A very special birthday

So it's been absolutely forever since I've blogged. My daughter has gotten a LOT more mobile and as a result I have a) baked less and b) spend all my time chasing her around and fishing things out of her mouth. She just turned 1 and we threw her a little birthday party. I had so much fun baking treats and making things for her party. I got a little carried away on pinterest but her party was really cute and special.

For the party, I cheated a little on the cupcakes and used a boxed chocolate cake mix (I couldn't find a recipe that made moist, light cake) and storebought icing. The vanilla cupcakes were the same from-scratch mix that I made the cake pops from though and they turned out really good. 

My friend let me borrow her Baby Cakes cake pop maker. You can purchase one here. They make cake pops that look pretty and are done in 5 minutes! The only thing that was difficult was icing them. I'm sure with some practice and a good recipe you could get this down but it took me forever. I used an icing glaze and then dipped them in sprinkles.  

Here are the recipes I used:

Vanilla Cake Pops & Cupcakes

Ingredients:

11⁄2 cups all-purpose flour, 1 teaspoon baking powder, 1⁄4 teaspoon salt, 1⁄2 cup butter, softened, 1 cup sugar, 2 eggs, 2 teaspoons vanilla, 1⁄2 cup milk, Glaze or coating of choice

Directions:

1. Combine flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside. 

2. In a separate bowl, beat together butter and sugar until light and creamy. Beat in

eggs and vanilla. 

3. Alternately blend in flour mixture and milk into butter mixture, beginning and ending

with the flour mixture. 

4. Fill each cooking reservoir with about 1 tablespoon of batter. 

5. Bake 4 to 5 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into a cake pop comes out clean. 

6. Allow to cool and glaze or coat, as desired.

Vanilla Glaze (for cake pops)

Ingredients:

1⁄4 cup melted butter, 11⁄4 cups confectioners’ sugar, sifted 1 teaspoon vanilla, 2 to 21⁄2 tablespoons hot water

Directions:

1. Combine melted butter with confectioners sugar, stirring until well blended. 

2. Stir in vanilla. 

3. Blend in 2 tablespoons hot water and stir until smooth. 

4. Add a little of the remaining hot water, if needed, to make a thin glaze consistency.

Makes about 3⁄4 cup of glaze

Tip: Vanilla glaze is perfect to use on donuts and will remind you of glazed donuts from a local donut shop.

Ps. I apologize for the wacky font changes. Blogger wouldn't let me change my pasted text for some reason. lame.