sparkly eyes, cupcakes, and the end of an era

Graduation is drawing ever closer. in almost one month exactly i will be walking across the stage to receive my diploma. With that day comes the end of my student teaching experience, the end of my BYU student experience, the end of my student days; it's a really weird realization.

i almost don't want student teaching to end. i've loved the opportunity to teach preschool and third grade. i haven't talked much about my experiences teaching here yet. My first placement was at the preschool on campus. i absolutely loved getting to work with all of those four-year-olds every day. i learned so much from Miss Dorie, Anne, and the other teachers there. i was able to see a truly developmentally appropriate preschool setting and learn how to best teach those children.

Currently i'm about half-way through my third grade placement. The differences between preschool and third grade are many but they still require the same thoughtfulness in instruction. Even though they can sit and listen to a lesson doesn't mean that they should only be taught that way; they still learn best when they're actively participating. i try my best to keep this in mind as i prepare each lesson and each day.

Some days feel longer and seem to be more tiring than others; but it's always worth it. i was told by my facilitator yesterday that i'm simply excelling in my teaching and that i have a wonderful teacher presence (the thing i've actually been most nervous about). He told me my constant smile and sparkly eyes help the students know i truly care about them which has helped develop the mutual respect i have with these children. it was simply the most wonderful compliment he could have given me. Definitely made my week.

Things just seemed to fall into place this week as well. i got my email today about the Teacher Work Sample saying "Hello Emme, I wanted to let you know that you have passed your Teacher Work Sample. Congratulations! I hope you have a wonderful weekend!" My cohort friends and i have been waiting for three weeks to hear the results of the TWS; from the sounds of it everyone has passed so far. The relief it brings is unbelievable. One step closer to graduation and the next step in life.

The family is making arrangements to come out for my graduation and i couldn't be more excited for them to come out and visit. Some of them will be here for a whole week!

i've also decided that i would like to plan an adventure. i was in the midst of making cupcakes today when i received a very unexpected Facebook message. An indiana friend from over a year and a half ago messaged me. He and i met when i visited indiana with Miss Momo back in 2012. We met, we clicked, we really liked each other. Things didn't end up working out between us and i hadn't talked to him since. So you can imagine my surprise to see him messaging me out of the blue. Apparently he'd been wanting to say hi to me for a few weeks and finally did. And you know what? i'm really glad he did. it was nice to hear that life was treating him well; just a good friend conversation. While we were chatting the topic of adventures came up with my graduation. i mentioned maybe New York which he fully supported. That and Niagara Falls. Then i remembered Carlos' Bakery out in Hoboken which i have been dying to visit. So i "planned" an adventure. Sometime in the next year i'm going to make it happen.

Today was the first time i've made cupcakes in months. i think i only made cupcakes one other time since the Fireman and i began dating. Time and energy for cupcakes were just never on my side throughout that relationship; not because of him. With spending time with the Fireman, student teaching, working, my church calling...i just never felt up to it. But being freshly single with time to spare now that i'm only student teaching i have all kinds of time now! And it feels like home to be spending it baking my favorite cupcakes. Check out those beauties!

 

 

i have a new favorite artist this week. Jasmine Thompson is another cover artist and i'm in love with her style. it's got the Ingrid Michaelson, Christina Perri, Julia Sheer vibe to it. Take a listen. it's simply fab.

it's finally here, folks!

it's finally here, folks! My last ever year of being an undergrad. And i'm determined to make it the best year yet!

i'm all moved into my new apartment with new roommates and everything. it was definitely terrifying at first; i've never not known at least one roommate before the start of a new academic year. Thankfully, my roommates are all rock stars (not literally, but they are pretty fab). i've finally attended the new ward at church and i think things are going to be just fine. The Relief Society president even told us she's just had the feeling that amazing things are going to be happening with this group of sisters (i'll keep you posted on all of our awesomeness, don't you worry yourselves about it).

My baking is finally taking off again as i've baked consistently over the last few weeks. The Lemon Bundt Cake of Sunshine is slowly becoming my specialty. Miss Calah says it's her absolute fave out of everything that i've made so far. She even had me make one for her boss's birthday last week (aka Mr. Boss Man). He's a very healthy eater and doesn't usually sample the cupcakes i bring to work but he ate TWO whole slices of the lemon! Hence why that was his birthday cake. We surprised him by just leaving it on his desk when he was in a meeting. He told me later that day that "it's the meanest present anyone has ever given me because i want to eat the whole thing and i can't". So, being the kind sir that he is, he decided to share it with anyone who wanted some. So Miss Calah and i brought in the whole of Finance and a few of the execs. One of the guys even told me "that cake is off the chizaaaaiinnn!" Which i believe means it was a success. This week i'll bring in chocolate cupcakes and see how those go over.

