Today we made the last payment on my student loans. Let me repeat that: WE PAID OFF MY STUDENT LOANS!! We are so excited and proud. We have been putting all of our effort into paying of them since January and we finally did it! Jack getting his promotion last month bumped up our goal date by a month, so yay Jack and yay to him for depriving himself all of the things he has been wanting for the last several months! Jack and I started following a tweaked version of the Financial Peace University plan, the 7 baby steps. I couldn’t get Jack to fully follow emptying our saving account or stop the retirement contributions. Lastly we also didn’t do the smallest debt first, we felt the student loan should be the one we worked on first since it had a much higher interest rate. Now that being said, I truly believe in the Dave Ramsey plan and tell everyone that will listen about it. If you are serious about getting out debt and changing your life, follow his plan! Now that my student loan is paid off we only have one more debt: Jack’s car loan. Thankfully it is small and our goal is to have it paid off by the end of next month. Every cake order since January and any leftover budgeted money has been going towards this goal and we are so close we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. I can’t wait until next month when we are truly debt free and we can shout “WE ARE DEBT FREE!”

This Little Mermaid was my favorite Disney movie when I was little. This was a really fun cake to do and it brought back memories of having my own huge Little Mermaid themed party, but my cake wasn't a cool as this! The sand is just brown sugar and I used candy pearls. The sealife was made from fondant using a molds, shape cutters and a pastry cutter. I was surprised how quickly I was able to get the cake finished with all of the detail work. The little girl was so excited when she seen the and that the Ariel toy she got to keep!

I have done several Hello Kitty cakes over the past few years and I think this one is my favorite.  The soft pink fondant looks so cute and girlie with the black and white details of this cake. I covered the cake in fondant like normal and used a large round cookie cutter to make the circles. I folded a piece of regular paper in half and cut out half of a Hello Kitty shape. I placed the unfolded piece cut out on rolled out white fondant and used a Zyto knife to cut out the shape. I carefully lifted the shape and placed on top of the cake, gluing it down with a little water. I used a small oval cookie cutter to make the eyes and yellow nose. I then rolled out a thin roll of black fondant and cut into two inch strips for the whiskers. I repeated the process with matching pink fondant and placed along the bottom of the cake. To create the turquoise bow I rolled out a thin layer of fondant and cut a piece one inch by four inches. I crimped the two ends and folded in meeting at the center. I placed a small round cut out for the knot.  For the large pink bow, I made a 50/50 mixture of fondant and gum paste. I quickly rolled out a thin layer and cut into a long one inch strip. I place the ribbon on the cake, overlapping slightly. Next I created the loops for each of the bow, and then placed another piece in the center where the two loops met for the knot. I like to use clean, dry paper towels to help hold the bow in place until the gum paste has time to fully dry. Once dried I removed the paper towels and was left with a super cute cake!

duunnn dunnn... duuuunnnn duun... duuunnnnnnnn dun dun dun. It’s my favorite week of the year again: Shark Week! I’m all ready to watch hours of documentaries on sharks with my shark cupcakes and this year I decided to add a cocktail to the party. Adult Ocean Water! This is a super easy and super tasty cocktail to have at any party, perfect for a JAWS themed one.
Ingredients:
2 ½ oz. Vodka
2 oz. Blue Curacao
1 oz. orange juice
 
Mix well and serve in a rocks glass with ice.  Garnish with orange slice and a shark gummy! Duunnn dunnn... duuuunnnn duun... duuunnnnnnnn dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dunnnnnnnnnnn dunnnn.

When Jack and I eloped eight years ago, I didn’t want to lose all of the extras. I made a bouquet for me and a boutonniere for Jack; we still had champagne and even a small cake. Every year I go back to that bakery and get the same cake for us to enjoy after dinner.  This year since I have been making a lot of ice cream pies, I decided to make an ice cream pie version. Yum! I used a graham cracker crust, strawberry cheesecake ice cream, whipped cream, and fresh strawberries.  I followed the same steps as the Fourth of July Pie: melted the ice cream, layered the strawberries on the bottom of the crust, poured in ice cream, layered more strawberries before pouring the rest of the ice cream, and froze. Once frozen, I topped the pie off with the whipped cream and strawberries. It was perfect after a long and hot summer day! Next year I think I am going to try to make it with custard….yummmm.

