ugh.. allergies.

every damn time the weather changes.. i swear. without fail my allergies haunt me. and, good for me, i have allergy-induced asthma.. so you can guess what else happens. to get through the day it takes a whole lot of zyrtec, claritin, benedryl, albuterol and one other steroid inhaler. ugh. i haaaaate it.

anywho.. today was LEFTOVERS day!!! how exciting!

breakfast:
coffee
multigrain cheerios w/ almond milk

lunch:
1 piece leftover cheese pizza from sunday

dinner:
leftover pork, potatoes and haricots verts from yesterday
carrot sticks
15 almond joy pieces (omg. these were amazing - glad they came from my friend.. or else i would have eaten the whole bag!)

snack (on the way home from my clinical rotation.. in the car. lol):
gala apple
2 peanut butter cookies
handful granola

now that i popped a benedryl i'm sure i'll be asleep any minute now.. after i finish my homework.. maybe. for your viewing pleasure.. pics from my phone of my weekend endeavors:

Finally!

So I finally found my camera cord.. and I can post again! I guess you can blame my hiatus on nursing school as well.. considering I haven't posted since BEFORE I started my summer school class.. and now it's over. It was fun to finally study something I'm really interested in and know that I will be applying to my career. I've also been distracted by the logistics of school. I have to deal with financial aid for the first time (since I have the most amazing parents and they paid for my undergraduate education, I didn't have to deal with it.. and everything I've taken since then I've paid for using my salary from my job at Packard).

Needless to say, it's been stressful. I don't qualify for grants since I have a bachelor's degree (yes, in many instances I have felt punished for having a degree.. this definitely isn't the first time).. so I have to get loans.. ugh. And mostly that's because my job won't let me decrease my hours. That means i'll have to go relief/per diem, which means I will no longer be getting benefits, and there's no guarantees to how many hours will be available to me each week. The good thing about that is that I don't have to work if I don't want to (because of exams, clinicals, etc), but I don't have a steady paycheck to pay for school/rent/insurance. So loans it is. I still haven't even told my work I'm going relief, but I'm waiting to make sure Kris will be able to add me to his insurance.. which is something he's kinda freaking out about. He says he's stressing about feeling like he's responsible for supporting me. I understand where's he's coming from, but it's not like this is a fling.. we've been together for, oh.. 8 1/2 years now. But still.. I do get it. And I so love him for being as supportive as he has been while I go back to school when he's ready to really start our lives together. I'm truly fortunate to have him.

So.. after all my excitement I realized my camera is sitting at home.. and I have all these pictures of stuff I've done lately. Like yummy food I've cooked, and cupcakes from my first big event, a wedding! So, I'll have to steal from facebook. I'll be right back.

Well, not right back.. it's been about an hour. But I found them, courtesy of my friend Renee (a bridesmaid in the wedding), who took the photos. Here's a close-up of the top. The red velvet cupcake (with cream cheese frosting) is topped with an iridescent purple flower with purple dragees. I really loved doing these because purple is my absolute faaaavorite color.

The flowers are made of colored gumpaste, which I formed using a make-shift foil flower former instead of an expensive one from the store. lol. I painted the flowers using purple lustre-dust, which I also used to color the dragees (they were initially white, like the one in the center of the flower). Here's a photo of them all boxed and ready to be gobbled up by the guests!

It was stressful, but fun.. now that I'm in school I don't think I'll be saying yes to any weddings for a while.. ^_^

ugh! camera cord.. where are you?!

my frustration over losing my camera cord has been overwhelming me the past couple days. i know, it shouldn't.. but ugh!!! i've been in 'organizing mode' lately since i'll be starting school soon, and i don't want to be stressed about studying AS WELL AS about the piles of my crap all over the apartment.

did you notice how i specified MY crap? yes.. i have a LOT of stuff.. much more than kris.. and i feel very guilty about it. needless to say, i've been getting rid of some of said crap.. trying to make my home 'nursing school ready'

i've also been organizing my digital life. i went through and organized my 650 emails in my inbox, deleting most and putting the rest into folders. i purged my email contacts, erasing anyone whose name i didn't recognize. then i set up my yahoo mail to forward to my gmail. this is all because i'm getting a new phone, the htc hero, which is a google phone, and i want my contacts and emails to be very organized. i hope i can keep it that way. kris has been netbook shopping for me... something i said that i'd buy for myself if i EVER got into school. finally! we're gonna go look next weekend and pick me out something nice.. and cheap. lol.

sooo.. since i can't find my cord, i had to steal pictures of my most recent adorable creations from my coworker whose daughter's birthday i made them for. the theme was abby cadabby. ?! yeah, i had no idea who she was either. apparantly she's elmo's friend on sesame street. the cupcakes were a lot of work.. but they turned out cute!

and i also made a color-coordinating cookie bouquet.. which the birthday girl's mom arranged. didn't it turn out cute?! i loooooooved the color scheme.. and i love the vase.

that is all.. cross your fingers that i'll find my cord soon. and then more photos will be coming your way!

