The crème de la crème of my daughter’s American Girl Tea Party Birthday were these Ice Cream Flowerpots. They were all she talked about after visiting the American Girl Bistro for a friend’s birthday a year ago, so I knew they absolutely had to make it to the tea-table when we had our own American Girl party. They took a little time, but the delight on the girl’s faces when I brought them to the table made the energy put forth totally worth it!
After begging for an American Girl doll the past three years, my daughter’s greatest desire was granted her last birthday with the gift of a green-eyed, curly blonde haired mini-me. She promptly named her doll “Maddie” and they’ve been inseparable ever since. The gratification of at last owning an American Girl doll all of her own could only be topped by celebrating her birthday this year with a themed American Girl tea party extravaganza. She wanted all her friends to come over and play dolls with her, while enjoying a delightful (and very grown up) tea. So here’s my great big American Girl Tea Party Birthday post, complete with free printable invitations, menus, name tags and all the food and craft ideas you could hope for!
Confession. I’m a giant bookworm. It’s a condition that dates back to my early childhood. My parents have time-lapse video from Christmases long past where I don’t move from the same armchair for over 10 hours. I’m a constant figure as the room buzzes with holiday activity around me. Motionless, except the occasional turning of a page. My favorite place to be is completely engrossed in a great novel, oblivious to the world passing me by. As such, it’s no great surprise that I’ve always wanted to host a book club. I was recently given the opportunity to start one with friends, and I jumped at the chance. Books and my best gals? Win-win. Bonus prizes for me include the excuse to use my grandmother’s dainty teacups, and making delicious treats for my guests. I began with this amazing cranberry upside down coffeecake.
“We’ll go to the food court and get one of those funnel cakes you love.”. So says the wife trying to mollify her husband after refusing to purchase him a two thousand and four hundred-dollar designer suit. Pouting ensues, before, finally accepting his fate, the hubby replies “We’ll get a funnel cake – it’ll be the highlight of my week.”.
A couple housekeeping items before we get to the deliciousness here. Notice the new watermark gracing the corners of my photos? Isn’t it lovely? Hopefully it will help keep people (who are not me) from passing off my stuff as theirs. Sometimes I’m so disappointed in humanity. Also, just above the actual recipe details, you’ll find a link to print a pdf of my deliciousness. Hooray! No more highlighting text to print it! Now, on to something that makes me very happy. Camping food.
(happy sigh) I love camping food. It’s the best. I’ve shared my smore bars before, with a graham cracker crust, chocolate middle and mallow topper. They’re quite delicious. But, they aren’t very camping friendly. It’s hard to broil the top of a layered dessert when hanging out around an open campfire. Leave it to Betty Crocker to have a solution. Crunchy graham cracker cereal tossed with buttery marshmallow goodness, with chocolate chips and mini-marshmallows sprinkled throughout. Like a delicious graham cracker rice crispy treat. With all the flavors of smores mixed in. Genius! These gorgeous bars take just minutes to put together and require no baking!
I just have to warn you that I’m extremely angry right now. I came home from a lovely Memorial weekend of camping in the great outdoors to find that someone has stolen content, copy and photos from Bakerlady and passed it off as his own. So here’s my great big “you thieving rat” post.
“Boy Meets Bowl” and “Cocinando con Alena” (both appearing to be run by the same person) have stolen the following recipes, original content and photos from Bakerlady. They’ve been pinned over 50,000 times from “his” blogs. I’ve reported the infringing posts — but until they are taken down I’m going to get on my soapbox (tiny as it may be) and let everyone know that these links are stolen. I’ve included my original links and photos below. If you or a friend has pinned, shared or reblogged any of these photos from the offending sites, please re-post with the correct content/links back to Bakerlady. What these blogs have done is theft. Pure and simple.
Alton Brown’s Stovetop Macaroni and Cheese
Disneyland’s White Chocolate Raspberry Cookie
Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bars
Yes. All of these were taken without permission. Passed off as original photos, content and recipes by “Boy Meets Bowl” and “Cocinando con Alena”. Seriously. Who does that? Currently I feel like I’ve been defrauded, robbed and impersonated all at the same time. Asking my readers to spread these original links is the only course of action I have while I wait for my legal people to get the infringing content down.
Thank you from the bottom of my royally pissed off heart.
