Hot Cocoa Birthday Party

My son's 9th birthday happens to fall right before Christmas, so this year we moved his party ahead and celebrated early.  Why didn't I do this before?  It gave me a lot of time to prepare and we had a blast getting ready instead of putting this on top of present wrapping and Christmas parties & dinners.

I decorate mostly in red, white and light blue for Christmas, so I decided to go with those colors for his party too.  I am sure the pictures speak for themselves.  Everyone had a good time and the cocoas (especially the Nutella cocoa) were yummy!

I found a lot of these ideas on the internet by searching for hot cocoa party!

These cups are made using those GIANT marshmallows!

The table is wrapped with wrapping paper.

Did I mention that my son has a large personality?

The cake is a Mario Power-UP mushroom.  I just baked a cake in a large metal mixing bowl, put it on top of a cake stand, covered it with chocolate icing, rolled fondant and painted eyes on the bottom of the cake stand with chocolate.

Happy birthday, to my little one!

Flag Cake for Patriotic Holidays

I know I already posted today, but I thought you might like to see the INSIDE of the cake I posted about earlier.  I found the tutorial at Glorious Treats.  Be sure to stop by to see how it is assembled!  Very neat!

I hid the baking and assembling part from my boys.  They didn't see it until the white, whipped cream icing was on it.  Under the whipped cream icing, I made and Italian buttercream and layered and crumb coated with that.  Yum!  My red is a bit pink, but I love pink, so I didn't mind!

Happy 4th of July!

Are you hosting a barbeque?  Are you going to one?  We were going to have a party, but decided against it because we are heading to NY City tomorrow.  I can't wait!  I think we are going to focus on SoHo and TriBeca.  Any suggestions of places to go with two boys ages 8 and 10?

Anyway, I did decorate my table in my screened-in porch, so I'll share that with you.  I also made a cake with some decorating help from my little guys.  I love the way it turned out.  So homemade looking.  Sometimes it is nice to just get everyone's hands in there and make something that was "made by me".

Admittedly, the tablecloth is a bit much, but I thought it looked really kitchy and fun.  The pillows and napkin rings and the banner were made by me.  Most of the other place setting stuff was found either at a thrift or a dollar store.  Including the $3 tablecloth.  Love that!

Happy 4th! 

Lego Birthday Party and a Mini-Figure Lollipop Tutorial

Birthdays in December are never a good thing.  So much going on and so many things to do!  I always try to do a real party for my son so he doesn't feel left out.  This year, he wanted a LEGO theme, so I found some LEGO candy for the party.  I used them for a lot of things.  I decorated the table and the cake stand with them and also put them on top of the cupcakes.  I must warn you, these candies are very hard.  I thought they would be like Smarties, but they were more like glass. 

I made some digital cupcake wrappers and printed them up.  I then used some Lego Mini-figure stickers on them.  Fun, striped candles and bright colors around the table brought the birthday party to life.  The cupcakes are brownies with whipped icing on top.  I also added some colorful sprinkles to the top.  You can get the wrappers to print below.

To use these, right-click on the picture and choose "Print Picture"

I also made some mini-figure head lollipops using marshmallows with the smaller marshmallows on the top dipped  in yellow chocolate melts.  I then drew some faces on them with black icing.  The tutorial is at the bottom of this post.

Here's the Birthday Boy!

LEGO Mini-figure Pops - A Quick Tutorial

These are pretty easy to make and you can probably figure out how to make them, but I did learn a few things that may help you in trying them.  Here's what they look like...

Here's what you need.  Another thing that I didn't show here is a piece of floral foam.  It really makes it easy to make these!  See the pictures below.  You can poke the sticks into the floral foam to hold them while they dry and while you draw the faces on.

Here's what you need.  I used strawberry, but you can use any flavor marshmallows.

Large-sized marshmallows (not those HUGE ones)
Mini marshmallows
1 tbsp shortening
Lollipop sticks
A tall glass
Yellow food coloring (not paste)
White candy melts (or yellow if you can find them)
Floral foam or Styrofoam block
Black icing (you can buy this in the birthday cake section of your grocery store, or make your own.  My recipe is HERE.)


Step one:  Put the candy melts in the tall glass.  You can fill it to the top... it will melt down.  Add 1 tbsp of shortiening in the glass too.   Put the glass in the microwave and melt for 1 minute.  Stir.  Melt again, one minute at a time until mostly melted.  Stir between meltings.  Next, add a drop of yellow food coloring and stir.  Add as much as necessary until you get the correct color.

Step two:  Put the larger marshmallows on the sticks.  Dip the mini-marshmallows in the melted chocolate and stick to the top of the large marshmallow.  Like this....

 Step 3:  Dip each lollipop into the glass of melted chocolate.  Tap the stick on the top edge of the glass until there is no excess chocolate on the lollipop. Messy, but fun!

 Step 4:  Stick the sticks into the floral foam.  Once they are dry, stick them into the side of the floral foam like this...  This way the faces won't run while the icing dries.  Be careful though.  If you stick more on one side, it will flip over, so put the lollipops on the other side the whole way around.

 Let them dry and then have a GREAT Lego party!

Here are some other cool items to use for your LEGO party.  I love the candles the ice cube trays and wish I had found them before my party!

LEGO Minifigure Cake Mold 852708
LEGO Minifigure Ice Cube Tray
Concord Candy Blox, Build'Em & Eat'Em- Assorted Fruit Flavor, 1 LbBlokz Candles
Lego Ice Bricks Tray