On Freezing Cupcakes and Blueberry Frosting

This weekend, I put on a few hats. One of them was my handy, dandy bakers cap. And the other, and they were hand in hand, was my 'scientist' cap. The scientist cap is not as sexy though. In fact, it kind of looked like this.



I decided to freeze three cupcakes.

The first cupcake is just a regular cupcake. Nothing exciting.


Then the second one I used a Wilton tip and filled the cupcake with peanut butter.



And the third one I used a cookie cutter and pulled a chunk out so that it could be filled while still frozen. When I wrapped this one (I wrapped them all in glad wrap and aluminum foil), I made sure to stick the glad wrap in the hole so that there wasn't any air in there. I don't know if that made a difference though...



All together now!




I froze these cupcakes on Saturday and then we tried them on Sunday and...they all tasted about the same! The filling actually thawed out all right. It tasted exactly like the peanut butter filling I hoped it would be. At the same time, it looked like this on the inside.



This is not enough filling, in my opinion. Maybe I needed to push the bag harder, but it just wasn't working.

At the same time, I only froze these cupcakes for a little less then 24 hours. They were rock solid, but we're going to freeze ours between two and two and a half days before the wedding. Looks like I'll be experimenting again next weekend/week! But I may try it with the vanilla cupcake instead of the chocolate.

I also experimented with a new blueberry frosting.

I cooked fresh blueberries on the stove and I then squeezed the blueberries through a sieve and got rid of (aka: ate) the cooked fruits. Well, I should have kept them. The first frosting was good, but had way too much sugar in it and didn't taste much like blueberries.



Nice color, right?

But it was too stiff. So I actually went out and bought blueberry juice. Actually pretty good! And mixed the blueberry juice with the rest of the buttercream.



Much better. Softer and it actually tasted like blueberries!!! Looking at the picture, it's a little TOO soft, so hopefully I can figure out some middle ground. :) You can tell the difference in this one:



Last, but not least! I also frosted a small chocolate cake. I'm not sure how I feel about the little frosting balls. I need to find a better way to decorate the cake.




Any suggestions?

I Think You Should Watch This

But I'm a little biased, I think.



And then you should visit Project O or just visit Vashti's blog! She is a pretty funny lady!

What's He Saying To Me?

In the last half an hour, I've read two blogs (one I read often and one I've NEVER read before) and both blogs contain Psalm: 139

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

And now I'm trying to find out what He needs me to know...

It's Almost Time

It's almost the end of this month's Give A Blessing for Baby Be Blessed and little Malachi Stephen is at $600. We have two days left to get to the $1,000 goal.


How cute is that face?

I understand that everyone's been in your pockets (that's what my mom always says...especially around Christmas time). I don't mean to be in your pockets, but I know that this little boy deserves some love and his parents could use some help.

Here's what his parents have to say about his first few days of life:
Within the first couple days we learned that he had a tracehoesophageal fistula that needed repair; his heart defects consisted of aortic atresia, ASD/VSD, and he needed meds to keep his PDA open so blood would be sent from his heart to his body; and choanal atresia. He has reflux which will require a g-tube and problems handling thick secretions which will most likely need a tracheostomy so we can bypass his upper airway. A week or two after his admission to the children's hospital, he was given the clinical diagnosis of CHARGE. Since the initial diagnosis of CHARGE, we have also learned that he is most likely completely deaf, adequate vision is questionable as he has bilateral optic disk colobomas, and his MRI showed evidence that would suggest moderate to severe mental retardation. We definitely have our work cut out for us!

Malachi has since undergone his TEF repair, Norwood stage I modified repair with placement of a Sano shunt, choanal atresia repair, and a closed-heart surgery where they placed a secondary shunt to help with pulmonary blood flow of which he is now recovering. He has also had a brain MRI, head CT, numerous echocardiograms, and too many x-rays to count. He had been having trouble keeping his oxygen saturation levels above 60, but after this recent surgery, he seems to be doing better.

CHARGE, according to Wikipedia, is a syndrome caused by a genetic disorder. It was first described in 1979. In 1981, the term "CHARGE" came into use as an acronym for the set of unusual congenital features seen in a number of newborn children.[1] The letters stand for: Coloboma of the eye, Heart defects, Atresia of the nasal choanae, Retardation of growth and/or development, Genital and/or urinary abnormalities, and Ear abnormalities and deafness. These features are no longer used in making a diagnosis of CHARGE syndrome, but the name remains.

Maybe you can't afford to donate any money, could you please forward this along to someone who might? Or could you at least keep this little boy in your prayers? God is faithful and prayers are definitely a welcome currency.

Just know that Baby Be Blessed does offer a drawing for those who donate. (E-mail order.babybeblessed@gmail.com to send your ChipIn information. The money goes directly to the family)

This month, first place is their newest item:


A lion! Grrrrr.

