happy Birthday, Dad!

We celebrated my dad's birthday yesterday. I think Oliver and Jo had the must fun celebrating.

Cupcakes!

Today, Aminta and I made cupcakes!

Our day started at Williams-Sonoma. We came to the store, excited to take their "waffle class." As it turns out, the so-called waffle class was a quick discussion about the new Cuisinart waffle maker, followed by a bite-sized waffle sample. Aminta commented to me later, "We didn't even get dirty!"

OK, so maybe the class was a disappointment. It didn't mean I wouldn't have fun making waffles at home! So I decided to browse their mixes. I've been in the store before when they've offered fun flavors, like pumpkin, but today's selection was a bit disappointing. I could get Belgian waffle mix, chocolate chip waffle mix, or blueberry waffle mix. None of them seemed worth $10. Le sigh.

Waffles were out. Then I saw the Sprinkles cupcake mix Erin (Andy's fiance) had in Des Moines. It suddenly clicked in my head that I'd seen a whole program on Sprinkles cupcakes. Was it on Oprah? Perhaps a show on Food Network? No idea. But I remember seeing an interview with the founder of Sprinkles cupcakes, and I remember seeing how big they were (most people split one!) and heard people rave about their flavor. At that same moment, I remembered telling Toby at work that I would bake a cake for Bruce's birthday on Monday. Surely cupcakes would do. So I bought two types of cupcake mix: red velvet and double chocolate. Yum! I also bought a cute cupcake travel tupperware thing from Macy's. With that, I was set!

Aminta and I spent almost 3 hours baking cupcakes. She's a trooper! In the end, it was definitely worth it. The red velvet (which I remember hearing was their number one seller) wasn't a big hit with me (I attribute that to the fact that I don't like cream cheese), but the chocolate was so, so devilishly good. I "sampled" the ones that broke coming out of the pan, and, let me tell you, it makes me want to break all of them. Delicious. Of course, Aminta and I saved some good ones for ourselves, too. Her mom will get to try a couple, and there'll be a few for Andrew.

So, here's to a good Saturday night, spent baking with a good friend.

Happy weekend, ya'all!