Christmas Praises

I know you're busy relaxing during Christmas break as am I, so I won't keep either of us long.

I just want to give thanks to God for what a nice Christmas we had. At a time in our life when we are facing another possible repossession, finding another place to live within a month when we have no money, and all the rest this unemployment has brought with it, we were remarkably blessed this holiday and mija hardly realized the bump in the road.

Her two favorite stocking stuffers

Aside from a Nutcracker and some chocolates for her stocking, we purchased nothing for her this year. All the stocking stuffers we gave were purchased at 50% off last year as were the Zhu Zhu pet items. Yes, I've kept this year's Christmas since last year.

I had wished to add something more, and God arranged that part.

Our church came along side us and some other struggling families in our church family and gave us gifts. Mija didn't know the church provided things some things.  All she knew was that there were presents under the tree one day. I just told her that God provided them! That's been a challenge for her to get her mind wrapped around!

In the gifts God gave, there was also a Price Chopper gift card. We determined that we'd use it to enhance the Christmas experience instead of for more practical things like milk and bread. From that gift card we made our candy and Happy Birthday, Jesus cake.

I posted about our White Christmas Crunch Squares. They were a major hit and required a second batch made...which still didn't end up being enough!

It's amazing to me how capable mija is becoming. Aside from me showing her how to separate egg whites from the yolk and doing the oven work, she made the whole Happy Birthday, Jesus cake herself! I remember when her contribution to the Happy Birthday, Jesus cake was just licking the bowl and now she's doing it all!

I know the yellow in the corner is the star of Bethlehem.
I'm not sure about the rest!

Lastly, but never really last when it comes to things God does for us, were gas cards. We were given some gas cards from individuals which allowed us to do our traditional Christmas Eve celebrations with my hubby's family about 50 miles away and the celebrate with my family on Christmas Day. 

Tomorrow, I'll share about a child's discernment and a new nutcracker tale!

Birthday Cake--Pinterest-style

While this week is mija's birthday, we celebrated on Saturday since The Nutcracker rehearsal is hogging the schedule. She didn't mind getting cake, ice cream, and gifts early!

I actually used the opportunity to use three...yes, three...of my pins from Pinterest! Here are the pins I used.

Source: omnomicon.com via Betsy Price on Pinterest

I didn't follow the recipe on cake, only the method to make a rainbow cake. I only used 4 colors and I didn't switch the colors around.

Source: tastykitchen.com via Betsy Price on Pinterest

The basic recipe for this frosting is the classic fruit dip...marshmallow fluff and cream cheese, so you know it tastes good. The difference is a little bit of vanilla. I even was able to put it in a bag and pipe shell work and such with it. I wouldn't recommend it for heavy duty decorating, however.

Source: brasstacksandbasics.com via Betsy Price on Pinterest

Because the picture was so small, I actually cheated and purchased the tubes of icing just to save me time. I actually found Wilton tubes cheaper and larger than the Betty Crocker tubes at the grocery store. Two things I recommend after doing this. First, select a cake that can handle a larger picture. My picture was less than a 4 x 6 which made detailing VERY challenging. Second, don't use the Wilton Sparkle Gel. It doesn't freeze which means it doesn't come up neatly when you pull up the wax paper. 

Here was my final product.

Twilight Dash

As I mentioned, it being small was a challenge and the use of gel messed it up some, but on the whole, you can tell it was a pony. The eyes and the cutie mark suffered the most. Mija thought it was cool regardless.

Here is the whole cake. 

Twilight Dash looks better from a distance!

I left the frosting unsmoothed. I thought it looked more "marshmallow-y" that way. 
Now for the piece de resistance which made everyone wonder how I did it...

I didn't prettify it before I took the photo, but you can see it worked awesome!

And most importantly, the birthday girl thought I was, in her words, artistic, a cake decorator, and talented! This mommy rocked the party.

Oh, yes. She had pink hair. She wanted to look like Pinkie Pie.