Projects, Where Oh Where are the Projects

I have missed my blog... It has been a tough week.  For some crazy reason I went into super-mom/Susie-homemaker mode last week.  My youngest son is home from college on fall break (he is on a crazy school schedule).  Ian asked me to make one or two of his favorite meals last week.  Of course this guy's favorite meals are not burgers and pizza.... oh no.... He wanted Greek Chicken Pie (i.e. chicken, feta, spring onions, spices, in a fabulous sauce wrapped in flaky phyllo) and Beef Bourguignonne with Egg Noodles.  Seriously.  The simpler of the meals he requested was homemade tacos and homemade beef BBQ. 

I think I have gained four pounds in the last week.  Did I forget to mention the homemade apple pie? Yes I did.  I made from scratch apple pie and pie crust on Sunday.  That pie was awesome.  And the crust was fabulous.  I also used the Cricut Cake machine to cut extra pie dough to decorate the top of the pie. The apples were from A Child's Year and the flourish is from French Manor.

Ian goes back to Atlanta on Friday and I think Doug, Bethany and I will going on a diet starting Saturday!  I will be making a round trip to Atlanta and back in one day, so there will be no crafting on Friday either.   But this weekend THERE WILL BE CRAFTING!! 

I have three projects planned for the weekend.  My next two BBTB2 projects as well as my fall Yudu napkins. 

I will be back tomorrow to select a winner of the Custom Crops gift voucher/blog candy.  Sorry to be so worthless in the craft world this week.  I will improve....

Blog Candy/Give Away at My Sister Blog

I have a blog candy give away going on over at my sister blog, Busy with the Cricky Cake.  I created the cake blog for the release for the Cricut Cake machine.  I am loving my Cricut Cake and wanted to document my cake journey with interferring with my paper crafting.  

The give away is a drawing for two $25.00 gift vouchers from Custom Crops.  You must do two things to be eligible for the drawing:

1. Become a follower of Busy With The Cricky Cake; and
2. Leave a comment in the Give Away post at the Cake blog.

The drawing will be on Saturday and two lucky winners will can have mini shopping spree at Custom Crops, the first sponsor of the new blog. 

Cake and Frosting Recipes - From Last Weekend

The cake I made last weekend is just crumbs in the platter now, but I was asked by a few of you to share the recipe.  I changed the original recipe in that the recipe called for seedless raspberry jam filling, but my dh prefers strawberry so I used strawberry preserves.  Otherwise I followed the recipe exactly.  This is my version of the cake recipe (Name changed to reflect our preferred filling). One more note, the frosting recipe is for a two layer cake.  I would suggest making 1.5 batches of the frosting for better coverage on your cake.

Strawberry-Laced Vanilla Cake

1 1/2 Cups of Butter, softened

1 1/4 Cups of Sugar

3 1/3 Cups of Cake Flour ( or 3 cups of all-purpose flour) * I used cake flour

2/3 Cup of milk

1 Tbsp of Baking Powder

1/2 tsp of Salt

1 1/2 tsp of Vanilla Extract

1/4 tsp of Baking Soda

4 Large Eggs

1 12 oz. Jar of Strawberry Preserves

Frosting (Recipe below)

Grease and flour three nine-inch round cake pans.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl with mixer on LOW speed beat butter and sugar just until blended.  Increase mixer speed to HIGH and beat for ten minutes, scraping bowl often.  Add to the bowl:  flour and the next six ingredients (though the eggs).  Mix on LOW speed until well mixed.  Increase mixer speed to high and mix for two minutes, occasionally scraping the bowl edges.

Spoon the batter evenly into the three prepared pans.  Bake for 25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean.  Remove from the oven and cool in the pans for 10 minutes.  Remove from the pans and cool on a wire rack to cool completely.

Make the frosting (recipe below). 

Using a serrated knife, cut each cake layer in half horizontally to make six cake layer.  Assemble as follows:

Place the bottom half of a layer with the cut side up on a cake plate.  Spead 1/3 jar of strawberry preseves over the layer.  Top with the cake top half layer; spread with frosting to cover.  Top with the second cake bottom half and agains spread with 1/3 of the jar of preserves.  Top with the second top half layer and again spread with frosting.  Repeat for the last two layer, ending with frosting on the top of the cake.  Spread the remainging frosting around the sides of the cake.  Enjoy!

Whipped Frosting

1/4 Cup of Flour

1 Cup of Milk

1 Cup of Butter

1 Cup of granulated Sugar

Dash of Salt

1 tsp of Vanilla

Prepare the flour paste:

In a small sauce pan combine 1/4 cup of all purpose flour and 1 cup of milk.  Whisk to blend.  Over medium high heat cook mixture until thick and smooth.  Set aside and cool completely.

Prepare Frosting:

Beat 1 cup of butter for four minutes.  Add 1 cup of granulated sugar and beat for an additional four minutes.  Add the cooled flour paste and beat again for four minutes.  Add a dash of salt and 1 tsp of vanilla and beat to mix well. 

Frosting will be light and fluffy, like whipped cream.

Cricut Cake Machine Cakes Sneek Peek

Have you seen what the Cricut Cake can do???  I am so impressed with what can be cut with this machine... It makes me wish I were more of a baker! This is a reprint of a Twitter photo from CHA that I wanted to share.  Yes, YES, I am enabling.....