Tuesday Muse-day

I was so excited to talk about my weekend yesterday that I completely forgot it was Muse Monday, d'oh!  I'm pretty sure this may become a common occurance; when I don't have time to blog on the weekends, doing a wrap-up on Mondays.  So I'm going to move the weekly muse post to Tuesdays... "Tuesday Muse-day" has a nicer ring anyways. 

Joey from Pop.O.Licious has challenged herself to create a new cake pop every day for one year, and appropriately named her blog Every Day Should Pop: 365 Days of Cake Pops.  More than just posting a different pop design, she has researched national recognition days, and themed her pops around them.  For example, yesterday was "National Get Out of the Doghouse Day", so she made Snoopy pops as well as a doghouse pop! As she states in her mission, her goal is to inspire your creativity, while you learn a random fact or two... you can't beat entertainment and education!

Not only are her pops fun and festive, but her presentation is so creative!  There are always cute little items in the background to match the day's theme, creating an entire scene, rather than a picture of just a pop.

It was hard to pick a favorite, but here are some that I really like...



International Sushi Day

Eat Your Veggies Day

Kitchen Klutz Day

xoxo,
  Kim

Sprinkles Spice Rack?

If you're like me, you probably have some type of spice rack sitting on your kitchen counter.  And if you're really like me, then yours is more dust-collector than it is kitchen-tool. 

I bought my rack on clearance at Kohl's, convinced I'd make dozens of wonderful creations using all of these different spices and seasonings.  Truth be told - I don't think I've even broken the seal... on any of them!

But what are my cupboards are full of though?  SPRINKLES!  Everything from sanding sugar, to confetti dots, to nonpareils, in every size, shape and color.

Well my friends, The Pink Kitchen has come up with a GENIUS solution - a Sprinkle Spice Rack! 

Come on now, how flippin' cool is that?  Just look at all of that color!  I will definitely be converting my dust-collector spice rack this weekend.  I may even have to go buy some more sprinkles, just to make it pretty like this one! 

To see the Before & After photos, click "Read More" below.

xoxo,

   Kim

Cake Pops For A Cause

I love making cake pops.  And I really (really) love helping charities.  So a year ago, I started combining my two passions. There are a number of names you can come up with for this type of thing… Cake Pops for a Cure, Pops with a Purpose, Baking for a Benefit… someone stop me!

Anyhoo, there’s two basic ways that I’ve donated my pops:

Bake Now: create a batch of pops, themed in the colors of the charity, and donate the arrangement to an event’s raffle or silent auction.  Donated pops can also be used for the charity event’s party favors or centerpieces.

Here are some pops that I donated to my local Relay for Life event.  I paid for the supplies, created the custom tags and donated my time, so that the charity received all of the proceeds from the sale of the pops at their bake sale during the Relay event.

Bake Later: donate a certificate from you or your business, offering the prize of custom cake pops, which allows the winner to choose what kind of pops they get. 

I recently ran in the Broad Street Run 10-Miler, a big race in the Philadelphia area. I ran with the Children’s Crisis Treatment Center team, and I wanted to help raise money for their cause in addition to my participation. So I came up with the idea of a raffle.  I sold raffle tickets for a chance to win a set of custom cake pops.  I created a flyer for the raffle, posted it on my Facebook and Twitter pages, and emailed it to my family, friends & colleagues. (If you’re able to ship your cake pops, this opens up a bigger audience of potential supporters.)  After a month of promoting my raffle, I’m proud to say I raised $750 for CCTC.  (And in case you’re wondering, I finished the big race in 1 hour 56 minutes, a personal best, woohoo!)

Speaking of Bake Now, I’m donating an arrangement of cake pops next week to a big fundraising event for Kisses For Kyle, hosted by the Philadelphia Phillies! I’m a little nervous, because they are my favorite baseball team (Go Phils!), and its shaping up to be quite the event!  I’ll post pictures after the event next week for sure.  Power to the pops!

xoxo,

 

  Kim