Frosting & Filling a Layered Cake

I've been playing with making filled cupcakes and layered cakes recently and it has been a very yummy experimentation process, even if some results weren't quite as pretty as I would have liked.  In my experimentation, this is the method that I came up with that makes a two layer cake with filling a breeze!

For this particular cake, I had two round yellow cakes, blueberry filling and lemon frosting.  When I made the frosting, I pulled out about 1 cup of the frosting that was thicker, before I had added enough of the liquid to the frosting to make it easily spreadable.  Here's the step by step.

1.  Slice the top off the cake that will be the bottom layer so that it is as smooth and flat as possible and position it on your tray.



2.  Take the thick frosting and put it in a plastic sandwich bag or piping bag if you have one.  Cut the corner of the bag so that it makes a 1/4 inch opening.  Pipe the frosting around the edge of the bottom cake layer creating a wall of sorts to hold your filling in.



3.  Spoon and spread your filling onto the cake.



4.  Add top layer of cake.  The frosting wall oozed a little bit but the blueberries stayed right in the middle where I wanted them.  The frosting that oozed was easily spread as part of the step 5.



5.  Frost the cake with a thin layer of icing to keep all the crumbs in place.



6.  Frost with a thick layer of icing to cover the cake.



7.  Slice and enjoy!

Improvising Dresses

I like to hit sales at the end of a season to snag deals on clothes that my daughter can use the next season or year.  Size up on spring items to use in the fall and the such.  At the end of last summer JCPenney was having a great clearance and I had a $10 off $10 purchase coupon so it was like they were giving me clothes.  What's not to like?  So I thought that since G-Tot was in size 18 months the end of last summer, that a 3T would be safe for spring tunic tops.  Um, wrong Mom.  They were cute little t-shirt tops but the length of a tunic top was lost on my string-bean of a daughter, and I had plenty of other spring T's for her.

So I took the three tops and matched them with three adult size T-shirts.  The green one was from my closet, the other two were from a 4 for $10 deal at our local craft store.



From this point I was completely neglectful in taking pictures of the process, but here's the basics.  I cut about a 5 inch strip from the bottom of each of the adult t-shirts.  Then took the large tubes of fabric, gathered them up and sewed them to the bottom of the tunic tops using a twin needle on my sewing machine.  This lengthened the tops and gave them a "skirt" effect.



I had elastic left over from the Trash Me Pants project and the blue and red shirts were large enough that I was also able to cut shorts out of the side seams.  So I made matching shorts to go under two of the dresses.  I  used a  method similar to the one that I used on the Trash Me Pants, except that I did have to hem the cuffs.

The lesson I learned the hard way with this project is that you cannot sew over pins in your project with a double needle like you do with a single needle.  I only learned this after breaking two of my twin needles.

So at the end of this project, with items I had on hand, and less than $10 of purchased materials (including the replacement needle) I ended up with three dresses for my daughter.  That works for me!

This post is linked up at Works For Me Wednesday.

Monday Sunshine

Practicing contentment by remembering the graces of the week and practicing gratitude by giving.

I just realized that I missed last week's Sunday Sunshine.  I'm not sure how that happened, but not surprised either.  We have just finished a couple of full weeks leading up to Easter.

From the last two weeks in no particular order:

::  Surprise lunch out with friends.

:: Hot cocoa with marshmallows on rainy afternoons and chilly evenings.

::  Abundant resources online with toddler craft ideas.

::  Sunny days and bubble machines.

::  Rainy days and puddles to throw rocks in.

::  Playmates

::  Sound, full nights of sleep.  (Shouldn't have let MD go home!)

::  Coffee

::  Talented friends (thanks again for the pix KW!)

::  Childhood delight at discovering new things - like that there were cheese puffs in the Easter eggs!

:: Projects finished.

::  The joyful celebration of Easter and the reflection of the basis of my faith.

It was a good couple of weeks.  I hope you can find the good in your week!