trick-or-.... wow it's been a while.

so here's the deal. for the past couple weeks i've had in my head all these ideas of posts i wanted to share, but never got to the computer to put them all down. lots of yummy recipes and good times. no weight lost.. but i remain the same, which is fine by me..

the first 'fall' thing i made was what i call 'pumpkin patch muffins'.. and they turned out pretty cute! i walked into michael's and saw the brach's fall mix and immediately knew that i had to do something fun with those cute little pumpkins! so here's what i came up with:

pumpkin muffins with cream cheese frosting.. decorated to look like a pumpkin patch!

i thought they turned out pretty cute! hopefully they were tasty.. since i was trying to be good i didn't eat any. =) i had another 'creative moment' just yesterday when i had a bunch of skull cookies that i had cut out but never got a chance to decorate.. so i made them into turkeys! it was just a practice run so they weren't perfect.. but they turned out pretty cute!

then for halloween i decided to try my hand at cake pops for the first time. i have done cake balls before, but never on a stick. well, turns out, these were much easier! other than the drawing the faces on.. the wilton pens SUCK! if you're getting them to write on candy coating, DON'T.. splurge for the ones on amazon... i've heard they're much better. so, since the pen failed, i used miniature chocolate chips for the faces.. and it worked! SEE?!

CUTE! and you can see my 'haunted house' candle-holder in the background. teehee! i love the holidays.

in between baking and all that good stuff, i went to a baby shower for a co-worker of mine.. now, i've made onesies before, but this happens to be the design i tried this time for her boy-to-be.

MONKEYS!!! i love monkeys.. i think they're adorable.

and, of course, since i'm such a baker, i always like to put a baking 'touch' in my gifts.. the first set of onesies i placed the socks in daisy-shaped cupcake cups and included a cupcake recipe that the mom-to-be had been asking for.. this time, i included an 'it's a boy!' cookie mix. it was really just cowboy cookies from bakerella's website.. but i used light blue and green m&m's and got some 'ABC' block fabric for the top! blogger doesn't like me right now so it won't let me put a photo.. but they're on my picasaweb page in the 'other baked goods' section.

i'll be on vacation for a while.. but i plan to stay on track.. even though we'll be eating out A LOT.. wish me luck!! maybe being out will make me MORE consciencious and i'll lose weight!

*here's hoping!*

Cupcakes!

So, I'm not the greatest cake baker in the world. Cookies I can do, but cakes, not so much. So imagine how ecstatic I was to get The Cupcakes! Book by the 'Cake Mix Doctor' from my aunt for Christmas. It has totally awesome recipes that all start with cake mix. I love cupcakes.. I think they're fun, adorable, and make us all feel like kids again. I've only been able to try a couple of the recipes, but one in particular, the "Cookies and Creme" cupcake, has been a big hit with everyone who has tried it! I've made them 4 separate times now because I keep getting requests!

Of course, when I saw these groundhog cupcakes featured on tipjunkie, you KNOW I automatically thought of doing them with the "Cookies and Creme" cupcake recipe!!! Especially since the recipe already has you garnish the top of buttercream frosting with oreo cookie crumbs =).

For those of you who are interested, here is the recipe:

• 1 box white cake mix (no pudding)
  
• 1 cup sour cream (light works just fine)


• 1/2 cup vegetable oil


• 3 eggs


• 1 teaspoon vanilla


• 30 oreo cookies

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Crush 18 oreo cookies in a large zip-top bag with a rolling pin.

Line 24 cupcake tins with paper liners. Separate remaining 12 oreos from one another, ensuring there is some creme filling on both sides of the cookie. Place cookie, creme side up, one in each cupcake liner.

Mix cake mix, sour cream, vegetable oil, eggs and vanilla in a bowl with a hand mixer on low speed for 30 seconds or until incorporated. Increase speed to medium for 2 minutes (batter will be thick). Fold in 1 1/2 cups of the crushed oreos, reserve remainder for garnish.

Spoon 1/3 cup batter into cupcake tins until about 3/4 of the way full. Bake at 350 for 18-22 minutes or until they spring back when lightly touched and are slightly golden. Cool on a wire rack.

Prepare buttercream frosting

• 1 stick butter (at room temp)
• 3 cups sifted confectioner's sugar
• 3-4 tablespoons milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
  

Cream butter until light and fluffy. Stop mixer to add sugar, 3 tablespoons of the milk, and vanilla. Mix on low until incorporated. Increase speed to medium-high for 1-2 minutes. If too stiff, add up to 1 additional tablespoon of milk. Frosting should be spreadable consistency. Frost cupcakes and garnish with cookie crumbs. Lightly press crumbs in to stick. If making groundhog cupcakes, see instructions through tipjunkie link!

Seriously, these cupcakes are ridiculously good.

update (10/7/09) i make these cupcakes so often i've played around with how to decorate them.. crumbs, mini oreos, oreo halves, piped frosting, spread frosting.. anywho.. these are my favorites: