A hula Girl Party

Well, we have hit 5 years old and I do not know where the time has gone. Our Little Olivia is now a big girl or so she says.

This year Olivia truly wanted to visit Hawaii but we just could not fit that trip into our budget or schedules so we decided a Hawaiian themed party would be perfect.  It was a great party and Olivia loved it especially when she found out her Daddy had hired a couple Hula dancers to come and teach the party attendants how to dance.

We had a handful of fun party games also but I forgot to take good pictures so I will try to explain what we did.
1. Javelin Throw: I cut up a couple pool noodles as the javelins and hung up a hula hoop.  They had to throw the javelins through the hoop.
2. Coconut Bowling: I got a small round coconut (not easy many of them are not so round. :)) The pins where water bottles that I dyed the water blue to look like ocean water.
3. Hula Hoop contest: Who can keep the hoop going the longest
4. Bean bag throw:  I had three sand buckets that where at different distances.   Bean bags where thrown into the buckets for points.
The kids loved the games and the Dancers.

Every Party we try to have special things for each of the guests: this party our guests where greeted with grass skirts and leis to put on as they entered the door.  To get into the party room they had to go through a big grass skirt that was made out of a plastic table cloth.  I cut little strips to make it look like a grass skirt and it was a fun party decoration.

The kids table was set with little table decorations that I purchased from Oriental Trading Company along with the colorful coconut drinking cups. For our drink station I made Hawaiian punch:
1 jug of Hawaiian punch drink
1 jug of sprint
little scoops of raspberry or strawberry sherbet
( a trick I learned with the sherbet for punch: use a melon baller or cookie scoop, an hour or more before the party scoop out many little balls onto a freezing cold cookie sheet, keep in freezer till just before the party. This is a quick way to add the balls of sherbet just before its time to party)

    Now we have the food table the most important part of a fun party.

 We did finger foods this party instead of a whole meal.  We had Hawaiian pizza, Hawaiian ham and cheese melts, fruit, veggies, and pineapple salsa with chips.  The treats where palm tree sugar cookies, Mini pineapple upside down cakes, and Chocolate cake.

Pineapple Upside down cakes came from:

www.toprecipeblog.com/2014/03/mini-pineapple-upside-down-cakes.html

Pineapple Salsa:

1 Fresh Pineapple                       1/2 onion

2 Roma tomatoes                       1/2 bunch of cilantro

1 lime                                           salt to taste

Chop all ingredients except the lime and mix together.  Juice the whole lime into the salsa mixture and add about 1 tsp of salt.  Mix again and let set in the fridge for an hour.  Taste the salsa with a chip if you need to add salt do a little at a time till the taste is to your liking.

Our cake this year was a two tier chocolate mint cake with a chocolate ganache filling and butter cream frosting.  The bottom tier was to emulate a grass skirt and the top was the water of the ocean.  The flower Lei and girl were created out of modeling chocolate.  

Chocolate Mint Cake:  The recipe is off the back of the Dark Chocolate Coco tub.  This recipe I have found to be one of the moistest Chocolate cakes I have ever made.  Instead of vanilla extract in the cake I substituted Chocolate mint extract purchased at a specialty cake shop.

Happy 5th birthday to my dear girl Olivia.

The Olivia Pictures where taken by Momma Mea Photography

Frozen Dessert Table

Frozen birthday parties are all the rage.  I was asked to create a whole dessert table to represent the Movie for a young lady turning seven.  She loved the table and all the treats.  I love to make any birthday kiddo happy with the treats I make for them.

Now the cake was super fun to design but oh I hate trying to create faces.  I painted and re-painted the noses ten times and then gave up.  So please do not be to harsh with my faces as it was the first time for me.  I do love how the girls dresses turned out it is all made out of modleing chocolate.  The large snow flakes are hand piped chocolate and the small ones where from a chocolate mold.

Now to the cupcakes:  Half had snow flakes and the other half Olafs created out of modeling chocolate.  I printed a picture of Olaf at the size I wanted to create.  Then taped the picture down with a piece of wax paper taped on top of that.  With the white chocolate I molded balls and shaped them on top of the picture to get the same size and shape for each.  I inserted a tooth pick into the bottom and up through each ball to hold them together.  His face was not easy but I just pulled out each shape and tried to match.  The arms where the hardest to make;  I used a thin wire and covered with brown fondant.

Other treats I created for the table were cake pops,

chocolate cover pretzel rods,

 Snow flake sugar cookies,

cheese cake bits, and Rice treat pops.

I had a blast putting this party table together.

Ballerina Birthday

Happy 4th birthday to my sweet little, lady Olivia. As you can see we had a ballerina themed birthday this year.  Olivia loves to dance and the color pink so I felt this was the perfect party to create for her.  The beautiful picture of Olivia was taken by Provosto Photography, She is a military wife and knows how to use natural light to make a picture come to life.  Thank you Amber for these memories!!

I went small on the treats this year, as we are living in a new location with not as many friends to attend the celebration.  The cake was a double chocolate cake with pink butter cream and home made fondant flowers.  http://www.howdoesshe.com/easy-marshmallow-fondant-you-can-do-it/#  here is the link on how to make Fondant, super easy!!

