When life gives you lemons...

Made these on a whim today: vanilla cupcakes with a lemon curd filling, topped with lemon buttercream frosting, yellow sprinkles and a lemon gummy wedge.

The cupcake recipe is adapted from a Sprinkles peppermint cupcake recipe and the frosting is also a Sprinkles recipe. They were pretty tasty!

Oh, and here is the name and logo I dreamed up for my imaginary bakery...

Cupcake Craze!

So one of my favorite things is cooking. I've always enjoyed working in the kitchen and find it very theraputic. Now that Luke eats dinner with Parker and me, I've made it my mission to cook real food for our family each night. Family dinners were a part of my growing up and I want the same for my children. We hardly ever dine out anymore. For one it's too expensive and we decided that was one area we could really cut back, and for another, it's never as good as what I can make at home.

I don't used any processed foods. The majority of what I make is organic, whole, unrefined and healthy. I enjoy trying new recipes and lucky for me, my son has never met a fruit or vegetable he doesn't like.

However, he's also never met a sweet treat he doesn't like! I like cooking but I love baking and my new favorite thing is making cupcakes! I've made cakes and cake pops, but I haven't made cupcakes until last week (fancy ones, I mean). My favorite part is decorating. I just think it's so fun to create something so pretty that's also deliciously edible. I decided rather than just posting pics on Facebook, I'd start keeping track of my cupcake concoctions on my blog. Enjoy!

These are strawberry cupcakes dipped in a dark chocolate ganache with fresh strawberry frosting and a chocolate dipped strawberry on top. I made them for a cookout we are going to on Saturday. The cupcake and frosting recipe is from Sprinkles so they should be yummy!

This is a S'mores cupcake-- a graham cracker crust with a graham cracker cupcake, a marshmallow filling, milk chocolate frosting and topped with graham cracker crumbs, a Hershey's mini and a toasted marshmallow.

Chocolate mud cupcake with chocolate frosting and dark chocolate shavings. This was my first fancy cupcake:)

Our Little Fish!

You never know who you're going to meet and I am always surprised and delighted by the kindness of strangers. The rude encounters are usually the more memorable and unfortunately what we generally expect. Lucky for us, we happened to be on the right beach at the right time.

My parents, Parker, Luke and I went to Florida in April because Parker was testing at the PGA facility in Port Saint Lucie. Parker was a ball of nerves for the first three days, testing and in classes from 7-5.

On our last night in Florida, Parker got to finally have a little fun. He passed all his PGA Level 1 exams and was finally able to take a breath (sidenote-- so proud of him! He studied like crazy and once he completes the next two levels he'll be a Class A Golf Professional...think of it as him getting his Masters in golf. It's takes about the same amount of time).

Anyhow, Parker, Luke and I went to Jensen Beach to hang out a little and eat dinner. We hadn't really planned on getting in the water so Luke was just wearing a normal outfit and a diaper. That, of course, was silly of us. He immediately began splashing around in the sand and tide so we stripped him down and let him frolick in his diaper.

We noticed a woman snapping pictures of Luke. I was a bit put off at first but she then asked if it was okay and said she loved watching him have so much fun. How could I say no? He was quite a sight afterall, hamming it up with his potbelly hanging out and his 10 pound diaper. Besides, I didn't have my camera and she had a professional one.

Long story short, she snapped dozens of pics, took my email address and a couple days later they were appeared in my inbox. She was really nice and had it not been for her, I wouldn't have these awesome photos!

I know I posted pics on Facebook, but these are different and I just have to share them. Luke is such a water baby and absolutely loved the beach.