Way before I had kids, I had friends who had kids and I loved all of these kids. My friend Sonja, had three kids who I adored and I think adored me back because they bought me the book Pinkalicious because they all thought I would love it. And I did, because it's a book about a girl who makes pink cupcakes with her mom and then eats so many she turns pink! "I cried because I was so beautiful" is quite possibly my favorite line.
Thomas has read the book several times before, but has recently been on a Pinkalicious kick. He's even got big chunks of it memorized so that he can read along. What color do you want your cupcakes? "Pink! Pink, pink, pink!"
So I promised him we would make some pink cupcakes this weekend and he was pretty excited!
I'll admit that we used a box mix because I thought it would be easier and I wanted him to be able to help more than he usually does. So I measured out all of the ingredients and he poured them in for me. He was so happy to have such big tasks to do! And he was so careful not to spill.
He got excited when I pulled out the blender, but then got all worried when I told him he could turn it on. He usually covers his ears, so he wasn't sure how to turn it on *and* protect his hearing...!
Obviously it wasn't on that high. We just needed to puree the strawberries for the frosting. After he realized it wouldn't deafen him, he was pretty excited about the whirling red mess inside of it!
He even scraped out the strawberries that were sticking to the side. And a side note - I shot all of these photos with the new 20mm lens. This sort of shot were I am holding the camera and shooting close enough in to see my hand and still get all of Thomas would have been impossible with my 35mm. Also note that my new Fitbit is huge on my tiny wrist! Good thing it's totally a thing that everyone is wearing them these days...
Pink cupcakes are done in the oven and waiting for their frosting. My sister gave me the Frosting cookbook and I thought we would try the strawberry one since it was already pink and we had put enough food dye in the cupcakes... "/
Thomas was on powdered sugar duty and did such a good job. I think he made less of a mess than I usually do... (Sorry I make such a mess, Matt!)
Henry got tired of watching from his high chair, so I let him roam free. Which of course means he wanted to be right in the action. Such a cute little guy, huh??
And since he helped with so much of the work, Thomas got his first introduction to the best part of baking...
Licking the beater!!! We used to fight over this one as kids - my dad usually won though. I obviously don't let him lick the batter (raw eggs are for adults only - ha!), but I figured the frosting was safe. Thomas did not mind this part of the day!
Then he helped me decorate them. I did get him to help me squeeze the icing on a few cupcakes, but obviously didn't get any photos. He was more interested in the sprinkles anyhow.
Though he only put them on two cupcakes... He was more excited to talk about the sprinkles, I think. But look at our awesome assortment of cupcake wrappers. I had so many patterns with just two or three left, so we used them all. We even have a skull and crossbones hiding in the back.
After we were finished I tried to get a photo of him with the book and he decided he just wanted to read the book to me instead. I finally got him to pose with a cupcake and he sat there and told me over and over again that he wasn't going to put the cupcake on the book. He was really concerned I wanted him to ruin it I guess. It's my book kiddo, I won't let you destroy it.
(I say that, but it does need a page repaired at the moment. Someone was too vigorous with their page turning the other night..."/)
After dinner we dug in to the cupcakes. Henry ate all of the frosting off his half-cupcake and threw the cupcake on the floor. I honestly don't blame him. The frosting was the most amazing frosting I have had in a while and the cupcake was just kinda "ok" in comparison. I just want to be alone with a spoon and the rest of that frosting. Alone because otherwise two boys would be trying to steal it. I know this because Thomas was leaning over and scraping the leftover frosting from Henry's tray with his spoon and eating it. Gross!
No wonder they *both* have a cold.
It's not like we didn't give him a full cupcake. He devoured it and wanted more. And like in the book "You get what you get and you don't get upset" wasn't quite good enough for him. Haha - Natalie is in the background staring him down, apparently she didn't mind the box-mix cupcake and was hoping for another one to hit the ground.
Sonja, Joey, Eleanor & Ben - Thanks again for the lovely book you gave me years ago. I still love it and now my boys love it too. Natalie mostly just likes the cupcakes though... ;)