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© mybakerlady.com and Bakerlady, 2010 – Present. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Bakerlady and mybakerlady.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
New Year’s resolution #1 is to get back to blogging. The whole, two kids in school at different times/becoming nothing more than a chauffeur thing has really thrown me off my game. Nevertheless, there were many brilliant recipes this year and so I bring you Bakerlady’s Top Ten of 2012. By popularity (that means you wonderful readers picked these), here they are:
Honorable Mention – Nanny’s Banana Pudding – I just can leave her off the list. It was so close to cracking the top 10. Probably my favorite dessert making memory of the year at her cabin with my sisters.
#10 Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup Parfait — A dessert I made for a dinner party with friends that turned out to be absolutely gloriously delicious. And beautiful. Very impressive.
#9 Disneyland’s White Chocolate Raspberry Cookie — My favorite snack in the park and apparently a cookie that many people want to replicate at home. I got to share one at Disneyland this fall with my kids. They love it as much as I do!
#8 Cinnamon Roll Pancakes — A quick way to fancy-pants up your kids breakfast. Ah-mazing!
#7 Rolo Cake Bars — I made these for the guys who painted my house this summer. Quick, easy and absolutely scrumptious!
#6 Greatest Chicken Salad Ever — This wasn’t a new recipe since last January, I’ve been making it a long time. Thanks to the power of Pinterest however, many new folks discovered it this year.
#5 M&M’s Rolo Pretzel Bites — Possibly the most evil (in the best way possible) thing I’ve ever discovered. You’ll find yourself eating them like popcorn…until you remember halfway thru the batch that you really really really shouldn’t do that because you just consumed a half bag of Rolos without realizing it. 
#4 Snickerdoodle Bread – Like your favorite cookie in bread form. Soft and delicious with a ribbon of cinnamon butter thru the middle and a crusty cinnamon sugar topper. Yum yum yum!
#3 Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bars — These were a spin-off another popular recipe. The addition of the pretzels to smooth peanut butter and chocolate was awesome in my book, and yours too!
#2 Lemon Monkey Bread — My personal favorite discovery of this year. No boring caramel monkey bread for my readers. This stuff is warm and soft with a hit of sweet and great tang from all the lemons. Dee-licious!
And the number one recipe this year coming in with more hits this year than my entire site had in the history of Bakerlady (aka: a whole lot!)…
Reese’s Peanut Butter Bars!! I love how many of you found Bakerlady thru this recipe (thanks Pinterest). I enjoy all the stories I get to hear about making this dessert with your mothers, grandmothers and enjoying them in your school cafeterias growing up. I’m still pretty peeved that my school never had these things…but happy for those of you who did. Sort of happy anyway.
Thank you all for coming back to Bakerlady all year for more deliciousness. Have a safe and happy New Year’s celebration and I’ll see you all in 2013!!
I love throwing Halloween parties. Mostly because I get to make delicious food and give it disgusting names. Here’s a round-up of all the deliciousness I made this year and the nastiness I called it. Most of these items are easy to make (and can be done ahead of time) so you won’t be slaving away in the kitchen while your guests are having a goulishly good time! My hot hubby and I dressed up as Johnny and June Cash this year. We had a blast!
First of all, my apologies for being away so long. Bad Tonya. Bad bad. I have allowed my life to become too full. Actually, I thought with both my children heading to school this fall, my schedule would free up substantially. Apparently having more time is the great lie of having school age children. Why didn’t anyone tell me that I was about to become the Tonya Taxi Service? I feel like my life is spent in my van driving round in a 2 mile loop. Ok, enough complaining. I have resolved to suck it up and find time to share with you all. You deserve it. Regardless of how harried I feel on a daily (hourly) basis these days. Deliciousness still needs to be made. Women have successfully managed school, children, meals, housecleaning and jobs for decades – it’s the least I can do to get some recipes typed up! Starting with these dee-licious apple chips. No dehydrator needed!
As I wandered the aisles of the grocery store the other day I was struck with the realization that I find great pleasure in having enough random stuff in my cart that the cashier wonders if I may have multiple personalities. Joy is found in the little things in life people. Confusing salespeople is one of the simple ways I stay happy. Thrilling as it was, this epiphany made me feel very old. It also reminded me of the movie Hook and the line “I’ve just had an apostrophe.”. Speaking of suddenly feeling middle-aged, babies born the year Hook came out are now old enough to purchase alcohol legally. Holy crap.
Bakerlady 