Happy Blogiversary . . . and Happy Birthday!

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Well, it's been one year since I started this blog.  I had hoped I would be better at posting more frequently, but sadly, life seems to get in the way of me being able to do that!  I have good intentions, but it takes a bit longer than I thought it would to get a post together.  I am amazed by all those bloggers out there who manage to write witty things and post gorgeous photos nearly everyday.  They manage to run their homes, work, dabble with various hobbies, raise kids, style their homes and vignettes and photograph them and get them ready for the web.  My hat is off to all of them!

When I started it I wasn't sure if anyone out there would find anything I had to say worth reading.  My mom, sister, cousin and some of my friends have faithfully checked in on a regular basis to see what's new in my little corner of the blogosphere and gave me words of encouragement.  My mother helped spread word to her friends and I have been happy to have them stop by from time to time and to have taken an interest in my little ramblings.  And, I have been surprised and pleased to have other bloggers who accidentally stumble upon my little blog to link to my blog as followers.  I am honored to have made some new blog friends this past year.  Thank you to each and every one of you who have stopped in to visit.

And thank you to everyone who has subscribed to my little blog and to those who have become followers.  I hope to be able to come up with enough interesting things to post about to keep you interested enough to keep following along and checking in from time to time!

There is also another thing to celebrate.  Tomorrow is D's birthday!  

Happy Birthday to you!  

Happy Birthday to you!  

Happy Birthday, dear D!  

Happy Birthday to you!  

Go do something fun . . . but, don't go getting into any trouble this time!  :-)  We're tired of having to bail you out every year!   (hee hee hee!)

(Pssst . . . . Don't worry, I won't tell anyone you are 85!  It'll be our little secret!  ;)

To celebrate both these dates, I made some of these Neapolitan Cupcakes from the Better Homes and Gardens Cupcakes magazine, . . . with a couple of modifications.  I wanted to make them entirely from scratch, so instead of using a box mix of white cake, I used their recipe for vanilla cupcakes and doubled the batch.  While they were moist and taste great, they came out pretty dense, so next time, I would chose a less heavy recipe for the base.  

I decided to put the chocolate layer on the bottom and added chocolate chips.  Next time, I would add a bit of espresso to bring out or intensify the chocolate flavor.  The white layer is vanilla flavored.  For the strawberry layer, I didn't have any strawberry preserves, so I used fresh strawberries and chopped them up, added a bit of sugar and let the mixture sit for a couple of hours to develop a little syrup before incorporating it into the mixture.

Basically, you mix just mix the cake according to the directions, divide it into thirds and add chocolate to one third, strawberry to another third and then leave the last one as the basic vanilla mix (though I'll bet it would be great as a banana flavored layer . . . hmmmmmm).  Their instructions were to put the strawberry layer on the bottom, but since I wanted to add chocolate chips, I decided to put the chocolate layer on the bottom, since I figured they would drop through to the bottom anyway.  The batter I used ended up being so dense the chips wouldn't have gone anywhere!

I topped them with a Butter Cream frosting.  They recommended mixing it up, dividing it half and adding red food coloring to one half and then filling the piping bag with white frosting on one side and the pink on the other side so when you pipe it you get the colors swirled together.  I am just learning to decorate, so mine didn't quite come out like their picture . . . but I don't think I did too badly!

Thanks again for all your support this past year!  I hope you take a moment to celebrate all the good things in your life today!  Don't forget to grab a cupcake on your way out! ! !