Birthday Party for little girls AND Paleo Vanilla Cupcake!

<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ok, don't judge me, but when February rolls around and two of my children's birthdays are looming, I do all I can to either 1. avoid a party....2. suggest we do a 'family roadtrip'...or 3. suggest just having the grandparents over for cake.</span><br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_HtqxJjOnzPmWiQb_XBMgiaVscOCY_v10DSDWlxxYzcjP0bB9tfOcAg9DgiUdMq5F2NJU0FkJaXYp9XWR8LUDL95L4X6lv5d4nFMML50XKNZ_i3oVSQPItNNMAK_i2WaWgf3BHh-Tmxvi/s1600/20170212_132046_1487170308095_resized.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_HtqxJjOnzPmWiQb_XBMgiaVscOCY_v10DSDWlxxYzcjP0bB9tfOcAg9DgiUdMq5F2NJU0FkJaXYp9XWR8LUDL95L4X6lv5d4nFMML50XKNZ_i3oVSQPItNNMAK_i2WaWgf3BHh-Tmxvi/s320/20170212_132046_1487170308095_resized.jpg" width="209" /></span></a></div> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My middle child Lucian and youngest child Clara have Birthdays just two days apart, and it's hard to make them both feel special without completely running myself ragged. Turning 6 and 9 they were both requesting I bake for their class at school, and both wanted sleepover parties. Oh my lordy.</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For those of you that know me, you know I'm completely overscheduled:) It's my downfall but also my superpower - always having a new project in the works, a new meal plan to create, or a new recipe to try out. The thought of adding party planner to the list is sometimes enough to put me over the edge - especially in the month of February, just as i'm recovering from Christmas madness!</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But still, this year my daughter and son both settled on having 2 friends each, on the same night, for pizza, dessert, movies and sleepover. So my husband and I did the 'divide and conquer' approach - he was left to entertain the boys, while I entertain the girls. </span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He ended up taking the boys ice fishing in the afternoon, and then met us back home for pizza.</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I decided to set up a spa for the girls. I covered the kitchen table with paper, and set up mini stations for the 3 girls. Each got their own mirror, nailpolish, headbands, face cloth and treats.</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Our first activity was to decorate their mirrors - I provided them with stickers and jewels. Next we did nail art with a variety of colors and nail stickers. They were rushing so much from one thing to the next that their nails didn't last more than 5 min., but hey, they were having fun I kept telling myself:)</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyIue7qNihEuGdzbZ2I_n5YDQ07RYoTi1WVPAfP673vjbc14BES_tyf9X8Sf3KhouxnK1C1Y7kB4Sx82u0h62eJPAJqQb9Z9Lww7AW_A__6GglVkurZ35Fb4woLesjNuy5HOE3ijGw9eIL/s1600/PicMonkey+Collage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyIue7qNihEuGdzbZ2I_n5YDQ07RYoTi1WVPAfP673vjbc14BES_tyf9X8Sf3KhouxnK1C1Y7kB4Sx82u0h62eJPAJqQb9Z9Lww7AW_A__6GglVkurZ35Fb4woLesjNuy5HOE3ijGw9eIL/s400/PicMonkey+Collage.jpg" width="400" /></span></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I had them play upstairs while I set up the lip balm activity. I melted 1 oz of cocoa butter, 1 oz of coconut oil and 1/2 oz beeswax on the stove top. Earlier in the week I was actually looking for koolaid crystals to color the lipbalms, but do you know they no longer have it?? Only koolaid jammers and liquid concentrate. The closest thing I could find was a walmart version of strawberry crystals sweetened with sugar AND stevia...I thought it would color the lipbalm and give it a nice flavor. Wrong. It was so light pink that there was no color added, and the sugar didn't melt in the lip balm so it ended up being more like a lip scrub. They didn't seem to notice, so I moved on. Each girl had a small lip balm jar to fill, and food coloring of their choice. This was my second fail - apparently food coloring doesn't mix with an oil emulsion, so the droplets just kept floating around in their jars. I think I was more upset than they were, but lesson learned!</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Next it was time for<b> face masks.</b></span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b> I mixed the following things in a blender:</b></span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1/2 banana</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1 tsp honey</span><br /> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghEC-SoU5rTMEUxhnAkkVb55H1DTzYISFI-kFGYwkWojnEI7TFywdKRaNfxi4_7LuHkr46D5fArole_eQCtxpp4wQAAqmAuOJrFpjOzQetcqaG4-XV98IS1uhnoizYzyWDdwCxS64VinuL/s1600/20170211_151023_1487170320409_resized.