erika's bridal shower: the sweets

i apologize now. all of the pictures from the bridal shower are snapshots with my point and shoot camera, so they may or may not be 100% in focus. but that's why we love snapshots, right? anyways, on to the sweets! when i took on the task of erika's bridal shower, one thing she made sure that i needed to know was that she wanted a barbie cake. red velvet, cream cheese frosting. once it got closer, she also mentioned wanting chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting. well, we made it all happen! last sunday we did our baking trial run, and probably spent about 6-8 hours baking. it was insane! we made regular sized cupcakes that day, and afterwards decided that mini cupcakes were the way to go.  the following thursday night, i made round 2 of both frostings, plus the red velvet cupcakes.  friday when i got off work, we began the final versions of everything.  problem was, between sunday when we did the trial run, and friday when it was time to do the real deal, california decided to basically double in temperature.  that might be a lie, but it sure felt like it!  we made the best of our situation, and knocked these treats out and decorated them friday night, left them in her fridge over night, and then they were good to go on saturday afternoon :) the cupcakes were super cute, and the smaller versions made them so much easier to eat.  we had a LOT left over still, so i took a bunch home, erika took some home, and pretty much anyone that was still there at the end of the shower was given a small plate of them too.  the cake part was all box mix, but the frosting was our homemade part.  i had never made red velvet frosting before, so i had no clue what it was supposed to taste like when it was done right.  with the help of pinterest & a martha stewart recipe, i was told by erika that it was PERFECT.  the peanut butter recipe was off of memory, but turned out really good as well. for you lovelies, here are the recipies
cream cheese frosting

ala martha stewart
4 blocks cream cheese (32 oz)
2 sticks soft butter
3 cups powdered sugar
2 tsp vanilla (or 1tsp if you use double strength like we have)
peanut butter frosting
as decided by erika
1 cup peanut butter

3 cups powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla (or 1/2 for double strength)
1/4 cup soft butter (i used 1/2 cup, because the stick was too soft to cut when i did round 2)
1/3 cup milk

the barbie cake went... alright... as far as the second round goes.  practice round, we had really thick frosting, and had to try and get it to soften up a little bit to do the detailing.  reality time, it was gooey and way too soft to do the stars like we had practiced.  she didn't turn out bad at all though!  i know friday night when we were frosting her, there was some excessive grumbling (mind you, it was also 10:30 at night) about the frosting.  but all in all, she looked pretty good!  the cake part was cooked in a pampered chef mixing bowl. and then set to cool while we were doing the cupcakes.  after round 1, we decided she needed a little "fancying" up so she looked like a bride instead of just a girl in a white dress.  i made the veil with a piece of netting i had leftover from the birdcage veil i made, as well as some of the orange ribbon left from her garters & the favors.  i threw together her "top" on friday morning using more of the netting as well as a piece of muslin.  not too shabby!  so many cupcakes were left over, we didn't even get to the cake... i think it went home with erika's future sister in law.  but overall, the directions were super easy to follow... the hardest part was the waiting to cool 3 hours before doing anything with it... with 2 very impatient girls in a toasty apartment.
click here pampered chef barbie cake directions!