Construction Cake

Click here for details of my son's construction themed birthday party.

• I am messy, so I always use parchment or waxed paper under my cakes while I decorate.

• I used two boxes of devil's food cake mix, baked as directed in two 9x13 rectangle pans.

• I used toothpicks to mark a road. I then frosted the entire cake with cream cheese icing that I tinted with an absurd amount of green food coloring. This is as close to grass green that I could manage. I have since learned that gel food dyes work better and you use less, but I haven't tried that yet.

• It took a little less than two tubs of frosting and I really loaded up the top so I could 'pull it' to look more like grass. The sides don't have to be thick or pretty because you can cover them later. I know you can use tips and bags to get a grassy look, but I don't have the patience for that. I have no idea where I learned this trick but I just stuck a clean butter knife flat on the frosting & pulled straight up all over to get the look I wanted. See the picture? I know it looks like waves of green water but in the big picture, it served its purpose for a three year old.

• Then fill the roadway with graham cracker crumbs (I only used 2 whole crackers, crushed in a baggie).

 
Now for the details:

• Chocolate sugar wafers stuck onto the sides....please learn from my very lucky mistake: They go soft and kinda chewy overnight AND they fall apart waiting for the party, so if you want them to stay nice and perfect, wait until the last minute to use them on the cake itself. I personally love how they were falling all over the place and it looked like it was done on purpose.
• I ran out of wafers near the back corner so I just used popsicle sticks to look like a wooden fence. I would have liked for them to be the wide ones, but I used what I had on hand.
• The little guy standing near the candles is one of the toy drivers from another construction truck among our playroom fleet.
• The rocks are actually completely edible chocolate rocks that Santa found at TJMaxx while looking for stocking stuffers. I somehow managed to convince my child to let me save most of them for his construction party and hid them away until the day of the party.
• Lastly, after the cake was set up at the party, I stuck his excavator/digger at the end of the road and crumbled the cake a bit to make it look like it was under construction.

Pretty cool, huh? Candy coated chocolate 'rocks'

We Like to Party

Adding this shirt to my birthday collection for BCFP, customizable to fit other themes, of course.

My oldest turned 3 at the end of February and knew just what kind of party he wanted months in advance. The kid is totally obsessed with tools and construction, so a Construction Birthday Party was on the books. See the end of this post for links to places & parties I visited for inspiration. Thanks to my ever-helpful mother for snapping shots of just about everything and a few from friends.

Check back soon for DIY directions for this cake.

Our local zoo has a pretty outstanding playground and surrounding picnic/party pavilions so my parents staked claim to one close to the play area and the bathrooms.

I think my favorite part of this party was the cake, but I loved the simple (mostly borrowed) decorations, too. I am a perfectionist at heart but small children and a time schedule force me to step out of my comfort zone more than I care to admit.

This is how it all broke down:

• Tables were covered with black plastic table covers ($1.99 at the party supply store) held in place by basic woodworking clamps, i.e. c-clamps & spring clamps (borrowed from my dad). I wanted to put yellow dotted lines down the middle of the table covers to add that road look, but I ran out of time and it was still fine. I would recommend finding yellow duct tape or gluing strips of paper if you want to do this.
• My mother-in-law kindly sent us a box of goodies from the huge party store where she lives. Included were construction themed plates and napkins, hats, a Happy Birthday banner and table top decorations. Oh, and I can't forget to mention the fabulous candles that look like safety cones.
• The birthday boy's uncle purchased a set of bulletin board border on clearance at an office supply store and I saved it for this party. It comes in strips so we just taped them randomly throughout the party space, using black electrical tape. Look here for the exact kind he found. 
•  The food table was so simple & I love how well it turned out. We used part of the birthday boy's our fleet of construction trucks, thoroughly cleaned. His giant dump truck was filled with chocolate covered mini doughnuts and the front loader was pushing a pile of pretzel nuggets. Someone mentioned that the doughnuts looked like tires, but I was hoping they were boulders. Either way, the kids demolished them and I didn't have to make anything but a trip to the store.
• Plastic construction party hats are easy to come by and we decided to scatter them around the food and cake to fill the table. Most of them have a flat space on the front so you can attach stickers to go along with your party design or the party-goers' names, or write with permanent marker.
• We used sports marker cones to hold bunches of yellow, orange and black balloons at the corners of the entrance to the pavilion. You can see one set on the corner of the food table. We purchased ours at Hibbett Sports but they have some just like them here at Target.