Every desirable and beneficial gift comes out of heaven. The gifts are rivers of light cascading down from the Father of Light.” (James 1:16 -The Message) May the light of the Father brighten your week!

Reworking a Decent Idea

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Signs of spring are starting to show in our area - my crocuses are blooming and my daffodils are starting to bud out.  Ok, one of my daffodils is starting to bud.  The rest are still held by the grips of winter.  My little mascot daffodil is embracing the tiny threads of spring that we keep getting.

I discovered, after a day of high winds, that the hoop covering for my early bed needs additional reinforcements.   The wind caught hold of the sheeting and twisted it up and threw it in the yard like a dirty shirt, dragging the hula hoop structure with it.  I'm thinking that I need to come up with deeper stakes to attach the hoops to.  I'm open to any ideas!

Fortunately, I had only put in spinach seeds to date, so there weren't any little broccoli plants to face the demolition.

This post is linked up at An Oregon Cottage's Tuesday Garden Party.

Kissing Shoes

I really really really REALLY wish I could remember where I picked up this little trick so I could properly credit the original author.  But I can't. And I googled every possible search term I could think of to find it again.  So instead I'll share my version of it.

G-Tot is getting pretty good at putting her own shoes on.  She loves her shoes and is so proud of herself when she gets them on.  Her delight is not impacted by the small fact of whether or not the shoes are on the correct feet.   I kind of like it if shoes end up on the right feet, but I do not like the extreme emotions that are expressed by G-Tot when I try to switch the shoes she so carefully put on.

Then I read about a mom who drew smiley faces with a pen on the inside of her child's shoes, like so:



Ok, it's kind of hard to see.  It's the blue spots on each shoe and I don't claim to be an artist in any form, but especially ink and rubber.  Here's a close up:



Easy so far, right?  Now I hand G-Tot her shoes, tell her to "Make them kiss".  She matches the little smiley faces complete with kissy noises and puts them on the floor, and then puts her feet in the correct shoe!  Everyone is happy.

This little trick has worked fabulously!  Now I just need to find a silver sharpie and hit her black soled ladybug boots!

Sunday Sunshine

Practicing contentment by remembering the graces of the week and practicing gratitude by giving.

This week brought some time in the candle room.  I was able to make some great headway in in organizing and pouring.  I'm just about ready for the summer!

It also brought lots of time "ou-SIDE!" as G-Tot loves to say.  We were loaned a Little Tikes play set for the summer, complete with two slides.  The morning after is arrived in our back yard, I was confronted with at two-year-old who wanted to go ou-side to "side" at 7:30 am.  In a "yes Mom" moment, I said "Sure!" and bundled her up and out we went.

I was gifted alone grocery time on Friday (Thanks HandyMan).  I also managed to get sucked into a book, finish it and have the house not crumble around me.  I planted spinach and worked with my little garden helper to water a couple days this week.

Now the sun is out and it was a good week.  I hope you can find the good in your week!

Every desirable and beneficial gift comes out of heaven. The gifts are rivers of light cascading down from the Father of Light.” (James 1:16 -The Message) May the light of the Father brighten your week!

Saturday's Pertinent Posts

I have a number of blogs that feed into my Google Reader.  Those blogs often link to other blogs and I end up with all kinds of ideas in inspirations.  Some speak to me as a mom, others as a home manager and others are just fun.  Here are a few of the posts that I found pertinent for my world this week.  Maybe there's something here that will help you out too!

:: I love the printables at 1+1+1=1 and this week Carisa posted some cute Birthday Printables.

:: What Megan's Making always inspires me.  Now I'm just waiting for a good excuse to make this amazing looking Dark Chocolate Cake with Hot Chocolate Frosting.

:: Life as Mom linked up a bunch of frugal meals as part of an Eat Well, Spend Less series.   I garnered lots of ideas for my summer menus.  I love this kind of help in the meal planning department!