For Little Miss Evie's 2nd birthday (that's right! She's already 2!) i made her Mickey Mouse cupcakes. They turned out phenomenal and i found myself the perfect baking assistant. One of friend's daughters is about 10 and just the cutest thing. She helped me make the frosting, frost the cupcakes, and decorate them. So much fun! Didn't they turn out fab?

i realize that none of that has anything to do with school, but it's all about the mental preparations, right? Making sure that my first day outfit is all ready, things are in order, books are purchased, my planner is organized, and such. Those things are all just part of keeping my mental and emotional health in check so i don't stress out too much. As far as baking goes, i think my roommates and ward mates will think it's an essential part of my mental health too. Haha.

So here goes nothing. Preparations are done. Tomorrow i begin to actually apply everything i've been learning the last couple of years into methods. i get to learn the HOW of teaching subjects instead of only learning the subjects. Come October i get to begin Practicum where, three days a week, i'll be helping out in real classrooms.

Come January? Student Teaching! So, ready or not, here i come! (i am ready, though, i promise).

life lately

it's been awhile, a long while, since i've written anything. And i'm ok with that. The past few weeks have been a whirlwind of emotions, activities, getting stuff on my list checked off, and family time.

First things first (because i know you're just dying to ask): things with the ArmyMan are not really things anymore. Again, i'm ok with that. He's basically been living the zombie life by working two jobs and whatnot and with an hour still between us it makes hanging out kind of difficult. So you know what? We're friends and i'm good with that. (With both of us being pretty busy my Summer Bucket List has been set on the back burner for now).

i also finally found housing! There were a lot of emotions involved and oddly enough Miss Calah and my housing experiences were very similar throughout the months of May and June. it would seem like we each found the perfect house and then something would fall through. Then it would happen again. it went on for several weeks and it seemed to be rather draining on us both (moreso on her since she and the family were moving to an actual house and i was simply finding a different apartment for the next year). Finally it seemed like it magically happened for the both of us. The house came through for her and the family and i went to see an apartment that just felt right. The feeling after walking through was something i couldn't fight and couldn't let go. So i now have a place to live next year and the stress of finding housing has lifted (the stress was starting to make me really freak out and feel nauseous if i thought about it too long).

Now that Miss Calah and her family have their house it's been a few weeks of moving and unpacking. i've tried to make myself useful as a babysitter or unpacking-helper-outer (just roll with the weird words, i'm tired here). Even though it's been exhausting, as moving always is, it has been so much fun to see them start to grow into their house. it's become their home and their belongings are starting to find their places. it's almost hard to imagine that they lived at the other place at all.

i've never been much of a picture-taker (i'm not even about to call myself a photographer) so i don't have tons of pictures of anything; high school, church activities, the college years. i want to change that, so i've been trying harder the last few weeks to document the little things in picture format. Finally getting an instagram account is helping this; although i'm trying to hold out as long as possible before i fully convert and start using hashtags. Since i've been up at Miss Calah's so much over the past few weeks i've mostly been documenting her and the family (and little Miss Evie).

Little Miss Evie loves their new backyard and the summer evenings have been full of drawing with chalk, making friends with the Rollie Pollies, and playing with her car, airplane, and lawn mower.

We even took a couple of trips in "Ah' Eh'ee's car" (Aunt Emme's car in case you don't speak toddler) and Miss Evie was SO excited.

She's also a natural at collecting rocks.

A fascinating fact from the last week is that i've discovered a love of tea (don't you worry, it's all herbal). i think it's time to cut back on all of the soda but i still want something yummy to drink. i just bought the most darling, cozy looking mug that just has "tea" written all over it! it actually says "coffee" all over it, but whatever. The Celestial Seasonings berry teas are delicious and warm and cozy. Basically just perfection in a mug.

My love of baking is starting to expand from cupcakes to other baked goods; i just made my first ever bundt cake and it turned out absolutely AMAZiNG! Just check out that beauty:

Life lately is pretty darn fab, if i do say so myself.

cupcake redemption & a fabbity-fab-fab day

Did i say i would make beautiful cupcakes, or what? Check it out!

 i made sure to get the ingredients for the chocolate-sour cream cupcakes (i have NEVER had a bad batch of these) and then i got so excited at how beautifully they were baking that i went all out with the frosting. Each cupcake was double-dipped in chocolate ganache, cooled, and then frosted with a half-and-half frosting (half buttercream, half cream cheese) before they were drizzled with chocolate and butterscotch ganaches. Well, not each cupcake is the same as you can see. Some people don't like butterscotch so i left it off a few; and i did run out of frosting so i left some with just chocolate ganache because that is ALWAYS delicious.

i'd also gotten some cupcake boxes so that i could present them to a few lucky souls in the most beautiful of packaging. i added the refrigeration reminder and my mini logo (which i designed - or doodled - a couple of weeks ago).

i also designed a normal logo which i'm just loving! it's changed a smidge since i first drew it with a sharpie and some highlighters but this is the basic concept.