Ballerina dress cupcakes

I used a small heart cutter for the top of the dress. I used fondant but suggest you use modeling chocolate as it is a stiffer medium. Butter cream was used to design the tutu part Wilton tip # 104.  Cake was a vanilla cake with fresh strawberries.

Marshmallow ballerina slippers

I have a bow chocolate mold that I first filled and allowed to set.  Then insert the stick into the top of a big marshmallow.  Melt pink melting chocolate (make sure to add a little veggie oil to thin out), dip the sides set down on wax paper to harden. (tip I throw them into the fridge)  Put left over pink chocolate into a sandwich bag.  Cut the tip off the bag and pipe the strings onto the front of the slipper.  Add a little chocolate to the stick and place bow onto the chocolate.



 

Welcome to our party set up: You will see a lot of pink :)  The banners where made with my silhouette cutter which I just love when it comes to making things for parties!! The flowers where designed by my wonderful mother-in-law.

Party Favors: I made Tutu's for each little lady that came to the party and also had a friend make hair bows.  Instead of goodie bags I did goodie jars filled with candy. 

Oh course every party must have a party game: We played pin the tutu on the ballerina

Then we had an art time where the girls made ballerina hand dresses and the boys created a hand pirate.  I used my cutter to cut out the leotard and then glued it on so the girls only had to go the hand prints.  It was a very fun and super cute project. 

I am blessed to have my little lady but cannot believe she is already four.  My prayer is for her to have a great year of learning and adventures!!

 

Blueberry Scones

Oh me, Oh my I found this scone recipe that was so yummy, I just have to share with you all.  I got the basic recipe from "Moneysavingmom.com" but changed a few things to make it just a little better.

Pre-heat oven to 400.
Blueberry Scone ingredients:

2 cups unbleached flour (you can use white, wheat, or gluten free)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2  teaspoon salt
1/2 cup cold butter
1 egg separated
3 Tablespoons honey
1/2 cup buttermilk ( if you do not have use 1/2 cup milk and 1/2 teaspoon lemon juice)
1/2 - 1 cup blueberries ( I do not like a ton of berries so I use 1/2 cup but I know some of you love tons of berries)
1/3 cup brown sugar
Cinnamon

Glaze:
1 tablespoon milk
1/2 teaspoon Almond extract
4 tablespoons powder sugar ( if you glaze is to runny for you just add a bit more sugar till it is as thick as you like.)

Directions:
1.  In a medium bowl combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.  Cut in the cold butter with two forks or a pasty cutter until mixture is crumbly.
2.  In a small bowl combine the egg YOLK ( put the white to the side as you will need it later), honey, and buttermilk or milk and lemon juice.  I did not have buttermilk so I did the alternative and it turned out great.
3. Once liquid is mixed well add to the dry bowl and combine to make a dough ball ( it will still be a little crumbly)
4.  Add the blueberries and mix in carefully with your hands.
5.  Get out a cookie sheet and spray with spray oil.  Place scone dough in the center of the pan and flatten into a circle with your hands.  It will not need to be perfect or thin.
6. Sprinkle the brown sugar and cinnamon over the top.
7. Cut the dough into eight pieces (I used a pizza cutter but a knife will work great also) and separate just a little so they cook all the way around each piece. 
8.  Cook for 15 minutes  (check that it is cooked all the way through, mine took a little more time because my oven is never up to the right temp)

9.  In a little bowl combine the Glaze ingredients until the thickness you like for a glaze.
10.  Add glaze to the top of each scone and some extra Blueberries.  Eat while warm or if you like them cold they are just as yummy!!!

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

Chocolate chip cookies are my all time favorite cookie so I really wanted to turn it into a fall cookie.  Pumpkin puree was the best choice I thought so that is what I added into the cookie along with a few pumpkin pie spices.  These turned out to be one of the best Chocolate chip cookies I have ever had and you cannot even taste the pumpkin.  The spices do come out just a little bit but they give the cookie just a new level of goodness.

First you will need to get a pie pumpkin ( you can use the pumpkin puree in a can but I did not like the flavor it gave the cookies)  Cut the pumpkin in half and clean out.  Lay the inside of the pumpkin face down in a baking dish.  Add a little water to the base of the baking dish put into the oven at 350 degrees.  Bake until the meat of the pumpkin is soft.
Once the pumpkin comes out of the oven spoon the meat into a mixing bowl.  With a hand mixer whip the meat into a puree.  Add 1 teaspoon of pumpkin pie spice, 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg,  and 3 table spoons of heavy whipping cream, whip until nice and creamy.  Set aside to cool.

Time to get your cookie batter mixed.  Use an electric mixer for this part. :)
Ingredients:  
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened to room temp.
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup of your pumpkin puree
1 large egg, at room temp.
2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoon cornstarch
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup chocolate chips

Directions:    Oven at 350 degrees
1.  Combine butter, brown sugar, and regular sugar into the mixing bowl.  Mix on medium for one minute and make sure to scrape down the sides of the bowl.  Add in the pumpkin puree and mix for another minute.  Time to add in the egg and vanilla extract mix until well combined. 
2.  In a small bowl combine the dry ingredients flour, cornstarch, baking soda, and salt.  Slowly begin to add to the wet mixture and combine well.
3.  Time for the chocolate chips.  Add them in and fold, do not use the electric mixture. 
4. Drop balls onto the cookie sheet and bake for 10 minutes.
5.  EAT while hot or allow to cool.