Sunny Days for Maren

We started the day out right!  And weather actually provided us a "Sunny Day;" the first in about a week!  Maren woke up to this Sesame Street scene right in our kitchen.  It was the backdrop to some fun pictures and it added such personality and color to the room!

Here's the dessert table.  Maren told me earlier in the week she wanted a strawberry cake.  After I baked it, she informed me that she wanted chocolate cake.  So I whipped up a few cookie monster cupcakes for her.  Did I mention that she's only TWO?

This was a "family party" so my girls got little giftbags and so did my two nephews.  I included bubbles, rubber duckies, goldfish crackers, crayons (Elmo loves his goldfish, his crayon too), and some color sheets, cookies and other little miscellaneous goodies.

I used a lot of Maren's toys to decorate the space.  Sesame Street is ALL OVER the place!

Here's her cake.   I made a gum paste/fondant bow and decorated the sides with Elmo, Cookie Monster, Ernie and Oscar the Grouch.  I made the characters out of gum paste.  

The cookies are my Marriage Proposal Cookies.  The frosting dries hard, but not too hard, and I dipped them in some color coordinated sugar.  These were delicious and gone so quickly.   The party was brought to you by the letter M and by the number 2.

I served a brunch buffet complete with themed fruit and veggie trays.  I found these guys or some like them on Pinterest.  Maren got a kick out of them and pretty much devoured Cookie Monster.

Danny made these scramble egg  and bacon pies with his mini-pie maker.   

We served croissants with my friend Erin's homemade strawberry jam - delish!

Bacon and sausage?  Check!

This was a cinnamon roll cake.  OMG.  It was amazing!!!

We also served some yogurt that our guests could top with fruit or granola.

After brunch we celebrated with the cake and Maren had her cupcake.  She requested chocolate cake with blue frosting, so I continued on with the theme and made them into little Cookie Monsters with mini Chips Ahoy cookies and all.

Here's Maren with a dangerously close view of fire.  She's absolutely mesmerized!!  She blew out her candle with perfect aim and devoured this Cookie Monster too.

Maren had a great time at her birthday party.  I got through it by using this as my mantra:  

Happy Birthday, my sweet little Maren!  You bring so much joy to our lives with your kindness, humor and wit.   We love you so!

Sunny Days for Callie!

Callie turns two today! And her parents were hosting a birthday party filled with all of her favorite Sesame Street friends.  Callie's favorite is Elmo (of COURSE) so he got the center stage for the cake.  

It's funny, Callie's mom, Stacy, is one of my dearest friends.  She and I have been close since we met in high school.  She ordered the cupcakes and only needed two characters.  She wanted Elmo cupcakes and Abby Cadabby cupcakes.  That would have been easier.  Certainly.  But these were for CALLIE.  I had to go all out.  I mixed up eight different bowls of frosting and then made this happen.    

After molding fondant and gum paste for about two hours, those cupcakes above became these cupcakes below; many of the beloved characters you'd find on Sesame Street.  Ernie, Grover, Bert, Telly, Abby Cadabby, Elmo, Rosita, Zoey, Cookie Monster, Big Bird, Count VonCount, and Oscar.  It was really trippy to watch these cupcakes come alive!  Both of my girls were super excited about them and Josie added that I needed to put the green triangle on Count for his cape.  Made all the difference.  

Callie's chocolate cake is topped with an Elmo toy.  You can open up Elmo's head and it becomes a diorama of Elmo's World with an Elmo figure, an Abby figure, a wagon, a table and an easel.  SUPER cute! I couldn't wait for Callie to see THAT bonus! 

The cupcakes were gluten free made with dairy free buttercream.  I'm told that the kids devoured them, so the buttercream passed the test!  :)  The cake was chocolate with chocolate fudge, buttercream and OREO filling.

Happy Birthday, dear Callie!  I hope you have a wonderful day!