AND Mama Toth made the most genius of comments today and told me that i should get these trademarked so no one else uses them before i can actually get a business up and rolling. in talking with one of my friends it turns out he knows quite a bit about the ins and outs of starting a business (as he's done his own) and he's more than willing to help me. Huzzah!

That combined with the excitement of a cupcake decorating FHE this coming Monday where i get to make the cupcakes, a FANTASTiC day at work, AND i got to wear my new (and extremely comfortable) maxi skirt and jean jacket, AND i started rereading one of my favorite books just makes for fabbity-fab-fab day!

Life is good. Life is great. Life is fab!

oh, how the cupcakes have turned

Today's attempts at baking fell....flat. Maybe the cupcakes sensed my excitement at finding another potentially phenomenal yellow cake recipe and thought it would be funny to make them volcano out of the tins.

Well guess what? it wasn't very funny. it was rather disappointing.

Which leads me to say that Yahoo! better check their recipes before claiming "it's the only yellow cake recipe you'll ever need". Psh! NOT TRUE. 1 FULL tablespoon of baking powder? Are you completely crazy? Baking powder is what makes the product (in this case cupcakes) rise. A typical recipe calls for maybe 1 1/2 teaspoons at the most. This recipe called for TWiCE that; it made me iffy but i figured i would try it out and see what happened.

it didn't work.

The frosting recipe associated with it on the other hand turned out rather delicious.

To go along with the frosting i decided i could just make some chocolate cupcakes and call it good. Except i didn't have sour cream for my go-to recipe so i used another.

Guess what? Those didn't turn out either. Just another sunken volcanic looking mess.

Oh, how the cupcakes have turned against me. No worries though, tomorrow is another day and they WiLL turn out beautiful. Just watch.

cupcakes expanding

The last few months (this whole semester, pretty much) i've had a difficult time finding the motivation to bake cupcakes (which is strange because i LOVE to bake). i would want to and then realize i didn't have half the ingredients or i couldn't decide on a recipe or i was just so tired after school and work that standing for a few hours while baking didn't sound appealing. So i only ended up actually baking a few times.

Well that has all changed. My dear sister, Miss Kierston, gave me an early birthday present: a cupcake apron! it says "She who bakes takes the cake". Perfect.

This (and my recent obsession with Cake Boss) have led to a whole new drive for baking cupcakes!

Last night's creation was Chocolate Sour-Cream Cupcakes (my absolute favorite chocolate recipe!) and chocolate buttercream. Now the buttercream is the key here because i came up with it ALL ON MY OWN! And i kid you not, it tastes exactly like my mom's homemade fudge! Done and done, my absolute fave cupcakes.

i also decided to mess around with decorating and just do whatever i felt like; hence, the mish-mash of everything known to mankind in this one batch of cupcakes.

So be prepared, world, because it's summer and the cupcakes are coming!

it's a cupcake kind of world

if you know me in real life (or even from my about me section) then you know that i love cupcakes. The odd thing is that it's only been in the last year that this has become apparent.

it all started with the discovery of Dr Pepper cupcakes on Pinterest. Dr Pepper is one of my all time favorite things in the whole wide world, so Dr Pepper cupcakes have to be equally amazing, right? After perusing a few recipes i found one that wasn't quite so involved and my love of cupcakes was born.

i soon began searching all over Pinterest for the best cupcake recipes i could find. See it isn't necessarily the eating of the cupcakes i love most (although i do love to eat them); it's the creating. Pulling all of the ingredients together and coming up with something fantastically delicious. The decorating makes them almost too cute to eat and then i get to share them. One of the greatest feelings is someone telling me that my cupcakes are delicious; seriously, hands-down one of the best.

My love of baking has led to some changes in my life goals. i'm still ecstatic to become an elementary school teacher. This semester has been my favorite because i just love my classes. i'm also only a year away from actually getting to teach and i just can't wait. But someday i want my passion for baking to become more than just passing them out to my friends. i've seen everything there is on Cupcake Wars, Cupcake Champions and been to several cupcakeries in the area. Someday i hope to open my own cupcakery (which i don't know if it's actually a word but i'm using it anyways). i want to teach for a while and then maybe take some business classes and get a degree in management or something. i can open up shop and share my love of cupcakes with the rest of the community. i would say world but i'm trying to be realistic.

