pumpkin cupcakes

when i found this recipe on real simple, i just couldn't resist!

(these photos are inspired by one of my newest idols, bakerella)

my ingredients with a little variation from real simple...

one 18.5-ounce box yellow cake mix (plus the ingredients called for in the package directions--except for the water!!! i also substituted egg whites for the eggs and did about 90% apple sauce/10% oil---you could probably skip the oil all together since the pumpkin is so moist)

1/2 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

one 15-ounce can pumpkin puree

tw0 8-ounce bars cream cheese, at room temperature

2 cups confectioners’ sugar

24 pieces candy corn

pre heat oven to 350° f

prepare the cake mix as directed but instead of the water called out in the cake instructions, substitute the can of pumpkin puree and add the pumpkin pie spice

line two 12-cup muffin tins with paper liners (mine were probably a bit larger, so i only got 18 out of the mix)

fill the muffin tins about 2/3 full and bake at 350° f for 18-22 minutes (mine took the full 22) or until a toothpick inserted into the center of a cupcake comes out clean

let cool on a dry rack

mix up the powdered sugar and cream cheese

(i actually found that you could add more powdered sugar to make it less runny)

dip in icing or spread on with a knife (knife was trickier, but looked the best in the end)

top each cupcake with a piece of candy corn (and try not to eat the rest of them yourself like i did!!)

girly flower cakes

this past weekend my friend lisa and i took on quite the challenge...making 2 (not 1) birthday cakes for a little girl birthday party! their only request was that we use lots of red, yellow, gerber daisies and sunflowers!!

to make the flowers we used gum paste! dyed it, rolled it out, & cut it with the flower cutter. 2 petals were used for each flower.
then the center was a circular cut out that was pressed against a metal colander.

so simple! and cute!

we made about a dozen big and 8 small for each cake.

the next few steps (baking, icing, decorating, etc.) i forgot to take pictures of (oops!), but here is the one i did get because charlie (lisa's english bull dog puppy) was biting my pants while i iced the cake! he is such a cutie!

the finished product! this was a chocolate cake with butter cream icing.

the 'red cake' was a strawberry cake with more butter cream icing (we went through a lot of butter cream!!)

this was such a fun project that i think i would enjoy doing more of ;)