Mermaid Birthday

My daughter turned 4 this Month and after getting home from Disneyland and doing other cookies orders. It was two days before her birthday party and I realized I had no plan for her cake. I asked her what she wanted and she was not specific about it. I gave her suggestions but she did not seem to be way excited about anything.

She does love her mermaid Barbie so I decided to get inspiration from Barbie Merliah and just make cookies because that would be simpler for me to do than a sculpted mermaid to sit on top of a cake.

So I made the plan and told my daughter the next morning, she said no she did not want it but wanted a Buzz Light Year cake. WHAT!! Where did that come from. Anyway after I drew out a picture of what the cake would look like she was finally on board.

Here are the cookies I did and used the colors found on the actual Merliah Barbie.

And here they are on the cake. Excuse my lighting I was at my in laws home and we were trying to find a background and hey lets face it I am not that great of a photographer.

One side had the number 4 and her name.

The bottom layer.

The front side a simplified mermaid.

And I saw this surprise cake idea on At the Picket Fence and thought it would be a fun idea to try. I forgot about it and started to stack the and fill the cakes. So I had to take apart the first two layers I had already filled and layered to cut the hole in them and then I was on the right track. My daughter loves chocolate and wanted a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting.

Here is my cutie pie with her cake, she loved it. :)

The Queen of Keeping it Clean - Tye

I am a little behind on posting but that's ok cause that means I have cookies to post. Last week was my SIL, Tye's, birthday. She is married to my older brother Alvin.

Tye is a wonderful woman she is always on the go doing something. She reminds me of a busy bee.

I am going to let her cookies describe her, her hobbies, likes, personality, memories, etc....

Tye keeps it clean. Her house is clean, her car is clean her kids were always clean.

I have never been in her home when it is messy. She even has to have the house all clean before they go out of town or on vacation.

Tye keeps it clean at her job. She is the cleaning check lady. She goes around to university approved housing and does cleaning checks on those who rent the apartments. They have to pass her cleaning check to be able to get their deposits back at the end of semester.

Tye likes to talk.... on the phone, at church, at sporting events, on the street, in front of her house. None of these are bad. I love getting to chat with her. She just talks way more than I do. I think it is a gift to be able to talk with anyone.

One of Tye's favorites or at least it used to be is mint chocolate chip ice cream. 

Wow I just realized as I am looking at this ice cream cone cookie picture that I totally forgot to finish the detail on the cones. Ooops. :)

A while ago she told me that she felt that she did not have any talents such as making something or having a side job talent. I told her that her talent is being able to be a friend to people. She kinda shrugged at that. But being able to befriend people  is a talent for sure and one that I lack in. Tye has so many friends and her ability to be able to be friendly and loving to others is an amazing talent and she should be happy that she possesses it.

I also threw this heart hand cookie in, because she loves to hold hands with people and especially with her husband and kids. She still always tries to get her children to snuggle, kiss and hold hands with her even though they are all grown up. Good thing she has a couple of grand kids to love on now. :)

And the last cookies are my memory of Tye. Tye can even keep it clean while lingerie shopping.

I love to tease her with this one. Tye is modest and that is not a bad thing, she is reserved and gets embarrassed if you start talking about the intimate things in life. Years ago when my brother just older than me was getting married three of us (me, my sister and Tye) went shopping for a bridal shower gift for our soon to be sister in law. My sister and I were pulling out nightgowns and chemises that were in good taste and a little sassy and Tye was getting all embarrassed and she held up some long sleeve, high necked night gown and suggested it. My sister and I gave her such a hard time. I really don't remember if it was a flannel plaid gown but that is how the story has been told ever since and so I made these for my memory of Tye.

I sure hope that Tye had a wonderful birthday and that she enjoyed the cookies!

Here is the whole gang together.

Lemon limes

My niece got married May 4th. We tried to talk her into doing a may the 4th be with you theme for her wedding but she just wouldn't go with it. She kept with her lemon lime them.
I made over 200 small cookies for the reception sweet table.

This was my little set up. I did not want to pipe and fill 200+ cookies so I thinned my icing down to 5 seconds and then just dipped 5/6 at time then immediatioly went back and piped in the lines and details.


I did full and half slices and they turned out pretty cute. I also flavored the icings lemon and lime.



Just a few of the finished product.