As it would be, I can't find the link to the most helpful blog of the week in our house... so stay tuned and I'll summarize it for you here in a couple days!

Tuesday Garden Party: The Early Bed

In our area, winter is finally loosening it's grip and I'm anxious for some fresh produce!  Our local produce stand opens this week and not a day too early as I've used up most of the veggies from the freezer and cringe at the grocery store prices on most produce right now!

Over the winter when thoughts of spring were trapped under days and days of sub-zero weather, I read about how Jamie at An Oregon Cottage used row covers to extend the growing season.  I was fascinated and the dreams began to grow.  Could I have green beans before July?  Tomatoes before September?  Oh IMAGINE!

Then I got a catalog with at $25 off coupon.  I had to do it.  So I purchased the row cover and started looking for ways to make the hoops to hold the cover up over my long garden bed.  The home improvement places didn't have anything to help, so I started thinking outside the box and here's what I came up with:



Hula hoops from Dollar Tree!  I pulled the ribbon off and stashed it  - I have ideas for the ribbon, but that's another post.  I separated the hoops placed them over the bed.  We had to trim them down a little, but the pruning shears did the job.



Handyman spent some time out in the garden last week with GBaby and turned all the soil.  Isn't it pretty!  The fabric came in a 10x10 sheet so I cut it in half.  The 5x10 sheets will be used as frost protection and I have a second sheet that will be used for more of a "hot-house" type protection.





I took the sheets and sewed fabric scrap strips along the inside to tie the sheets to the hoops.  I ended up using some clothespins on the ends too.  It needs a little bit more shoring up along the short posts on the end of the bed and I think it will be ready to go.

Last night we had some pretty decent winds and it held up really well.  I was afraid that it was going to double as a kite if the winds kicked up, and glad I was wrong.  I'm planning on planting broccoli and spinach in the next week-and getting the other two pieces of fabric ready to go.  We'll see how that all plays out!

This post is linked up at An Oregon Cottage's Tuesday Garden Party.

Monday Sunshine

Practicing contentment by remembering the graces of the week and practicing gratitude by giving.

Sunday slipped away from me and was filled with great time with friends, rest and time outdoors.  Last week was wonderfully productive around here and I feel accomplished in all the completed chores and projects.

It brought the small blessings of alone grocery shopping and toddler snuggles. Games with Handyman and dinner with friends. Seeing the grace of provision and budgeting creativity.   Warmer weather and time outside with the bubble machine rounded out the week.

It was a good week.  I hope you can find the good in your week!

Every desirable and beneficial gift comes out of heaven. The gifts are rivers of light cascading down from the Father of Light.” (James 1:16 -The Message) May the light of the Father brighten your week!

Pertinent Posts

I have a number of blogs that feed into my Google Reader.  Those blogs often link to other blogs and I end up with all kinds of ideas in inspirations.  Some speak to me as a mom, others as a home manager and others are just fun.  Here are a few of the posts that I found pertinent for my world this week.  Maybe there's something here that will help you out too!

:: I Take Joy make me ask myself Do I wake up TO my daughter for FOR my daughter?

:: Lovely Craftey Home gave me inspiration to better a cabinet that's sitting in my bathroom by converting the shelves to pull out shelves.  I may also apply the concept to create a pull out laptop shelf in another cabinet.

:: With Easter right around the corner I love this idea for an Easter Story Countdown.

:: Life As Mom gave a great overview on taking a critical look at you spending and budgets in Audit Yourself to Cut Expenses and Money Saving Mom has some good pointers for saving money on gasoline.

This post is linked up at Simply Staci's Saturday Stumbles.

Clean Kitchen!

Spring cleaning is a sporadic activity in my house.  I'm not one of those folks who enjoys cleaning.  If there's one household task where I cut as many corners as possible, it's cleaning.  So today was HandyMan's day off from work and he had invited some folks over for dinner so I declared it cleaning morning.  I busted out my master cleaning list, added a few more things to it and we got down to work.  The kitchen and down stairs bathroom were targets of our buckets, brooms, and rags.  HandyMan gets full credit for the bathroom.  I was busy cutting corners in cleaning up the living room.