Want to know how I made the cake? Check back soon for the DIY instructions.

Be sure to check out the following blogs/sites for my inspiration and so many more great ideas for a construction themed birthday party.
Your Southern Peach
Juicy Bits
The Smiths
Kids Party Fun
seattletimes
 Creative Hostess
  Creative Party Place

And guess what? My friend is letting me help with her daughter's Princess Party! I get to make the castle cake (!) and am really looking forward to another cake creation and something girly for a change!

Late is still great

 I know Valentines Day was a week ago, but I still want to share something sweet.

My husband and I don't do much for Valentine's Day. He loves me all the time (of course!) and humors my moods, endless projects and everything else our family slides his way. We don't make a fuss about gifts and such for each other except for our anniversary, and Mothers & Fathers Days, and birthdays. We try to celebrate 'us' in the smallest & simplest of ways every day. That gets harder as our family grows, but we love it all. Who can complain about lack of dates when your 3 year old agrees to be your Valentine? Kids make holidays fun in new ways for all of us.

At any rate, we decided to get some couples together for a fun date night. Brilliant idea? Bowling! One couple graciously offered to help host in their new home. Cocktails & appetizers at their home and then on to the bowling lanes. 'Nooter' lovingly divided our group into two teams so that spouses were split, and then gave us each a new nickname. By the way, I granny bowl and I do it well. Well, usually, but not that night.

I made this delicious and pretty treat for our pre-bowling social hour and had to share. It was easy and yummy. Thanks to this blog that inspired me, my friends rolled their eyes at me and called me "Martha". I really think Shayna's (Texas Monkey) are prettier, but I didn't have the time or the budget for chocolate dipped strawberries, nor do I own square cake pans.

Here's what I used:

1 Box of Chocolate Mousse cake mix
(it even comes with the mousse makings). I would love to say I am thrilled that I discovered this wonderful box, but I am not, if only because I now know how easy it is to get a really good chocolate fix from a boxed mix.

2 boxes of these hazelnuts yummies
(or 1 can of the real deal Pirouettes, both available at WalMart)
but I recommend 3 boxes.
They are called 'rolled wafers' in case you need to know.
The reason I recommend 3 boxes is what I won't show on the back side of the cake. I had to piece together the broken ends and it wasn't pretty.

1 lb of fresh strawberries, cleaned, trimmed and sliced in half.






 

Bake the cake according to the package directions, then top with the mousse (which tastes like pudding to me). Break your wafers about 2/3 of the way down and stick them to the sides of your frosted cake. (I purposely broke mine so they would would be varying heights.) Top cake with strawberries and tie a ribbon around the whole thing. Tada. Seriously.
Note: my decorated cake just barely fit under the dome of my cake plate so plan ahead.

Brown Bag Burritos aka Freezer Frijoles or BBB (Beef 'n Bean Burritos)

I originally found this through Money Saving Mom by this link for freezer cooking. You can find the original post here from another great lady, Amy (and you should check out her site.)
This is by far one of the best freezer meal ideas/recipes I have come across to date.  You have to try these. This is (sadly) one of the very few recipes even my ultra-picky almost-3 year old will eat without hesitation. I love to cook, but with 2 little people underfoot, my meals tend to be only those that are quick, easy and cheap. I think my favorite part is how well they freeze. With a side salad, talk about an easy lunch in 2 minutes!

My recipe notes:
I use fresh onion, sauteed, not dried.
I only use  2 cups of shredded cheese.
I use fajita size tortillas and get 30-something burritos.
I just roll them, no tucking for this chica.
Two fajita size burritos, rolled, fit nicely in a paper towel (then foil) & you can get the whole batch into 3 gallon size zipper freezer bags. (Anyone have a great suggestion for freezer containers, besides glass?)
These are great to make for dinner, then freeze what your family doesn't eat.

MY ALL TIME FAVORITE FREEZER COOKING TIP:
Brown ground meats before you freeze them. We buy ground beef in bulk, so I always take an hour to divvy it up, saving some to freeze uncooked for things like meatloaf or burgers, before browning the rest. I bought some freezer safe containers at Wal-Mart for a few bucks for the browned portions. You really won't believe how much of a time saver this is until you can make chili or spaghetti or Upside Down Pizza or Tater Tot Casserole in about 30-35 minutes.

I just realized I need to make a tab for recipes:)