So Many Books, So Little Time

I know it isn't book related but I have to post about it anyway.  We celebrated my sweet baby Julia's 3rd birthday last week and it was so much fun.  I can't believe that she is three already, time has flown by! Over the weekend, we had a huge family party; it was really hot so we had all kinds of water fun for the kids and they had a blast.  Her actual birthday was last Tuesday and we had a nice quiet family evening with her. I know soon she's going to be too old for birthday shirts but I couldn't stop myself from getting her one this year.  I found this glittery iron on 'three' on Etsy and it turned out so cute. We did kind of a sprinkle theme for her party because it was nice and simple so I decided to make her a sprinkle cake.  It was super easy!  I used a tutorial I found on pinterest and basically just rolled the frosted cake in the sprinkles. I had sprinkles all over my kitchen but the cake was a huge hit. For her big gift we got her t...

Sorry for so many non-bookish posts but I have to talk about my sweet Julia's birthday.  She turned two on June 28!!! I can't believe she's two already!  Julia loves the movie Frozen so her birthday party was Frozen themed. I made her Anna and Elsa cakes and I'm pretty happy with how they turned out.  I don't love Elsa (I had lots of problems with her) but I think Anna turned out pretty good! I also ordered some really cool Frozen themed cookies from a local bakery.  They turned out great!! We had about 10-15 kids under the age of five so I had to come up with some fun activities for them.  We had a water table and some other outside toys and I made 'snow' and homemade sidewalk paint.  They were a HUGE hit.  The kids had such a blast.  The snow was messy to make but the kids loved it!  I don't have any pictures that I can post but here is a link to the recipe I used.  I wasn't a huge fan of the sidew...

One of the reasons I have been MIA lately is because I was busy getting ready to make a wedding cake for a friend's wedding.  It was a long, stressful process that I'm so glad is over.  Almost every month in May was devoted to prepping for it and I'd been testing cake and frosting recipes for 6-8  months prior.   I baked all the cakes the weekend before the wedding and froze them.  I baked every day for four days (it was Memorial Day weekend).  I had no idea how long it would take to bake all the layers and I baked extras just in case. Baking Day The wedding cake was three layers and square.  There was a 6", 10" and 14" layer.  Square cakes suck.  I don't ever want to do one again. When I signed up for this gig, the original plan was for a round cake but the changed their minds. Practice layer I made the weekend before the wedding. I took the day off before the wedding because I wanted to get most everything done t...

Reading is my number one hobby but there are other things I like to do.  One of those hobbies is cake decorating.  I used to work as a cake decorator during my freshman year of college (10 years ago) but it's only been in the last year that I have really started doing it again.  Last week I made my first tiered cake for my old boss to celebrate the birth of her granddaughter.  Here is the end result:   It definitely wasn't perfect but I think it turned out decent for a first try. What other things do you like to do besides reading?