Cupcakes- Graduation Themed!

I recently volunteered to make one hundred cupcakes for my friend t.'s graduation party. Believe me it was no simple feat. I had a bit of help from a. so it was fun at the same time.

The first thing to remember about cupcakes is that presentation matters, not only should they taste fantastic, but they should look tempting too, almost to the point that you might not want to eat such a pretty treat.

For t.'s party, he wanted simple cupcakes. White cake with Vanilla frosting. I dressed up this simple dessert with these cupcake holders from ikea. They are taller than normal, so they gave the dessert a bit of an edge. The theme of the party was Alabama, where he will be attending in the fall.

The icing needs to be thicker to use the Pampered Chef Easy Accent Decorator, so I added more confectioner's sugar than usual. This gadget is inexpensive and I use mine to ice cupcakes all the time, so much classier than using a knife. I am not as skilled as the bakers at Sprinkles Cupcakes, so I need to lean on a gadget from time to time. No shame in that, the cupcakes were a hit!

Simple Graduation Present

I find my self going to many graduation parties in late May all the way through June. Now that I am done with the gift giving, I am able to write about my favorite gift for high school graduates. This gift is simple, practical and inexpensive. Making a gift seems more genuine than the typical "cash in a card," which is what I love about this craft project.

First, I bought a plain bulletin board with a wood edge. I painted the wood with two coats of gray acrylic paint. Then, I used a red paint pen to write "The Ohio State University" in the upper left corner and "Class of 2015" in the lower right hand corner. For a girl, I added rhinestones for a feminine touch. Around the rest of the board I wrote "OSU! Go Buckeyes!" over again.

To finish the project I took the same color rhinestones and hot glued them to to the top of push pins and included a favorite picture of my friend and I on the board.

Shrimp Tacos

Since I have been home, my mother has been daring enough to let me experiment with family dinner once or twice a week. Last night I made my own variation on Chipotle Shrimp Taco with Salsa Verde from the Food Network. I prepared the shrimp as suggested, but cut them into smaller bits, so that you have a bit of shrimp in every bite. Using the food processor for the salsa is optional. I feel that the dish is better with simple large bites of plain avocado. Also, I added shredded Monterey Jack cheese to the taco to top it off. Overall this was a very light and delicious summer meal!

The Pinwheel: Ribbon Bow

These bows were relatively simple to create, they are the basic grosgrain hair bow. My friend a. helped me out, she is in the picture. We picked this particular pattern because it matches the many t-shirts we have for the ice cream shop we work at over the summer.

One of my favorite parts about Hobby Lobby is the craft idea brochures that they have throughout the store. The bow how-to came from the ribbon aisle. There are many more complicated designs that we hope to make this summer.

This aren't the instructions that we used, but I found that this version is visually more helpful!

Hanging Tissue Paper Flowers

Also for the Pampered Chef Party I was inspired by this Martha Stewart craft to create a center piece for over top of the demonstration table. The easy part was putting the flower together, the hard part was finding that much tissue paper at my house!

http://www.marthastewart.com/how-to/tissue-paper-pom-poms-how-to