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghEC-SoU5rTMEUxhnAkkVb55H1DTzYISFI-kFGYwkWojnEI7TFywdKRaNfxi4_7LuHkr46D5fArole_eQCtxpp4wQAAqmAuOJrFpjOzQetcqaG4-XV98IS1uhnoizYzyWDdwCxS64VinuL/s320/20170211_151023_1487170320409_resized.jpg" width="180" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">2 tbsp plain yogurt</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">2 tbsp oats.</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Once blended, I had each girl put on their hair bands and then paint their faces with the face mask mixture using clean paint brushes. It was kind of gross and fun. They liked it! I gave them bowls of warm soapy water to wash it off after a couple minutes (they didn't last long).</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We ordered pizza as a real treat, but I opted to bake my own cupcakes. For some reason I was dead set on trying my hand on creating a delicious vanilla Paleo cupcake. From my experience, the kids seems to just eat their icing and I throw out tonnes of cupcakes, regardless if they were out of a box, or from the store. But I wanted to see what I could whip up. </span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For those of you that have baked Paleo, you know that the grain-free flours like almond and coconut are much denser than traditional flour.</span><br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1aFXs_utR0YZsv1FJ7rd2yVmCdUrr-gmvNPbfFFI7BfnC9BHw203wpmTS3NzLMTlURBIf4ObN6i-6k9uZn893_4PpFr_OFtAsgM2EY9aY-HqJeUmQYUFEUJIa5e6CHTCnFvJHmBkq6EfA/s1600/20170211_133055_1487170323138_resized.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1aFXs_utR0YZsv1FJ7rd2yVmCdUrr-gmvNPbfFFI7BfnC9BHw203wpmTS3NzLMTlURBIf4ObN6i-6k9uZn893_4PpFr_OFtAsgM2EY9aY-HqJeUmQYUFEUJIa5e6CHTCnFvJHmBkq6EfA/s320/20170211_133055_1487170323138_resized.jpg" width="180" /></span></a></div> <br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> It can be tough to create a cupcake that doesn't look and feel like a puck. They are heavy and often dense. I decided to still use some coconut flour, but in retrospect I would leave it out and go with just the almond flour. I bought almond flour instead of grinding down raw almonds like I normally do - I knew that blanched almond flour would be lighter.</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The final result was DELICIOUS! Still heavier than I would have liked, but the flavor was really good. I did a traditional butter cream icing (butter, vanilla, icing sugar, salt) and decorated the cupcakes in different themes to please both the girls and boys (sneaky girls ended up eating all the worms and dirt themed cupcakes, so next time I won't assume they want pink cupcakes with candy hearts!). The kids ended up eating their cupcakes!! I was shocked. I will definitely make these again.</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here is my recipe:</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8udhSS1yTat7Yp9xdOLRvV_NqEqoxzbDBEFgDbF1Bxg33qfaJDBlYj9klsdXjeYguECdNJAxIFAq7HLuWRlPZoIhaGKnDE7jQmOUZTH-vTk6SlVytBh5Hi3CUHjoZ0a7QFRT9NzCKbhyphenhyphenn/s1600/20170211_133014_1487170361097_resized.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8udhSS1yTat7Yp9xdOLRvV_NqEqoxzbDBEFgDbF1Bxg33qfaJDBlYj9klsdXjeYguECdNJAxIFAq7HLuWRlPZoIhaGKnDE7jQmOUZTH-vTk6SlVytBh5Hi3CUHjoZ0a7QFRT9NzCKbhyphenhyphenn/s400/20170211_133014_1487170361097_resized.jpg" width="225" /></span></a><b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Vanilla Paleo Cupcakes:</span></b><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1.5 cups almond flour</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">0.5 cups coconut flour</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">3/4 cups arrowroot flour</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">5 eggs</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">3/4 - 1 cup coconut sugar (sub brown sugar)</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1 tbsp vanilla</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1/3 cup melted coconut oil</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1 tsp salt</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1 tbsp baking powder</span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Sift your dry ingredients into one bowl. In a separate bowl add your coconut oil, eggs, vanilla and sugar - beat until smooth. Add your dry ingredients into your wet ingredients and gently mix in without over-stirring. Transfer into muffin tins lined with cupcake liners. </span><br /> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span> <b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bake at 350 for 22 min.</span></b><br /> <b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Let them cool completely before decorating with your favorite icing! Once the icing is applied it will prevent your cupcake from drying out, so don't leave them without icing!</span>

Birthday Party for little girls AND Paleo Vanilla Cupcake!

Ok, don't judge me, but when February rolls around and two of my children's birthdays are looming, I do all I can to either 1. avoid...