Sugar cookies and diaper cakes

So, last weekend I hosted a baby shower for my good friend Angie here at the house, and I have to say it went really well. Although in true fashion for myself, I got sick before the big event. This always happens to me. I get all anxious about things, go crazy planning it, then right before "it" is about to happen...I come down with some aliment. Oh well...moving on. The shower was wonderful, another gal helped me plan it, she took care of the games and such and I did the food - was there ever a doubt.

For her gift I made my first ever diaper cake, and let me just say I was tickled pink (pun intended) at how it turned out. Take a look. The lighting in the pictures is bad, so forgive me for that, but you get the idea.

Diaper Cake

For favors I made these sweet sugar cookies with royal icing. I'll post both recipes below (or links where you can find them). These sugar cookies were the BEST I have ever made. I've been on a quest for sometime now to find one that lived up to my high sugar cookie expectations and this one does. Anyway, here's a picture of the favors, and some of just the cookies as well.

The Favors
Cookies - I made onesies, teddy bears, and baby carriages

And finally the cake...YUM. It was white cake with a lemon curd filling and strawberry and whip cream icing. It turned out so wonderful!! The only change I would make is to use a different recipe for the actual cake. The one I used was a bit on the dry side, which the lemon curd helped with, but still...I've made better. But definitely a nice "spring" cake - I think I may do it again for Easter!

Cake

So, there you have it, my weekend was pretty much all cooking and baking and when I wasn't doing that, sleeping.

The fam is doing well. My munchkin has a sinus infection at the moment, but is feeling better now that he is on antibiotics. Last night was the first night in over a week that I wasn't up with him at least a few times, so that was a nice change. Big kid is out of school this week. We had his parent/teacher conference yesterday, and it went very well. His teacher had nothing but good things to say about him, which is always nice. I know all parents think their children are wonderful and little geniuses but it's nice when you hear from others that they are doing as well as you think they are.

Alright, well I need to get a move on the day before the boys wake up. I LOVE LOVE LOVE that daylight savings seems to have broken the "wake up at 6 on the nose" cycle that we have had going for so long! YAhoooo for the little things! Oh and a big HAPPY BIRTHDAY shout-out to my mama - and Happy St. Patty's Day to everyone else out there!!!

Cream Cheese Sugar Cookies

Recipe adapted from here

1 cup butter, softened

1/2 cup cream cheese, softened
2 cups white sugar
4 eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 teaspoon Almond Extract
5 - 5.5 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt

In mixer, cream together butter, cream cheese and sugar until smooth. Add in eggs and vanilla, beating until smooth. Mix in the flour, baking powder, and salt until incorporated. Cover and chill dough for at least one hour (or overnight) to make rolling out simpler. NOTE: I started with 5 cups of flour, but after letting it chill it was still really sticky so I ended up adding about 1/2 cup more just to be able to handle it a bit easier, and they turned out wonderful.

Preheat oven to 390 degrees F (yes 390 it's not an error). Roll out dough on floured surface 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick. Cut into shapes with any cookie cutter or by hand. Place cookies 1 inch apart on cookie sheets lined with parchment or a Silpat.

Bake 6 to 8 minutes in preheated oven. Allow to cool completely.

Decorate with royal icing if desired, I use THIS recipe for my royal icing and it turns out really nice. Although I do add a bit of almond extract to flavor it a little.