So, in honor of this awe-inspiring new life goal i would like to share with you the few cupcake items i have collected over these last few months.

Mickey Mouse measuring cups, oven mitt, and molds (courtesy of Miss Calah):

Sifter, frosting tips, cupcake cookie cutters, and bottle for decoration:

Measuring spoons with cupcakes printed on the metal (courtesy of Miss Momo)

pumpkin cupcakes

i was already going to make cupcakes for my evening class, when i realized i didn't want to just leave it at cupcake and frosting, but add cute decorations of some kind. Edible decorations. My sister suggested Pumpkin Cupcakes (in honor of it finally being Fall) and my mom suggested making them look like actual little pumpkins. Genius!

Here's the first batch of decorations:

And the second:

For my first tries at actual cupcake decorating i think they turned out rather cute, ya?

not my day

The last couple of days have not quite been fab. Today finally got to 5:45 PM when all i had left was visiting an exhibit for class and then one of my night classes. i walk up to the exhibit doors ready to get my peaceful feelings on and....it's closed. it closes at 5 PM Monday through Friday. Seriously? This was THE perfect time that i had set aside. it then started to drizzle. i took that as a sign to walk home, clean, and bake something. There's no way i was going to be able to last through a three hour class after that. The results of my evening? A clean kitchen and bathroom and Butterbeer Cupcakes.

For those who don't know what Butterbeer is, it's "described as tasting 'a little bit like less-sickly butterscotch.' Butterbeer is served cold in bottles and hot in 'foaming tankards'. In Hogsmeade, it's sold at the The Three Broomsticks  and The Hog's Head, although the fact that the latter pub's stock was described as 'very dusty' suggests that it was not sold there very often. In Diagon Alley, the drink has been known to be sold at the Leaky Cauldron." (http://harrypotter.wikia.com/wiki/Butterbeer). For those who don't know any of those references, you obviously haven't read Harry Potter and you need to. So get to it.

cupcake wars

You may think this post will be about the TV show Cupcake Wars, a genius competition pitting four cupcakeries against each other for $10,000 and showcasing their cupcakes at a celebrity event. Well it's not. Sadly, this is a war between me and my cupcakes. i had found the perfect chocolate cupcake recipe. it failed me today. Two whole batches overflowed like Vesuvius and then pathetically caved in in the middle. it was the most tragic thing. i was able to salvage about half of the cupcakes and filled them with frosting. i can't serve people skiwampus cupcakes! The new people in the ward have already been told by others that i always make cupcakes and they're always good. i have to keep up with these high expectations because i KNOW i can make yummy and pretty cupcakes. Which may be why the ones today turned out so tragic: karma kicking me in the butt for being so confident.

you are my cupcake

Today i discovered this little treasure "You Are My Cupcake" by Joyce Wan. it's a children's board book with each page dedicated to the yummy endearments we give our children (and each other). Some include pumpkin, cutie pie, sweet pea, and peanut. Adorable, right? Needless to say, i purchased the book this afternoon. Cupcakes have pretty much become my favorite thing. i even found a whole cupcake display at Barnes & Noble complete with sticky notes, puzzles, and key chains. Again, i'm fairly certain i need these things. i have also decided that i would like to be called Cupcake. Ya...we'll see haha

it's a baker's life

Over the past couple of months i've come to discover my passion for baking. Whether it be cream puffs, birthday cake, or cupcakes i love to make it all. Especially cupcakes. i love the process of combining all of the ingredients and seeing how (after the appropriate baking time) the finished product looks just how the recipe promised. There's definitely a trial-and-error process that goes on though. Because some recipes are just not good: the cakes sink in the middle or rise too much and overflow or are too moist or have fall apart. But i am proud to announce that i have finally found the perfect vanilla cupcake recipe! Which is fabby but at the same time kind of suckish because it isn't all from scratch, which is what i really want. i have found one nonetheless. This is after trying about 3 or 4 different recipes, all ending in despair. i came across this recipe while making Cinnamon Toast Crunch cupcakes. i realized the recipe is simply vanilla cake with cinnamon. Genius! These have the perfect dome-top, texture, color, everything! i even made some yesterday and added strawberry extract for my Strawberries N' Cream cupcakes. Simply divine!
Aside from loving the baking process, i love sharing my creations (creations is a bit of a loose term. i don't create the recipes. i simply follow directions and sometimes add my own little twist. i hope to create recipes someday though). i love taking the treats to different apartments in the ward and to Calah and to Momo. Everyone loves baked goods, especially homemade and it just gives me the warm fuzzies when they love MY homemade baked goods.