Valentine Cupcakes with Chocolate Ganache

Well it's February and you know what that means.
Valentine sweet treats!!

A box of chocolates and specialty cookies left over from Christmas make perfect Valentine's Day cupcake toppers.

Dipping the cupcakes into a little chocolate ganache before frosting makes them even more special.

Make Valentine cupcakes for the sweethearts in your life.
They will like you.
A lot.

Chocolate Cupcakes with Chocolate Ganache

1 box Devil's Food chocolate cake mix
1 cup buttermilk
4 eggs
1/3 cup canola oil

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line pan with 24 cupcake liners.

Sift cake mix into a large mixing bowl.
Add eggs, buttermilk and oil. Using an electric mixer, mix until ingredients are all combined.
Using a large cookie scoop, fill liners 2/3 full. Bake for 18-20 minutes or until done.
Cool on a wire rack.

Ganache:
1 cup chocolate chips
1/4 c heavy cream

When your cupcakes are cooled, place chocolate chips and whipping cream in a heat proof bowl. Microwave for 30 seconds and then stir. Continue to microwave in 10 second increments and stirring in between until it's smooth.
Dip the tops of your cooled cupcakes into the ganache and let set before frosting.

Buttercream Frosting:

3 sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature

6 cups confectioners sugar
1 T whipping cream
1 tsp. vanilla extract

In the bowl of your stand mixer add butter and mix for about 1 minute.

Add confectioners sugar one cup at a time.
Add whipping cream and vanilla extract and beat until light and fluffy.
Pipe frosting onto cooled cupcakes.

Garnish with Valentine sprinkles and decorative chocolates and/or cookies.

 

Madison's Graduation Celebration

Hi there!  Did you miss me?  I sure have missed you all!
Sorry for the delay in new posts, but we have had a lot going on in our family.
I won't go into any details, but I am so glad to have some sense of normalcy back in our life.

I can't wait to share Madison's graduation with you all.
Hold on, this is going to be a long one :)

We are so proud of our girl and all of her accomplishments! 
Graduation day was perfect.  Sunny and warm :)
Here she is receiving her diploma from Mr. Walk, her school principal.

Yay - she did it!

Proud mom and dad :)

We actually held her party the evening before graduation day so she would have time to attend all of her friends parties too.  The party colors were aqua, red and white.  Love that combination!
Thanks to all of my family and friends that helped to pull her party together!  We love you all!!

Of course she had to have a dress to match the party colors :)

Here's the beverage station.  I <3 mason jars!

It's not a party without cupcakes!

A friend and I designed the cupcake toppers.

Thanks Pat :)

Don't you just love my aqua ladder of cupcakes!

I spray painted it with Rustoleum Blue Lagoon from Home Depot.

I was so happy the way it turned out.

We had so much food! 
I will share some of those recipes with you over the next few posts.
Lots of tasty stuff! 
Well, hope you enjoyed the glimpse of Madison's celebration. 
She's moving onto campus at James Madison University in the fall. 
Then we will be empty nesters.  Yikes!

Linking to:
Lil Luna
The D.I.Y. Dreamer
The 36th Avenue
Fireflies and Jellybeans
Serenity Now
Thirty Handmade Days

30th Birthday Party Cupcakes & Homemade Cupcake Stand

This past weekend we held a 30th Birthday Party for my friend Bekka. I had a great time making the cupcakes. The 30's and B's on top are made from Candy Melts. I melted them in a plastic ziploc baggie and then piped the letters and numbers onto wax paper. I think they turned out really cute. We also made our own cupcake stand by stacking different sized boxes and then wrapping them with silver wrapping paper and ribbon.

We had a Hollywood theme complete with a red carpet and Hollywood Walk of Fame. Bekka loves the Twilight Series, so our friend Kristy made sure that Edward was at the party too!

What a fun night!