Second prize gets a shirt from Wild Olive Tees. I'm kind of actually in love with these t-shirts. They're beautiful!


So if you could donate, that would be wonderful. If you know someone you think would be able to donate, that would be great too. And if you could please pray, I'm sure they would thank you a thousand times over.

I Feel Like A Scientist (And A Prayer Request)

If you couldn't tell, cupcakes are taking over my life.


I call it planning. My husband calls it my neurotic tendencies. My mother-in-law thinks I missed my calling. I can't help it. I want these cupcakes to look nice.

I've been searching online and I can't find anything about frozen, filled cupcakes. Can you freeze a cupcake with filling in it? Can you freeze a cupcake with a little piece taken out of it so that it can be filled while frozen? Do you want to fill it while frozen?

These are questions I am asking!! If you happen to know the answers to these questions, please let me know. If not, I will be freezing cupcakes this weekend and deciding the way to go for the wedding in March. Ooooo! Science experiments! Last time I did a science experiment with food, I threw some twinkies off of my roof.
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I've noticed that my blogging friends (and definitely The SITS ladies) are big-hearted people! I love it. And I wanted to ask you to read a post.



How beautiful is she?!

She has a really hard home life and could really use your prayers. You can visit Vashti to read the whole story.

What?! More Cupcakes?!

Chocolate Guinness cupcakes with peanut butter filling and chocolate buttercream frosting. One has a Reeses' Pieces on top and the other one a mini Reeses' cup. Steve thought the Reeses' Piece was better looking. I was wondering though if they should be plain.



Vanilla cupcakes with lemon curd filling and blueberry buttercream frosting. I LOVE the lemon curd.



How was your weekend? I love the weekends, but I always feel like there's never enough time!!

Hurting Your Parents

You never want to see your kids hurt, you know? I had surgery once and I mean, I was at least 20, but I could NOT handle the IDEA of an I.V., let alone putting one in my arm. Now that I've donated blood, you could stick a needle in and I wouldn't notice, but at that time, I was almost screaming in the hospital. My mother was with me before they took me and right when they were putting the needle in my arm. She's trying to hold me still so they can put it in and I'm having a nervous breakdown. I remember her tears too that day. I don't remember much after that because of the ridiculous amount of drugs, but she told me silly stories about myself. But she cried first.


Please ignore that ridiculous look on my face. That's my mom and me this past Christmas.

My husband's father had a heart attack and I was left alone in New York City while he flew back to Ohio. Not a big deal, right? I dropped my keys on the tracks and, as I was going to donate platelets (my favorite Sunday activity, after church, at that time), I passed out on the 6 train platform. A train attendant had to help me and call and ambulance. I called my mother in the emergency room waiting area and she got upset and said, 'What do you want me to do about it?'

My parents live in Hong Kong. That's 13 hours away and it takes me at least 15 numbers for me to dial their phone number. I didn't want her to do anything. I didn't want to come up later and she be like, what?!?! She told me later that she was upset because there was nothing she could do.

I'm old enough to make my own decisions now, of course, along with my husband. And I feel that I'm being called.

But how do you tell your parents that you're giving up a kidney? And I'm not just giving up my kidney...it's to a woman at church, not a family member.

I like my mom's approach that she's using with her parents. My mom, dad, and brother all live in Hong Kong (my brother is young enough to still be in school) and they were supposed to be moving back to the US this June. They've signed on to stay in Hong Kong for 3 more years so that my brother can graduate from high school. But...my mom doesn't want to tell my grandparents. Because they talk ALL the time about my parents moving back to the United States. She just wants them to find out when my parents don't move back in June.

I'm kind of feeling that approach.

When I was a teenager, I suffered from depression and self-harming. Long story short, I (kind of) told my parents. My mom didn't talk to me for weeks. She was upset; she thought she was a bad parent. That was a long time ago, but I still get nervous: what is she going to say when I tell them?

In the end, it doesn't matter. But I still get this pit in my stomach whenever I think about it.

My mother has told my brother that he can do MMA fighting and that he can play rugby. She will sit on the sidelines and she'll support him, but she may close her eyes and I know that she sits at his rugby games and cries. She doesn't get up to help him because she knows he can make it on his own.


This is my 14-year-old brother. Covered in mud and his own blood after being kicked in the head during a rugby game.

I'm kind of hoping that's how she'll feel with me.

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For those of you in the US (or even those outside), tonight is the Hope For Haiti Now Telethon. MTV is hosting it so that means I'm working! But I think you should watch it. WHAT?! YOU DON'T WATCH MTV!!?? (That's okay, neither do I) But that's okay! Because the Hope For Haiti Now telethon will be on ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, Facebook, Myspace, MTV.com, CBS.com, Palladia...you get the picture.

If you are outside of the United States, Hope For Haiti Now will be streaming on MTV International in 21 different languages. Just visit hope.mtv.com

And thanks for listening to me. :) I really appreciate it!