This was one of the three food table at the reception, the decor was so darn cute.

My favorite was the lime ones, but the bride liked the lemon, she said they tasted like lemon bars but with out the mess.

Teacher Appreciation

Teacher appreciation week was last week.



Cute cookies I did for an order and got them done right before we left on our vacation. I got the idea from Sugarbelle and I used a white food color marker that I made myself from the help of Lilaloa's post and I think it is perfect cause it looks just like chalk.



All ready to go.



Thanks Denee.



We were on vacation during teacher appreciation week and I did not get something for my sons teacher before we left so when we got back I made some cookie flowers to take toher. I think they turned out great.

Where competitiveness begins - Kanani

I wanted to post this while I was on vacation last week at Disneyland so that it would have been up on my sisters actual birthday but our Hotel WiFi did not want to work for us. So here it is a few days late but that is ok.

Kanani, that is an interesting name, my father gave her the name. He served a two year mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day saints in Hawaii and Kanani is a Hawaiian name. It means, "the beautiful one". She is of course beautiful but my other sisters and I give our Father a hard time saying that Kanani must be the special one because she is "the beautiful one'. :)

She is also very competitive and if you look at all the post I did for her five children Brady, Kelsey, McKenzie, Zach and Sydnee. You can tell that they are all very sports oriented and competitive kids.
Kanani has spent countless hours driving her kids to practices and watching their games. It seems like there never is a weekend that at least one of her children are participating in some game or meet.

My sister also likes to cook and bake and she is very good at it. I think that is something that all of my Mom children inherited from her. :)

She likes to make cupcakes and she makes some awesome rolls so I wanted to do some cookies to represent her talents of baking so I did a couple of cupcakes and a rolling pin.



This next pic is to represent all the swim meets and soccer games she has attended to support her children. Her oldest swam for BYU and her middle child will start swimming for the Y in the fall. The yellow suit is to represent Orem High swimming which three of the kids have been on the team there. And I think that everyone of them played soccer and of course the youngest two still do.



Another thing I think of when I think of Kanani is Hawaii. Not because her name is Hawaiian but they have gone to Hawaii on their family vacations for quite some time. Pretty sure if they lived there they would be the #1 surfing family. So I thought I would do a flip flop cookie to represent that.



Now these by far are not my best. I have decided that cars, truck and motorcycles are not my thing. When Kanani saw these she thought it was because she is the one driving her kids all over the place but in fact I did these because they represent my memory of Kanani.

It is supposed to be a 1983 Nissan Sentry hatchback.  The real car looked pretty much looked like the car on the left.

Not sure what year it was but I am thinking 1985/86. I would have been around 13/14 years old. I don't have the best memory but this is what I remember. It was summer time and we were having a family reunion out at Deer Springs Ranch. I for some reason got to ride out with Kanani to the cabins. Kanani was cool cause she was in college and she had a cool new (used) car. When we pulled off of the main highway to the smaller road Kanani pulled over and she let me DRIVE her car. I was way excited. To a 12/14 year old getting to drive a car is a big deal. All you ever want to do as a teen is to be able to drive. I can't remember how the drive went, I think it was a stick shift and it was a little tricky to drive. We obviously both survived the event. But I remember thinking that my sister loved me and that she was so cool to let me drive her car for a little bit.

This birthday was my sisters 50th, I should have made a big 50 cookie but maybe she does not want that rubbed into her face. Hope you have a wonderful birthday Kanani!!



Love Natalie

Ballet Cookies

My daughter has been in a dance class this past year. Once a week for 25 minutes 10 3/4 year olds put on their tap and ballet shoes and have a great time. Sometimes they follow the teacher sometimes they are picking their noses and sometimes they refuse to do  anything. But it sure is a fun sight to see and puts a smile on my face.

I have been wanting to bring some cookies for all the little tap and ballet students in the class and since we were going to be gone on vacation this week I finally got them done last class.



I had these colors left over and was thinking they might not be the cutest for ballet shoes but I think they turned out great.


All year the girls have been preparing two dances for the year end recital. Their tap dance is to "It's a Hard Knock Life" and oh my it is the cutest think ever. And for the life of me I can't remember the name of the ballet number but it's precious as well.

Recital is this coming Saturday and I hope my daughter has such a great time dancing her little heart out.



Bagged up...