Isn't this cake just beautiful?! This two-toned yellow cake was a last minute order and turn out so gorgeous!! I found the flowers on sale at the craft store since I knew I wouldn't of been able to do sugar flower. I traced a template I cut out of paper to make the shield shape and after it was added to the cake I piped the pearls and Happy Birthday Mom. The black on the pastel yellows with white flowers gives it a real classy look!

It hot where we leave during the summer time and the best way to cool down is with some homemade ice cream pie! Normally I make my Fourth of July Trifle, but this year since we are keeping it small I decided to make an ice cream version this year. I got a graham cracker crush and layered sliced strawberries along the bottom. I think poured some melted strawberry ice cream. I put another later of strawberries and added some blueberries before topping it off with more ice cream. I placed it in the freezer until the ice cream re-froze and then finished it some whipped cream and decorated with more strawberries and blueberries. This is going to be such a nice cool treat while we watch the fireworks! 

Something that Amber and I started a few years ago was creating Fourth of July shirts for our annual barbeque. Last year we tried the classic way of doing tied dyed shirts, but they looked more like purple and pink instead of blue and white. Thankfully the guys didn’t mind the colors and were willing to let us try tie dying again this year. Last month when I was at Target getting the birthday bag for memory board I found some tie dying kits on sale and picked a few up. Each kit came with three bottles filled navy, turquoise, and red dye and all I needed to do was add water, seemed easy enough! I did a little research on the best way to tie dye and decided on what pattern we wanted. This year, since we are nerdy after all, decided to make Captain American tie dye shirts. The most important part of this design was the shield so we needed to make sure the colors didn’t bleed together. To get the best seal we read that we should use zip ties, who knew?! We zipped tied each shirt with four zip ties in the pattern of the shield.  Next we damped each shirt since apparently wet shirts helps the dye to get to all of the areas of the shirt.  We started with the red dye, following the instructions on the package and dyed only the designated red areas of the shield, once the red was finished we repeated the process with the blue. However, since the blue looked purple we mixed the blue and turquoise to get more of a royal blue color. We covered the shirts and let them seat for at least six hours like we had read to let the dye set. 

Two years ago the idea of this adorable apron came to me and I finally made it! The first year I couldn’t find the right star fabric and last year I was able to finally find the correct fabric, but didn’t have enough time to make it. I have tons of tubs full of projects that I just never got to, so lately I have been trying really hard to get to them. I decided to finally make this apron and enter it into the fair later this fall. I started by cutting out a regular shaped apron bodice and skirt. I ended up making the neck a little more sweetheart shaped to make it look more like a dress. I cut out two half circles for the skirt side panel and a white panel for the bodice. To create the bodice, I pinned the red ribbon in place and sewed the white panel to the blue pieces. I darted the sides of the bodice to give it more shape and added the white lace. For the skirt I pinned the sewed blue panels to the bodice, creating plenty of ruffles. Once all pinned I sewed on the red skirt and finishing it with white lace. Lastly I added I sewed red ribbon for the neck and the ties, making sure to melt the ends of the ribbon to prevent unraveling. The apron came out better than I thought it would two years ago! Now I am all ready for the 4th of July in my red, white, and blue!

Today is my wonderful husband’s birthday. Happy Birthday Jack! Last year I made Jack’s favorite dessert: Reese’s Peanut Butter Ice Cream Pie; but this year he said I could try a new recipe I found. As a kid I remember going to potlucks at our church and there was my favorite dessert of all time: Jack’s Peanut Butter Pie. Jack was our pastor and he made this dessert for every potluck. It was so thick and rich and delicious! I have been trying to find the recipe for years so I can recreate it and last week while on Pinterest I came across a recipe that was similar enough that I could tweak and try it. The original recipe called for a chocolate crust and creamy peanut butter and I knew that Jack’s pie had graham cracker crust and chunky peanut butter.
Ingredients:
1 Pre-Made Graham Cracker Crust
1 Cup Chunky Peanut Butter
1 package (8 Ounce) Softened Cream Cheese
1-1/4 cup Powdered Sugar
1 package (8 Ounce) Whipped Cream, Thawed
 
Directions:
In a mixer add the peanut butter and the cream cheese, beat until smooth. Slowly add powdered sugar and beat until smooth. Lastly add in the whipped cream and beat the mixture until smooth.
 
Pour the filling into the graham cracker crust and chill for at least an hour before serving.
 
The pie turned out better than imagine and it was just like Jack’s pie! I am so happy that I finally have the recipe to make this childhood favorite any time I want! Oh and Jack loved the new pie too!