Anna's and Lyla's Birthday Party

In the interest of staying sane, we have started combining some of the kids' birthday parties.  So this year, Anna and Lyla had their party together.  We had a great time celebrating Anna's sixth birthday (coming soon in May) and Lyla's fourth birthday (in April.)  Time has sure flown--I can't believe how big my girls are getting.

Anna requested rainbows, and Lyla wanted Hello Kitty again for themes for their cakes.  I decided to make cupcakes.  That way I could decorate half with each girl's theme.  What better way to have a Rainbow Hello Kitty party?

We made rainbow cupcakes by dividing the cake batter and using food coloring to make the cupcakes themselves in a rainbow pattern.  My son Evan and I spent quite a while one morning scooping small amounts of colored batter into cupcake pans.  We used two boxes of 15.4 ounce white cake mix, and we made 28 cupcakes.  I think we could have made 30 so that the cupcakes would not have been quite as big.

I made a recipe and a half of this buttercream frosting.  It uses cream cheese, and I thought it was delicious!  I saved about a half cup of white for the clouds and then colored the remaining frosting half sky blue and half purple to pipe onto the cupcakes.

After piping on blue frosting, I put a small amount of white frosting on for the clouds and then placed rainbow sour rolled belts into the "clouds."

I used this blog post as inspiration for making the Hello Kitty cupcake toppers.  The kids and I had fun making these with modeling chocolate.  It was kind of like working with play dough--although you had to be careful not to work with it for too long or it will melt.  I used one recipe of white chocolate modeling chocolate (recipe found here.)

I found an image of Hello Kitty on the computer and printed it out on card stock and cut it out for a template.  Then I rolled out the white modeling chocolate on my counter and cut around my card stock.   I colored some purple for the bows and a small amount yellow for the noses.  I cut out the two parts of the bow using card stock templates as well.  We used a flower sprinkle to decorate the bow.  Eyes and whiskers were piped on with black gel frosting.

My oldest daughter, Maddie, has really enjoyed sculpting, so I turned her loose on making this special Hello Kitty for the top of one of the cupcakes.  I placed two toothpicks into the base of the Hello Kitty to help keep it secure before placing it on top of the cupcake.

Lyla enjoyed her special cupcake.

Anna with her rainbow cupcake (with rainbow sherbet, too!)

And a second cupcake!

Some of the gift highlights included Polly Pockets, personalized backpacks, and several Frozen-inspired items.  (I think we have watched that movie at least 20 times--we all love it!)

It was a fun day with my girls!  Thanks to all who were able to celebrate with us!  Anna and Lyla, I love you so dearly and pray that this next year will be filled with many blessings!