Then we all got to work in the kitchen.  While some believe in "keeping it real", I'm  not going to subject you to "before" shots of my nasty kitchen.  Here are my helpers at work:



We cleaned counters, appliances, cabinet fronts, and even under the fridge and stove.  It's sparkling clean, and has stayed that way for almost 5 hours now.





We'll see if I can maintain it -  at least for a couple days.

Book Review: Judgment Day

I love a good suspense novel. The type with a plot that twists and turns and leaves you lost in a maze.  Characters that are believable are essential to the good suspense novel.  Judgment Day by Wanda L. Dyson is one of those novels.

I was hooked from page one with this story.  Judgment Day reads with screen-type clarity with themes common in many action television shows and movies.  It’s not hard to imagine the tough chic female lead, the less than honorable reporter or the tangled mess of politicians and wealthy power players.

I was immediately board with Alex, Marcus and Razz to find the villain while irked by Suzanne the antagonist.  As the pages flew through my fingers multiple plot-lines unfolded with clarity and a great dose of suspense.  With solid hints at faith, the mentions are unobtrusive to the storyline and plot and come in believable moments in the story.

Judgment Day is a great, quick, read if you are a fan of mysteries or suspense novels.

I received a complementary copy of this book from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review as part of the Blogging for Books program.  The opinions and thoughts of this are my own and are not influenced in any way.

Trash Me Clothes

As I've mentioned before, we live rurally.  We have grass, rocks, mud and a creek all within 100 feet of our house.  Not to mention plans for gardening and painting and all sorts of other messy things once the weather turns nice.

G-Girl is usually right in the middle of our projects.  And the mud. And the paint.   I subsidize our clothing budget by consigning her clothes that are still in good shape by the time we're past the season or the time she outgrows them.  To this end I try to keep her stuff in pretty good shape.  But she is a kid and should not be deprived of a muddy, grass-stained, paint-covered childhood.  So I have developed her summer "trash me" wardrobe.

One of the dresser drawers at her level (since she now likes to pick  out her clothes) will contain her every-day Trash Me clothes.  The ones that are for the days where we're not going any farther than the back yard.  This drawer will have Trash Me Pants, and a stash of T-shirts dedicated to messiness.

The central piece of the Trash Me Wardrobe is the Trash Me Pants.  I gathered up a stack of old/extra t-shirts we had around and refreshed my memory RookieMoms directions for re-purposing adult T-shirts into toddler/youth pants.  Then I got to work!  I expanded the concept to use the long-sleeves from a long sleeve T-shirt for the legs of the toddler pants.  Since the stack of T-shirts that I started with were white - some with screen printing and some with stains.  So I picked up a packet of black dye to hide the stains they started with and so the pants wouldn't look totally nasty after a good afternoon in the yard.  Since I put too much fabric in the dye batch they ended up more of a steel-grey, but that's just fine.  I wasn't going for perfection on this project, just completion!



The elastic was about $3 with a coupon at Joanns and the dye was $2.50.  The old T-shirts were re-purposed and I had the thread on hand.  The cost of the project and 8 pair of pants/shorts/crops was under $6.  That works for me!

This post is linked up at We Are That Family: Works For Me Wednesday.

Preparing the Tot to Garden

While much of the country is embracing spring, in our area winter has overstayed it's welcome.  Spring tried to grumble its way in yesterday with a nice little thunderstorm and I'm just waiting for the temperatures to reach that spring warmth.

