My little boy turns 2! and Elmo....

Thats right, my chubby cheeked, mischeivous little boy has officially turned into a toddler! He is now 2! how did that happen? where did those 2 years go?

I decided to really challenge myself this year, I was going to make Elmo cookies , instead of goodie bags, an Elmo cake as well as Elmo cup cakes. It didn't quite happen the way I planned...

I found a Red Velvet cake recipe on joy of baking , I have always been intrigued by the ruby red luscious look of this type of cake.
My first two cake layers looked great! but then to my horror when I tried to move one, it just fell apart! I scraped up all remnants and put in a bowl...I had an idea...(more on that later!)
I made another two layers, dis regarding the fact that it was 2am, the cupcakes could wait till the next day.
Awaking nice and early and running on very little sleep, I managed to get the cupcakes made (with a little help from Master J, who gave his seal of approval when my back was turned and nabbed as many as he could fit in his chubby little hands ) then whipped up the butter cream, I had already abandoned any hope of doing Elmo faces on the cupcakes, I decided to just go with the same colour scheme.
I made up a heap of number 2 5cm biscuits to go as cupcake toppers and iced them in red and black.
My elmo biscuits had turned out really well, I was ever so pleased with them! Had them done and packaged and put away, then I returned to the cake and cupcakes.

Twas the night before the party, pulled out my buttercream and started tinting it, I had a rough idea of what I wanted to do with the cake, ended up being 3 layers of red velvet (and boy, was it RED!) with vanilla buttercream between layers, iced allover with buttercream then I piped on elmos's face and all the rest.

and heres my finished cake! oh, I also used an edible image strip around the sides..
I was very impressed, seeing as it was my first go at doing something like that!
the cupcakes I was and am still rather "meh" about, but heres a pic anyway..

now for the awesomeness...! remember that cake that crumbled? I stuck it in the fridge out of the way while doing all the above, then after finishing all that I took a leaf out of Bakerella's blog, and made some red velvet cake pops!
Being in Australia, I don't think we have "cream cheese frosting in a can" so I improvised with a block of Philly and icing sugar, mixed it all in with the cake crumbs and fashioned balls, stuck them on a stick, then dipped in melted white chocolate...can I just say YUM!!

I think you can see from the pic, just how RED they were!
they didn't last long on the day, everyone wanted one (or two!)
so all up it was a success, I am sure Jbaby had a great day, even I did, no stressing out, all was prepared beforehand and didn't cost me a fortune!
and heres one of Jbaby enjoying his birthday cake!

mmmm, red deliciousness!

I got a bread maker!

The Jman loves fresh bread. We had a second hand bread maker, which lasted a few years, then the bearing gave out and resulted in flat, lumpy, heavy bricks of bread. So we bought a new one.
A really cool new one! that has lots of different settings and options, unlike the old one which only had knead and bake.
The new one has jam setting, and different dough settings, options to add stuff like nuts and dried fruits with an automatic dispenser! it also came with a book FULL of recipes for bread, doughs (pizza, foccacias etc) also buns! I just LOOOOVE a good sticky bun.
My dad, when I was a child used to make the most heavenly, sticky, coffee and cinnamon scrolls, I have pestered him for years to make them again, all to no avail.
So I made my own.
Using my brand spanking new bread machine to knead the dough. I wasn't all that confident but they actually worked out quite well, and tasted delicious.

These ones are caramel and walnut scrolls, before I added icing.

and after...

mmm, so yummy, Dad was impressed, hehehe.

And Jman is happy as now we can once again have fresh bread, although I will be honest and say that I have not yet attempted making bread from scratch, I buy those single packet bread mixes for crusty white loaves, maybe next time I will try to do it myself.

It's 5am

and I'm thinking about baking already!
Had to be up early this morning as the Jman left VERY early for his flight to Sydney.
Jbaby is also awake, otherwise I think I would actually prefer to be in a blissful state of slumber. There was far too much excitement going on for him to go back to sleep, so planning and designing it is!
I now have myself a sketch book, in which I have been jotting down ideas and designs for biscuits, flavours I want to try and icing designs I'd like to do.
It is amazing the amount of beautiful photos on the web, I love looking at other baking blogs and seeing what ideas others have come up with.
I have also been doing a bit of research into packaging. I originally planned on doing something like 1-3 biscuits in a bag, tied up with ribbon, simple, looks great.
Cookie Bouquets is another thing I'm about to have a go at, which will involve quite a bit more packaging and wrapping, ie; individual wrap for each biscuit, pot/basket/mug or box for them to stick into, then cello wrap the lot and finish with bows or ribbons.

So, for today I think I need to get down to the shops, stock up on some essentials, then get baking! I really want to give the melting moments recipe a try, I will drop some off with the cornflake cookies, see if they sell.
I also want to do some more iced biscuits so I can get more photos up, Im not particularly proud of what I have up at the moment, I know I can do better!