In the meantime, I'm dreaming my early garden bed and trying to figure out how gardening is going to work with a two-year-old helper this year.  We'll be working on our colors in an attempt to distinguish between ripe and not-so-ripe tomatoes and strawberries.  I think weeding is going to have to be done when my copy-cat isn't looking, or she may "weed" my whole garden.  While my brain is working overtime on the protection needed to preserve my crops from a toddler, I'm also looking forward to teaching her about planting and seeds.  It's about time to gather up all the gardening related story books we have and add them to the story stacks around the house.

While we were at the children's museum this past week, we practiced planting skills.  We'll be planting for real soon enough!

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This post is linked up at An Oregon Cottage's Tuesday Garden Party.

Sunday Sunshine - A Week of Celebrations

Practicing contentment by remembering the graces of the week and practicing gratitude by giving.

The last week of March brings much celebration in our household as HandyMan and I both celebrate our birthdays.  Along with birthdays comes favorite meals and special treats.  GGirl benefited as well since we took some extra family time and visited a couple of the children's museums we can access with our annual pass.  I had a perfect day for my birthday and am truly grateful to celebrate another year of life and health.  We were able to spend a day with HandyMan's Mom and get a brief change of scenery and family time.

This week also brought the completion of a Trash Me Pants (blog is coming!) the addition of a great new-to-us couch to our home and a wonderfully mis-forecasted snow storm.  Friends willing to share their time with GGirl again highlighted my week.

It has been a good week.  I hope you are able to see the joy in your week and the peace in the night.

Every desirable and beneficial gift comes out of heaven. The gifts are rivers of light cascading down from the Father of Light.” (James 1:16 -The Message) May the light of the Father brighten your week!

ThrivingMama's Mission of the Month: April

This month I stumbled across Mama Jenn's Monthly Mission Of The Month posts.  It's kind of like an accountability circle to set goals for the month and report on the accomplishments.  I am currently surrounded by unfinished projects, un-written goals and general mayhem.  There is a two year old in the house after all.  Ok - no more using the toddler for an excuse.  Here's what I hope to get done this month:

Inside: Spring Cleaning

I know myself better than to think that I'll get the whole house deep cleaned.  My goal is to get four areas of the house deep cleaned and get rid of all the winter dust and cob-webs.

Outside: Garden

This year I am trying something different with my garden.  I have gotten the materials to set up one of my raised beds with a cover and plant some crops that I hope to get in early.  If the weather holds and night time temperatures stay above 27, I hope to get this bed set up an planted around the middle of the month.

Blogging

I have a half a dozen blogs started here in my software or in my head.  I would like to get 8 posts up this month of projects that I'm working on and want to share.

Charity's Candles

Charity's Candles (one of my WAHM projects) goes into hibernation after Christmas.  It is time for that little bear to start waking up. It is my goal to get my inventory replenished to restock for one craft show coming up and one retail location as well as a special order that's come in for a baby shower.

I'm looking forward to seeing how many of my missions I can tackle and complete!

A Perfect Day

Yesterday was a perfect day.  It started with G-Girl snuggling in and watching cartoons with me while HandyMan made me breakfast.  I got a full breakfast of biscuits, bacon, eggs and hollandaise served up to me with OJ and coffee.  On the side, a gift certificate for a pedicure.  So whenever spring decides to show up (or July, whichever comes first) I get a bit of pampering and pretty toes!

Breakfast was followed by some fun crafty time, instead of dishes.  Then came some kick-up-my-feet time.  I was able work on a bunch of blog posts that have been hanging out on my camera and in my head.  Lots of fun things getting posted next week- stay tuned!

A leisurely shower and we were off for a quick get-away.  I only had to pack and gather my stuff and ride along.  Dinner was wonderfully prepared by HandyMan's mom and followed by yummy cheesecake.  After G-girl gave into sleep, we played some games and nibbled on an amazing dessert called a Chocoalte Dome from a local gourmet bakery.  The icing on the cake - no, not the chocolate glaze on the dome, although that was amazing! - the big winter storm predicted for our area was a big April Fools joke on the weathermen and we are again on track for spring!